Chapter Nineteen.

Chapter Nineteen.George.They had three years and more without a break of the happy life to which Jean had looked forward when her brother came home. The days seemed all alike in the quiet routine into which they fell; but no one wished for a change.If Mr Dawson had misgivings as to how his son, after his long wanderings round the world, would settle down into the man of business, intent chiefly on the work which the day brought to his hand, they were all put aside after a time. George fell into his place with an ease which indicated a natural aptitude for the kind of work expected from him; and during a slight but tedious illness, which kept his father a few weeks at home, George filled his place in the counting-house with a success which proved that in all but experience, he was fitted, and might be trusted to hold it to as good purpose as ever his father had done. He had the same clear head, and the same directness of purpose in his dealings with other men; and he had, what his father even in his youngest days had never had, the natural kindliness of heart and temper that won good-will without an effort.Mr Dawson had always been respected as an honest man,—a man of his word; but when their fellow townsmen discussed the father and son in their new relations, as they were not slow to do, it was said of George, that he was “a true gentleman”; and by this it was meant, that the temptations which his father, as a man of business had all his life successfully resisted, the son would never see as temptations at all. While those who came into business relations with him saw that he would probably be as successful in the making of money as his father had been; they also saw that he cared far less for it; and with better opportunities for knowing, they would also have seen that he spent a good deal of it in a manner, which, according to his father’s judgment, would bring but poor returns. The poor folk of Portie, the sailors’ widows and orphans, and the “puir auld wivies” of the town, knew about it, though even they oftener saw Miss Jean’s hand in the help that came from him, than his own.“Ane o’ Miss Jean’s folk,” they called him, and so he was, in that he served the same Master, and loved the service. But he did not offend nor grieve his father by openly casting in his lot with these people as his aunt had done. There was not the same need. Miss Jean had found in communion with the despised little flock in Stott’s Lane, the help and comfort which she had failed to find in the kirk of her fathers. But times had changed since then. In the kirk of their fathers in Portie as well as elsewhere there was found in George’s day the personal consecration, the fervour of love, the earnestness of service, which in the old days had made the folk of Stott’s Lane “a peculiar people.” George was content to remain with them, and his aunt had no desire that he should do otherwise.And then he went quietly on his way, unconscious that the eyes of all Portie were upon him; not just watching for his halting, yet with a certain movement of expectation to see him fall into his old light-hearted, careless ways again. He did not begin his new life among them with any definite plan of work. He had no such faith in his own strength or wisdom as to make him hopeful as to what he might do for any one. But this work came to him, as in one way or another work will come to all who wish to serve.It came to him out of the every-day work of his life, which brought him into contact with ships and sailors, either setting sail, or coming home after a voyage. He sent away those who were going with a friendly “God speed,” and met those who returned with a kindly greeting, and was frank and sympathetic with all, because it was his nature to be so; and the men liked him as every body who came near him had liked him all his life. And his sympathy and their liking opened the way for the help which he could give, and which some of these poor fellows needed badly enough.By and by he found himself in the midst of work which had come to his hands he scarcely could have told how;—certainly not from any impelling sense of the duty which he owed to this class of his townsmen, and not consciously from any thought of the service that he owed them for his Master’s sake. One needed his help, and another, and he gave it gladly, taking pleasure in it, and before he knew it, his hands and his heart were full. It was in one way humble work enough that he did—speaking a word of caution to one, laying a restraining hand on another, guiding another past an evident danger, helping another firmly to withstand the temptation of strong drink, too often the sailor’s strongest and wiliest foe.All this led him at times into dark places, and queer companionships, where was needed a strong arm as well as a cool head and a persuasive tongue. For “poor Jack,” just off a long voyage with money in his pockets, was considered fair game in Portie as in other places; and even in Portie, where dark deeds could not be easily hidden, dark deeds were sometimes done. Though the influence of the respectable part of the community could be brought to bear more readily and directly on the doers of such deeds, than could be the case in larger places, yet direct interference, either to prevent or to punish, was not always effectual. “Poor Jack” himself was often as eager as his enemy to resent and resist such interference, and those who ventured upon it, sometimes fared ill between them.To these poor fellows George gave both time and interest, and not in vain. In all his dealings with them they were made to feel that it was not a sense of duty merely, that brought him near them. He understood them, and liked them and their ways, and was their friend. They believed in him, and did, to please him, what they would hardly have been brought to do from higher motives. After a time they trusted him entirely, as well they might. He loved them. There was nothing that he would not do to help them—few things that he did not do for some of them. In the many ways which genuine personal interest can devise, he befriended them and theirs. In sickness he helped them by helping those to whom they belonged—which was well, and he put his own hands on them, which was better,—putting his strength to gentle uses: soothing, restraining, comforting them, as he never could have done if he had not loved them, and if they had not had confidence in his love.And because he loved them, they were not unwilling to listen to him when he told them of a “greater love,” the love of One who grudged not to give His life for their sakes. He never told it in many words, and he did not for a good while try to tell it to any but the sick and the suffering, as he got a chance for a word with them one by one. But later, when there were occasions, now and then, for sharp though kindly words of rebuke where numbers had gathered, words of gentleness were sure to follow about the love that could keep them in all straits from yielding unworthily to wrong-doing. And if such occasions grew more frequent as time went on, it was because of no plan or intention of his.Little of all this was known in Portie, except among the men themselves and their families, and among the ill-doing folk who would fain have made gain of their folly; but the result was visible enough in the better lives of some and added comfort of many a home in the place. But to no one did George’s work do more good than to himself. It gave him an interest in life which business, engaged in conscientiously for the sake of pleasing his father and making up to him for the disappointment which the last few years of his life had caused, could never have supplied. It did more to establish him permanently in Portie, and to make him content there, than did the partnership into which during the second year he entered with his father.He grew more like his old self, his father said to Miss Jean, giving the new partnership, and the increased interest and responsibility which it implied the credit for it. In Miss Jean’s eyes, he was as little like the wilful lad who had given cause for many anxious thoughts in the old days, as could well be, except that he had the same sunny temper and the same winning ways, and was well-beloved as he had been in his most foolish days. Now he was a man to be trusted as well as loved. He was a graver man than he might ever have become without the discipline of sorrow through which he had passed, and the remorseful memory of the worse than wasted years that followed; but his “trouble,” as the suffering and sinning of those years were vaguely called, had not harmed him. At least good had come out of it all. He was grave, but he was not gloomy; and though he availed himself less than pleased his father of the opportunities given for mingling in such society as Portie and its neighbourhood afforded, he made home a different place to them all.These were happy days to Jean. Between her and her brother, as to all that filled his life and made the future hopeful, there was perfect confidence and sympathy. She helped him in his work among the sailors and their wives and families, and among the fishers of the neighbourhood, by doing many things that only a woman’s tact and skill and will could do, and she helped him even more by the eager sympathy with which she listened and advised when she could not put her own hand to the work.They were true friends as well as loving brother and sister, and as time went on, their father began to fear that they might grow too well content with each other and the life they were living, and so fail of the higher happiness which he coveted for them, and which was the right of such as they.“There is time enough,” said Miss Jean comforting him.“Yes. He is young, and he will surely forget,” said his father. “And as for Jean, she is fancy-free.”To this Miss Jean made no reply. She was not sure of either the one thing or the other. But she saw that the brother and sister seemed content, and that they were doing willingly and effectively the work that fell to their hands, and in her esteem life had nothing better to give than this.“All that you wish for them may come in the natural course of things, but ye must have patience and no’ try to force it,” said Miss Jean. “And in the mean time, ye ha’e ay one o’ May’s bonny boys to fall back upon for Saughleas, if that is what is in your mind.”For they had lately heard of the birth of Mrs Manners’ second son, and much rejoicing had it caused.“I wonder ye’re no’ thinkin’ o’ going south to see your new grandson. The change would do you good, and it would be a great pleasure to May.”“There is nothing to hinder, if Jean will go with me.”But there was much to hinder Jean it seemed. May had better nursing than she could give her, and she would much rather make her visit when her sister should be well and strong and able to go about with her. And then George had been promising to take her to Paris and perhaps farther, later in the summer, and they could visit May at the same time. Besides—she told her father privately she would not go away and leave her aunt so long alone just at present, for she was never strong in the spring; and her father could urge her no longer.Jean had another reason, of which she could speak to no one, why she did not wish to leave Portie at this time. She had heard from one of the young Petries of the hope they had of a visit from Marion Calderwood and her brother, and Jean would not leave home and lose the chance of seeing them.Willie Calderwood had never been in Portie again, and Jean had never seen him, since he left it on the morning of her sister’s marriage day, and that was a long time now. She had waited patiently, but she longed for the time of waiting to be over. She knew now how well she loved him, and in her heart she believed that he loved her as well. He had never spoken, he might never speak; but whether he spoke or not, she had a longing unspeakable, just to see his face and touch his hand again. She had been quite happy during these two years, she told herself; but her heart sprang gladly up at the thought that her time of waiting might be nearly over. She had never spoken his name even to her brother, and he had been as silent to her, but she sometimes thought that George knew how they cared for one another, and that he kept silence because he knew it would not be well to speak. But all the same, Jean would not lose the chance of seeing Willie again. So, after some consideration, Mr Dawson set off alone. He reached London late at night and did not go to his daughter’s house until the morning. She lived in a pleasant part of a pleasant suburb, in a little house which stood in the midst of a tiny garden, which was enclosed within high walls. They had removed to it recently, and Mr Dawson had never seen it before. It was a very pretty place, he thought as he entered—a little confined perhaps, for the high walls were not very far apart—a little like a prison, he could not but fancy, as the gate was locked behind him.Mr Manners had already gone out for the day, the neat little maid told him, and Mrs Manners was not down yet, but she would be down presently. She was well and so was baby.But he was not left alone long, and then he had another greeting. He thought for a moment that it was May who came toward him with outstretched hand. It was not May. It was a tall, slender, dark-eyed girl with a blooming face in which there was something familiar. He knew who it was as soon as he heard her voice.“Didna Jean come with you?” A shadow fell on the bright face at his answer. But it passed in a minute.“It is good to see a ‘kenned face’ again. Mrs Manners is very well, and so is baby—such a darling! Mrs Manners is coming down-stairs to-day for the first time. She will be down soon,” added the girl more sedately, as if she had got a little check. She was thinking of the time when she stood before Mr Dawson with the broken branch of the apple-tree in her hand, and oddly enough, so was he. But the sight of Marion Calderwood stirred no angry feelings now. That was all past. The ill that had come to his son through Elsie Calderwood had been changed to good. The sudden glad remembrance of the son he had left at home—a man strong, earnest, good—softened his heart and his voice as he looked on the girl’s wistful face, and he smiled kindly as he said,—“England seems to agree with you, my lassie.”Marion shook her head.“But it is no’ home,” said she. “I like Portie best.” Then she took courage to ask him about the place, and about the folk in it, and the changes that had taken place since she left. Trifling questions some of them were, but they were asked so eagerly, and the answers were listened to with such interest, that he could not but take pleasure in it. Nobody was forgotten. From Miss Jean herself to poor old Mrs Cairnie, every body in Portie seemed to be a friend of hers, and all that concerned them of the deepest interest to her. Mr Dawson had difficulty in recalling some of the folk she asked about.“Ye should come back and renew acquaintance with them all.”“Oh! wouldna I like it! And maybe I may—some day. We thought Miss Dawson was coming with you,” said Marion with a little change of face and voice!“Jean? yes, I thought that too; but she had some good reasons of her own for staying at home. Her aunt is not just so strong as she might be, and she didna like to leave her. She’ll come soon, however. She is a friend of yours, it seems.”“She was ay good to me,” said Marion softly, and there was nothing more said for a while.“But what have I been thinking about all this time?” said Marion suddenly.She left the room and returned almost immediately with a child in her arms—May’s eldest, a beautiful but rather delicate looking boy of a little more than a year old.“This is George Dawson—the precious darling. He is just a little shy at first, but he is not going to be shy with his own grandpapa, is he, my pet, my darling, my bonny boy?” And she fell into a soft babble of fond words, which would have had no meaning to an indifferent listener, but the grandfather listened, well pleased. The “bonny boy” showed his shyness by clinging to his nurse, but he looked at his grandfather bravely enough, and did not resent the cautious advances made to him. He was persuaded to show all his pretty tricks of action and speech, and smiled, and cooed, and murmured his baby words; and it would not have been easy to say whether his nurse or his grandfather was most delighted at the success of the introduction.“And now,” said Marion, “I think we may tell grandpapa our secret. And it will not be long a secret now, will it, my bonny boy? For mamma is coming down to-day, and all the world must know.”Then setting the child safely in a corner, she moved a step or two away, and held out her arms. Then there were more sweet foolish words, and then the venture was made, and two or three uncertain steps taken, and the little hero was safe again in her arms.Again and again, with a skill and courage that increased as the distance was lengthened, the journey was made in triumph. Then Marion knelt down, and steadying the child before her, said softly and firmly,—“Now go to grandpapa.” And forgetting his shyness in the glory of success, away he went with eager, faltering steps, and sprang joyfully into the old man’s arms. The door had opened softly and the young mother, pale but smiling, stood on the threshold seeing it all. As the child turned she stooped and held out her arms, and again he crossed the space between them with quick, uncertain steps; and May kissed her father with her child in her arms.Then, after a whispered word, Marion went out and returned in a little carrying a tiny bundle with trailing white robes, and presented to Mr Dawson another grandson. If she had been at all afraid of him at first, her fear had not outlasted the play with the child, and Mrs Manners saw with mingled surprise and amusement the good understanding between them, and the interest her father allowed to appear in the pretty ways and pleasant words of the girl whom in the old days they had found it best to keep a little out of his sight.He listened to their lamentations about Jean’s not coming patiently, and answered with a good grace, more questions in ten minutes than ever she had ventured to put to him in as many days.“She has wonderfully improved since she left Portie,” said he, when Marion had carried away the baby again.“She was ay a bonny lassie,” said May.She was not going to put him on his guard against the fascinations of her friend by praising her too earnestly.“I like her to be here with me when I cannot go out. She is very nice with Georgie.”That was all she said to him, but she told her husband that night, that Marion, with the help of the “bonny boy,” had made a conquest of her father.

