CHAPTER II
AWAY FROM ORCHARD GLEN
Mrs. Johnnie Dunn, driving home from town in her new Ford car, spun down the hill and through the village, without even stopping at the post office.
Mrs. Dunn was the only truly emancipated woman of Orchard Glen; her husband was a quiet, shy little man, whom every one called "Marthy," and he always referred proudly to his clever wife as "The Woman." She managed her husband, her household, her farm, and a dozen other enterprises such as no woman was ever supposed to be able to manage, and did it all in such a thoroughly capable manner that she was the envy and the scandal of the whole neighbourhood.
Her latest escapade had been to buy up the old Simms place, next to her own farm, turn it all into pasture for cows, buy a milking machine and a Ford car, and go dashing into town every morning with milk for a list of customers that astonished all the milkmen of the district. And she often came tearing back to her day's work when the lazy village folk were shaking the breakfast tablecloth out of the back door!
As she came storming down into the village on this bright May morning, Marmaduke Simms was sitting on the store veranda as usual, with his peg leg displayed upon a soap box, as his eternal excuse for his idleness. But there was no excuse for Trooper Tom Boyd, The Woman's own nephew, whose two perfectly good legs were stretched out beside him, and all in the middle of a morning in the middle of seeding!
Trooper Tom had once ridden the prairies in the Mounted Police force, but though he had been one of the most fearless riders of the plains, he was frankly afraid of his Aunt. He had fully intended to be back in the field before her return, and now, when her car appeared upon the hill half-an-hour earlier than it should have come, he gave a start of dismay.
"Great Ghosts," cried Marmaduke, "it's The Woman, sure as death!"
Trooper Tom gathered his long limbs together in one swift spasm, and leaped to cover through the store door-way.
"I ain't a bit scairt of her, Tilly," he remarked to the store-keeper's daughter, as he landed tumultuously against the counter, "but I just remembered all of a sudden that I wanted to buy a box o' matches."
Tilly leaned against the counter and went off into a spasm of giggles, while the car stormed past the store in a cloud of reproving dust. Marmaduke reached his head around the door-post. "She's gone, Trooper," he whispered, as though afraid that The Woman might hear, "and, say, I guess you're goin' to have swell company. She's got a passenger, and he waved his hat at me and yelled."
Trooper ventured out upon the veranda, followed by Tilly.
"Like as not he was yellin' for help," he suggested. "It's a man, sure enough, Trooper," said Tilly, with a giggle. "Guess she's goin' to give you the sack, and she's brought him out to do the seedin'."
"Too good to be true," sighed the young man mournfully. "'Most likely it's an implement agent. The Woman's always buyin' something new made o' wheels."
"She'll be gettin' a machine to wind you up and set you goin' at four in the mornin'," said Duke comfortingly. "Sit down and have a smoke, she'll know you're gone in a minit anyhow."
Meanwhile the car bumped across the little bridge that spanned the creek and went storming up the opposite hill. And at the top of the hill sat Christina Lindsay on the fence top wishing with all her might and main that Mr. Opportunity would come out and meet her.
As soon as Mrs. Johnnie Dunn saw her, she stopped her car opposite the stile with a word to the man at her side. He picked up his suit-case and stepped hurriedly from the car.
"Hello, there, Christine!" shouted The Woman, over the stranger's shoulder, "here's a man from Algonquin wants a place to board. Do you think your mother'd take him?"
The stranger came forward looking intently at Christina, with a twinkle in his eye. He was stout, with iron-grey hair. His bronzed face was good to look at, and he had a loud hearty voice, and a breezy manner. He raised his hat with elaborate politeness.
"I hope you can take a stranger in for a week or two," he said. "I heard that the Lindsays are noted for their hospitality."
"I'm afraid we can't, but I'll ask mother," said Christina, coming down off the fence to a more formal position. She spoke rather stiffly, for the stranger's air of easy familiarity rather put her on her dignity.
Mrs. Johnnie Dunn still sat in her churning car and looked on with laughing eyes. "Take him along up home and show him to your Ma, and see if she likes him," she shouted "'cause if youse folks won't keep him, I'll have to cart him back to town."
The stranger burst into a laugh. It was a big, hearty, noisy laugh, with something in it that arrested Christina's attention. He shut up his eyes just the way Sandy did, and he showed his two rows of teeth just like Neil, and he threw back his head exactly like John, and it surely couldn't be, and yet it really was,——
"Allister!" screamed Christina, and the next moment she was over the fence, with her arms tight round the stranger's neck, and was saying over and over, "Oh, Allister, Allister, I just knew something awfully good was going to happen, and it's you!"
And The Woman, who could carry through a business deal with a high hand and was a terror in a bargain, sat in her car and watched the brother and sister, with the tears blurring her vision.
It was not until the day's work was done and the reunited family were gathered round the supper table that the Lindsays had time to realise the wonderful fact that Allister had come home.
He sat in the centre of an admiring circle and told all his experiences of the past ten years, shouting occasional bits of the history to Grandpa, who was sitting devouring him with his eyes.
There were the first hard years when everything went wrong; the year he was hailed out, and the year the frost got everything, and the year of the great prairie fires when he was on the verge of throwing everything up and coming back to Ontario. But there had been good years in between and finally he had begun to move up the hill. Everything in the West moved in the same direction, and now he had a big ranch and some coal mine shares, and building lots in Prairie Park where real estate was going up like a sky rocket.
And the truth of the matter was that if everything went all right he would be a rich man some day not far distant. And he was planning that when he sold out and got from under some of his schemes he would come home and fix up the old farm and make it the finest place in Ontario. He was going to buy all the new machinery for John, and have electric light,——
"And a piano," put in Christina, "we need one far worse than we need a hay loader, don't we, Mary?"
"You'll have one some day if I go bust," shouted Allister, and went on to tell of profits and prices and real estate deals. His mother's face looked a little wistful, but if there was rather much talk of money and none of the wealth that thieves cannot steal, she put aside her disappointment. Allister was home, he was well and prosperous and that was surely enough happiness for one day. She sat beside him, keeping tight hold of his hand, patting it occasionally and repeating Gaelic words of endearment, precious words he had not heard since he was a child and which brought a sting to his eyes.
The family conference did not last long, for the neighbours had heard that Allister Lindsay was home from the West, and the chores were not nearly completed when visitors began to arrive to welcome the long absent one. The girls hurried about their work, while Allister ran here and there and got in every one's way. He followed Christina down to the milking and back again to the spring house and helped her with the separator, and she was rapturously happy that he should single her out for special notice.
He was back at the barnyard with Uncle Neil again, when she came out of the barn with a basket of eggs. Uncle Neil was turning the cows into the back lane to drive them up to the pasture.
"Here, Uncle Neil, let me do that," cried Allister. "I want to see what it feels like to drive the cows to the back pasture again. Hurrah here, Christine! Come along with me, for fear I get lost!"
Christina fairly threw her basket of eggs at Uncle Neil, and ran after her brother. They walked hand in hand up the lane like a couple of children.
"Maybe you wanted to go back to the house and get dolled up before the boys come," he said, looking down at her big milking apron.
