She went to the kitchen for a plate of apples, leaving them discussing the Minister of Militia, and was taking down a plate from the high old cupboard in the kitchen, when she heard a sound as if some one were fumbling at the door. The big kitchen was empty, the damp day had been bad for Uncle Neil's rheumatism, and he had gone to bed early, it was almost too late for a visitor, and thinking it might be only the wind, Christina put down her plate and went to look if the outside porch door were slamming.

She threw open the door and the rain and wind whirled in her face, and out of the wet and the darkness emerged a tall figure in a long khaki overcoat and a Highland bonnet. The bonnet came off immediately, and the soldier said in a soft Highland accent, "Good evening, Christine."

"Oh, Gavin," she cried in surprise, and a sudden unreasonable joy. "Is it really you? Come away in. Are you wet?"

But Gavin still stood in the doorway. "No, I cannot come in," he said hurriedly; "Hughie is waiting for me at the gate. He is taking me into Algonquin."

Christina looked past him into the darkness. "To Algonquin! Oh, Gavin, you're not called away are you?"

"Yes, the Battalion is ordered to Halifax, we will likely be sailing at once. I did not know till this morning; and I—" his voice dropped to a whisper, "I just couldn't go away without saying good-bye to you, Christine."

A gust of wind swayed Christina's skirts, and Gavin stepped inside and closed the door, but stood holding the latch.

"And your poor Aunties!" cried Christina. She was angry with herself the moment she said it, for a look of anguish passed quickly over Gavin's face.

"They are very brave," he said simply. He paused, there was silence in the big warm kitchen.

"Won't you come in, just a minute, and say good-bye to John?" asked Christina. "Mother and Uncle Neil are gone to bed, but—"

"No, I have no time to-night, but I could not go without seeing you, just once, and saying good-bye," he whispered.

Christina's eyes suddenly stung with tears. "Oh, Gavin," she faltered, "I—I don't deserve it."

He shook his head to indicate that she was wrong, and again silence fell. Gavin glanced at his wrist watch. She noticed that his awkwardness had disappeared under his military training, he held himself with a new dignified bearing. "I must not be keeping you," he said, but it seemed as if he could not go. He stood looking down at her and she could not mistake the look in Gavin's eyes. Her own fell before them.

"Oh," she managed to whisper, "I have always wanted to tell you that I think it is so brave and so grand of you to go, and, ... oh, I hope you'll come back safe," she ended, faltering, and Gavin still stood unable to speak and looked at her as if he could never take his eyes away.

The loud, slow tick of the old clock marked off the minutes.

Suddenly Gavin put his fingers under the collar of his coat. "Could you—would you mind taking this as a little keepsake?" he whispered, handing her the regimental pin of the Blue Bonnets. She took it with grateful thanks.

And then a sudden impulse came to her.

"But, I ought to give you something in return."

She looked up and down her dress. She wore no ornament but an old-fashioned brooch of her mother's fastening the throat of her soft blue dress. "I haven't anything," she said helplessly. She followed Gavin's eyes that were fastened on her left hand.

"Could you spare me that?" he whispered. It was a little old ring, one that Allister had sent her before he came home for his first visit, just plain gold with her initials carved on it. Christina slipped it off her finger eagerly.

"Oh, it's just a poor little, old thing, Gavin, but I'd be so proud to have it go to the war," she cried. He took it, his face radiant.

"Oh," he cried, "I ought not to have asked you. I was too bold, perhaps, I shouldn't—perhaps—he,—wouldn't like it?"

Christina's face flamed. "There is no one who has any right to say what I should do," she said with sudden boldness.

Gavin's face lit up. He slipped the ring on his little finger. It would hardly go on, but he managed it. A line of the old song he had sung flashed through Christina's mind as he did it, something about the plighted ring the warrior wore, being crushed and wet with gore.

"Oh, Gavin," she whispered, the tears welling up into her eyes, "God bless you, and bring you home safe again."

A sharp whistle sounded from the gate where Hughie Reid was waiting impatiently in the rain. Gavin started as if from a dream. He held out his hand. "Good-bye, Christine," he whispered, "you won't forget me, will you?"

Christina put her hand into his. She shook her head; she could not answer. He was going away, perhaps to his death, and she had not a word for him, and yet he was leaving her deliberately to another at the call of duty. Her heart was in a tumult of grief and self-abasement. She could only stand and look up at him, her eyes filled with tears, her lips trembling, and the next moment, Gavin had stooped, with the sudden boldness of a shy man, and kissed her.

And then the door was flung open and shut again, and he was gone into the storm and darkness, and Christina was left standing motionless, gazing at the closed door.

It was a long time before she found courage to return to the sitting-room. Her heart was throbbing with grief and at the same time a wild exultation that she could not understand and had no time to analyze. She did not even attempt to answer Wallace's raillery as to the length of time she had been away, or John's as to why she had stayed in the cellar long enough to eat all the apples which she found she had forgotten to bring. The event had been too stupendous for her to come down to the commonplace. And at last Wallace grew just a little piqued over her absent-minded air and went home early very much to Christina's relief.

It was the week after Gavin had gone out into the storm and Christina was still going about in a sort of daze, with feelings still unanalyzed, when she remembered that Friday would be Jimmie's eighteenth birthday. Jimmie should have been through school, but he had done that disgraceful thing that, so far, no Lindsay had ever done; he had failed in his examinations the Summer before. Had it not been for the boys' going to war, the great event that absorbed the mind of the family, Jimmie might have fared badly. As it was he received a solemn warning from John, and went back to school in the Fall very unwillingly.

"Life is so queer," Christina was constrained to say. "I was always dying to go to school and couldn't, and Jimmie is dying to stay out of it and can't."

"It's Allister's money that's spoiled the silly kid," grumbled John. "That and the war. I tell you, Christina, we always thought it was a dreadful misfortune to be poor, and wished we had money, but I am beginning to think that we ought to thank the Lord that we have had to do without. Jimmie has never done very well at school just because it has been made easy for him to there."