They had three years and more without a break of the happy life to which Jean had looked forward when her brother came home. The days seemed all alike in the quiet routine into which they fell; but no one wished for a change.

If Mr Dawson had misgivings as to how his son, after his long wanderings round the world, would settle down into the man of business, intent chiefly on the work which the day brought to his hand, they were all put aside after a time. George fell into his place with an ease which indicated a natural aptitude for the kind of work expected from him; and during a slight but tedious illness, which kept his father a few weeks at home, George filled his place in the counting-house with a success which proved that in all but experience, he was fitted, and might be trusted to hold it to as good purpose as ever his father had done. He had the same clear head, and the same directness of purpose in his dealings with other men; and he had, what his father even in his youngest days had never had, the natural kindliness of heart and temper that won good-will without an effort.

Mr Dawson had always been respected as an honest man,—a man of his word; but when their fellow townsmen discussed the father and son in their new relations, as they were not slow to do, it was said of George, that he was “a true gentleman”; and by this it was meant, that the temptations which his father, as a man of business had all his life successfully resisted, the son would never see as temptations at all. While those who came into business relations with him saw that he would probably be as successful in the making of money as his father had been; they also saw that he cared far less for it; and with better opportunities for knowing, they would also have seen that he spent a good deal of it in a manner, which, according to his father’s judgment, would bring but poor returns. The poor folk of Portie, the sailors’ widows and orphans, and the “puir auld wivies” of the town, knew about it, though even they oftener saw Miss Jean’s hand in the help that came from him, than his own.

“Ane o’ Miss Jean’s folk,” they called him, and so he was, in that he served the same Master, and loved the service. But he did not offend nor grieve his father by openly casting in his lot with these people as his aunt had done. There was not the same need. Miss Jean had found in communion with the despised little flock in Stott’s Lane, the help and comfort which she had failed to find in the kirk of her fathers. But times had changed since then. In the kirk of their fathers in Portie as well as elsewhere there was found in George’s day the personal consecration, the fervour of love, the earnestness of service, which in the old days had made the folk of Stott’s Lane “a peculiar people.” George was content to remain with them, and his aunt had no desire that he should do otherwise.

And then he went quietly on his way, unconscious that the eyes of all Portie were upon him; not just watching for his halting, yet with a certain movement of expectation to see him fall into his old light-hearted, careless ways again. He did not begin his new life among them with any definite plan of work. He had no such faith in his own strength or wisdom as to make him hopeful as to what he might do for any one. But this work came to him, as in one way or another work will come to all who wish to serve.

It came to him out of the every-day work of his life, which brought him into contact with ships and sailors, either setting sail, or coming home after a voyage. He sent away those who were going with a friendly “God speed,” and met those who returned with a kindly greeting, and was frank and sympathetic with all, because it was his nature to be so; and the men liked him as every body who came near him had liked him all his life. And his sympathy and their liking opened the way for the help which he could give, and which some of these poor fellows needed badly enough.

By and by he found himself in the midst of work which had come to his hands he scarcely could have told how;—certainly not from any impelling sense of the duty which he owed to this class of his townsmen, and not consciously from any thought of the service that he owed them for his Master’s sake. One needed his help, and another, and he gave it gladly, taking pleasure in it, and before he knew it, his hands and his heart were full. It was in one way humble work enough that he did—speaking a word of caution to one, laying a restraining hand on another, guiding another past an evident danger, helping another firmly to withstand the temptation of strong drink, too often the sailor’s strongest and wiliest foe.

All this led him at times into dark places, and queer companionships, where was needed a strong arm as well as a cool head and a persuasive tongue. For “poor Jack,” just off a long voyage with money in his pockets, was considered fair game in Portie as in other places; and even in Portie, where dark deeds could not be easily hidden, dark deeds were sometimes done. Though the influence of the respectable part of the community could be brought to bear more readily and directly on the doers of such deeds, than could be the case in larger places, yet direct interference, either to prevent or to punish, was not always effectual. “Poor Jack” himself was often as eager as his enemy to resent and resist such interference, and those who ventured upon it, sometimes fared ill between them.

To these poor fellows George gave both time and interest, and not in vain. In all his dealings with them they were made to feel that it was not a sense of duty merely, that brought him near them. He understood them, and liked them and their ways, and was their friend. They believed in him, and did, to please him, what they would hardly have been brought to do from higher motives. After a time they trusted him entirely, as well they might. He loved them. There was nothing that he would not do to help them—few things that he did not do for some of them. In the many ways which genuine personal interest can devise, he befriended them and theirs. In sickness he helped them by helping those to whom they belonged—which was well, and he put his own hands on them, which was better,—putting his strength to gentle uses: soothing, restraining, comforting them, as he never could have done if he had not loved them, and if they had not had confidence in his love.

And because he loved them, they were not unwilling to listen to him when he told them of a “greater love,” the love of One who grudged not to give His life for their sakes. He never told it in many words, and he did not for a good while try to tell it to any but the sick and the suffering, as he got a chance for a word with them one by one. But later, when there were occasions, now and then, for sharp though kindly words of rebuke where numbers had gathered, words of gentleness were sure to follow about the love that could keep them in all straits from yielding unworthily to wrong-doing. And if such occasions grew more frequent as time went on, it was because of no plan or intention of his.

Little of all this was known in Portie, except among the men themselves and their families, and among the ill-doing folk who would fain have made gain of their folly; but the result was visible enough in the better lives of some and added comfort of many a home in the place. But to no one did George’s work do more good than to himself. It gave him an interest in life which business, engaged in conscientiously for the sake of pleasing his father and making up to him for the disappointment which the last few years of his life had caused, could never have supplied. It did more to establish him permanently in Portie, and to make him content there, than did the partnership into which during the second year he entered with his father.

He grew more like his old self, his father said to Miss Jean, giving the new partnership, and the increased interest and responsibility which it implied the credit for it. In Miss Jean’s eyes, he was as little like the wilful lad who had given cause for many anxious thoughts in the old days, as could well be, except that he had the same sunny temper and the same winning ways, and was well-beloved as he had been in his most foolish days. Now he was a man to be trusted as well as loved. He was a graver man than he might ever have become without the discipline of sorrow through which he had passed, and the remorseful memory of the worse than wasted years that followed; but his “trouble,” as the suffering and sinning of those years were vaguely called, had not harmed him. At least good had come out of it all. He was grave, but he was not gloomy; and though he availed himself less than pleased his father of the opportunities given for mingling in such society as Portie and its neighbourhood afforded, he made home a different place to them all.

These were happy days to Jean. Between her and her brother, as to all that filled his life and made the future hopeful, there was perfect confidence and sympathy. She helped him in his work among the sailors and their wives and families, and among the fishers of the neighbourhood, by doing many things that only a woman’s tact and skill and will could do, and she helped him even more by the eager sympathy with which she listened and advised when she could not put her own hand to the work.

They were true friends as well as loving brother and sister, and as time went on, their father began to fear that they might grow too well content with each other and the life they were living, and so fail of the higher happiness which he coveted for them, and which was the right of such as they.

“There is time enough,” said Miss Jean comforting him.

“Yes. He is young, and he will surely forget,” said his father. “And as for Jean, she is fancy-free.”

To this Miss Jean made no reply. She was not sure of either the one thing or the other. But she saw that the brother and sister seemed content, and that they were doing willingly and effectively the work that fell to their hands, and in her esteem life had nothing better to give than this.

“All that you wish for them may come in the natural course of things, but ye must have patience and no’ try to force it,” said Miss Jean. “And in the mean time, ye ha’e ay one o’ May’s bonny boys to fall back upon for Saughleas, if that is what is in your mind.”

For they had lately heard of the birth of Mrs Manners’ second son, and much rejoicing had it caused.

“I wonder ye’re no’ thinkin’ o’ going south to see your new grandson. The change would do you good, and it would be a great pleasure to May.”

“There is nothing to hinder, if Jean will go with me.”

But there was much to hinder Jean it seemed. May had better nursing than she could give her, and she would much rather make her visit when her sister should be well and strong and able to go about with her. And then George had been promising to take her to Paris and perhaps farther, later in the summer, and they could visit May at the same time. Besides—she told her father privately she would not go away and leave her aunt so long alone just at present, for she was never strong in the spring; and her father could urge her no longer.

Jean had another reason, of which she could speak to no one, why she did not wish to leave Portie at this time. She had heard from one of the young Petries of the hope they had of a visit from Marion Calderwood and her brother, and Jean would not leave home and lose the chance of seeing them.

Willie Calderwood had never been in Portie again, and Jean had never seen him, since he left it on the morning of her sister’s marriage day, and that was a long time now. She had waited patiently, but she longed for the time of waiting to be over. She knew now how well she loved him, and in her heart she believed that he loved her as well. He had never spoken, he might never speak; but whether he spoke or not, she had a longing unspeakable, just to see his face and touch his hand again. She had been quite happy during these two years, she told herself; but her heart sprang gladly up at the thought that her time of waiting might be nearly over. She had never spoken his name even to her brother, and he had been as silent to her, but she sometimes thought that George knew how they cared for one another, and that he kept silence because he knew it would not be well to speak. But all the same, Jean would not lose the chance of seeing Willie again. So, after some consideration, Mr Dawson set off alone. He reached London late at night and did not go to his daughter’s house until the morning. She lived in a pleasant part of a pleasant suburb, in a little house which stood in the midst of a tiny garden, which was enclosed within high walls. They had removed to it recently, and Mr Dawson had never seen it before. It was a very pretty place, he thought as he entered—a little confined perhaps, for the high walls were not very far apart—a little like a prison, he could not but fancy, as the gate was locked behind him.

Mr Manners had already gone out for the day, the neat little maid told him, and Mrs Manners was not down yet, but she would be down presently. She was well and so was baby.

But he was not left alone long, and then he had another greeting. He thought for a moment that it was May who came toward him with outstretched hand. It was not May. It was a tall, slender, dark-eyed girl with a blooming face in which there was something familiar. He knew who it was as soon as he heard her voice.

“Didna Jean come with you?” A shadow fell on the bright face at his answer. But it passed in a minute.