Christina eyed him suspiciously. She was wondering if he was thinking that she needed much more fixing up than her sisters.
"No," she answered, "I'm beautiful enough without. It's just girls like Ellen and Mary that need to be fussing over their looks."
Allister looked down at her in admiration that was impossible to mistake.
"By ginger, you're right," he shouted heartily; "you're the sort of a girl for me. Say, what would you say to coming out West and keeping house for me?"
Here was Opportunity come back to her! Christina seized him tightly.
"Oh, my! Wouldn't that be grand. It would be the very best—well, the second best thing in the world!"
"And what would be the very best?"
"To go to the University with Sandy next Fall!" she answered promptly.
"Well, I declare!" Allister laughed, "you've all been bitten by the education bug. Mr. Sinclair used to say that if father was to change the catechism, he'd have it read: 'Man's chief end is to glorify God and get a good education.'"
"Just what I believe exactly!" declared Christina, who was trembling with excitement.
"But girls go and get married, or ought to," said Allister practically.
"Well, I hope I will some day," confessed Christina. "I don't want to be an old maid like the Auntie Grants. But I want to go away from Orchard Glen first, and see what the world's like—and get a grand education and know heaps and do something great—oh, I don't know what, but just something like you read about in the papers!"
The cows were in the pasture by this time, and as Allister put up the bars he said,
"Let's set down here for a few minutes and settle this matter."
Christina perched herself at his side on the top of the low rail fence. The soft May mists were gathering in the valleys, the orchards shone pink in the sunset. Away down in the beaver meadow the frogs were tuning up for their first overture of evening, and a whippoorwill far up in the Slash had begun to sing his lonely song to the dark hillside. Allister looked about him and uttered a great sigh of contentment.
"Oh, it's great to be home again," he breathed. "Now that I don't have to keep my nose to the grindstone I'm going to come home oftener. Things change so. We may never all be home again together."
"Well, I'd be sorry for that," said Christina, who was fairly dancing with impatience. "But I'd be sorrier if I thought things wouldn't change. We don't want to live here for ever and ever just as we are."
"No, of course not. But I hope some of us will always be in Orchard Glen. John always will."
"I suppose so. John's spent all his life working hard for the rest of us," cried Christina, "and I suppose he'll go on doing it to the end."
"There's nobody better than John," declared Allister. "But let me tell you this, that the man or woman, either, who gives up all his chance in life to somebody else is bound to come out with the small end of the stick. It sounds fine, but it don't pay." Allister spoke with the assurance of the successful man of business. "There's a certain amount of looking out for Number One that's necessary in this pleasant world."
Christina was silent. Her heart told her he must be wrong, but she could not have argued the matter if she would. It did not seem possible that John's life of self-sacrifice and devotion had been a mistake. Something that Neil was always quoting was running through her head, "There is no gain except by loss." She could not recall it fully, but she remembered distinctly another quotation, "Whosoever will lose his life for my sake, shall find it."
"Well, we're all getting on in the world all right," cried Allister heartily. "I tell you, our family's doing fine. And if I make my pile as I hope to, we'll all do better. I'd like to be able to give Neil and Sandy a lift, but Sandy's ready to go next Fall to the University anyway. And it'll be a good while before Jimmie's ready."
"Ellen and Bruce will be married some time next Fall, I expect," said Christina, going over the members of the family in her mind.
"I hate to think of her as a farmer's wife," said Allister. "If I had her out West I'd do better than that for her, but I suppose I might as well tell her I wanted to cut her head off."
"I should think so!" laughed Christina; "it's a dreadful thing to be in love."
"Look as if Mary wouldn't be teaching school long either, eh? Mother'll soon be without a girl if they all keep going off like that. What about the one they call Christina?"
"Goody! We've come to Christina at last! Let's settle her case. Christina will stay at home and milk the cows and feed the pigs and bake and scrub and take the eggs and butter to Algonquin on Saturdays. She will be the old maid sister with the horny hands, who always bakes the pies and cakes for Christmas when the family come home!"
Allister threw back his head and laughed into the coloured heavens till the echoes came back sharply from the whippoorwill's sanctuary on the hillside.
"Never!" he cried heroically, waving the long stick with which he had driven the cows up the lane. "Never! Let me die before I see the day! No, siree! Christina will go to the University and take all the gold medals, or whatever truck it is they get there, and she'll be a high-brow and go travelling over the country lecturing on Women's Rights!"
"I do believe I'd do it, even the lecturing part, for the sake of the college course," she declared. "Oh, Allister, I'm simply aching to get away and have a good education and be—be somebody—even if it's only a Woman's Righter!"
"Hooroo! I'm with you. I guess your education won't break me. You've got the kind of spirit that's bound to win, so off you go. You get your sunbonnet and all the fal-lals girls have to get, and be ready next Fall to finish your High School and then it's you for college!"
"Allister!" She turned to look at him. It just could not be that he meant what he said. Her eyes were like stars in the twilight, her voice sank to a whisper.
"Allister! What are you saying?"
He laughed joyfully. "I'm saying that you can start out on the road to glory next September and I'll foot the bills!" he shouted. "You're deaf as Grandpa!"
Christina suddenly realised that he really meant it; that the glorious unbelievable thing upon which she had set her heart was hers. She gave a sudden spring from her seat to throw herself in an abandon of gratitude upon her brother. But the leap had an entirely different result. The unsteady fence rail upon which she sat gave a lurch, turned over and Christina and it together went crashing into the raspberry and gooseberry bushes and thistles and stones of the fence corner.
Allister jumped from his perch to her assistance.
"Gosh hang it, girl," he cried, "you might have killed yourself!"
Christina staggered to her feet, scratched and dishevelled. "Oh, my goodness!" she cried, "to think of killing myself at this supreme moment! If I had I'd never, never speak to myself again for missing that University course!"
When they got back to the house Christina went about in a happy daze. There was no opportunity to do more than whisper the wonderful news to Sandy, and then she had to fly about to help put everything in order before the guests arrived.
The Lindsay home was at all times a popular gathering-place of an evening, for there was always plenty of company and music there, and a jolly time. Indeed Uncle Neil was in the habit of saying that, when the milk pails were hung out along the shed they were like the Standard on the Braes o' Mar, for when the young fellows of the countryside saw them, they came flocking over the hills. And indeed the last pail had scarcely been washed and put in its place to-night when the first visitor appeared in the lane.
Uncle Neil, coming up from the pump in the orchard, with two pails of fresh water, announced that the whole MacKenzie family were coming across the field, and burst into the song that always set Ellen's cheeks flaming.
"MacDonald's men, Clan Donald's men,
MacKenzie's men, MacGillivray's men,
Strath Allan's men, the Lowland men
Are coming late and early!"
"MacGillivray's man's coming early to-night, Mary!" called Sandy. "There's his buggy comin' up the line! Man, it's easy to see he hasn't any chores in the evening!"
"I'm all behind the times!" cried the new brother. "Tell me all about this MacGillivray man. He's a new one!"