"I'm afraid Allister's money is not likely to do any of us much more harm, anyway," Christina said to herself, remembering another rather despondent letter from him. She could not quite agree with John that money was not a very good thing to have. It would have opened for her the road to the college halls, but it had been denied. And yet she was not unhappy. Something sang in her heart these days, the memory of a certain farewell at the back door in the wind and the rain and darkness, a memory that was all light and glory.

But Jimmie was still unsettled and dissatisfied with school, and Christina said that she would please him by making him a birthday cake. She would ice it with plenty of thick almond paste, his favourite, and put his initials on it and the date. It was a very handsome and tempting confection indeed, when she put it on the pantry shelf in a secluded spot where he would not see it until the right moment arrived.

The kitchen was still filled with its spicy fragrance when there came a quick footfall in the porch and a knock at the door. Christina opened it to meet a slim young soldier who strode into the room and saluted smartly. She stood looking at him in stupefied silence for a moment, and then she dropped upon a chair and put her head down on the kitchen table.

"Oh, Jimmie! Oh, Jimmie!" she sobbed. "How could you?"

But the new recruit caught her round the waist and waltzed her across the room, and then, snatching the butcher-knife from the table, he presented arms and saluted and posed all in such an absurd fashion that in spite of her grief she smiled.

"Go right back into the shed till I tell mother," she exclaimed, "she mustn't see you till she has had warning."

Jimmie went out and hid himself, just a little subdued. Evidently his gallant act, the thing that everybody had admired in Trooper, had taken on a different colour when performed by him.

He had little opportunity to reflect upon his act. There was hardly time for sorrow before Jimmie was gone; he had been put in a draft for a Battalion already in England and to his huge delight he was sent overseas almost immediately. It seemed as if this, her baby's going, was almost more than Mrs. Lindsay could bear, and Christina was more and more called upon to be a comforter and a bearer of burdens.

It was not the fear of gas nor bomb nor German bullet that kept Jimmie's mother wakeful at night, but the pestilence that walked in darkness, waylaying the souls of young men. Terrible tales of brave boys falling before an enemy more to be dreaded than all the frightfulness of the Hun came back to Canada. It was this living Death that stalked through the camps of England, and behind the lines in France and Flanders, that made the mother's heart sick with fear.

As she watched her mother's silent suffering, Christina's soul began, again, to ask questions. What was the meaning of that psalm that Grandpa had read when Sandy and Neil went way, and, later, when Jimmie left? Did it mean anything? And if it did, why could it not bring comfort to her mother's sorely-tried heart?

Through all the days of Christina's loneliness and anxiety there was no one so kind to her as Wallace's mother. Mrs. Sutherland made a point of selecting Christina for her special helper at Red Cross meetings, and Christina could not but notice the significance of her attentions.

"You are such a comfort, Christine," she declared one day when the girl handed her back a sock with a dropped stitch deftly picked up. "Your mother is a fortunate woman. I wish I had a daughter like you!"

Christina's cheeks grew scarlet, and she was thankful that the clatter of sewing machines and the noise of Mrs. Johnnie Dunn's orders secured them from being overheard.

But indeed, she could not shut her eyes to the fact that all events pointed in the direction so prettily indicated, again and again, by Wallace's mother. Wallace was succeeding beyond his own expectations, and Uncle William was growing more lamb-like every day. The road to success had surely opened out for Christina. Her Dream Knight had ridden up to her very door. He was possessed of a fine house, and broad acres, and had prospects of great wealth. He was handsome and gay and debonair, and what more could any human girl ask?

And in the face of all this grand good fortune that unreasonable Christina Lindsay was more dissatisfied and restless than she had ever been in all her life. She reasoned with herself and scolded herself all to no avail. That foolish heart of hers, that had always got in the way of her worldly prospects, was standing stubbornly right in the very highway of success.

Here was the great opportunity of her life, such prospects as might dazzle any Orchard Glen girl, and its glory was all blotted out by the memory of a tall figure in a khaki coat, coming suddenly out of the wind and rain of a dark night. Wallace had sat by Christina's side that night in the warmth and shelter of the fireside, but though Christina did not quite realise it yet, her heart had gone out into the storm after Gavin, and could never come back. It was still following him over the perils of the high seas and into the blood and carnage of the battlefield, and it valued farms and stock and fine houses less than the dust.

And so Christina was more dissatisfied than she had ever been in her life, and she lay awake nights wondering what she should do, and how she could possibly extricate herself from the impossible position in which she found herself.

And to make matters worse or better, she did not know which, Gavin wrote to her, and she wrote him long letters in reply. And she grew into the habit of running over the hills to Craig-Ellachie to cheer the Grant Girls, and, of course, they talked of their soldier-hero all the time, and of nothing else.

The Aunties literally lived by his letters. Everything was dated by them.

"We started yon crock o' butter jist the day Gavie's first letter came from France," Auntie Janet would say. "It's time it was finished."

"Gavie's letter was a bit late this week," they announced at another time, "so we didn't start the ironin' till it came. It jist seemed as if we couldn't settle down."

Gavin's letters were certainly worth waiting for, Christina had to confess. He wrote much easier than he spoke, and his happiness in being permitted to write to her at all filled them with a quiet humour. Christina's eyes searched them just a little wistfully for any hint of the feeling he had displayed in his farewell. But there was none. Gavin was too much the true gentleman to presume on that parting. He told her he had the little ring safe, and that it was his most precious possession, but beyond that he did not refer to that last evening. There was never a hint of hardship, even after he reached the Front, and was in many a desperate encounter. It was only all joy that he was able to be in the struggle for right. He had just one anxiety and that was lest his Aunts be lonely, and he wondered if she would be so good as to comfort them just a little when she could.

And Christina wrote him long letters in return and felt like a criminal in her double dealing. She knew she was wrong but she could not make a decision. On the one hand was all that she could hope this world could offer, and on the other nothing but a true and gallant heart. She was angry and ashamed of herself and very restless, and withal, in spite of herself, quite unreasonably happy.