“It is good to see a ‘kenned face’ again. Mrs Manners is very well, and so is baby—such a darling! Mrs Manners is coming down-stairs to-day for the first time. She will be down soon,” added the girl more sedately, as if she had got a little check. She was thinking of the time when she stood before Mr Dawson with the broken branch of the apple-tree in her hand, and oddly enough, so was he. But the sight of Marion Calderwood stirred no angry feelings now. That was all past. The ill that had come to his son through Elsie Calderwood had been changed to good. The sudden glad remembrance of the son he had left at home—a man strong, earnest, good—softened his heart and his voice as he looked on the girl’s wistful face, and he smiled kindly as he said,—

“England seems to agree with you, my lassie.”

Marion shook her head.

“But it is no’ home,” said she. “I like Portie best.” Then she took courage to ask him about the place, and about the folk in it, and the changes that had taken place since she left. Trifling questions some of them were, but they were asked so eagerly, and the answers were listened to with such interest, that he could not but take pleasure in it. Nobody was forgotten. From Miss Jean herself to poor old Mrs Cairnie, every body in Portie seemed to be a friend of hers, and all that concerned them of the deepest interest to her. Mr Dawson had difficulty in recalling some of the folk she asked about.

“Ye should come back and renew acquaintance with them all.”

“Oh! wouldna I like it! And maybe I may—some day. We thought Miss Dawson was coming with you,” said Marion with a little change of face and voice!

“Jean? yes, I thought that too; but she had some good reasons of her own for staying at home. Her aunt is not just so strong as she might be, and she didna like to leave her. She’ll come soon, however. She is a friend of yours, it seems.”

“She was ay good to me,” said Marion softly, and there was nothing more said for a while.

“But what have I been thinking about all this time?” said Marion suddenly.

She left the room and returned almost immediately with a child in her arms—May’s eldest, a beautiful but rather delicate looking boy of a little more than a year old.

“This is George Dawson—the precious darling. He is just a little shy at first, but he is not going to be shy with his own grandpapa, is he, my pet, my darling, my bonny boy?” And she fell into a soft babble of fond words, which would have had no meaning to an indifferent listener, but the grandfather listened, well pleased. The “bonny boy” showed his shyness by clinging to his nurse, but he looked at his grandfather bravely enough, and did not resent the cautious advances made to him. He was persuaded to show all his pretty tricks of action and speech, and smiled, and cooed, and murmured his baby words; and it would not have been easy to say whether his nurse or his grandfather was most delighted at the success of the introduction.

“And now,” said Marion, “I think we may tell grandpapa our secret. And it will not be long a secret now, will it, my bonny boy? For mamma is coming down to-day, and all the world must know.”

Then setting the child safely in a corner, she moved a step or two away, and held out her arms. Then there were more sweet foolish words, and then the venture was made, and two or three uncertain steps taken, and the little hero was safe again in her arms.

Again and again, with a skill and courage that increased as the distance was lengthened, the journey was made in triumph. Then Marion knelt down, and steadying the child before her, said softly and firmly,—

“Now go to grandpapa.” And forgetting his shyness in the glory of success, away he went with eager, faltering steps, and sprang joyfully into the old man’s arms. The door had opened softly and the young mother, pale but smiling, stood on the threshold seeing it all. As the child turned she stooped and held out her arms, and again he crossed the space between them with quick, uncertain steps; and May kissed her father with her child in her arms.

Then, after a whispered word, Marion went out and returned in a little carrying a tiny bundle with trailing white robes, and presented to Mr Dawson another grandson. If she had been at all afraid of him at first, her fear had not outlasted the play with the child, and Mrs Manners saw with mingled surprise and amusement the good understanding between them, and the interest her father allowed to appear in the pretty ways and pleasant words of the girl whom in the old days they had found it best to keep a little out of his sight.

He listened to their lamentations about Jean’s not coming patiently, and answered with a good grace, more questions in ten minutes than ever she had ventured to put to him in as many days.

“She has wonderfully improved since she left Portie,” said he, when Marion had carried away the baby again.

“She was ay a bonny lassie,” said May.

She was not going to put him on his guard against the fascinations of her friend by praising her too earnestly.

“I like her to be here with me when I cannot go out. She is very nice with Georgie.”

That was all she said to him, but she told her husband that night, that Marion, with the help of the “bonny boy,” had made a conquest of her father.