He caught hold of Mary as she came in from the spring house, but she dodged him. This MacGillivray man was a new and quite special cavalier. He was no country boy from a neighbouring farm, but a prosperous young merchant from Port Stewart, a town some dozen miles away on the lake shore. Driving through the country one bright day in early spring, he had met Mary on her way to school, and had never got over the sight. Since then he had driven out all the way to Orchard Glen many a night for a repetition of the vision.
"Will you finish for me, Christine?" Mary whispered in a panic. "I'm not fixed up yet, and he's coming up the lane."
Christina promised and hurried her away. It didn't matter, she reflected, whether she was dressed in her best or her milking apron. There was no MacGillivray's man or MacKenzie's man, Highland or Lowland, coming over the hills to see her. And then she suddenly remembered with dismay the flowers that must be still lying under the bushes at the stile!
She hurried through her work, threw off her apron, smoothed her hair, and ran down the path to the grove. The evening shadows had full possession now, and there were no splashes of gold on the undergrowth. The veeries were ringing their bells in the tree tops and a cat bird was fairly spilling out music of a dozen delightful varieties from a hidden corner behind a basswood bush. Christina ran down the path and parted the undergrowth. The basket was gone! She searched in every corner. And then she remembered that on her way out to the milking she had seen Gavin driving home from town. He had taken the basket back, lest she should not find it! She turned and went slowly back up the path, feeling ashamed and a little relieved. He would never know that she had seen it, and yet it seemed too bad not to thank him for such a beautiful gift!
She hastened back to help Grandpa to bed. Grandpa always sang his evening hymn just before he went to sleep, and as he lived in the belief that every one was as deaf as himself, it was well to get the performance over before the house was filled with company.
Grandpa had a very ancient little hymn book with an orange cotton cover which had been one of Grandma's treasures, and which was now his most prized possession. Grandma Lindsay had been a Methodist before her marriage, and under her influence Grandpa had often been in danger of wandering from the paths of Presbyterianism. He would have considered it a great sin to confess that this old hymn book with its gospel songs was more to him than the psalms of David, and he would never have dreamed of introducing one of them into family worship. But he loved every line inside the tattered orange covers, and their bright melodies had helped him over many a hard place after Grandma had left him. His favourite hymn was the last in the book, "The Hindmost Hymn," Grandpa called it, and every night of his life, unless he were too ill, he sang at least one verse of its sweet promise,
"On the other side of Jordan,
In the sweet fields of Eden,
Where the tree of Life is blooming,
There is rest for you.
There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for you!"
"Aren't you too tired to sing the Hindmost Hymn to-night, Grandpa?" asked Christina slyly. But Grandpa did not fall into the trap.
"Tired? Hoh! Me tired! And the Lad jist come home! Indeed it will be more than a hymn I'll be raising to the Lord this night. I'll jist be singing Him a psalm, too, for He has brought Joseph back to the land of Israel."
Christina was ashamed of her subterfuge, and joined him in his psalm of gratitude, feeling that she, too, should raise a song of thanksgiving for all that had come to her on this wonderful day. So she joined Grandpa's shaking notes in
"Oh, thou, my soul, bless God the Lord;
And all that in me is
Be stirred up by His holy name
To magnify and bless!"
And then they finished with every verse of the Hindmost Hymn. Though Grandpa never confessed it, he had a secret hope, every night, as he lay down to sleep, that all his aches and pains might be at an end and that the next morning he would waken "on the other side of Jordan, in the sweet fields of Eden," and he liked to close the day with the cheering words.
So Christina sang it with him to the very end and then tucked him into his big feather bed. She left his door into the winter kitchen ajar so that he could hear the singing, which they were sure to have. Then she helped her mother air the spare room for Allister, and put a little fire in the shiny box stove in the hall, for the May evening was chilly.
By the time she had finished all her little duties the house was full of visitors. Mrs. Johnnie Dunn and "Marthy" were the first, the former eager to retell the manner of her introduction of Allister to his family.
The McKenzies, who lived on the next farm above, were all there, and Bruce was helping Ellen carry chairs out to the veranda. The Browns, a big family who lived just across the road from the Lindsays, were in the kitchen, and young Mr. MacGillivray's horse was in the stable and he himself was seated in the parlour talking to Uncle Neil, and looking at Mary.
Then there was quite a little crowd coming up from the village, Tilly Holmes and Joanna Falls, the blacksmith's handsome daughter, and Mr. and Mrs. Martin, who owned the mill, people of some consequence in Orchard Glen, for Mrs. Martin had been a school teacher before her marriage. Then there was Burke Wright, who worked in the mill, and his little wife; Trooper Tom Boyd and his chum Marmaduke, and even Mr. Sinclair, the Presbyterian minister, and his wife, all come to do honour to the long-absent son of Orchard Glen.
Christina joined Tilly Holmes and Bell Brown and some more girls of her own age in a corner of the veranda and told them all about Allister's sudden appearance, and how she had taken him for a stranger looking for a place to board, and how he had promised to send her to the High School next Fall and then to the University with Sandy!
The young folk bunched together in the semi-darkness of the veranda, laughing and teasing, the older women gathered with Mrs. Lindsay in the parlour, and the men collected about Allister in the greater freedom of the kitchen, where coats could be laid aside and pipes taken out, and they sat astride their chairs in the smoke and listened to him tell about the prairies and the wheat crop of Alberta and the prices of real estate.
It was just like a party, Christina felt, as she ran here and there, waiting on the guests, and trying hard not to think about the glory of the future.
Uncle Neil came to the veranda door in his stocking feet and shirt sleeves.
"Come away in here, you musicians," he called, "Allister wants to hear some of the old songs!"
There was much holding back and shoving of others forward, and many declarations of heavy colds and a rooted inability to sing at any time, but finally some of the girls were persuaded to move inside, and the boys followed.
Minnie Brown was organist in the Methodist church, so she was invited to the place of honour on the organ stool. Ellen lit the big lamp with the pink shade, and Trem. Henderson, who was the leader in musical circles and whom everybody called Tremendous K., was called in from the smoky region of the kitchen to start the singing.
They sang several of the old hymns first, so that Grandpa might enjoy them; and then Allister sent Sandy in from the kitchen to say that he must have some of the good old rousing Scotch songs they used to sing when he was home. So Mary brought out the old tartan-covered song-book and they sang it through, from the dreamy wail of "Ye Banks and Braes" to the rollicking lilt of the Hundred Pipers when
"Twa thousand swam ower to fell English ground,
An' danced themselves dry to the pibroch's sound!"
It was a grand old-time evening, such as was not so often indulged in as when times were newer and money scarce. When Mrs. Lindsay and the girls had passed around cake and pie and big cups of tea thick with cream the festivity was over, and the company moved away down the lane in the soft May moonlight.
And Christina and Sandy hung over the garden gate, like a pair of lovers, long after the last guest had gone, and made wonderful plans for the future, when they would be going to the University together.
CHAPTER III
"WHOSOEVER WILL LOSE HIS LIFE"
Christina was sitting in the old hammock on the veranda, ready for church. She had already done a big morning's work. For, though the Sabbath was rigidly kept in the Lindsay home, and made a day of rest as much as possible, the usual multitude of barnyard duties had to be attended to, for the chickens and the pigs and the calves clamoured just as loudly for their breakfast on Sabbath morning as any week day.