Mary had been writing all Winter urging her to come for a little visit, and see Hughie Junior, who was a marvellous baby, with wonderful feats to his credit that no human baby had ever yet performed. But Christina put the tempting invitations aside, feeling she must not leave her mother in her deep anxiety.

And then there came letters from overseas that brought a wonderful relief from her mother's worry, and lightened greatly the burdens of the night.

For many and many a night her mother sat sleepless by her window, looking up at the stars that hung above her home and that also watched above her soldier sons. She had no fears for Neil, a thousand might fall at his side and ten thousand at his right hand, but it would not come nigh him. And Sandy,—Sandy was honest, and true, and as fine a lad as marched in the Canadian Army, but he was young and careless and gay, and how did she know what temptations might assail him? And there was Jimmie! Night after night she lay awake, thinking of Jimmie, praying and agonising for him. He was so young, such a big overgrown baby, how could he come through unscathed?

And then there came from France this great relief from her dread. Jimmie's draft had reached England and Neil had managed to get himself transferred to Jimmie's Battalion. It was going to France immediately, and France was safer than England, Neil wrote, from certain kinds of dangers. And his mother was not to worry, for he had Jimmie right beside him and he would look after the boy and see that no harm could come to him. And Sandy wrote that Neil had refused a chance to take the officer's course and a Commission, because he would not leave Jimmie.

Full of joy and gratitude, Christina watched her mother's eyes grow bright again, and so she left Mitty in charge of her many affairs and took the train for a week's visit to Port Stewart.

Mary's house was as pretty as ever, but had lost much of its immaculate tidiness. For Hughie Lindsay MacGillivray's wardrobe and appointments overflowed into every room. But Hughie himself was all he had been reported and more, and Christina fell down and worshipped his apple blossom face and his dimples at the first sight.

"And tell me all about Wallace Sutherland," demanded Mary, between raptures. "Isn't it grand that he's doing such fine things with the Ford place. Why, Christine, you'll be a wealthy woman some day!"

"Oh, hush!" cried Christina in distress. "Why, Mary, I haven't even been asked to live at the Ford place yet, and it's positively shameless to talk about, about anything, yet!"

"Nonsense!" laughed the practical Mary. "You know perfectly well that Wallace is in love with you, and that you are as good as engaged."

"He is not! I am not!" denied Christina excitedly. "Don't you talk like that, Mary, I—I can't bear it—"

"Why, Christine, why, mercy! I didn't mean anything!" cried Mary, alarmed and amazed at the sight of tears in Christina's eyes. "Why, what's the matter, dear? You haven't quarrelled with Wallace, have you?"

"Oh, no, of course not," said Christina dolefully, regaining her composure.

"And his mother's just lovely to you now, isn't she?"

"Yes."

"And, well, what's wrong? Why, any girl I know, even here in town, would give anything for your prospects!"

But Christina could not explain her sudden outburst. It had astonished herself as much as Mary. She knew that now was the great opportunity to confess to Mary that Wallace had fallen far below her high standard, but the memory of the Ford place and all it meant closed her lips. It seemed too much to give up, and she went home with the battle between her heart and her head still raging.



CHAPTER XIV

"OVER THE TOP"

The Lindsay boys had been about a month on the battle line when, beside their weekly letters, there came a splendid big fat envelope to the home people, containing a letter from each of the three.

There had been many letters from the boys, gay and bright and full of cheer, but none that contained such comfort as these. And the assurance they brought put new life into the mother and Christina's loving eyes noted a new energy in all her movements.

She read Jimmie's letter first. It was headed "Back of the Front," and was largely taken up with a list of the wonderful things they had had to eat for their Christmas dinner. It was a bang-up spread, sure enough, and with the boxes sent from home on top of it all, they ate so much that they couldn't even have run away if Fritz had come over to pay them a visit.

But the important part of the letter was the description of a Sunday afternoon he and Neil and Sandy spent together behind the lines. It was great having that day with Sandy. Of course he and Neil were always together, for Jimmie wished to assure them all at home that he couldn't blow his nose without Neil standing over him to see that he did it just right. But a day with Sandy was a treat, for besides being in another quarter he was an officer, and as hard to get at as the Kaiser. But they arranged a meeting this Sunday, and Jimmie guessed that Sandy bust all the red tape in the British army doing it.

"Neil and I had just come out of our ground-hog's hole and we had nearly all France on our uniforms, and Sandy was such a swell, all dolled up like a field-marshal that Neil said perhaps we oughtn't to be so familiar as to salute him. But we got a bath and got fumigated too, and it was real Christmas holidays not to have to scratch for a whole day. We had to salute Sandy when there was any one else round, but when we got him alone I paid him up for all the respect and I wiped the floor with a few yards of his officer's uniform. I tell you, Christina, he can't put me down now the way he used to. I'm as hard as nails and I'm as tall as he is. Sandy said I could be court-martialed and shot for it, but Neil refereed and saw that justice was done. I started out to tell you and Mother about that Sunday we had together, but I'll leave it to Neil, he can do it better than I can, but I want Mother to know that I agree with everything he says, and she needn't be scared about me out here. I'm all right."

"So don't cry, Dear, I'm all right here. Oh, it's just like bein' at hame."