Chapter Twenty.Marion.That was but the beginning. Mr Dawson might have had a dull time for the next few days, since Mr Manners was more than usually engaged, and Mrs Manners was not permitted to come down-stairs very early. But he did not. There was the boy, and there was Marion, ready to show one another off to the best advantage for his admiration and amusement. And when the boy was carried away by his nurse, Marion still considered herself responsible for the entertainment of the old gentleman of whom, since he had showed himself inclined to unbend, she had ceased to be afraid.She read to him, she sang to him, she talked to him about many things—about the leaders in theTimes, the fishing interests, the prospects of a good harvest. And when other subjects failed there was always Portie to fall back upon. Her interest in all that pertained to her old home and its inhabitants was inexhaustible.“Oh! we are never at a loss,” she told Mrs Manners, when she asked her how they had got through the day.It might have come to that, however, if Mrs Manners had not judiciously suggested a change. When one morning Mr Dawson said he must go into the city, his daughter suggested that business and pleasure might be united for once, and he might take Marion. His business took him to the Bank of England, and there Marion found her pleasure. For he took her through all that wonderful place and showed her what was to be seen, to her great delight.Then they threaded their way through the crowds of Cheapside, and came to the great cathedral which hitherto Marion had only seen in the distance. It was almost too much in one day, she thought, the Bank of England and Saint Paul’s. But did she not enjoy it? They only meant to go in to rest for a minute, but hours passed before they came out again.Then Mr Dawson took her to lunch at a curious little place near Ludgate Hill, and then they moved through crowds again along Fleet Street till they came to Temple Bar and turned into the Temple.Oh! the peace and quiet of the place, after the jostling and noise and confusion of the great thoroughfare! Marion fancied herself walking in a dream, as they wandered through the silent courts, and listened to the soft “plash, plash” of the fountain, and then sat down to rest under the trees of the garden.A score of names famous in history and fiction rose to her lips. They had not said much to one another all the morning. Marion had said only a word now and then in her delight at the wonderful things she saw, but as they sat a while to rest and catch the cool air blowing from the river before they set out for home, her lips were opened, and she talked a good deal more than she would have been likely to do to Mr Dawson, or any one else, in other circumstances.Foolish talk some of it was, about unreal folk who will still live forever because of the genius that called them into being. Unknown names most of them were to her listener; and in another mood and place, he might have called it all folly or worse. But he listened now with the pleased interest that one gives to the fancies of a child. And all she said was not foolish, he acknowledged as she went on. There were little words now and then, clear and keen and wise, which pleased him well.But nothing that was seen or said that day pleased him so much as this.“You have made a day of it together,” said Mrs Manners laughing, as she met them at the door. “You must be tired enough by this time.”“Yes, I am tired. And no wonder. I think I never had so much pleasure in one day in all my life before.”She did not say it to him. He only heard it by chance as she passed up the stairs. But he said to himself that there should be more such days for one so easily pleased before he left London.And so there were. They saw together pictures and people, parks and gardens. They went to Richmond and Kew and Hampton Court, and to more places besides. Mrs Manners went with them sometimes, but their energy and interest were too much for her, and usually she let them go without her. And Mr Dawson was fain to acknowledge to himself that he had a share in the pleasure which he meant to give “the blithe and bonny lassie” at such times.She was “blithe and bonny” at all times, but when he saw her, as often happened, moving about among the guests that sometimes filled his daughter’s pretty rooms, none more admired and none more worthy of admiration than she, he owned that she was more than that.They were not just well-dressed, well-mannered nobodies that Mrs Manners entertained. Many of them were men and women who had been heard of in the world for their worth or their wisdom, or for good work of one kind or another done by them. And this blithe and bonny lassie, who enjoyed her play with the child and her sight-seeing with the old man, was not out of place among them. She was young and a little shy of folk that seemed great folk to her, and she was very quiet and silent among them. But many eyes followed her with delight as she moved up and down among them in her pretty evening dress; and she had words of wisdom spoken to her now and then as well as the rest, and she could answer them too, on occasion, as he did not fail to see.She sang too, not only the old songs that delighted him, but grand, grave music, to which they listened who were far wiser about such things than he. She was a wonder to him at such times, but in the morning she was just as usual, “bonny and blithe” and easily pleased.“Ye mind me whiles of our Jean,” said he to her one day, and he could not but wonder at the sudden brightness that flashed over her face at the words. Mrs Manners laughed.“That is the very utmost that can be said, papa. You cannot go beyond that. There is no one like. Jean in. Marion’s eyes.”“Am I like her? Maybe I may grow like her, sometime,” said the girl softly.All this time May had been keeping a wise silence with regard to her friend. She believed that he would see all that was good and pleasant in her all the more readily that they were not pointed out to him; and so it proved.The days passed quickly and happily and came to an end too soon. All this time Mrs Calderwood had been at the seaside with her old friend, who had needed the change, and when they returned Marion was called home. She was glad to go home, but at the same time she acknowledged herself sorry to leave.“For I think I never had so much pleasure all my life before. Only I am afraid my mother will think I cannot have been much comfort to you.”“She will be quite mistaken then,” said Mrs Manners laughing and kissing her. “You have been a great comfort to me.”A great surprise awaited Marion when she reached home. She found her mother pondering gravely over a letter which she held in her hand, and the shadow of care did not—as it ought to have done—pass from her face as her daughter came in. It deepened rather; and in her pre-occupation she almost forgot to return the girl’s greeting.“Is any thing wrong, mother? Is it Willie?”“No, no. It is a letter I have gotten from Miss Jean.” She spoke with hesitation. Marion looked wistfully at the familiar handwriting of her old friend.“Miss Jean asks you to visit her in Portie. It seems her nephew and niece are thinking of a journey, but Miss Dawson doubts about leaving her aunt, who is not strong. Miss Jean thinks she would go if you would promise to go and stay with her a while.”“Oh! mother! I should so like it.” Marion held out her hand for the letter, but her mother did not offer it to her; she read bits of it here and there instead.“‘I have said nothing about it to Jean, and shall not till I hear from you. They would likely set off at once if you would promise to let Marion come to me, and that would please you, though—’“‘If you decide to let her come, she might travel here with young Mr Petrie, who, I hear, is soon to be in London. Though I think myself it might be better for her to come at once, in the company of my brother, who will not likely stay much longer.’”“Oh, mother! I should so like to go. And is that all that Miss Jean says?”“All she says about your visit.”“You don’t wish me to go. Why, mother? It is nae surely that you canna trust me so far away? I am not more foolish than other girls, am I?”Mrs Calderwood looked at her a moment as though she did not understand what she was saying. Then she laughed and kissed her.“Nonsense! dear. You are a sensible lassie and discreet. I would be sorry to disappoint Miss Jean, though she has friends enough in Portie one would think. But it is the first favour she has ever asked of me, and many a one she has done me.”“But, mother, I think this is a favour to us—to me at least. Oh! it seems too good to be true.”“Well, we will think about it.”“And, mother, if I should go, I would like—wouldn’t you? rather to go with Mr Dawson than with James Petrie.”Her mother’s face clouded again.“What ails you at young Mr Petrie?”Marion shrugged her shoulders.“Oh! nothing. Only I like Mr Dawson better—better than I could have believed possible. He has been very good to me. I haven’t told you yet. Mother, I think he must have grown a better man since George came home.”Her mother said nothing. She did not think well of Mr Dawson. She did not wish to think well of him. When she had heard from Marion that he had come to his daughter’s house, her first impulse was to recall her at once. The impossibility of leaving her old friend, or of permitting Marion to travel alone, prevented her from acting on her first impulse, and when she had time to consider the matter, she saw that it would be better for her to remain. It was not likely that Mr Dawson would see much of her, and whatever he might feel, he would not do otherwise than treat politely his daughter’s guest.That he should “begood to her,” that he should put himself about, as she knew he must have done, to give her pleasure surprised her, but it did not please her. She had forgiven him, she told herself. At least she bore him no ill-will for the share he and his had had in the trouble of her life, but she wished to have nothing at all to do with him, either as friend or foe.But Miss Jean’s friendship was quite apart from all this. It had been a refuge to her in times of trouble long before she lost her Elsie, and this invitation was but another proof of her friendship, and she would let her daughter go.As for her escort—Mrs Calderwood was as averse to accepting James Petrie as such, as her daughter was, though from a different reason. But she was equally averse to any appearance of presuming on the kindness of Mr Dawson. Fortunately the matter was taken out of her hands.Mrs Manners came the next day empowered to plead that Miss Jean’s invitation should be accepted, and when she found that this was not necessary, she found courage to propose that instead of waiting for any one, Marion should hasten her preparations and go on at once with her father.Trouble! What possible trouble could it be for her father to sit in the same railway carriage with the child? As for Jamie Petrie—it was easy seen what he was after. But it would be quite too great a grace to grant him at this early stage of—of his plans and projects. Oh! yes. Of course it was all nonsense, but then—But the nonsense helped to bring Mrs Calderwood to consent that Marion should go at once. And so it was arranged.It would have pleased Mr Dawson to take Marion with him to Saughleas, but this she modestly but firmly declined, because her mother expected her to go at once to Miss Jean’s house by the sea, and there she was kindly welcomed.It was like getting home again, she said. The sound of the sea soothed her to sleep, and it woke her in the morning with a voice as familiar as if she had never been away. She was out, and away over the sands to the Tangle Stanes, and had renewed acquaintance with half the bairns in Portie, before Miss Jean was ready for her breakfast.The bairns had all grown big, and the streets and lanes, the houses and shops, had all grown narrow and small, she thought. But the sea had not changed, nor the sands, nor the far-away hills, nor the sky—which was, oh! so different from the sky in London. Marion had not changed much, her friends thought. Some of them said she was bigger and bonnier, but she was blithe and friendly and “a’e fauld” still—and London hadna spoiled her as it might very easily have done. At any rate she meant to enjoy every hour of her stay, and that was the way she began.She did not miss Jean either, for George had been called away on business for a few days and when he returned they were to set out on their travels. During these few days Marion saw much of her friend. Jean was graver than she used to be, Marion thought; but she was kind and friendly, and could be merry too, on occasion. They had much to say to one another, and they spent hours together in the old familiar places, in the wood and on the rocks by the sea, and heard one another’s “secrets,” which were only secrets in the sense that neither of them would have been likely to tell them to any one else.Marion told her friend all that she had been seeing and doing and reading, and some things that she had been hoping, since she went away, and Jean did little more. She told what her brother was doing and the help she tried to give him, and she told of the life that seemed to be opening before them.Not such a life as they used to plan and dream about for themselves, when they were young; a quiet, uneventful, busy-life, just like the lives of other people. Judging from the look on Jean’s face it did not seem a very joyful life to look forward to. Marion regarded her friend with wistful eyes.“No. It will never be that, I am sure—just like the lives of other people, I mean.”“And why not? Well, perhaps not altogether. It will be an easier life than the lives of most people, I suppose. It will not just be a struggle for bread, as it is for so many. And we can do something for others who need help, and we need not be tied to one place every day of the year, as most folk are. And by and by we will be ‘looked up to,’ and our advice will be asked, and folk will say of us, as they say of my father, that ‘they are much respeckit in the countryside.’ And by that time I shall be ‘auld Miss Jean,’ and near done with it all. But it is a long look till then.”“But it may be all quite different from that. Many a thing may happen to change it all.”“Oh! many things will happen, as you say. May and her bairns will be coming and going, and the bairns will fit into the places that the years will leave empty, and George will need a staff like my father, and I will grow ‘frail’ like Auntie Jean, and sit waiting and looking at the sea. And ye needna sit lookin’ at me with such pitiful e’en, for who is waiting so happily as she? And yet who will be so glad to go when her time shall come?”Marion said nothing, but turned her eyes seaward with a grave face. Jean went on.“Yes, many things will happen, but it will be just the same thing over again. The ships will sail away, and there will be long waiting, and some of them will come home, and some will never come, and the pain will be as hard to bear as if it had never come to many a sore heart before. And some folk will be glad, and some will be at least content, and some will make mistakes and spoil their lives and then just wait on to the end. Marion, what are you thinking about?”“I’m wondering if it is really you who are saying all that. And I am thinking that is not the way Miss Jean would speak.”“Oh! Miss Jean! No, she has won safely past all that. But once, long ago, before she had learned the secret of peaceful and patient waiting, she might have been afraid of the days. Come, it is growing cold. Let us go on.”They rose from the Tangle Stanes where they had been sitting and moved away, and Jean said,—“And as for you—Are you sure it is to be the grand school after all? Well, you will come back when the heat and burden of the day is over to take your rest in Portie. And you will be a stately old lady, a little worn and sharp perhaps, as is the fate of schoolmistresses; but with fine manners, and wisdom enough for us all. And the new generation of Petries will admire you and make much of you—not quite as the Petries of the present day would like to do,” said Jean laughing. “And behold! there is Master Jamie coming on at a great pace. Shall we let him overtake us? Or shall we go in and see poor old Tibbie and let him pass by?”They were on their way to Saughleas, where Marion was to pay her first visit. Miss Jean had gone on already in the pony carriage, but the girls were walking round by the shore. There was no reason why Marion should wish to avoid Mr James Petrie, except that she wished no one’s company when she had Jean’s, but she was quite willing to go into Mrs Cairnie’s house where she had been several times already. It was a different looking place from the house to which Miss Jean had taken Mrs Eastwood long ago. Mrs Cairnie’s daughter Annie had returned and was going to remain, and the place was “weel redd up,” and indeed as pleasant a dwelling, of its kind, as one would wish to see. Poor old Tibbie had lately met with a sad mishap, which threatened to put an end to her wanderings, and keep her a prisoner at home for some time to come. Annie had come home to care for her, with the design of earning the bread of both, by making gowns and bonnets for such of the sailors’ wives and fisher folk, as were not equal to the making their Sunday best for themselves.But a different lot awaited her. She had gone away with the English lady “to better herself,” it was said; but that was only half the reason of her going. She went because she feared to be beguiled into marrying a man whom she loved, but whom she could not respect, because of his enslavement to one besetting sin.The love of strong drink had brought misery to her home, since ever she could remember. It had driven her brothers away from it and had caused her father’s death and her mother’s widowhood, and she shrank with terror from the thought of living such a life as her mother had lived. When her lover entreated her, saying, that being his wife she might save him from his sin, she did not believe it; but she knew that in her love and her weakness she might yield her will to his, and lose herself without saving him. So she went away with a sore heart, and when her mother’s accident had made it necessary for her to come home again, she hardly could tell whether she was glad or sorry to come.And the first “kenned face” she saw as she drew near home was the face of her lover. He did not see her. He had stepped from another carriage of the train, into the little station a few miles from Portie. Young George Dawson’s hand rested on his shoulder, for the single minute that he stood there, a very different looking person from the wild lad she had left years ago.“Yon’s young Saughleas,” she heard one fellow-traveller say to another. “And yon’s Tam Saugster. He’s hame again, it seems.”“I ha’e heard that he has gathered himsel’ up wonderfu’ this while back. He is a fine sailor-like lad.”“Ay. He’s his ain man now. And he’ll be skipper o’ the ‘John Seaton’ before she sails again if young George Dawson gets his way, and they say he gets it in most things with his father.”Then Annie saw the sailor spring back into the carriage again as the signal was given, and she got a glimpse of George Dawson’s kindly face as they passed, and then she saw nothing for a while for the rush of tears which she had much ado to hide.“The skipper o’ the ‘John Seaton’! Ah! weel, he has forgotten me lang syne, but that is little matter since he has found himsel’.”But Tam had not forgotten her, and whatever he might have done at the time, he did not now resent her refusal to take as her master one who could not master himself. That very night as she sat in the gloaming listening to her mother’s fretful complaints, and taking counsel with herself as to how they were to live in the coming days, a familiar step came to the door, and Tam lifted the latch and came in without waiting to be bidden.All the rest was natural enough and easy. The next time Tam sailed he was to sail as master of the “John Seaton,” and he was to sail a married man, he said firmly, and what could Annie do but yield and begin her preparations forthwith. The cottage in which Mrs Cairnie had hitherto had but a room, was taken, and Tam set himself to making it worthy to be the home of the woman he loved.And a neat and pleasant place it looked when Jean and Marion went in that day. Into the pretty parlour the bride that was to be looked shyly, scarcely venturing to follow them.It was Marion who displayed to Jean the various pretty and useful things already gathered.On the mantel-piece was a handsome clock, and over it the picture of a ship with all her canvas spread, sailing over smooth seas, in the full light of the sun of an Arctic summer day. There was a low rocky shore in sight, and the gleam of icy peaks in the distance; but the ship with the sunshine on the spreading sails was the point of interest in the picture—and a pleasant picture it was for the eyes of a sailor’s wife to rest upon. They were both Mr George Dawson’s gift to the bride, Marion told Jean. Jean nodded and smiled.“Yes, I know,” said she.“Miss Dawson,” said Annie taking one step over the threshold where she had been standing all the time. “It is all your brother’s work, and you must let me say to you what I canna say to him. Though he had done no more good in the world, it was worth his while to live, to help in the saving such a lad as Tam Saugster.”“They helped one another,” said Jean softly.“Ay. That I can easily believe. There are few men like Tam when ance ye ken him.”“And Jean thinks there are few like George,” said Marion smiling, as they came away.“And isna that what you think of your brother?” said Jean.“Oh! yes; and with good reason,” Marion said; and the rest of their talk was of their brothers, till they came to the gate of Saughleas.

That was but the beginning. Mr Dawson might have had a dull time for the next few days, since Mr Manners was more than usually engaged, and Mrs Manners was not permitted to come down-stairs very early. But he did not. There was the boy, and there was Marion, ready to show one another off to the best advantage for his admiration and amusement. And when the boy was carried away by his nurse, Marion still considered herself responsible for the entertainment of the old gentleman of whom, since he had showed himself inclined to unbend, she had ceased to be afraid.

She read to him, she sang to him, she talked to him about many things—about the leaders in theTimes, the fishing interests, the prospects of a good harvest. And when other subjects failed there was always Portie to fall back upon. Her interest in all that pertained to her old home and its inhabitants was inexhaustible.

“Oh! we are never at a loss,” she told Mrs Manners, when she asked her how they had got through the day.

It might have come to that, however, if Mrs Manners had not judiciously suggested a change. When one morning Mr Dawson said he must go into the city, his daughter suggested that business and pleasure might be united for once, and he might take Marion. His business took him to the Bank of England, and there Marion found her pleasure. For he took her through all that wonderful place and showed her what was to be seen, to her great delight.

Then they threaded their way through the crowds of Cheapside, and came to the great cathedral which hitherto Marion had only seen in the distance. It was almost too much in one day, she thought, the Bank of England and Saint Paul’s. But did she not enjoy it? They only meant to go in to rest for a minute, but hours passed before they came out again.

Then Mr Dawson took her to lunch at a curious little place near Ludgate Hill, and then they moved through crowds again along Fleet Street till they came to Temple Bar and turned into the Temple.

Oh! the peace and quiet of the place, after the jostling and noise and confusion of the great thoroughfare! Marion fancied herself walking in a dream, as they wandered through the silent courts, and listened to the soft “plash, plash” of the fountain, and then sat down to rest under the trees of the garden.

A score of names famous in history and fiction rose to her lips. They had not said much to one another all the morning. Marion had said only a word now and then in her delight at the wonderful things she saw, but as they sat a while to rest and catch the cool air blowing from the river before they set out for home, her lips were opened, and she talked a good deal more than she would have been likely to do to Mr Dawson, or any one else, in other circumstances.

Foolish talk some of it was, about unreal folk who will still live forever because of the genius that called them into being. Unknown names most of them were to her listener; and in another mood and place, he might have called it all folly or worse. But he listened now with the pleased interest that one gives to the fancies of a child. And all she said was not foolish, he acknowledged as she went on. There were little words now and then, clear and keen and wise, which pleased him well.

But nothing that was seen or said that day pleased him so much as this.

“You have made a day of it together,” said Mrs Manners laughing, as she met them at the door. “You must be tired enough by this time.”

“Yes, I am tired. And no wonder. I think I never had so much pleasure in one day in all my life before.”

She did not say it to him. He only heard it by chance as she passed up the stairs. But he said to himself that there should be more such days for one so easily pleased before he left London.