But Christina's work was all done and she was neatly dressed; her heavy golden brown braids were placed in a shining crown about her head, and her freshly ironed white dress and her white canvas shoes were immaculate. For her keen sense of a lack of beauty had taught her the value of scrupulous neatness. She was studying her Sunday School lesson, and her white gown and her bright head bent over the open Bible on her lap, made her look not unlike a young saint at her meditations; which was an entirely misleading picture, for Christina's mind was rioting joyously across the University campus, far away from Orchard Glen and Sabbath calm, even though her eyes were reading words such as never man spake,
"Therefore, take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or drink ... is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?"
"Are you really ready?" cried Sandy in admiring astonishment, as he settled himself beside her in the hammock. "You never take half as much time as the other girls to get dolled up!"
It was more than two months since Allister had gone back to the West, and Neil had left for his summer Mission Field away out on the prairies. July was marching over the hills, trailing the glory of her clover-blossom gowns, her arms ladened with sweet-smelling hay. The pink blossoms were blown from the orchard and instead the trees were hung with a wealth of tiny green globes. Inside the house and about the barnyard there were changes also, for Allister had been very generous, especially to John, and his labours had been very much lightened by machinery.
Christina sat with her fingers between the leaves of her Bible, her thoughts far away on the shining road to success which she and Sandy were so soon to take. For her the days could not move fast enough.
"My, but I wish I didn't have that year of High School to put in first," she declared. "But then I suppose I wouldn't be satisfied if I were a B. A. and you a Ph. D. But I'm going to study like a runaway horse next winter," she added, growing incoherent in her joy, "and maybe I'll catch up to you, Mr. Alexander Lindsay."
Sandy lay back in the hammock and gazed up at the festoons of little green balls, hanging in the trees. He did not respond with his usual readiness to his sister's nonsense. His gaiety seemed to have deserted him lately.
"I don't see how you can help getting up on the barn and yelling for joy, Sandy," she declared impatiently. "I know I would, every time I think about going to college, if I were a boy. But I have several good reasons for not expressing myself in that manner. Ellen's one, and Mrs. Sinclair's another, and then I'm really a very well behaved young woman anyway, and I'm going to be a lady some day, and it might not be well to have such dark places in my past."
Sandy laughed rather forcedly. "It'll be time enough for me to yell, when I've got something to yell about," he said. "'Don't holler till you're out of the bush,' is a good old adage. And I'm a long way from being out of it yet."
"What do you mean?" asked Christina in alarm.
"I was talking things over with John last night, and we're afraid we can't manage for me to go this year. Allister lost some money in real estate last month, and can't be depended on to help John as much as he expected. I've almost decided to go down and see Mitchell about the Anondell school. They wrote yesterday asking me to take it again."
"Oh, Sandy! Oh!" Christina's tone was full of unbelieving dismay. "I can't believe it. Surely,—oh, John won't let you stay! Something can be done surely——"
"Oh, of course John wants me to go and he'd manage somehow. But I won't let him. It would cut Neil short too. It's no use making a row over it," he concluded stoically. "It just can't be helped."
But Christina was inconsolable. It required a great deal of explaining to convince her that it was not all an evil dream. She just couldn't and wouldn't believe it. It was harder to bear Sandy's disappointment than if it had been her own. He found he had to undertake the role of comforter and try to convince her it was not such a disaster after all. There was no use making a row over what couldn't be helped, he repeated again and again. She would catch up to him in the year she would have at school, and who knew but they might enter college together.
But Christina could only sit and stare in silence down the orchard aisle to where the sun was glowing, richly purple, on the last uncut clover field. The glory had departed from the morning, and the glory had departed too, from the road to success which she and Sandy were to have taken together. For she alone realised what a bitter disappointment this was to Sandy. He would never complain, she well knew, nor indulge in self-pity, but she did know that there was grave danger of his throwing away the hope of a University education altogether, and going into business or perhaps back to the farm. For if he did not start this year, how was one to know what might happen before the next year? She sat perfectly silent, and when Christina was silent she was in deep trouble. Sandy strove in vain to cheer her. "Never mind. Don't let it worry you," he said bravely. "I can study nights and perhaps I won't lose so much time. And if I can't manage it next year I can go out West with Allister. Come along, let's get to church."
She rose slowly, and as slowly went into the house to see if Grandpa were comfortable. They left him in a cool corner of the winter kitchen with his Bible and hymn-book and Sport at his feet. The family gathered on the veranda, and though Christina's mind was so disturbed, she did not forget to see that her mother had a clean handkerchief, and that her bonnet was on straight.
Mary was like a fairy in her white muslin dress, and Ellen looked unusually radiant, in a new blue silk, a present from Allister. But Ellen had an especial reason for looking radiant these days. For a long time she and Bruce had nursed the hope that he might study medicine one day, and Dr. McGarry had promised to hand him over all his practice the day he graduated. Times had been too hard on the McKenzie farm for Bruce to leave, but crops had been good for several years now, and he had almost decided to try the University. And Ellen, who shared the Lindsay ambition to the full, was sharing his joy and urging him on.
John walked by his mother's side, and Christina fell behind between Sandy and Jimmie. Usually her mother had to rebuke the hilarity of these three on Sabbath mornings, but to-day Christina was so quiet that Jimmie enquired if she were sick.
They passed silently through the little gate between the lilac bushes, and down the lane to where the tall poplars stood guard at the entrance to the farm. When their mother accompanied them the Lindsays never went by the Short Cut, for even Sandy's stile was too difficult a climb for her.
As they passed out onto the Highway they were joined here and there by groups of church goers. For everybody in Orchard Glen except two or three odd characters, went to church, and Sunday was a day of pleasant social intercourse, such as no other time of the busy week afforded.
It was a real relief, too, from the long strain of six days' toil, and as yet neither the pleasure-seeker nor the money-getter had interfered seriously with its grateful peace. It was a day when you took yourself out of your toilsome environment, dressed in your best, and drove or walked leisurely to church, with a feeling of ease and well-being that no hurried pleasure-seeking could ever give. And you met all your friends and neighbours there, and had a word with them, and incidentally you were reminded that while crops and cattle and fine horses and motor cars and a swelling bank account were good things to possess; like the work of the past week, they would be put away one day, while the unseen things would remain.
The McKenzies came down the path from the farm above, the whole family, from Old Johnnie, who was an elder, to Katie, who was Christina's age. They paired off with the Lindsays, and Bruce and Ellen dropped behind, for they had gotten so far on their courtship, that they even walked to church together, in broad daylight, a stage that was supposed to immediately precede a wedding.
The young folk from the Browns came pouring out of their gate. The Browns were Methodists and the old folk went only to their own church which held its meetings in the evening. But youthful Orchard Glen practised Church Union very persistently, and the Browns were only following the usual custom when they went to each church impartially.
Mrs. Johnnie Dunn and Marthy came bouncing past in their car. The Woman was a Methodist, but Marthy was a Presbyterian so they went to both churches. Trooper Tom never went with his Aunt anywhere that could be avoided and he came down the pathway with the wide stride that marked him for a rider of the plains, and walked beside Sandy.