Sandy's letter told still more about the meeting; but Neil's letter went right to the heart of the matter. "I wish you could have seen us at our Battalion service, Mother, that Sunday morning. It wasn't very far back, and we could hear the guns booming as we stood in a quiet spot behind a shattered little village. We sang 'Faint not for fear, His arms are near,' the last hymn we sang in Orchard Glen church, and after it was over we met Sandy and we went off together, Sandy and Jimmie and I, to have one of our old-time Sunday talks, just as we used to wander off to the fields after Sunday School, we two, with Jimmie tagging at our heels. It wasn't much like home, though, just a desolate shell-torn corner behind the ragged remnants of a barn, but, somehow, the quiet took us back to Orchard Glen and home, and you seemed there. And we got talking about the contrast between our life out here and back there and the temptations all around that were so new. And we each stood up, so to speak, and told our experience, like a good old Methodist class-meeting, that would have delighted Grandpa if he could have heard it. And Sandy said that when he saw the devastation Sin could bring, it had made him want to be a preacher more than ever before. And then it was Jimmie's turn, and he confessed that something about military camp life gave him a feeling of physical nausea at first. For a month he didn't want to go beyond the Y. M. C. A. tent, and then he began to get used to it all, but he never had the smallest inclination to mix in it. He's the same bright, clean boy that left you, Mother, a great deal older and wiser, but no sadder, and you need not fear for him. We were saying that it was you who had given us our strength against temptation, because you never set anything but the highest before us and Sandy remarked that you had buckled our armour on tight before you sent us out to battle, and then Jimmie said, 'It's like being in one of the Tanks. You ride right over everything in the biggest show the Huns can pull off and nothing can touch you.'"

"I think that was a fine description of what you gave us, don't you, Mother? You had no money to give us, but you built and riveted a Tank with your years of hard toil, and you put us all inside and we are safe there forever. And so you must not worry about us. For even if we are called upon to pay the price, what does that matter?"

When the letter was read and reread, Christina was surprised to see her mother put it carefully away in the pocket of her skirt; and putting on her bonnet and cloak, she slipped out quietly and went away across the Short Cut towards the village. Christina wondered that she had said nothing about where she was going and stood at the window watching her with anxious loving eyes and wondering if she were wearing warm enough clothing as the wind swayed her bent old figure. She supposed her mother had gone to see Granny Minns, but Joanna dropped in with some Red Cross work on her way up to Mrs. Johnnie Dunn's for an afternoon's sewing, and told Christina that she had seen her mother sitting in the churchyard beside her father's grave.

Christina's eyes filled with tender tears; she understood. Her mother had gone with the boys' letters to share with their father the glad news that had lifted the burden from her heart.

Christina read all Neil's letter to Grandpa that night. It was no light task, but she could not bear that he miss a word. She had her reward, for he sang the 103rd psalm at the top of his lungs before he settled for the night, and the Hindmost Hymn louder and clearer than he had ever sung it since the day the boys went away.

And the next morning he read again the 91st psalm, and his old shaking voice rose high and strong as he came to the words that spoke the triumph over all life's ills, and for the first time in her life Christina understood them. "Surely He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler and from the noisome pestilence.... Thou shall not be afraid for the terror by night nor for the arrow that flieth by day nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness."

The promise was literally true! The white Comrade walked beside her warrior brothers and they were safe. And Christina learned that morning that there was only one thing in life that mattered after all. For even though the boys had had wealth and power and great fame and social position none of these would have brought any real comfort to the heart of the mother and grandfather at that moment. The knowledge that they were safe from sin and its power was everything. And those things upon which she had set her heart and counted of supreme importance did not weigh at all in the great crisis of life.

And right on that day of exultation, when the psalm was still repeating itself triumphantly in their ears, the dreaded word came from the battlefield. Mr. Holmes received the telegram at the little office behind the store. He had been very distant with Mr. Sinclair ever since he joined the Methodists against the Presbyterians, but he forgot all about their estrangement in the terrible task that faced him of carrying the news to the Lindsay family. So he went hurriedly to the Manse with his heavy burden, and Mr. Sinclair did not seem to think it strange that he should come. The two men left their work and went up the hill to the Lindsay home walking close together like children who were afraid and were trying to give each other support.

And there by the bright fireside, sitting in the sunny window, where her scarlet geraniums bloomed as gay as the poppies in Flanders Field, they found Christina and told her the news: that Neil and Jimmie had gone over the top, together, very eager and glad, and that they would not come back.

Christina was thankful afterwards for the merciful numbness, that was like an anaesthetic in a painful operation. She had a feeling that she would awaken soon and realise fully the terrible calamity that had befallen, but just now, if she kept still it would not hurt so much.

She was filled with wonder at her mother's courage. Even in the first moments of anguish she showed not a moment of wavering faith. And she was more filled with wonder at Grandpa. Neil had been Grandpa's special pride, and she was afraid of the result of the news. She went to the bright corner of the kitchen where he sat and tried tremblingly to make him understand, holding back her own grief by main force, that she might tell it gently. He made no outcry, spoke no word of grief; but for an hour afterwards he sat quite still in deep thought, and she heard him saying over and over to himself, as though trying to grasp the magnitude of his sorrow, "Both o' them! Not the two o' them, surely?" And then after pondering a while, "Aye, the two o' them!"

But when she put him to bed that night, dumb and sick with anguish herself, she could not but notice that Grandpa was acting strangely. He had an air of suppressed excitement, as though he were hiding some good news. She did not guess what it was until she had left him, and overheard him saying, "Aye, aye, I'll see them all the sooner. All the sooner!" in a tone of exultation. She did not hand him the hymn book, thinking he would not want to sing, but when she peeped in later to see if it were time to take away the lamp, she was amazed to hear him singing very softly and low, lest any overhear him, but singing, nevertheless, in the house of mourning, the Hindmost Hymn,

"On the other side of Jordan, in the sweet fields of Eden, Where the tree of life is blooming, there is rest for you."

For Grandpa had travelled far on the upward road, and Christina did not realise that death was a small incident in the life of one who stood just at the door into the other world.

In the morning when she went in and ran up his window blind to the top to let in the sunlight, he was lying as she had left him the night before, with the little orange-covered book held loosely in his cold hands. For Grandpa had sung the Hindmost Hymn for the last time and was even now singing the First Hymn in a new Book away in the sweet fields of Eden, where there is no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither is there any more pain.

Christina had no time for her own grief, so busy she was comforting her mother, cheering Uncle Neil, sustaining John and writing consoling letters to the absent ones. Sometimes she was so occupied that she almost forgot the terrible blow that had fallen, and then it would come upon her with an unbelievable shock that Neil and Jimmie were dead,—gone forever out of the world!