And so there were. They saw together pictures and people, parks and gardens. They went to Richmond and Kew and Hampton Court, and to more places besides. Mrs Manners went with them sometimes, but their energy and interest were too much for her, and usually she let them go without her. And Mr Dawson was fain to acknowledge to himself that he had a share in the pleasure which he meant to give “the blithe and bonny lassie” at such times.

She was “blithe and bonny” at all times, but when he saw her, as often happened, moving about among the guests that sometimes filled his daughter’s pretty rooms, none more admired and none more worthy of admiration than she, he owned that she was more than that.

They were not just well-dressed, well-mannered nobodies that Mrs Manners entertained. Many of them were men and women who had been heard of in the world for their worth or their wisdom, or for good work of one kind or another done by them. And this blithe and bonny lassie, who enjoyed her play with the child and her sight-seeing with the old man, was not out of place among them. She was young and a little shy of folk that seemed great folk to her, and she was very quiet and silent among them. But many eyes followed her with delight as she moved up and down among them in her pretty evening dress; and she had words of wisdom spoken to her now and then as well as the rest, and she could answer them too, on occasion, as he did not fail to see.

She sang too, not only the old songs that delighted him, but grand, grave music, to which they listened who were far wiser about such things than he. She was a wonder to him at such times, but in the morning she was just as usual, “bonny and blithe” and easily pleased.

“Ye mind me whiles of our Jean,” said he to her one day, and he could not but wonder at the sudden brightness that flashed over her face at the words. Mrs Manners laughed.

“That is the very utmost that can be said, papa. You cannot go beyond that. There is no one like. Jean in. Marion’s eyes.”

“Am I like her? Maybe I may grow like her, sometime,” said the girl softly.

All this time May had been keeping a wise silence with regard to her friend. She believed that he would see all that was good and pleasant in her all the more readily that they were not pointed out to him; and so it proved.

The days passed quickly and happily and came to an end too soon. All this time Mrs Calderwood had been at the seaside with her old friend, who had needed the change, and when they returned Marion was called home. She was glad to go home, but at the same time she acknowledged herself sorry to leave.

“For I think I never had so much pleasure all my life before. Only I am afraid my mother will think I cannot have been much comfort to you.”

“She will be quite mistaken then,” said Mrs Manners laughing and kissing her. “You have been a great comfort to me.”

A great surprise awaited Marion when she reached home. She found her mother pondering gravely over a letter which she held in her hand, and the shadow of care did not—as it ought to have done—pass from her face as her daughter came in. It deepened rather; and in her pre-occupation she almost forgot to return the girl’s greeting.

“Is any thing wrong, mother? Is it Willie?”

“No, no. It is a letter I have gotten from Miss Jean.” She spoke with hesitation. Marion looked wistfully at the familiar handwriting of her old friend.

“Miss Jean asks you to visit her in Portie. It seems her nephew and niece are thinking of a journey, but Miss Dawson doubts about leaving her aunt, who is not strong. Miss Jean thinks she would go if you would promise to go and stay with her a while.”

“Oh! mother! I should so like it.” Marion held out her hand for the letter, but her mother did not offer it to her; she read bits of it here and there instead.

“‘I have said nothing about it to Jean, and shall not till I hear from you. They would likely set off at once if you would promise to let Marion come to me, and that would please you, though—’

“‘If you decide to let her come, she might travel here with young Mr Petrie, who, I hear, is soon to be in London. Though I think myself it might be better for her to come at once, in the company of my brother, who will not likely stay much longer.’”

“Oh, mother! I should so like to go. And is that all that Miss Jean says?”

“All she says about your visit.”

“You don’t wish me to go. Why, mother? It is nae surely that you canna trust me so far away? I am not more foolish than other girls, am I?”

Mrs Calderwood looked at her a moment as though she did not understand what she was saying. Then she laughed and kissed her.

“Nonsense! dear. You are a sensible lassie and discreet. I would be sorry to disappoint Miss Jean, though she has friends enough in Portie one would think. But it is the first favour she has ever asked of me, and many a one she has done me.”

“But, mother, I think this is a favour to us—to me at least. Oh! it seems too good to be true.”

“Well, we will think about it.”

“And, mother, if I should go, I would like—wouldn’t you? rather to go with Mr Dawson than with James Petrie.”

Her mother’s face clouded again.

“What ails you at young Mr Petrie?”

Marion shrugged her shoulders.

“Oh! nothing. Only I like Mr Dawson better—better than I could have believed possible. He has been very good to me. I haven’t told you yet. Mother, I think he must have grown a better man since George came home.”

Her mother said nothing. She did not think well of Mr Dawson. She did not wish to think well of him. When she had heard from Marion that he had come to his daughter’s house, her first impulse was to recall her at once. The impossibility of leaving her old friend, or of permitting Marion to travel alone, prevented her from acting on her first impulse, and when she had time to consider the matter, she saw that it would be better for her to remain. It was not likely that Mr Dawson would see much of her, and whatever he might feel, he would not do otherwise than treat politely his daughter’s guest.

That he should “begood to her,” that he should put himself about, as she knew he must have done, to give her pleasure surprised her, but it did not please her. She had forgiven him, she told herself. At least she bore him no ill-will for the share he and his had had in the trouble of her life, but she wished to have nothing at all to do with him, either as friend or foe.

But Miss Jean’s friendship was quite apart from all this. It had been a refuge to her in times of trouble long before she lost her Elsie, and this invitation was but another proof of her friendship, and she would let her daughter go.

As for her escort—Mrs Calderwood was as averse to accepting James Petrie as such, as her daughter was, though from a different reason. But she was equally averse to any appearance of presuming on the kindness of Mr Dawson. Fortunately the matter was taken out of her hands.

Mrs Manners came the next day empowered to plead that Miss Jean’s invitation should be accepted, and when she found that this was not necessary, she found courage to propose that instead of waiting for any one, Marion should hasten her preparations and go on at once with her father.

Trouble! What possible trouble could it be for her father to sit in the same railway carriage with the child? As for Jamie Petrie—it was easy seen what he was after. But it would be quite too great a grace to grant him at this early stage of—of his plans and projects. Oh! yes. Of course it was all nonsense, but then—

But the nonsense helped to bring Mrs Calderwood to consent that Marion should go at once. And so it was arranged.

It would have pleased Mr Dawson to take Marion with him to Saughleas, but this she modestly but firmly declined, because her mother expected her to go at once to Miss Jean’s house by the sea, and there she was kindly welcomed.

It was like getting home again, she said. The sound of the sea soothed her to sleep, and it woke her in the morning with a voice as familiar as if she had never been away. She was out, and away over the sands to the Tangle Stanes, and had renewed acquaintance with half the bairns in Portie, before Miss Jean was ready for her breakfast.

The bairns had all grown big, and the streets and lanes, the houses and shops, had all grown narrow and small, she thought. But the sea had not changed, nor the sands, nor the far-away hills, nor the sky—which was, oh! so different from the sky in London. Marion had not changed much, her friends thought. Some of them said she was bigger and bonnier, but she was blithe and friendly and “a’e fauld” still—and London hadna spoiled her as it might very easily have done. At any rate she meant to enjoy every hour of her stay, and that was the way she began.

She did not miss Jean either, for George had been called away on business for a few days and when he returned they were to set out on their travels. During these few days Marion saw much of her friend. Jean was graver than she used to be, Marion thought; but she was kind and friendly, and could be merry too, on occasion. They had much to say to one another, and they spent hours together in the old familiar places, in the wood and on the rocks by the sea, and heard one another’s “secrets,” which were only secrets in the sense that neither of them would have been likely to tell them to any one else.

Marion told her friend all that she had been seeing and doing and reading, and some things that she had been hoping, since she went away, and Jean did little more. She told what her brother was doing and the help she tried to give him, and she told of the life that seemed to be opening before them.

Not such a life as they used to plan and dream about for themselves, when they were young; a quiet, uneventful, busy-life, just like the lives of other people. Judging from the look on Jean’s face it did not seem a very joyful life to look forward to. Marion regarded her friend with wistful eyes.

“No. It will never be that, I am sure—just like the lives of other people, I mean.”

“And why not? Well, perhaps not altogether. It will be an easier life than the lives of most people, I suppose. It will not just be a struggle for bread, as it is for so many. And we can do something for others who need help, and we need not be tied to one place every day of the year, as most folk are. And by and by we will be ‘looked up to,’ and our advice will be asked, and folk will say of us, as they say of my father, that ‘they are much respeckit in the countryside.’ And by that time I shall be ‘auld Miss Jean,’ and near done with it all. But it is a long look till then.”

“But it may be all quite different from that. Many a thing may happen to change it all.”

“Oh! many things will happen, as you say. May and her bairns will be coming and going, and the bairns will fit into the places that the years will leave empty, and George will need a staff like my father, and I will grow ‘frail’ like Auntie Jean, and sit waiting and looking at the sea. And ye needna sit lookin’ at me with such pitiful e’en, for who is waiting so happily as she? And yet who will be so glad to go when her time shall come?”

Marion said nothing, but turned her eyes seaward with a grave face. Jean went on.

“Yes, many things will happen, but it will be just the same thing over again. The ships will sail away, and there will be long waiting, and some of them will come home, and some will never come, and the pain will be as hard to bear as if it had never come to many a sore heart before. And some folk will be glad, and some will be at least content, and some will make mistakes and spoil their lives and then just wait on to the end. Marion, what are you thinking about?”

“I’m wondering if it is really you who are saying all that. And I am thinking that is not the way Miss Jean would speak.”

“Oh! Miss Jean! No, she has won safely past all that. But once, long ago, before she had learned the secret of peaceful and patient waiting, she might have been afraid of the days. Come, it is growing cold. Let us go on.”

They rose from the Tangle Stanes where they had been sitting and moved away, and Jean said,—

“And as for you—Are you sure it is to be the grand school after all? Well, you will come back when the heat and burden of the day is over to take your rest in Portie. And you will be a stately old lady, a little worn and sharp perhaps, as is the fate of schoolmistresses; but with fine manners, and wisdom enough for us all. And the new generation of Petries will admire you and make much of you—not quite as the Petries of the present day would like to do,” said Jean laughing. “And behold! there is Master Jamie coming on at a great pace. Shall we let him overtake us? Or shall we go in and see poor old Tibbie and let him pass by?”

They were on their way to Saughleas, where Marion was to pay her first visit. Miss Jean had gone on already in the pony carriage, but the girls were walking round by the shore. There was no reason why Marion should wish to avoid Mr James Petrie, except that she wished no one’s company when she had Jean’s, but she was quite willing to go into Mrs Cairnie’s house where she had been several times already. It was a different looking place from the house to which Miss Jean had taken Mrs Eastwood long ago. Mrs Cairnie’s daughter Annie had returned and was going to remain, and the place was “weel redd up,” and indeed as pleasant a dwelling, of its kind, as one would wish to see. Poor old Tibbie had lately met with a sad mishap, which threatened to put an end to her wanderings, and keep her a prisoner at home for some time to come. Annie had come home to care for her, with the design of earning the bread of both, by making gowns and bonnets for such of the sailors’ wives and fisher folk, as were not equal to the making their Sunday best for themselves.

But a different lot awaited her. She had gone away with the English lady “to better herself,” it was said; but that was only half the reason of her going. She went because she feared to be beguiled into marrying a man whom she loved, but whom she could not respect, because of his enslavement to one besetting sin.

The love of strong drink had brought misery to her home, since ever she could remember. It had driven her brothers away from it and had caused her father’s death and her mother’s widowhood, and she shrank with terror from the thought of living such a life as her mother had lived. When her lover entreated her, saying, that being his wife she might save him from his sin, she did not believe it; but she knew that in her love and her weakness she might yield her will to his, and lose herself without saving him. So she went away with a sore heart, and when her mother’s accident had made it necessary for her to come home again, she hardly could tell whether she was glad or sorry to come.

And the first “kenned face” she saw as she drew near home was the face of her lover. He did not see her. He had stepped from another carriage of the train, into the little station a few miles from Portie. Young George Dawson’s hand rested on his shoulder, for the single minute that he stood there, a very different looking person from the wild lad she had left years ago.