They were down in the village proper now, and every house sent out its representatives. The village did not begin until the Lindsay hill had been descended and the little bridge that spanned the brown stream crossed, and right on the bank stood the tiny cottage where little Mitty Minns and her old invalid grandmother lived. Mitty had lately married Burke Wright who worked in the flour mill, and was now emerging from the gate with her new husband, fairly bubbling over with joy and pride at being off alone with him for a few hours, away from Granny's complainings.
Across the street stood a much more imposing residence, Dr. McGarry's red brick, white pillared home. Mrs. Sutherland, his widowed sister who kept house for him, came rustling out in her best black silk, and wonder of wonders, the Doctor with her!
Joanna Falls, the blacksmith's daughter, burst from the next gate, like a beautiful butterfly from a green cocoon. Joanna was glorious in a pink silk and white shoes, and a hat trimmed with pink roses. She was a very handsome girl, but she was fast nearing the danger line of thirty, and a long attachment to Trooper Tom Boyd, who was a gay lad, attached to nobody, had rather soured Joanna's temper and sharpened her tongue.
Her father, in his shirt sleeves, was sitting in the most conspicuous part of the little veranda with his stockinged feet on the railing, smoking his pipe and reading the newspaper. Mark Falls always managed, when the weather permitted, to arrange himself in this position on a Sunday before the church goers. He knew it scandalised the worshippers and especially angered the good old Presbyterians who were strict Sabbatarians. Mark made a great parade of his extreme irreligiousness, and could tell stories all day long about duplicity of ministers and the hypocrisy of church members. Joanna was his one orphan child and he was not a very kind father, which had added not a little to his daughter's acidity of temper. But they went their several ways quite independently, and Joanna's way was always where Trooper Tom Boyd was to be found.
She happened to come out of her gate just as Trooper and Sandy Lindsay were passing together, and of course they walked with her. It was surprising how many times little coincidents like this happened. Trooper whispered something to her and Joanna's happy laugh could be heard all down the line of demure church goers.
The procession passed the closed and deserted store, but Marmaduke Simms was perched on the veranda, and Trooper meanly deserted his fair partner, and swung himself up beside his chum, there to wait until the sound of the first hymn would assure them they were in no danger of being too early for church.
Tilly Holmes came tripping out of the side door and through the garden gate, an entrance used only on the Sabbath. The Holmeses were strict Baptists, and their service was not held until the afternoon. But they found it impossible to keep their children from the promiscuous church-going habits of the village and long ago had given up the struggle. They even allowed Tilly to belong to the Union Presbyterian-and-Methodist Choir, knowing that youth will be wayward and you can't put old heads on young shoulders.
Tilly was trying hard not to giggle, seeing it was Sunday, but she found it particularly difficult, for she had to walk beside Joanna, and since Trooper had dropped away Joanna's tongue had become more than usually sarcastic.
The unusual sight of Dr. McGarry going to church proved an irresistible opportunity. Mrs. Sutherland was never done telling Mrs. Sinclair how the Doctor struggled to get to church on Sundays, and all in vain. It seemed as though the whole countryside selfishly arranged their maladies to prevent his attending the sanctuary.
"Well my sakes," declared Joanna, "the Doctor's goin' to church! Everybody must a' got awful healthy all at once, or else they've all up and died on him."
She turned to Mary and Christina who were walking behind her. The unimpaired success of the Lindsays was particularly trying to Joanna's temper.
"Well, how's that rich brother o' yours gettin' on, Christine?" she asked, her black eyes snapping. "I see he hasn't sent you to college yet."
"It's very kind of you to ask after him, Joanna," said Mary smoothly. Mary Lindsay was the one girl in Orchard Glen who could put Joanna in her place. "If Trooper was of a jealous nature he might object, but he doesn't seem to be that kind at all."
Joanna whirled around and addressed herself to Tilly, her cheeks flaming. Her love for Trooper Tom, who was but a wayward cavalier, was the cause of much bitterness and heart-burning.
They were turning in at the church gate, when an old-fashioned double-buggy rattled past, drawn by a heavy shining team. A young man was driving and there were three very gaily-dressed ladies with him.
Gavin Grant's three Aunts were always a sight worth seeing on a Sunday. They were lovely ladies, who, by the calendar, might have been termed old; but they had stopped aging somewhere in the happiest period of girlhood. So it was not unfitting that they should dress in their girlhood clothes, though they were all of a fashion of some thirty years previous. And so, though Auntie Elspie's hair was white and her face wrinkled, and Auntie Flora was stooped and rheumatic and Auntie Janet stout and matronly, their hearts were young and light, and they arrayed themselves accordingly. They owned the most wonderful flower garden in the countryside and the old democrat looked as if all its hollyhocks had come to church, as Gavin pulled up at the door. The Grant Girls were all dressed in ancient silks and velvets made in the fashion of an early Alexandra period, with much silk fringe and old heavy jewellery as accessories.
Gavin carefully helped each of them alight, for the Aunties had given much time to their boy's manners and had seen to it that he did not fail in little acts of courtesy. And though the women declared that they had "babied" him beyond belief, and the girls said he was as much an old maid as any one of them, their kindness had not spoiled him for he was as generous and unselfish as they were.
Christina felt the blood mount to her cheeks as she caught Gavin's glance. She had never mentioned her flowers to him, and always felt ashamed when she saw him.
The three Grant Girls were immediately surrounded by friends. Everybody loved them, and their arrival at church always caused a pleasant stir.
Gavin came back from putting his horses into the shed and showed them to their seats, where he sat with them until it was time for him to go into the choir.
Christina always went to choir practice, but like many another, she did not sing in the choir on Sundays, so she went to the family pew with her mother while Mary and Ellen joined the singers in the vestibule.
The congregation were almost all seated, when the choir, with Tremendous K. at their head, came hurrying down the aisle, and took their places in seats beside the pulpit. Joanna Falls was leading soprano, by virtue of a voice of peculiar strength and carrying power, Gavin Grant, who had the best baritone voice in the countryside, led the boys, and Minnie McKenzie, whose father was an elder, and Martha Henderson, Tremendous K.'s sister, played the organ on alternate Sundays—an arrangement necessary to prevent a split in the church.
Mr. Sinclair had been in Orchard Glen for twenty-five years, and knew his people better than they knew themselves. He realised that the week's toil was absorbing, and on Sundays he tried hard to turn his people's eyes away from the things that are passing to those that are eternal. And on this morning it seemed to Christina that he had chosen his sermon entirely for her benefit.
"For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it;" the divine paradox was his text, and he told Christina plainly that by saving for herself this life of wider experience and greater opportunity, she was missing the one great opportunity that comes to all souls. She was losing her life.
When church was over and Mr. Sinclair was moving about among the people, he came down the aisle and gave one hand to Sandy and the other to Christina at the same time.