It was something her heart would not accept. How could it be, it argued, that Neil, so strong and steady and full of high purpose, and Jimmie, so radiant and full of life, could be lying dead in the mud of a trench? It was unbelievable. And at last she came to understand, through watching with her mother, whose faith leaped over even this barrier of death, that the instincts of her heart were right. Jimmie and Neil were not dead. They were gone, somewhere, beyond her sight, but they were still living and moving and working as they had done here on earth. Some fault of vision, some failure of the senses made it impossible for her to communicate with them. But they were there, and alive! Her mother was sure of that. And Grandpa was right, he had met them the sooner for their untimely call to the Life Beyond.

Allister came home as soon as the news about Neil and Jimmie reached him. He stayed a week with them, comforting his mother and Uncle Neil, helping John about the barn, and trying to keep Christina from going too often to Grandpa's empty room. He brought a long letter from Ellen, offering to come home just as soon as the hospital authorities would spare her. She was getting on wonderfully well, Allister reported, and had determined, should the war continue, that she would offer herself as a Red Cross nurse, but had decided to come home if she were needed.

Christina was longing for her elder sister's presence and help, but the remembrance of Neil's sacrifice for Jimmie made her ashamed of the thought. So she wrote bravely to Ellen bidding her stay until she finished her course.

On the evening before Allister left, he and Christina sat by the fire talking, long after the others had gone to bed. Wallace had been there earlier in the evening, and to Christina's amazement Allister did not share in the universal admiration for him.

"He's got money, that young chap, Christine," he said. "But money isn't everything, girl, remember that."

"But you like Wallace, don't you?" asked Christina in surprise.

"Oh, I guess he's all right. But he's got things too easy. And he'll want to get them easy all his life or he'll kick over the traces."

Christina was not conscious of any feeling of resentment. She did not even take the trouble to attempt to defend Wallace, and Allister seemed surprised.

"Yes, I thought money was the whole thing," he went on, "and now the war has made me a poor man. I've got the farm I had when I went West first, and I've got something more, I've got a pocketful of debts that will take me years to pay off. But, I guess I'm about as well off in some ways as I ever was."

Christina would have been very much dismayed at this some months earlier, but in the face of the stupendous events of her life the loss of property or even of the chance of wealth seemed trivial. She said so to Allister and was glad to find that he agreed with her.

"I found that out since I was home last," he declared. "I thought you lacked ambition because you always gave up your chance in life to this one and the other one. But you were the wise one. Money, and gettin' on in the world and all that don't amount to much after all. And if money is all this fellow of yours has, mind you, that ain't enough. It might do for some girls, but let me tell you, it won't satisfy you."

As the dark days of the war dragged on, Christina found her talent for comforting others sadly needed. For her own family were only the forerunners of many another stricken home.

Burke was the next to fall, and little Mitty was left alone to struggle with Granny and poverty and grief, and Christina needed all her strength to bring her through the trial.

And the next was Trooper. He went over the top in a gallant raid of the Princess Pats, calling on his comrades to follow, and it seemed to those who had known him, that somewhere he must still be going on, gay and bright and fearless, always calling on other high hearts to come after him.

Joanna bore his going like a soldier's wife. She never walked quite so erect again, and her jet black hair began to turn grey, but she was even more faithful in her work at the Red Cross meetings, and she and The Woman grew firmer friends than ever in their common grief.

Christina went about among the stricken ones, easing her own grief in comforting others. But she had one ever present trouble for which she could receive no comfort on any side. Every day the falseness of her attitude towards Wallace Sutherland weighed more heavily upon her honest heart. And how she was going to tell him of the change in her she did not know. How was she going to tell him that, though he had once been her hero, her ideal True Knight, that he had failed to live up to her high standard, and that another, a real hero, who had left her at the call of duty, had, all unwittingly, slipped into his place?

And then an event happened that made it unnecessary for her to tell him. It was the news that came one early day in Spring, when all the world was a wild rush of wind and water, and blinding sunshine,—the word that Gavin had been killed.

By a strange chance it was Wallace, himself, who brought the news to Christina. When Mr. Holmes heard the dread message ticked off on the telegraph machine, he went straight to Mr. Sinclair, again, with his burden of dismay and grief. And, unable to bear the heavy news alone, the minister went over to see if Dr. McGarry would help him carry the terrible burden to Craig-Ellachie.

Mr. Holmes kept the dread secret to himself until they had time to deliver it, fearing that the Grant Girls might hear it from another source. So the news had not reached the Lindsay farm in the evening when Wallace came up the hill to see Christina.

He could not but notice a growing change in her manner towards him, but he had put it down to her grief over the loss of her brothers. One of Christina's charms in his eyes had been her independence and her evident indifference as to whether what she did or said should please him or otherwise, but he thought it was high time she was showing some warmth of feeling and instead she had been strange and cold and aloof recently. And Wallace, accustomed to have everything arranged just as he wanted it, was beginning to feel somewhat ill-used. He felt that, though Christina were so heartbroken over Jimmie and Neil, she ought to show more consideration for him. And to-night he had made up his mind to ask her to share the Ford place with him. He had quite decided that there could never be any one like Christina for him, and he felt sure that when they were really engaged she would be more like her old self, and they would be as happy as they were in the beginning.

Christina was sitting in the warm corner by the sitting-room stove, knitting a sock for Gavin when he entered. The room was bright and pleasant, and Wallace felt very happy when he flung himself luxuriously upon the deep sofa. But Christina was graver than she had ever been. She was sorry for him and was blaming herself bitterly; she had laid a snare for her own feet and now she was in desperate straits to get out of it.

Wallace saw her evident distress and supposed she had heard of Gavin, and was disturbed for his Aunts.

"Awful thing, this, for the poor old Grant Girls," he remarked, sympathetically.

Christina stopped in the act of sitting down, and straightened herself quickly, as though she had been struck a blow.

"What?" She uttered the word in a fearful whisper, but the young man felt she was showing only the natural agitation she must feel, remembering Jimmie and Neil.

"Didn't you hear? Gavin's killed," he said concisely.