“Yon’s young Saughleas,” she heard one fellow-traveller say to another. “And yon’s Tam Saugster. He’s hame again, it seems.”

“I ha’e heard that he has gathered himsel’ up wonderfu’ this while back. He is a fine sailor-like lad.”

“Ay. He’s his ain man now. And he’ll be skipper o’ the ‘John Seaton’ before she sails again if young George Dawson gets his way, and they say he gets it in most things with his father.”

Then Annie saw the sailor spring back into the carriage again as the signal was given, and she got a glimpse of George Dawson’s kindly face as they passed, and then she saw nothing for a while for the rush of tears which she had much ado to hide.

“The skipper o’ the ‘John Seaton’! Ah! weel, he has forgotten me lang syne, but that is little matter since he has found himsel’.”

But Tam had not forgotten her, and whatever he might have done at the time, he did not now resent her refusal to take as her master one who could not master himself. That very night as she sat in the gloaming listening to her mother’s fretful complaints, and taking counsel with herself as to how they were to live in the coming days, a familiar step came to the door, and Tam lifted the latch and came in without waiting to be bidden.

All the rest was natural enough and easy. The next time Tam sailed he was to sail as master of the “John Seaton,” and he was to sail a married man, he said firmly, and what could Annie do but yield and begin her preparations forthwith. The cottage in which Mrs Cairnie had hitherto had but a room, was taken, and Tam set himself to making it worthy to be the home of the woman he loved.

And a neat and pleasant place it looked when Jean and Marion went in that day. Into the pretty parlour the bride that was to be looked shyly, scarcely venturing to follow them.

It was Marion who displayed to Jean the various pretty and useful things already gathered.

On the mantel-piece was a handsome clock, and over it the picture of a ship with all her canvas spread, sailing over smooth seas, in the full light of the sun of an Arctic summer day. There was a low rocky shore in sight, and the gleam of icy peaks in the distance; but the ship with the sunshine on the spreading sails was the point of interest in the picture—and a pleasant picture it was for the eyes of a sailor’s wife to rest upon. They were both Mr George Dawson’s gift to the bride, Marion told Jean. Jean nodded and smiled.

“Yes, I know,” said she.

“Miss Dawson,” said Annie taking one step over the threshold where she had been standing all the time. “It is all your brother’s work, and you must let me say to you what I canna say to him. Though he had done no more good in the world, it was worth his while to live, to help in the saving such a lad as Tam Saugster.”

“They helped one another,” said Jean softly.

“Ay. That I can easily believe. There are few men like Tam when ance ye ken him.”

“And Jean thinks there are few like George,” said Marion smiling, as they came away.

“And isna that what you think of your brother?” said Jean.

“Oh! yes; and with good reason,” Marion said; and the rest of their talk was of their brothers, till they came to the gate of Saughleas.

Chapter Twenty One.A Meeting.Mr Dawson and Miss Jean were sitting on the terrace by the parlour window as they went in. Jean knew by many signs that her father and Marion had come to be very good friends, and she was prepared to see him give her a warm and kindly welcome. But she was a little surprised at the ease and pleasure with which Marion met him. She did not turn away after a shy brief greeting, as the young people who came there were rather apt to do, but smiled brightly and answered merrily when he asked her whether she had enjoyed all that she had expected to enjoy when she came to Portie. And then she sat down on the grass at Miss Jean’s feet, and looked round with a sigh of satisfaction at “the bonny place.”“What kept you on the way?” asked Miss Jean. “Oh! we came round by the shore,” said her niece, “and we sat a while at the Tangle Stanes, and then we went in to see Mrs Cairnie—and by the by—we didna see her after all.”“She was sleeping,” said Marion.“And we were admiring the fine things that Captain Saugster has been gathering for his bride,” said Jean.“That would hardly have kept you long,” said Mr Dawson. “A few chairs and a table, and a bed and blankets, and some dishes.”“But we saw more than that; didna we, Marion?”“Yes. Even Annie herself wasna thinking of chairs and tables and dishes. It was of the new home that is to be there, we were thinking, and it never might have been, if—Jean, tell them what Annie said.”“Tell it yourself,” said Jean.“I canna just mind all,” said Marion with hesitation. “But it was to Mr George Dawson that they owed it all—their happiness, I mean—and that it was a grand thing to have a hand in saving such a lad as Tam.”“She thinks muckle o’ Tam, it seems,” said Mr Dawson laughing. “And he is a good sailor, if he can only keep hold o’ himsel’ where the drink is concerned.”“His Master will keep hold of him, I trust,” said Miss Jean.“And is he to sail the ‘John Seaton,’ papa?” asked Jean.“That is what George says. There is a risk, but we’ll take it, and Tam will be none the less safe for the responsibility, let us hope.”“Annie is proud and glad, and so are all the Saugsters,” said Marion.“But the proudest and gladdest of all must be—George.”“Ay, even the angels are glad over a sinner repenting,” said Miss Jean.Mr Dawson looked from one to the other.“Saved, is he! And George did it? But Tam has hardly been tried yet.”“Oh! yes. He is surely to be trusted now. Three whole years since he has touched a glass. Yes, nearly three years Annie told me once—and I think she wouldna be vexed at my telling you, because—George belongs to you,” said Marion, turning a soft bright glance on Mr Dawson. She rose in her eagerness, and stood before them, and with softened voice and changing colour told the story of one dark night on board the “John Seaton,” when some kind word of George’s had touched a sore spot in poor Tam Saugster’s remorseful heart, and had opened his lips to utter all his shame and sorrow over a life worse than wasted. The very first thought of hope that had come to Tam since Annie forsook him, came when George laughed at him for saying that his life was nearly over. He was but a lad yet, and his life was before him, and the way was to let the past be past, and begin again with better help than he had asked for yet. And Tam was not ashamed to say that his tears had fallen fast into the sea as he listened, and if he had been his own brother, George could not have been more patient with him, or have done more for him than he had done. “And I think,” added Marion, turning her shining eyes on the old man, “that George must be even happier than his friend.”She paused suddenly, turning a startled look to Miss Jean, who had gently touched her hand. Jean was looking at her father with a smile upon her lips, but he was looking away to the sea.“Shouldna I have said it? Was it wrong? Tell me what you are thinking about, Miss Jean,” said Marion in dismay.“I’m thinking the wind has been making free with your hair, my lassie, and it is near tea-time.”Jean kissed her laughing.“Come with me and put your hair in order, as auntie says. No, never mind. There is nothing to look grave about. It was only that my aunt was surprised to hear any body say so many words to my father, and about George too. Oh! yes, he liked it, you may be sure. I’m glad that he heard it anyway.”“But I’m afraid that Miss Jean must have thought me—forward,” said Marion, hesitating over the hateful word.“Nonsense, you are not a child any longer. And she was as well pleased as I am that my father should hear it all.”It was Mr Dawson who broke the silence that fell on them when the girls went away.“She is an outspoken lassie yon.”“Ye canna judge her as ye might any o’ the common sort,” said Miss Jean shortly.“I’m no’ seeking to judge her. She seems a nice lassie enough. I like her frank, free way.”“She’s but a bairn—though she is the height of our Jean, and coming on to womanhood,” said Miss Jean with a sigh.“Ay. She is a weel grown lassie,” said Mr Dawson, rising, and then he went away and moved up and down the walks, pausing at shrub or tree, or flower bed, as his manner was when he was at leisure, and he only returned in time to give Miss Jean his arm when they were called into the house.That evening they were so fortunate as to have the company of James Petrie and his sisters, and several other young people, among whom was Mr Charles Scott, to whom the eldest Miss Petrie was engaged. The young people enjoyed themselves, but Marion was not able to forget the touch of Miss Jean’s fingers upon her arm, and she was rather grave and silent, the others thought. They had music, in which she took her part, singing a song or two, and then Miss Petrie played her masterpiece, a very grand piece indeed, in the midst of which Mr Dawson went out to the little gate to wait for his son.He had gone there many times since that first night of his son’s coming home. He did not always wait till he came in sight. He moved away sometimes, as his footsteps drew near, slow to acknowledge to himself, or to let his son see how much his home coming meant to him. But to-night he waited.“There are young folk at the house to-night,” said he, as though giving a reason for being in the garden at that hour.“The Petries are there, and young Scott, who seems to be one of them. And your aunt is over and her visitor. Will you go and see them?”“Oh! yes, surely; only I would need to go upstairs first. Jamie Petrie! What brings him here? I thought that was over,” said George with a laugh.“Is it Jean you mean?” said Mr Dawson gravely. “But it’s no’ Jean the nicht.”Very evidently it was not Jean, Mr Dawson thought when he went in again. Young Mr Petrie had eyes for only one, and that was Marion, who, sitting at Miss Jean’s side, seemed busy with a piece of worsted work. Mr Petrie was talking eagerly and confidentially, as though he had a right as well as a pleasure in doing so.“He has put Jean out of his head soon enough,” said Mr Dawson to himself, by way of accounting for the uncomfortable feeling of which he was conscious at the sight.“Are we to have no more music? Will you not give us another song, Miss Petrie?” said he.Certainly Miss Petrie would give him more than one, but Marion Calderwood must come with her—not to sing, but to turn her music for her, a task to which Mr Scott was not quite equal. And so it happened that Marion was standing gravely at her side, in the full light of the lamp, when George came to the door of the room. He stood for a moment, with his eyes, full of wonder and pain, on the fair thoughtful face of the girl, and his father saw him grow white as he gazed.“He hasna forgotten,” thought he with a sudden, sharp pang of regret and anger.Would the memory of the dead girl ever stand between him and his son? He had not thought Marion like her sister; but as he saw her now, standing so still with a face of unwonted gravity, there came a vivid remembrance of the young girl who in his hearing had said so quietly and firmly to her mother,—“He will never forget me, and I will never give him up.”“She should never have been brought here. What could Jean have been thinking about? What could I have been thinking about myself?”When he looked again George was gone. When, however, he came into the dining-room, where they were all assembled later, he appeared just as usual, and greeted the young people merrily enough. But Mr Dawson forgot to notice him particularly, so startled was he by the sudden brightness of Marion’s face at the sight of him. George did not see her at first—at least he did not seem to see her, and she stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, her smile growing a little wistful as she waited for his coming. Miss Jean looked grave as she watched her.“George,” said his sister, laying her hand on Marion’s and drawing her forward, “George, who is this? Have you forgotten our wee Maysie?”No, that was not likely, he said; but he could scarcely have been more ceremoniously polite in his greeting had she been a strange young lady from London, and not the Marion whom he had petted and played with as a child. He lingered a moment beside her, asking about her mother, and if there had been any news from her brother, and then he went to his place at the table, and made himself busy with his duty there.Something was said about the anticipated trip to the continent, and the time of setting out George had intended to leave at once if his sister were ready, but he found he must stay in Portie a few days longer.“But next week, Jean, we must go, or give it up altogether.”“The sooner you go now, the better, or the best season will be over,” said Mr Petrie.“Oh! as to that, any season is good for what we mean to do.”“Still, the sooner the better. Could not I do what would be necessary to let you go at once?” said his father.George laughed and shook his head.“I am afraid not. It seems I stand pledged to be best man at Captain Saugster’s marriage, and he has no idea of putting off the happy day for a month or more—since his time may be short. So he is to hasten it on instead, and I must wait and see him through it.”“That will hardly be fair on Annie,” said Miss Jean.“Oh! she is ready, I dare say; and she can finish her preparations afterwards,” said Miss Petrie.“And it is to be very quiet. Indeed, hardly a wedding at all in the usual sense,” said George.“But that is rather mean of Tam, I think,” said Mr Petrie. “He ought to give a dance on board the ‘John Seaton,’ if he is to have the command of her.”His sisters were charmed with the idea. And would not Mr George put the thought into Tam’s head?“The ‘John Seaton’ is not in yet. He would hardly consent to wait for that,” said Mr Scott.“Don’t you call it a risk, giving a man like Tam Saugster the command of a vessel like the ‘John Seaton’?”Mr Petrie asked the question not at George, but at his father.“There is ay a risk of one kind or another about all seafaring matters,” said Mr Dawson quietly.“But there ought to be a fine wedding. Tam is quite a credit to the town now. We could all go to the dance,” said Miss Annie Petrie.“But I am afraid Tam would not long be a credit to the town if the whiskey were to flow as freely as it usually does at sailors’ weddings. That could hardly be dispensed with, the whiskey, I mean. It would test Tam’s principles at any rate, in which I cannot say I have very great faith,” said James with a little sneer.“I think keeping out of the way of temptation might be a better proof of his wisdom,” said Mr Dawson coldly. “I doubt, Jean, your aunt is getting wearied. She should be allowed to go.”But Jean had long ago sent word to Nannie that her mistress was to stay at Saughleas for the night. The young people did not linger much longer. George went out with them to the gate, and did not return till the rest had gone upstairs. Nor did they see him in the morning. He had taken an early breakfast and gone away long before any one was down.On each of the three days that passed before Jean and her brother went away, George went to his aunt’s house as was his daily custom; but he scarcely saw Marion. The first day she had gone out, the next his father was with him, and the third time there were several of Marion’s young companions with her, so that no word passed between them till the day of Tam Saugster’s marriage.“If marriage it could be called,” said some of Tam’s indignant friends, “going off on the sly as gin he were ashamed o’ himsel’.”They were by no means ashamed of themselves. Tam and Annie went quietly to the manse with Tam’s father and mother, where Miss Dawson and her brother and Marion Calderwood and Maggie and Robbie Saugster were waiting for them, and they “got it putten ower quaietly,” as Tam’s father rather discontentedly said. His judgment doubtless approved of “a teetotal” marriage in Tam’s case, but neither his taste nor his sense of the fitness of things was satisfied. Who had a better right to feast their friends and “fill them fou” on such an occasion than the Saugsters? And to go back to Tam’s house just to tea and jelly and fushionless sweet cakes!—It might be prudent, but it wasna pleasant, and any thing but creditable, in his father’s opinion.And while he grumbled secretly the bride’s mother, poor Mrs Cairnie, openly resented and railed at the manner of the marriage as mean, and as a confession of most shameful weakness on Tam’s part. Even shrewd and sensible Mrs Saugster, though joyful over her returned prodigal and thankful to escape the risks attending a marriage as usually ordered in their rank of life, even she did not think it wrong to connive at the brewing of a steaming bowl of “toddy” for the comforting of the old folks when Tam and his wife had set out on their week of pleasure, and all the rest of the young folk were gone away.It was a “bonny nicht,” Jean said, as they lingered in their walk down the street. Over the soft glow of sunset fading in the west hung the pale new moon, and a star showed here and there among the grey wreaths and flakes of cloud that floated far beneath the blue. The tide was out, and over the sands came the soft “lap, lap” of tiny waves, with a sound more restful than silence. They stood still a minute at the point where they were to turn into the High-street.“We may as well go home the long way. It is not late yet,” said Jean.“Going home the long way,” meant turning back, and going over the sands, the mile that lay between the town and the Tangle Stanes, and they turned with one accord.“It is our last night for a while,” said Jean, and scarcely another word was spoken till they found themselves climbing the broken path that led to the High Rocks. The night air blew cool from the sea, and Jean led the way to the sheltered seat a little further down. The two girls sat down together, and George stood above them with folded arms, looking out upon the sea.They spoke about “the happy couple,” who had gone away to begin their new life together, about Tam’s long voyage and Annie’s hopeful waiting, and the chances they had of happiness, because they loved one another. And then they went on to other things, some of them glad, and some of them sad, and “do you mind that time?” and “have you forgotten this?” they said, and sometimes they sighed, and sometimes they smiled, and at last they fell into silence. By and by Jean rose and moving upward, paced up and down the narrow ledge, as she had done so many a time before in so many a mood. The two who remained were silent still, busy with their own thoughts, till George, stooping down and speaking softly, said.“Marion, do you mind one day coming here with—Elsie and me?”“Ay, George, I mind it well.”Marion turned, and took in both hers the hand that he held out to her.“Poor George!” said she, drooping her head till her cheek just touched it. Then she rose and stood beside him still holding his hand. George stood with his face turned away, and neither spoke or moved for a good while.“George, do I mind you of her? Does it grieve you to see me?”George turned and met the look in her sweet wistful eyes.“You mind me of her, but it does not grieve me to see you—my dear little sister.”And then George did an unwise thing. He clasped and kissed her, and held her to him, “as I might have clasped and kissed my own sister,” he said to himself afterward, trying to still the voice that said it was not wise.And Marion went home smiling in the darkness, and saying to herself,—“Now I have two brothers, and which of them I love best; I’m sure I canna say.”So George and Jean set out on their travels next day, and Miss Jean and her visitor were left to entertain one another, and they did not find it a difficult thing to do. Miss Jean had lived too much alone, to care even for pleasant company continually, and Marion had friends and engagements enough to call her away, so as to leave her to her solitude for a while each day. And whether she was out with her friends, or at home with Miss Jean, she was happy as the day was long.They had many quiet hours together, when the wisdom which had come to the elder woman out of her sore troubles and solitary days which God had blessed, and out of willing service given to the needy and the suffering for His sake, was spoken for the good of the girl who had all her troubles and her solitary days before her. These were the hours that afterwards Marion liked best to remember.It seemed a very happy world to her in those days. Nothing evil or sad seemed possible to her in her young strength and hopefulness. And even trouble itself, sickness or pain or disappointment, if it brought to her what had come through all these to Miss Jean—a heart at peace, a heavenly hope, surely even of these things she need not be afraid. When she said something like this to Miss Jean, her old friend smiled and answered,—“Surely not. Even when you feel the pain you needna fear the evil. And when the pain hurts most—is worst to bear, I mean—it doesna really harm. Why should I fear for you?”“And do you fear for me more than for the rest?” said Marion gravely.“I ought to fear less for you than for some, because I hope ye’re one who winna lose the good which is meant to come out of all trouble. But ye’re young and bonny and winsome, and whiles troubles come to such that pass others by; and a heart both strong and tender, such troubles hurt sore. But the sorer the pain the deeper and sweeter the peace, if it sends you to the feet of the Master,” added Miss Jean cheerfully.There was silence for a little while, and Miss Jean looked up with surprise at Marion’s first words.“Am I bonny, Miss Jean? As bonny as our Elsie was?”Miss Jean looked at her a moment without speaking. Elsie Calderwood had indeed been a bonny lassie, but looking at her sister, Miss Jean could not but acknowledge that she was far more than that. She was like her sister. She had the same sweet eyes and lovely colour, the same wealth of shining hair. But in the face before her Miss Jean’s discerning eye saw a beauty beyond that of mere form and colouring. It might have come to Elsie too, with cultivation, and a higher intelligence, and the wisdom that experience brings. But Miss Jean, remembering well the girl who was dead, saw in her living sister’s face a beauty that had never been in Elsie’s.“Does your mother think ye’re like your sister?” said she, evading the question.“My mother hardly ever speaks about my sister. But once—some one said—that I minded him of her.”As she spoke, a feint, sweet colour overspread her face. Her eyes did not fall before the grave eyes of her old friend, but there came into them a soft, bright gleam, “like a glint o’ sunshine on the sea,” Miss Jean told herself as she gazed.“Ay, ye’re like her. I think them that mind her weel would say that ye’re like her.”Marion’s head drooped and rested on her hand.“Whiles I wonder how it would have seemed if Elsie hadna died.”“It was a mysterious Providence indeed, her early death. The living should lay it to heart,” said Miss Jean; and then she took up the book that lay at her hand—a sign that no more was to be said at that time.