"Well, well! and you'll both be leaving me soon!" he cried heartily. "I'm getting used to sending off my boys to the University, but it's a great event when I send one of my girls! Sandy, I want to hear of you in Knox yet. That's your destination, don't forget. You'll make as good a preacher as Neil any day. Well, well, and how are you to-day, Miss Flora—and you Janet—?" He had passed on and was shaking hands with the Grant Girls, giving Christina no chance to reply. She glanced at Sandy; his eyes were on the floor, but she could read his face, and she knew he was struggling with the bitterness of disappointment.
She was even more silent on the road home from church. Bell Brown and Tilly Holmes chattered away on either side of her, asking questions about where she would board in Algonquin, and what new dresses she would get, and how long she would be at school before she would be ready for the University, and wasn't she scared stiff at the thought of studying hard for years and years the way folks had to do at college?
Christina answered absently and when she parted with them she surprised herself by suddenly exclaiming:
"Oh, don't talk about my going any more, girls. Maybe I won't go after all!" and fled from them before they could demand explanations.
That Sunday marked the opening of a period of misery for Christina. She worked furiously in house and barnyard, striving to smother the insistent voice that kept reiterating, "Whosoever will save his life shall lose it."
She had caught Opportunity as he came to meet her, determined not to fall into her old error, and now that she held him, her full hands were unable to grasp a greater prize that was slipping away. Christina did not realise all this; she only knew with a feeling of sick dismay that Sandy was not going to college and that it lay within her power to let him go.
She was still fighting her battle when Friday evening came, the night of the greatest function of all Orchard Glen's weekly events. It was the night when the Temperance Society met, and though it was still early, Christina had finished her work and was ready as usual long before the other two girls. She went down the orchard path and seated herself beside Sandy on the old pump platform. Sport stretched himself out at Sandy's feet, panting with the exertion of putting the cows in their place and Christina's pet kitten curled up at her side, the green eyes on guard against the enemy.
Sandy had striven manfully all week to raise Christina's spirits and he burst into cheerful conversation.
"What do you suppose, Christine? Bruce says he's got everything fixed up and he's going to Toronto this fall and Dr. McGarry's tickled to fits. He thinks the world of Bruce."
"Bruce—Bruce McKenzie!" Christina groaned. "Well, I never! It seems as if everybody in Orchard Glen was going to the University but you," she added returning to the one subject that absorbed her attention.
"Well don't go chewin' on that all the time," said Sandy cheerfully. "It's better to have one fellow left. Bruce's been saving up his money for the last five years."
"Ellen won't have to get married so soon then," remarked Christina with some feeling of comfort, for Ellen's presence at home made her leaving easier. "But oh, Sandy, if only——"
"Come along," cried Sandy jumping up. "It's time we were going. There's Tremendous K. passing now."
Christina went back to the house to see if her mother needed anything before she left, and if Grandpa was comfortable in bed, and returned to the veranda where Sandy stood waiting for her. Bruce and Ellen were there ready to start, and Mary and young Mr. MacGillivray were already strolling down the lane.
"Well, Christina," cried Ellen, her cheeks pink with excitement, "how would you like to have Bruce for a doctor if you were sick?"
More than a year before Bruce McKenzie had been prepared for college, but lack of money had stood in his way and every one had thought that he and Ellen had given up the idea and had decided to settle on the farm.
"Why, Bruce!" cried Christina, forgetting her own trouble for the moment. "Isn't that too grand for anything?"
"Ellen here says I've got to keep up with the family, you see," said Bruce, standing in the midst of the admiring circle, half proud, half embarrassed. "Everybody in Orchard Glen seems to be getting the college fever, and Dr. McGarry's been at me all summer, so I guess I'll try it anyway."
If Sandy had been going Christina would have been rapturously happy over this. Ellen's approaching marriage had always hung like a cloud on the horizon, but if Ellen were going to be left at home until Bruce became a doctor, what a joy that would be. But nothing could be a joy now that Sandy's hopes had been blighted.
"It's just bully," Sandy was saying generously, "I'm sorry that"—— He was interrupted by Christina's pinching his arm, and stopped suddenly. No one noticed in the dusk of the veranda, and when they were out in the lane, Sandy asked an explanation. "I might as well tell everybody first as last," he said, "it's decided now. And I'd rather tell and get it over."
"Oh, don't," pleaded Christina, "wait for a little while. You don't know what may happen. Don't say anything about it for a few days, anyway. I—I want to think about it. Promise me you won't, Sandy, till I let you."
Sandy promised reluctantly, saying she was a silly kid. Thinking for a month, day and night, wouldn't double his bank account, but he promised; and Christina proceeded to think about it as she had said, and to think very hard and very seriously all the way down to the village.
The old Temperance Hall was open and already several had arrived. Burke Wright, with his little wife, Mitty, her face shining at being out alone with her husband, were sitting on the steps and Joanna was there laughing and chatting with Trooper Tom and, of course, Marmaduke Simms, with a crowd of girls. For Marmaduke was a sort of lover-at-large and made love openly and impartially to all the girls of the village.
The McKenzie girls had proudly announced that Bruce was going away to learn to be a doctor, and this piece of news was the chief topic of conversation. The girls all half envied Ellen, half pitied her. It took a deal of study and a dreadful long time to become a doctor, Joanna explained, and as none of the McKenzies were very smart, Ellen would be an old maid before Bruce was through. But Ellen seemed radiantly happy, and no subject for commiseration, and every one agreed that it was just the way with all the Lindsays, there was no end to their luck.
The crowd gathered inside the hall, where a number of the boys were bunched in a corner preparing the programme with much anxiety.
After the business of the evening which was never very heavy, there was always a programme rendered by the boys and girls on alternate evenings. To-night was the boys' turn to perform, which always meant a great deal of fun for the girls. John Lindsay was President of the Society, and was down on the programme for a speech on Reciprocity, and there was to be a male chorus, both sure to be good numbers, for John had some fame as a political speaker, and the boys of Orchard Glen could always put up a fine chorus with Tremendous K. to beat time and Gavin Grant's splendid voice to hold them all to the right tune.
So the programme opened auspiciously with the chorus. The only trouble was the organist. Sam Henderson, a brother of Tremendous K., was the only young man in Orchard Glen who could play anything more complex than a mouth organ, and Sam always seemed to have too many fingers. And he pumped the air into the bellows so hard that the organ's gasps could be heard far above its strains.
Then three of the boys played a rousing trio on mouth organs, and young Willie Brown played a long piece on the violin. Tommy Holmes, Tilly's brother, who worked in Algonquin and came home week-ends, then gave a recitation, a comic selection which cheered everybody up after the wails of Willie's fiddle.
Tremendous K. sang a solo, a splendid roaring sea song that fairly made the roof rock, and then John delivered his speech and Christina sat and twisted her handkerchief and fidgeted every minute of it, in silent fear lest John make a mistake or anybody laugh at him. But John's speech was loudly applauded, though Tremendous K. said afterwards there was to be no politics brought into the Temperance Society, for Tremendous K. was not of the same political party as the President and was not going to run any risks of the liberals getting ahead.
When John had sat down there arose from the back of the hall among the young men a great deal of shoving and pushing and exhorting to "go to it," and Gavin Grant came forward very reluctant, very red in the face, and looking very scared, to sing his first formal solo in public.