Christina stood and looked at him stupidly. "What did you say?" she asked in a dazed fashion.

"Gavin,—Gavin Grant," he repeated wonderingly, "he's been killed. They just got the telegram to-night, and Mr. Sinclair and Uncle Peter have gone to tell the poor old Aunts—" he stopped, struck by the look in her face. She had turned perfectly white, even to her lips, and sat down, slowly and dazedly. She picked up her knitting, looked at it a moment, foolishly, and then laid it down with a bewildered air.

Wallace got up suddenly from the sofa. "Christine!" he cried in alarm. "What's the matter? Don't—don't look like that! I didn't mean to frighten you. Oh, Christina, was Gavin?—Oh, I didn't know! What does it mean to you?" he cried in sharp dismay.

She looked at him with honest, stricken eyes. "It means everything to me, Wallace," she said simply. "Everything in the world," telling the bald truth, in this supreme moment, without an effort. And when she had said it, a great billow of darkness came rolling across the room and surged over her. She heard Wallace calling for her mother, heard Uncle Neil run in from the kitchen, and then sank away into a great silence and peace.

They tried to make her stay in bed the next day, but she insisted upon going to see the Grant Girls with her mother. The fields were too wet and soft to be crossed, so Christina drove Dolly in the old buck-board. Craig-Ellachie was all sunshine, and the windows were alight with blossoms, scarlet geraniums and great waxy begonias, pink and white and crimson, were in every sunny nook and corner, and purple hyacinths and pure white Easter lilies filled the old kitchen with fragrance. The garden, too, showed signs of beauty, for already the first crocus had pushed its brave little head through the brown earth of the flower beds.

But the Grant Girls had lost the Spring-time bloom of their youth. An untimely frost had smitten down the one flower of their hearts. They were not girls any more; three stricken old women sat in the wide bright kitchen among the flowers in a bewilderment of grief too deep for tears.

Hughie Reid and his wife were there, and Mr. Sinclair and Joanna, and several other friends from the village. And out in the summer kitchen Mrs. Johnnie Dunn had blackened and polished the stove that did not need polishing, and was now madly scrubbing the floor that did not need scrubbing in the least, the tears all the while streaming down her face. Everything that loving hands could do in the house and barn was done, and the Aunties sat about in unaccustomed idleness, like lost children who had suddenly found themselves in strange surroundings, and were even afraid to speak.

And Christina sat beside them, dumb with her grief and theirs, and not even daring to whisper to them that her heart was lying with theirs, "Somewhere in France."

It seemed a very little thing, in the face of their stupendous loss, when the news came that Gavin had died a very glorious death, that he would have been given the Victoria Cross had he lived, and that they were sending it to Auntie Elspie. He had held back a rush of the enemy, alone and single-handed, until his comrades got to a place of safety. He had stayed on in a desperate position, working his machine gun, while the world rocked beneath him and the mad heavens raged with shot and shell above him, had held on though he was wounded again and again, saying between his teeth, "Stand Fast, Craig-Ellachie!" And then a shell had come and the gallant stand was over. But he had saved the Blue Bonnets from destruction, and spared many lives in losing his own.

The Aunties held up their poor bowed heads, as Mr. Sinclair read them the splendid story. They knew Gavie would do something great, and it was just the way he would have wished to go, Auntie Elspie said tremulously. But the light had gone out of their lives, and it was small comfort that it had blazed so gloriously in the going.



CHAPTER XV

THE GARDEN BLOOMS AGAIN

The day that Gavin's picture appeared in the Algonquin paper with an account of the gallant deed in which he had given his life, Christina received a letter in an unknown handwriting.

Mitty brought it up to her room on a sunny April afternoon, where she was sitting, trying to interest herself in some sewing for baby Hugh. She laid the letter aside while she finished her work, too indifferent even to open it, but when the last button-hole was fashioned in the dainty little muslin dress she remembered it.

She opened it slowly, noticing with some interest that it was from the Front, and then she suddenly sat up very straight and read the written pages greedily. The letter was signed, Harry Kent, and was from a comrade of Gavin's in the Blue Bonnets, a boy whom he had often mentioned in his letters to Christina.

And inside was a letter from Gavin himself sealed in a separate envelope. The first was a formal note from a shy boy.

"Dear Miss Lindsay: I hope you won't mind if I take the liberty to write to you, though I am a stranger. Gavin Grant and I were pals, and when he went up to the Front for the last time he gave me the letter I am enclosing, and he asked me to mail it to you. We knew his company was going into a hot place, and he said he did not think he would get back. So he wrote you this letter and when I heard he was killed I said I would mail it to you. Gavin was the finest fellow I ever knew. He was always singing and he taught the fellows a lot of songs. There was one he was always singing, it was called a 'Warrior Bold,' and he was singing it that morning just before the Boche came over. The fellows in our Company would rather we had all gone West than Gavin, he was worth them all put together...."

There was more about what Gavin had done in that last dread struggle. But Christina could not take the time to read it. She opened Gavin's letter reverently, with trembling hands. The blinding tears would permit her to make out only a few sentences at a time.

"I wrote you a letter last night," it said, "and I hope you will not think I am too bold to be writing you another to-night. But we are going up into a rather bad place to-night and if I do not come back, I want to send you a good-bye message. I have never been able to tell you how much you have always been to me. I could not even write it in a letter. I have always been afraid I would offend you. But I thought you would not mind that I told you if I never came back. You have always been so far above me, that I did not have the courage to try to go with you. And then somebody else came, and I knew I had no chance then. But you have always been my girl in spite of all that, ever since the day you filled my pail with your berries to save me from a thrashing. I was always singing about you when I sang that old song,

"'My love is young and fair, My love has golden hair, And eyes so blue and heart so true That none with her compare.'