Mr Dawson and Miss Jean were sitting on the terrace by the parlour window as they went in. Jean knew by many signs that her father and Marion had come to be very good friends, and she was prepared to see him give her a warm and kindly welcome. But she was a little surprised at the ease and pleasure with which Marion met him. She did not turn away after a shy brief greeting, as the young people who came there were rather apt to do, but smiled brightly and answered merrily when he asked her whether she had enjoyed all that she had expected to enjoy when she came to Portie. And then she sat down on the grass at Miss Jean’s feet, and looked round with a sigh of satisfaction at “the bonny place.”

“What kept you on the way?” asked Miss Jean. “Oh! we came round by the shore,” said her niece, “and we sat a while at the Tangle Stanes, and then we went in to see Mrs Cairnie—and by the by—we didna see her after all.”

“She was sleeping,” said Marion.

“And we were admiring the fine things that Captain Saugster has been gathering for his bride,” said Jean.

“That would hardly have kept you long,” said Mr Dawson. “A few chairs and a table, and a bed and blankets, and some dishes.”

“But we saw more than that; didna we, Marion?”

“Yes. Even Annie herself wasna thinking of chairs and tables and dishes. It was of the new home that is to be there, we were thinking, and it never might have been, if—Jean, tell them what Annie said.”

“Tell it yourself,” said Jean.

“I canna just mind all,” said Marion with hesitation. “But it was to Mr George Dawson that they owed it all—their happiness, I mean—and that it was a grand thing to have a hand in saving such a lad as Tam.”

“She thinks muckle o’ Tam, it seems,” said Mr Dawson laughing. “And he is a good sailor, if he can only keep hold o’ himsel’ where the drink is concerned.”

“His Master will keep hold of him, I trust,” said Miss Jean.

“And is he to sail the ‘John Seaton,’ papa?” asked Jean.

“That is what George says. There is a risk, but we’ll take it, and Tam will be none the less safe for the responsibility, let us hope.”

“Annie is proud and glad, and so are all the Saugsters,” said Marion.

“But the proudest and gladdest of all must be—George.”

“Ay, even the angels are glad over a sinner repenting,” said Miss Jean.

Mr Dawson looked from one to the other.

“Saved, is he! And George did it? But Tam has hardly been tried yet.”

“Oh! yes. He is surely to be trusted now. Three whole years since he has touched a glass. Yes, nearly three years Annie told me once—and I think she wouldna be vexed at my telling you, because—George belongs to you,” said Marion, turning a soft bright glance on Mr Dawson. She rose in her eagerness, and stood before them, and with softened voice and changing colour told the story of one dark night on board the “John Seaton,” when some kind word of George’s had touched a sore spot in poor Tam Saugster’s remorseful heart, and had opened his lips to utter all his shame and sorrow over a life worse than wasted. The very first thought of hope that had come to Tam since Annie forsook him, came when George laughed at him for saying that his life was nearly over. He was but a lad yet, and his life was before him, and the way was to let the past be past, and begin again with better help than he had asked for yet. And Tam was not ashamed to say that his tears had fallen fast into the sea as he listened, and if he had been his own brother, George could not have been more patient with him, or have done more for him than he had done. “And I think,” added Marion, turning her shining eyes on the old man, “that George must be even happier than his friend.”

She paused suddenly, turning a startled look to Miss Jean, who had gently touched her hand. Jean was looking at her father with a smile upon her lips, but he was looking away to the sea.

“Shouldna I have said it? Was it wrong? Tell me what you are thinking about, Miss Jean,” said Marion in dismay.

“I’m thinking the wind has been making free with your hair, my lassie, and it is near tea-time.”

Jean kissed her laughing.

“Come with me and put your hair in order, as auntie says. No, never mind. There is nothing to look grave about. It was only that my aunt was surprised to hear any body say so many words to my father, and about George too. Oh! yes, he liked it, you may be sure. I’m glad that he heard it anyway.”

“But I’m afraid that Miss Jean must have thought me—forward,” said Marion, hesitating over the hateful word.

“Nonsense, you are not a child any longer. And she was as well pleased as I am that my father should hear it all.”

It was Mr Dawson who broke the silence that fell on them when the girls went away.

“She is an outspoken lassie yon.”

“Ye canna judge her as ye might any o’ the common sort,” said Miss Jean shortly.

“I’m no’ seeking to judge her. She seems a nice lassie enough. I like her frank, free way.”

“She’s but a bairn—though she is the height of our Jean, and coming on to womanhood,” said Miss Jean with a sigh.

“Ay. She is a weel grown lassie,” said Mr Dawson, rising, and then he went away and moved up and down the walks, pausing at shrub or tree, or flower bed, as his manner was when he was at leisure, and he only returned in time to give Miss Jean his arm when they were called into the house.