Gavin was a tall fellow and well built, but his clothes, the majority of which his Aunties still fashioned, were always too small and very ill-fitting. They seemed to have a tendency to work up to his neck and they were all crowding to the top when he lurched forward and took his place beside the organ.
"Gavin always looks as if some one had just carried him in by the back of the neck and set him down with a thud," said Joanna, loud enough for all the girls to hear. Every one laughed except Christina. She had not been able to laugh at Gavin since she had been so unkind to his birthday gift. Her heart always smote her for the waste of that wonderful basket of blooms. Now that she knew she was going away she felt she might at least have acknowledged them.
Meanwhile Gavin had brought out his Auntie Flora's oldest song book, "The Casket of Gems," from its wrapping of newspaper, and Sam Henderson had once more mounted the tread-mill of the organ, and was trampling out the opening bars of the solo. Tilly and a few of her companions were in convulsions of giggles by this time, but when Gavin's rich voice burst into the first notes, every one was hushed and attentive. He sang without the slightest effort, pouring out the melodious sounds as a robin sings after rain.
"In days of old when knights were bold,
And barons held their sway,
A warrior bold with spurs of gold
Sang merrily his lay,
Sang merrily his lay
'My love is young and fair,
My love has golden hair,
And eyes so blue
And heart so true
That none with her compare;
So, what care I though death be nigh,
I live for love or die!
So, what care I though death be nigh,
I live for love or die!'"
It was a gallant lay of love and war and deathless devotion but only one as unsophisticated as Gavin could have sung it. For while it was held quite proper for a young man to sing of war in a public way, no one with a sense of the fitness of things would dare to raise his voice in a love song, alone, before an audience of his fellows. But Gavin's voice brought the warrior's gallant presence so vividly before them that not even Tilly felt like smiling, and there was a sober hush as the song went on to tell how the brave knight
"Went gaily to the fray.
He fought the fight
But ere the night
His soul had passed away.
The plighted ring he wore
Was crushed and wet with gore,
But ere he died
He bravely cried,
'I've kept the vow I swore!
So what care I though death be nigh,
I live for love or die.
I've fought for love, for love I die!'"
The singer put all the valour of his brave young heart into the song, all its pent up feeling. For Gavin Hume had been born a real diamond in a dark mine of poverty and ill-usage; he had been dug up, and polished and smoothed by the loving hands of the three Grant Girls and his character was beginning to shine with the lustre that comes only from the real jewel. But very few people knew this, he was too shy to give expression to the high aspirations that thrilled his heart, and only in such songs as this did his soul find a medium of expression. There was a day coming swiftly upon him, that was to try to the utmost all the pent up valour of his reticent nature, but as yet that day was all undreamed of. And Christina Lindsay, remembering when that day came, this Temperance meeting, recalled with self-abasement that she had thought that Gavin Grant could not have chosen a song more unlike himself; he, so shy and shrinking to sing of "A Warrior Bold." If she had not been so downhearted she would have laughed at him.
When the song was finished there was a moment's hush over the meeting, and then came a storm of applause, long continued. The boys took to clapping and stamping rhythmically, and shouting, "More, more," until the old building rocked.
But Gavin shook his head persistently, and John arose and announced the next. This was a comic song by Marmaduke Simms, and Duke certainly was a very funny fellow. He could imitate anything from Mrs. Johnnie Dunn's car on a steep hill, to the Martins' youngest baby crying. He soon had them all in roars of laughter, and the meeting broke up in much gaiety, and some anxiety on the part of the girls as to their ability to do as well on the next Friday.
Most of the boys and girls paired off and vanished into the darkness. The unfortunate ones who were not yet attached, moved away in bunches. Christina belonged to this latter class, unless a brother was with her. But Jimmie had disappeared with the boys of his own age, John was walking ahead, arguing hotly with Tremendous K. about the subject of his address, and Sandy had meanly deserted her to go off with a white dress, which she had identified as belonging to Margaret Sinclair, the minister's youngest daughter who was home for her holidays. Under happier circumstances Christina would have been pleased at his choice, but nothing in connection with poor Sandy could please her just now. He was bearing his disappointment far better than she was, for her trouble was worse than a disappointment. The unbearable part to her was the fact that stared her in the face, the fact that she was deliberately taking the privilege denied him.
She walked away from the hall slowly and silently, between Joanna Falls and Annie Brown, for Joanna's cavalier was a very uncertain quantity and poor plain Annie had never had a beau in her life. But Joanna suddenly remembered that she had left her handkerchief on the seat in the hall, and must run back for it before Trooper and Duke locked the door. The girls knew better than to wait for her, and then Burke Wright and Mitty strolled up and began talking with Annie. Christina stepped behind them in the narrow pathway for a moment, and it was then that a tall figure loomed up beside her out of the darkness, and a musical voice with a slow Highland accent that it was impossible to mistake, repeated the proper formula.
"May I see you home, Christine?"
Christina stopped short in the pathway. Never in all her nineteen years had she been asked that momentous question; the opening note of all country romances. She had heard it sounded on every side for years but its music had always passed her by. She had begun to wonder just a little wistfully, when she would hear it. And now here it was! But, alas, like her first birthday gift, it had came from an unwelcome source!
But she answered quite cordially, being incapable of deliberately wounding any one, and Gavin gave a deep breath of relief as he took his place at her side. He was too shy to take her arm in the approved fashion, as all young men did when seeing a young woman to her home. Instead he left a foot or two between them as they walked up the hill under the stars in the warm scented darkness.
Christina tried to chat, but Gavin was so overcome with the wonder of seeing her home, that he could not talk. He longed for some deadly peril to threaten her so that he might be her protector, some catastrophe that he might avert.
He was fairly aching to tell her that his great ambition was to be her Warrior Bold, and ride out to do doughty deeds for her sweet sake; that she was his Love so young and fair, of whom he had been singing, with eyes so blue and heart so true; but instead, he walked dumbly by her side, keeping carefully a yard away from her, and answering her laborious attempts at conversation with only a word. For Gavin was one of the inarticulate poets of earth, a mute, inglorious Lovelace, with a heart burdened with unsung lines to his Lucasta on going to the wars.
They had come to one of their prolonged seasons of silence, when Christina discovered that they were strolling slowly behind Old Johnnie McKenzie, Bruce's father, and Mr. Sinclair who was seeing him a piece of the way home, for the purpose of rejoicing over the good news about Bruce. The minister had been so many years in the pulpit that he used his preaching voice on all occasions, and there was no chance of missing a word that he said.
"This is great news about Bruce, Mr. McKenzie," he was saying in a full round voice, "great news! I'd rather see him going for the Ministry. But you have brought up your lads in the fear of the Lord and Bruce will serve his Maker well as a doctor, I've no fear. Yes, it's fine news."
Mr. Sinclair was greedy of gain of the highest order for his flock, and gave parents no rest if he thought they were not giving their children the utmost education they could afford. It was largely due to him that all Orchard Glen looked to the University rather than to the counting house as the goal of those who would succeed, and that old Knox always had an Orchard Glen boy helping to keep her halls noisy.