"It was partly because you were so much to me that I wanted to enlist. I felt that I would be fighting for you. And if I do not come back to-morrow I will be glad to feel that I will be helping to save you from harm. You will not miss me, but the Aunties will, and I am going to ask a great favour of you. Will you always go to see them, and comfort them? And tell them they must not grieve for me. It is so much better to come out here and die for a good cause than to live in peace and safety at home. I am so glad, and they must be glad too, for my sake. I will have your little ring——"

Christina could read no more just then. Her bright head went down on the sunny window sill, she slipped to the floor in a very passion of grief. She was realising with overwhelming remorse that a most beautiful thing had happened to her and her eyes had been too blind to see until the pageant had faded. Her True Knight—and what lady of high degree had a knight more noble?—her True Knight had ridden out to mortal combat, and she had not even waved him farewell from her window!

She left the work with Mitty the next day and went up over the hills to see the Grant Girls. She did not take her letter, it was too sacred for even their loving eyes, but she wanted to talk to them about Gavin and, if she were alone with Auntie Elspie, she would whisper to her that her heart had gone out into the storm and darkness after Gavin that night he went to the war, and that it still followed him somewhere in the shining regions where he moved.

She went slowly up over the dun fields, lying all quiet and restful, waiting for the stirring of the Spring. Away down in the beaver meadow a soft green flush told that the pussy willows were already out, a bold robin was singing the opening song of the Spring concert, and the crows cawed derisively over the memories of a vanquished Winter.

But Christina's sad heart could not respond to these little, gay greetings of Spring. She lingered in the bare slash, remembering the day of the berry-picking when Gavin had been in such deep trouble. She stood in the place where he had stood when he pulled the bind-weed, and when they had listened to the call of the opening drum beat of the war. And she went over in memory every foot of the walk in the harvest moonlight from Craig-Ellachie that night when she had been so happy with him, but had walked beside him with blinded eyes.

The garden at Craig-Ellachie had already wakened to life, the crocuses were out, rows and rows of them, and the garden hyacinths were holding up their little green spears. But there was no happy gardener working in the brown beds. Christina went slowly up the walk where the dry leafless branches of the climbing roses hung over her head. Gavin's dogs came tumbling down the steps to meet her in joyous welcome.

She looked up in wonder as the kitchen door was flung suddenly open. Mrs. Johnnie Dunn flashed into the doorway and shouted something incoherent, and as suddenly disappeared, and Hughie Reid's wife came to the window and waved frantically. Christina ran forward, filled with foreboding. She darted up the steps and stopped amazed in the doorway. The kitchen was full of people, it seemed, all moving about and talking wildly. Mr. Sinclair was there and Dr. McGarry and a half dozen women, and the Aunties were running about laughing and crying, and it seemed as if every one had suddenly gone quite mad.

And then it seemed to Christina that the room was going round and she found a chair and sat down quickly, for Mrs. Johnnie Dunn's voice from far away was calling out the most amazing and unbelievable thing—shouting that Gavin was not dead! He had been found! He had been buried in a shell-hole, half-dead, and when the Blue Bonnets swept back over the enemy's trenches he had been rescued. He had been badly wounded and had lain unconscious for a long time. But he was alive and was in a hospital in France!

Christina flew over the brown hills on the way to her mother with the news, saying over and over to her benumbed senses that Gavin was not dead, that he was alive. It seemed as if her heart had been so stupefied with grief that it could not yet accept joy. She ran in a kind of dream saying that she would soon wake up and find that this was not true.

But the glorious news was confirmed. There was a week of alternate wild hope and fear, and then, as wonderful as a message from the dead, came a cable from Gavin himself. He was in a hospital in France and was progressing rapidly. The next news told that he was in England, and then came a blessed letter from his nurse, saying that he was recovering slowly but surely and was promising himself that it would not be long until he would write a letter home.

Such a clamour of joy and relief as the news of Gavin brought to Orchard Glen no one would have thought possible. Every one had sorrowed deeply with the Grant Girls and now the whole countryside came out to Craig-Ellachie to rejoice with them and to hear again and again the story of Gavin's rescue. And the Grant Girls put in such a garden as the county had never seen, and grew young and bright again with joy and hope.

As for Christina she moved about in a golden dream. Life was not real at all these days, but the dream of it was beautiful and the colour came back to her cheeks and the light to her eyes, and she went about the house with her old swift motions.

She could not believe in the reality of her joy at all until she received her first letter from Gavin. As soon as the message came that he was in England she wrote him. It was her answer to the letter that he had never intended her to see during his life. It must have been a satisfactory answer, for not all the skill of surgeon and sister combined had produced a fraction of the healing and strengthening quality that its closely written pages brought to the wounded soldier in England. And his answer made Christina's eyes brighter and her step lighter than they had been since the day Jimmy and Neil went over the top.

It was not until Gavin was so well that he was walking about that he wrote confessing the full extent of his injuries. He had lost an arm, only his left arm, he wrote, which he really didn't miss much. He made jokes about it and warned Auntie Janet that she need not be laying plans to do as she pleased, for he could manage the whole family and make them mind, even with one arm. And as he was still a little lame and would be likely to carry a heavy stick for some time he would be quite able to keep her in her place.

But he did not write so lightly on the matter to Christina. He had only one arm, and was a poor hobbling creature, he confessed, and how could he ask her to share life with him? He was only half a man, and a poor weak half at that.

But Christina wrote him such a letter as forever put such notions out of Gavin's head. It was a letter that made him feel not like half a man but as though he had the strength of ten. For what was the loss of an arm when one had such a warm heart beating for him, and awaiting his coming?

Christina had not seen Wallace Sutherland since the day he had disappeared from her view in the black mist that had rolled up over her with the news that Gavin was killed. Her mind had been too much racked to think of him since, but now that it was at rest she remembered him with a feeling of shame. So she sat down and wrote him a letter, telling him humbly and frankly all the truth, how Gavin had held her heart long before she realised it. She begged him to forgive her if she had done him any injury and ended up by the tactful hint that as their association had been a pleasant friendship, in which the kindnesses had been so many and so generous on his side, she hoped he would think of her with pleasure, and that they would always continue to be friends.