That evening they were so fortunate as to have the company of James Petrie and his sisters, and several other young people, among whom was Mr Charles Scott, to whom the eldest Miss Petrie was engaged. The young people enjoyed themselves, but Marion was not able to forget the touch of Miss Jean’s fingers upon her arm, and she was rather grave and silent, the others thought. They had music, in which she took her part, singing a song or two, and then Miss Petrie played her masterpiece, a very grand piece indeed, in the midst of which Mr Dawson went out to the little gate to wait for his son.

He had gone there many times since that first night of his son’s coming home. He did not always wait till he came in sight. He moved away sometimes, as his footsteps drew near, slow to acknowledge to himself, or to let his son see how much his home coming meant to him. But to-night he waited.

“There are young folk at the house to-night,” said he, as though giving a reason for being in the garden at that hour.

“The Petries are there, and young Scott, who seems to be one of them. And your aunt is over and her visitor. Will you go and see them?”

“Oh! yes, surely; only I would need to go upstairs first. Jamie Petrie! What brings him here? I thought that was over,” said George with a laugh.

“Is it Jean you mean?” said Mr Dawson gravely. “But it’s no’ Jean the nicht.”

Very evidently it was not Jean, Mr Dawson thought when he went in again. Young Mr Petrie had eyes for only one, and that was Marion, who, sitting at Miss Jean’s side, seemed busy with a piece of worsted work. Mr Petrie was talking eagerly and confidentially, as though he had a right as well as a pleasure in doing so.

“He has put Jean out of his head soon enough,” said Mr Dawson to himself, by way of accounting for the uncomfortable feeling of which he was conscious at the sight.

“Are we to have no more music? Will you not give us another song, Miss Petrie?” said he.

Certainly Miss Petrie would give him more than one, but Marion Calderwood must come with her—not to sing, but to turn her music for her, a task to which Mr Scott was not quite equal. And so it happened that Marion was standing gravely at her side, in the full light of the lamp, when George came to the door of the room. He stood for a moment, with his eyes, full of wonder and pain, on the fair thoughtful face of the girl, and his father saw him grow white as he gazed.

“He hasna forgotten,” thought he with a sudden, sharp pang of regret and anger.

Would the memory of the dead girl ever stand between him and his son? He had not thought Marion like her sister; but as he saw her now, standing so still with a face of unwonted gravity, there came a vivid remembrance of the young girl who in his hearing had said so quietly and firmly to her mother,—

“He will never forget me, and I will never give him up.”

“She should never have been brought here. What could Jean have been thinking about? What could I have been thinking about myself?”

When he looked again George was gone. When, however, he came into the dining-room, where they were all assembled later, he appeared just as usual, and greeted the young people merrily enough. But Mr Dawson forgot to notice him particularly, so startled was he by the sudden brightness of Marion’s face at the sight of him. George did not see her at first—at least he did not seem to see her, and she stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, her smile growing a little wistful as she waited for his coming. Miss Jean looked grave as she watched her.

“George,” said his sister, laying her hand on Marion’s and drawing her forward, “George, who is this? Have you forgotten our wee Maysie?”

No, that was not likely, he said; but he could scarcely have been more ceremoniously polite in his greeting had she been a strange young lady from London, and not the Marion whom he had petted and played with as a child. He lingered a moment beside her, asking about her mother, and if there had been any news from her brother, and then he went to his place at the table, and made himself busy with his duty there.

Something was said about the anticipated trip to the continent, and the time of setting out George had intended to leave at once if his sister were ready, but he found he must stay in Portie a few days longer.

“But next week, Jean, we must go, or give it up altogether.”

“The sooner you go now, the better, or the best season will be over,” said Mr Petrie.

“Oh! as to that, any season is good for what we mean to do.”

“Still, the sooner the better. Could not I do what would be necessary to let you go at once?” said his father.

George laughed and shook his head.

“I am afraid not. It seems I stand pledged to be best man at Captain Saugster’s marriage, and he has no idea of putting off the happy day for a month or more—since his time may be short. So he is to hasten it on instead, and I must wait and see him through it.”

“That will hardly be fair on Annie,” said Miss Jean.

“Oh! she is ready, I dare say; and she can finish her preparations afterwards,” said Miss Petrie.

“And it is to be very quiet. Indeed, hardly a wedding at all in the usual sense,” said George.

“But that is rather mean of Tam, I think,” said Mr Petrie. “He ought to give a dance on board the ‘John Seaton,’ if he is to have the command of her.”

His sisters were charmed with the idea. And would not Mr George put the thought into Tam’s head?

“The ‘John Seaton’ is not in yet. He would hardly consent to wait for that,” said Mr Scott.

“Don’t you call it a risk, giving a man like Tam Saugster the command of a vessel like the ‘John Seaton’?”

Mr Petrie asked the question not at George, but at his father.

“There is ay a risk of one kind or another about all seafaring matters,” said Mr Dawson quietly.

“But there ought to be a fine wedding. Tam is quite a credit to the town now. We could all go to the dance,” said Miss Annie Petrie.

“But I am afraid Tam would not long be a credit to the town if the whiskey were to flow as freely as it usually does at sailors’ weddings. That could hardly be dispensed with, the whiskey, I mean. It would test Tam’s principles at any rate, in which I cannot say I have very great faith,” said James with a little sneer.

“I think keeping out of the way of temptation might be a better proof of his wisdom,” said Mr Dawson coldly. “I doubt, Jean, your aunt is getting wearied. She should be allowed to go.”

But Jean had long ago sent word to Nannie that her mistress was to stay at Saughleas for the night. The young people did not linger much longer. George went out with them to the gate, and did not return till the rest had gone upstairs. Nor did they see him in the morning. He had taken an early breakfast and gone away long before any one was down.

On each of the three days that passed before Jean and her brother went away, George went to his aunt’s house as was his daily custom; but he scarcely saw Marion. The first day she had gone out, the next his father was with him, and the third time there were several of Marion’s young companions with her, so that no word passed between them till the day of Tam Saugster’s marriage.

“If marriage it could be called,” said some of Tam’s indignant friends, “going off on the sly as gin he were ashamed o’ himsel’.”

They were by no means ashamed of themselves. Tam and Annie went quietly to the manse with Tam’s father and mother, where Miss Dawson and her brother and Marion Calderwood and Maggie and Robbie Saugster were waiting for them, and they “got it putten ower quaietly,” as Tam’s father rather discontentedly said. His judgment doubtless approved of “a teetotal” marriage in Tam’s case, but neither his taste nor his sense of the fitness of things was satisfied. Who had a better right to feast their friends and “fill them fou” on such an occasion than the Saugsters? And to go back to Tam’s house just to tea and jelly and fushionless sweet cakes!—It might be prudent, but it wasna pleasant, and any thing but creditable, in his father’s opinion.

And while he grumbled secretly the bride’s mother, poor Mrs Cairnie, openly resented and railed at the manner of the marriage as mean, and as a confession of most shameful weakness on Tam’s part. Even shrewd and sensible Mrs Saugster, though joyful over her returned prodigal and thankful to escape the risks attending a marriage as usually ordered in their rank of life, even she did not think it wrong to connive at the brewing of a steaming bowl of “toddy” for the comforting of the old folks when Tam and his wife had set out on their week of pleasure, and all the rest of the young folk were gone away.

It was a “bonny nicht,” Jean said, as they lingered in their walk down the street. Over the soft glow of sunset fading in the west hung the pale new moon, and a star showed here and there among the grey wreaths and flakes of cloud that floated far beneath the blue. The tide was out, and over the sands came the soft “lap, lap” of tiny waves, with a sound more restful than silence. They stood still a minute at the point where they were to turn into the High-street.

“We may as well go home the long way. It is not late yet,” said Jean.

“Going home the long way,” meant turning back, and going over the sands, the mile that lay between the town and the Tangle Stanes, and they turned with one accord.

“It is our last night for a while,” said Jean, and scarcely another word was spoken till they found themselves climbing the broken path that led to the High Rocks. The night air blew cool from the sea, and Jean led the way to the sheltered seat a little further down. The two girls sat down together, and George stood above them with folded arms, looking out upon the sea.

They spoke about “the happy couple,” who had gone away to begin their new life together, about Tam’s long voyage and Annie’s hopeful waiting, and the chances they had of happiness, because they loved one another. And then they went on to other things, some of them glad, and some of them sad, and “do you mind that time?” and “have you forgotten this?” they said, and sometimes they sighed, and sometimes they smiled, and at last they fell into silence. By and by Jean rose and moving upward, paced up and down the narrow ledge, as she had done so many a time before in so many a mood. The two who remained were silent still, busy with their own thoughts, till George, stooping down and speaking softly, said.

“Marion, do you mind one day coming here with—Elsie and me?”

“Ay, George, I mind it well.”

Marion turned, and took in both hers the hand that he held out to her.

“Poor George!” said she, drooping her head till her cheek just touched it. Then she rose and stood beside him still holding his hand. George stood with his face turned away, and neither spoke or moved for a good while.

“George, do I mind you of her? Does it grieve you to see me?”

George turned and met the look in her sweet wistful eyes.

“You mind me of her, but it does not grieve me to see you—my dear little sister.”

And then George did an unwise thing. He clasped and kissed her, and held her to him, “as I might have clasped and kissed my own sister,” he said to himself afterward, trying to still the voice that said it was not wise.

And Marion went home smiling in the darkness, and saying to herself,—

“Now I have two brothers, and which of them I love best; I’m sure I canna say.”

So George and Jean set out on their travels next day, and Miss Jean and her visitor were left to entertain one another, and they did not find it a difficult thing to do. Miss Jean had lived too much alone, to care even for pleasant company continually, and Marion had friends and engagements enough to call her away, so as to leave her to her solitude for a while each day. And whether she was out with her friends, or at home with Miss Jean, she was happy as the day was long.

They had many quiet hours together, when the wisdom which had come to the elder woman out of her sore troubles and solitary days which God had blessed, and out of willing service given to the needy and the suffering for His sake, was spoken for the good of the girl who had all her troubles and her solitary days before her. These were the hours that afterwards Marion liked best to remember.

It seemed a very happy world to her in those days. Nothing evil or sad seemed possible to her in her young strength and hopefulness. And even trouble itself, sickness or pain or disappointment, if it brought to her what had come through all these to Miss Jean—a heart at peace, a heavenly hope, surely even of these things she need not be afraid. When she said something like this to Miss Jean, her old friend smiled and answered,—

“Surely not. Even when you feel the pain you needna fear the evil. And when the pain hurts most—is worst to bear, I mean—it doesna really harm. Why should I fear for you?”

“And do you fear for me more than for the rest?” said Marion gravely.

“I ought to fear less for you than for some, because I hope ye’re one who winna lose the good which is meant to come out of all trouble. But ye’re young and bonny and winsome, and whiles troubles come to such that pass others by; and a heart both strong and tender, such troubles hurt sore. But the sorer the pain the deeper and sweeter the peace, if it sends you to the feet of the Master,” added Miss Jean cheerfully.

There was silence for a little while, and Miss Jean looked up with surprise at Marion’s first words.

“Am I bonny, Miss Jean? As bonny as our Elsie was?”

Miss Jean looked at her a moment without speaking. Elsie Calderwood had indeed been a bonny lassie, but looking at her sister, Miss Jean could not but acknowledge that she was far more than that. She was like her sister. She had the same sweet eyes and lovely colour, the same wealth of shining hair. But in the face before her Miss Jean’s discerning eye saw a beauty beyond that of mere form and colouring. It might have come to Elsie too, with cultivation, and a higher intelligence, and the wisdom that experience brings. But Miss Jean, remembering well the girl who was dead, saw in her living sister’s face a beauty that had never been in Elsie’s.

“Does your mother think ye’re like your sister?” said she, evading the question.

“My mother hardly ever speaks about my sister. But once—some one said—that I minded him of her.”

As she spoke, a feint, sweet colour overspread her face. Her eyes did not fall before the grave eyes of her old friend, but there came into them a soft, bright gleam, “like a glint o’ sunshine on the sea,” Miss Jean told herself as she gazed.

“Ay, ye’re like her. I think them that mind her weel would say that ye’re like her.”

Marion’s head drooped and rested on her hand.

“Whiles I wonder how it would have seemed if Elsie hadna died.”

“It was a mysterious Providence indeed, her early death. The living should lay it to heart,” said Miss Jean; and then she took up the book that lay at her hand—a sign that no more was to be said at that time.

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