“The grace of God, the light and life that flow from His indwelling, can lift the very weariest and hardest-driven soul into a dignity of endurance, a radiance of faith, a simplicity of love, far above all that this world can give or take away.” Dean Paget.

But perhaps no one so thoroughly rejoiced in the news of the engagement as Myra Brinton. It was Ivy herself who first told her, when she and Evereld with Bridget and Dick in attendance rejoined the company at Worcester. Ralph had of course heard all about it the first Sunday he had visited them at Bath, but he had kept his own counsel, for Ivy preferred telling her own news herself both to Macneillie and to her friends in the company.

Nothing could so completely have restored peace and harmony between Myra and Ivy, all the past mistakes and disagreements faded into oblivion, and the two became once more excellent friends.

As for little Dick he soon became the darling of the whole company. Thanks to Bridget’s good management he throve wonderfully, spent most of his time in sleeping, seldom cried, and behaved with discretion on journeys, to the immense satisfaction of his mother, who proudly reflected that not even the most crabbed old bachelor in the company could ever complain that Dick was in the way.

Like a true Denmead he was thoroughly well-bred and had a way of accommodating himself to all surroundings; but Evereld saw he would run an excellent chance of being spoilt as soon as he grew a little older, for everyone made much of him and he received votive offerings in such profusion that it became difficult to pack them. Even the low comedy man broke his rule of silence so far as to inquire occasionally after his health, and at Christmas presented him with a magnificent red and blue clown who shook his head to solemn music.

As to Macneillie, though he had always professed total indifference to children, he was completely subjugated by the wiles of his Godson. Either from insight into character, or from some consideration of the strong hands and arms which held him so delightfully, Dick preferred the manager to anyone else in the world; his father’s long slender hands and taper fingers were not to be compared for a moment with the comfort of the highlander’s firm and comfortable grasp. And Macneillie found it impossible to resist the subtle flattery of this small worshipper who was always ready to laugh and shout with glee at the mere sight of him. In his darkest hours the little elf would often cajole him into a temporary forgetfulness, seeming indeed to take a special delight in beguiling him into a romp, whenever his clouded brow betokened that his own great trouble and the bitter thought of Christine’s lonely and difficult life were weighing him down.

On the whole the years which followed the birth of Ralph’s child were as happy as any Macneillie had known since Christine’s marriage, and as tranquil as his life was ever likely to be. Ralph and Evereld were like a son and daughter to him, and both were able to do much to help him in the busy and harassing days which fall to the lot of most managers.

Still there was no denying that his private troubles had more or less shattered his health; he worked on bravely, as had always been his custom, but now and then an intolerable sense of weariness crept over him and he would wonder how much longer he could keep going.

At last, soon after Dick had celebrated his second birthday, the manager suddenly broke down.

There was nothing which could definitely account for his failure; he had indeed been very busy with preparations for the Shaksperian Performances at Stratford-on-Avon, which were that year to be given by his company during the birthday week. But hard work seldom does people any harm. It was rather that he had for years been bearing a load which overtaxed his strength and at last, from sheer exhaustion, nature gave way.

His old enemy, utter sleeplessness, returned to torment him, and there was nothing for it but to obey the doctor’s orders and go to Scotland for rest and change.

“You are looking sorely fagged, Hugh,” was his mother’s comment when on the evening of his arrival at Callander they sat together by the fireside. It was some months since she had seen him and she was quick to note that he was hollow-cheeked and that his face, as she expressed it, “looked all eyes.”

“Scottish air will soon cure me,” he said with forced cheerfulness. “I shall sleep to-night.”

“Ah lad,” she said with a sigh, “and what reason is there that you should not be always breathing your native air? If you had but chosen the calling I would have had you choose, how different all might have been.”

“Yes, we might now have been sitting in the most comfortable Manse,” said Macneillie, a gleam of humour lighting up his grave face. “Instead of a lean and hard-worked actor, roaming from place to place, I might have been a portly minister revered by half the neighbourhood.”

“I believe you are tired of your wandering life after all,” she said, scrutinizing his careworn face with her keen eyes.

“Deadly tired,” he admitted with a sigh. “But what has that to do with it? Are not half the manses in the land filled with weary men who would give anything for a change in the dull routine of the work they are called to do? It is the same with all of us, Mother. However much we love our profession there must be hard times now and again, and somehow we have got to live through them like men.”

She did not reply, but silently knitted away at one of his socks, thinking to herself how different his life would have been had she had the ordering of it. He should have come to great honour, should have been a noted preacher filling a high position in Edinburgh, he should have married well, and about her in her old age troops of grandchildren should have played. As it was, his life had she felt been wrecked by the luckless taste for dramatic art which had puzzled her so much from his childhood upwards. She laid all his misfortunes to that strange and unaccountable passion for acting which she was wholly unable to comprehend. It was this which had brought him into contact with Christine Greville, this which had debarred him from marriage, this which had for years prevented him from settling down, and forced him to lead the life of a wanderer.

“Hugh,” she said, “is it even now too late? Could you not give up acting and do something more worthy of your powers?”

He started as though someone had struck him a blow.

“Give up my profession?” he said in amazement. “Why no, mother, I could never do that. I am tired out and in a grumbling mood but you must not take me too literally. My vocation has saved me again and again from making utter shipwreck. Depend upon it no other work is as you would say ‘more worthy’ of me.”

She urged it no more; but the old sore feeling that his mother could not understand his point of view, that she still in her heart desired him to take up work for which he was wholly unfitted, came back to mar the entire peace of Macneillie’s holiday.

On the Saturday before Holy Week he could no longer resist the restless craving for change which took possession of him as his strength gradually returned. And taking leave of his mother he left Callander and travelled down to Stratford, intending there to await the arrival of his company later on.

It was a mild bright afternoon in mid April when he reached the quiet little town. It seemed to sleep tranquilly in the golden sunshine, scarcely a breath of air stirred the trees, the beautiful spire of the stately old church rose into the bluest of skies, and the green fields flecked with daisies seemed to be just the right setting for a picture so fair and peaceful. The pastoral character of the scenery somehow suited Macneillie’s mood better even than the rugged mountains of his own land. Surely in this quiet loveliness, rich in associations with the great Master he could gain the rest and the ease he so grievously needed!

He would spend his days on the river, would not allow any business anxieties or arrangements for the following week to invade his repose; Shakspere and Shakspere’s country should hearten him for the future—the quiet of Holy Week should lift him up out of the depression which sought to drag him back into its dreary torture chambers.

So he thought to himself on the evening of his arrival; forgetting that “through the shadow of an agony cometh redemption”;—never dreaming that in this most tranquil place he was to be confronted with the worst ordeal of his whole life.