"Yes sir, it's grand to see another of our boys entering the University," he went on, as though delivering his Sunday sermon. "And now that Johnnie's got into the High School we'll have to head him for the ministry. He's a bright lad that Johnnie of yours. Neil Lindsay is the only boy we have in Knox now, and there must be another coming along before he gets out. I was hoping I'd get Sandy Lindsay started to the University this Fall, but he seemed to talk to-night as if he wasn't sure of going. I'll be disappointed if Sandy doesn't get away soon; I was hoping Allister would see him through. Sandy would make a fine man in the pulpit. He's got the same gift as John. Man, I hope he won't be kept back. We can't do without our representative in Knox, Mr. McKenzie, the boys must be coming on. And your Johnnie will have to be the next. Come away in, Mr. McKenzie, and we'll tell Mrs. Sinclair, this is a day of good tidings. Come away in, man."
They stepped in at the Manse gate, and Christina and Gavin moved on alone. She had almost forgotten his presence, but she turned to him now, because she must have some one to confide in.
"Oh, Gavin, did you hear what he was saying, that Sandy might be a minister some day!"
"But that would be a great thing, wouldn't it?" asked Gavin, surprised out of his shyness at the grief in Christina's voice.
"But, I'm afraid—Sandy thinks we can't afford it this Fall. I mean for him to go to college," whispered Christina in distress. "And if he doesn't go now he may not go at all. He has had to wait so long."
Gavin forgot his shyness entirely in his efforts to comfort her.
"But you must not be feeling so bad," he said gently. "Is there no way to help it?"
Christina suddenly remembered that Mr. Sinclair had often told her mother that Gavin Grant had both the ability and the longing to be a minister, but he would never confess his desires, lest they trouble the Aunties. Perhaps he could understand her case and advise her, and in an impulsive moment, born of her great need, she told him all about the cloud that had been hanging over her during the past week.
"I want just dreadfully to go to college and get a good education," she finished up. "You know all about it, I'm sure you do, don't you, Gavin? And now I've got my first real chance, and if I take it I'll be keeping Sandy back. Perhaps I'll be keeping him from being a minister, and wouldn't that be dreadful? And I don't know what to do."
It did not seem queer, somehow, for her to be asking Gavin's advice about this momentous question, but his position was especially difficult. He could not answer her for a few minutes. For he knew that he was not at all an unbiased judge. Next to his own going, he wanted more than anything else in the world that Christina should be left at home. He could hardly bear to think of what life in Orchard Glen would be like without the chance of looking at her in church or at meeting, and occasionally speaking to her. Indeed he would not have dared to take this bold plunge of asking to see her home to-night had he not known that it would likely be his last chance, and that she would soon be gone out of his life.
"I am afraid I would want to go if I was in your place," he confessed at last. "But," he hesitated shyly, "Auntie Elspie always knows what is best, and she has always told me that we never lose a thing by giving it up for some one else. She gave up all her chances for Grandmother Grant and stayed home and cared for her. And she let their only brother go to college, while she managed the farm at home. And she says now she is always glad she did it."
He stopped suddenly, embarrassed. It looked as if he had actually had the presumption to preach Christina a sermon.
But she did not seem to think so. "And you, yourself," she said, "Mr. Sinclair always wants you to go to college, Gavin, and you know you would like to, wouldn't you?"
"I am in a very different position from any one like you or Sandy," said Gavin with a new note of sternness in his voice. "It is not for me to choose whether I will go to college or not. But," he added hastily, "my Aunts would let me go if they could, you may be sure of that."
Christina's heart felt a sudden rush of sympathy. She guessed what Gavin must suffer, seeing this boy and that pass on, leaving him behind.
There was another long silence, which he broke. "You will always do the kind thing," he whispered. "You could not do anything else."
They had come to the big gate between the sentinel poplars, and Christina stopped. Mary and young MacGillivray were leaning on the little garden gate that led in from the lane, and Bruce and Ellen, who had long passed the hanging-over-the-gate stage of courtship, had gone indoors for something to eat.
"Oh, I'm afraid you're all wrong," she declared; "I—I don't want to a bit, but, you think I ought to let Sandy go, don't you?"
Gavin looked down at her in the dim starlight for a moment before he found courage to reply. "You know so much better than I do," he said at last. "And I am not the one to advise you, because,—because,——"
"Because what?" she asked wonderingly.
"Because I can't bear to think of you going away," burst out Gavin with desperate boldness.
Christina felt her cheeks grow hot under the sheltering darkness. She was speechless in her turn, and then afraid of what might follow this sudden outburst, she said confusedly, "I must go in now and think about it," and with a hurried good-night, she was gone.
She ran noiselessly up the lane, avoiding the lovers at the garden gate, and entered the back gate that opened from the barn-yard. She found Bruce and Ellen with John and her mother in the kitchen eating scones and drinking buttermilk. No one remarked her entrance except that her mother, looking over her shoulder asked, "Where's your brother, Christine?"
"He's gone off with some one else's sister," answered Christina trying to speak carelessly.
"Sometimes sisters go off with some one else's brother," remarked John, his eyes twinkling. "No, I don't believe he is a brother to any one, is he?" Christina gave him an imploring look, that begged him to keep her secret, and he generously changed the subject. They were all full of Bruce's new prospects, and Christina slipped away unnoticed to bed.
But for the first time in her healthy young life worry drove sleep far from her. She heard Sandy come in, heard Jimmie enter the next room and his boots drop heavily on the floor, and when Ellen and Mary came up she pretended to be asleep. She occupied a small room opening off the one shared by her sisters, and could hear their whispers and hushed laughter. Ellen was so proud of Bruce and all he was going to be, and Mary was justly proud of her lover, and Christina had nobody to see her home but Gavin Grant, and no hope of anything better was before her. For how could she go to school and leave Sandy behind?
How could she? She was facing the question at last. And her heart answered that no matter what wise folks might say about grasping Opportunity, she simply could not let it stand in Sandy's way. There was only one answer to her question.
She lay very still till she knew that her sisters were asleep. Then she rose and softly closed the door between their rooms. She lit her lamp, feeling quite like a thief, and took out her box of writing paper. The pen and ink were downstairs, but she had a lead pencil, and Allister would not mind.
She took the little stubby pencil and poured out her heart on to the paper. She just could not go, that was all about it. And would he send Sandy instead? Sandy might be a minister some day like Neil, Mr. Sinclair said, and she would never, never be happy again if she thought she had made him stay home and be a farmer, or perhaps just a school-teacher because she had taken his chance away from him. And would he mind if she stayed home? Perhaps she could go some other time. Or she could teach for a while and put herself through. Sandy was nearly two years older than she was and he would soon be thinking he was too old to go to college. Of course Sandy did not know she was doing this. He would not let her, she knew, so she had told no one. She was up late at night when every one else was asleep, and she could not rest until she told him what she wanted. And she was going to get up early and give the letter to Mrs. Johnnie Dunn to post in Algonquin so it would get to him sooner. And oh, would he please, please, write right away, the very day he got it, and tell Sandy he could go in her place. For she could never, never be happy——"