But Wallace was thinking of Christina with feelings entirely the reverse of pleasant. And his mother was thinking very bitter thoughts about her indeed. For just when Mrs. Sutherland had become reconciled to her son's changed prospects, and when Uncle William was doing handsomely by the boy, when there was every prospect that Wallace would soon be married and be safe from the recruiting officers, with a farm and a wife and a widowed mother between him and military service, when everything had turned out better than she had dared to hope, suddenly the whole fabric of her plans came crashing about her ears. And all owing to the outrageous conduct of a girl who had thrown her son aside for a farm boy, merely for the glamour of a medal won on the battlefield!

It was really very hard on poor Mrs. Sutherland, and Christina was overcome with shame when she thought of her. For Wallace sold the Ford place to Mrs. Johnnie Dunn for a shamefully low figure and went off to the States where quite likely some wicked sleuth of a recruiting officer would find him and send him to the war after all.

Christina was very humble and very much ashamed of herself, but it was hard to worry over Wallace when such wonderful things were happening in one's own life. For before the apple blossoms came to decorate the orchard for her birthday, Sandy was home to help celebrate. Even the news that he was wounded came as a relief from the strain of waiting. At least he was off the battlefield. And then it proved that the wound was not serious; but he was lame and unfit for more active service and was coming home to finish his course at college if that were at all possible.

And Uncle Neil took out his fiddle when the letter heralding Sandy's return was received, and played softly some of his old favourite airs; tunes Christina had not heard since the boys went away to the war. And they brought the tender tears to her eyes, remembering the happy old days when they were all at home and Grandpa sang the Hindmost Hymn at eventide. Sandy's presence brought new life to the Lindsay home. John and Uncle Neil sat up half the nights listening to his tales of the world of glory and horror in which he had been living. And Christina and her mother could scarcely let him out of their sight. He was all that had been spared them from the War Monster's greed.

In spite of all the dread sights he had witnessed he was the same gay old Sandy, and the home took on some of its old-time life and gaiety. He and Christina soon fell back into their habit of comradeship. They had many confidences to exchange, and Christina had to tell all the story of Gavin and what his going had meant to her. Sandy was full of joy at the telling. Gavin had always been a True Knight in his eyes and then he had all the returned soldier's disdain of the slacker. Christina could not but shudder at what her life might have been had ambition ruled, instead of her heart and Wallace and Sandy were meeting here in the old home.

They had many long talks on the pump platform under the blossoming orchard boughs, and they smiled often over their great plans that had all turned out so differently from what they had expected.

"Are you still bound to get out of Orchard Glen?" asked Sandy slyly, and Christina had to confess that she was not. She could not quite explain to Sandy that all her restless ambition had been but the desire for something great and heroic such as her simple life did not seem to contain. But the great and heroic had come right to her door, unseen, it is true, but now recognised, and her soul was perfectly content in its radiance. Life could never be narrow and common-place any more. She had attained all her ambition through following the road her heart indicated,—the shining pathway of loving self-sacrifice that leads to the stars.



CHAPTER XVI

THE HILLS ABOVE ORCHARD GLEN

As soon as the word reached Craig-Ellachie that Gavin was to be sent home to Canada, Orchard Glen began to bustle about for a grand celebration when he arrived.

Tremendous K. got the biggest choir together that the village had ever seen; a harmonious jumble of Presbyterians, Methodists and Baptists. And the children of the three Sunday Schools united in a grand chorus, and Minnie Brown and Martha Henderson worked like slaves teaching them songs and patriotic exercises, all denominations so mixed up nobody could tell which was which.

Mr. Sinclair was chairman of the committee to plan the celebration with Mr. Wylie and the Baptist minister as his assistants. And nobody raised the slightest objection when, at the very first meeting, Marmaduke proposed that they invite Piper Lauchie McDonald to come down from Glenoro and play Gavin home from the station.

Mr. Wylie nodded, and said "A good idea," and old Tory Brown himself spoke up and said, "Yes, yes, let's have the buddy. I don't like his noise, myself, but Gavin will be pleased. He aye liked the pipes."

And Piper Lauchie was vastly pleased when he received the invitation and graciously declared that he would set his vow aside, not for the sake of Orchard Glen, but out of his reverence for the Victoria Cross, and permit the misguided folk to listen to his music once more.

Every one was pleased furthermore because the public reception was to be held in the Temperance Hall instead of the Presbyterian Church, for it was felt that for this occasion Gavin belonged to the whole village, no Church should claim them. And this arrangement suited the good folk who were alarmed at the possibility of hearing the piper in church, for as old Willie Henderson said, "Even though the lad did a great deed, that was no reason why the people of the village should pollute the House o' God."

So the Hero was to be received in the Temperance Hall where Gavin had sung his songs of heroic deeds, none so great as that he had done himself. Then after the reception, with speeches and singing, all were to gather in the basement of the Methodist Church for a great supper. The Red Cross work was to be cleared away for the occasion, and tables were to be set that would hold all the township of Oro. And if the weather was fine the supper was to be taken out to the church lawn and everybody was to have a real good old-fashioned picnic.

Young Mrs. Martin, who had once taught school, and knew how things should be done, suggested that they arrange the supper in a more up to date style. It could be held in the Hall also, and everybody could sit down to the tables first and have the speeches after, as was the proper way. But The Woman, who was running the affair, would not listen to her.

"When you want to eat, why eat and be done with it, says I," she commanded. "But this mixing up of a concert and speeches with the food and dirty dishes on a table, I just can't abide. And the idea is nothing but some foolishness of them town trollops who don't know how to do things right anyways."

So, when everything was arranged so perfectly, and the two choirs could sing "O Canada" and "Keep the Home Fires Burning" without a flaw, and sufficient sandwiches and cakes and pies had been promised to feed all the Blue Bonnets had they been coming home, it was something of a shock to everybody's nerves when the astounding intelligence was received that the people of Algonquin were actually claiming Gavin as their own, and were arranging a reception for him at Algonquin on the very same day!

Fortunately Mrs. Johnnie Dunn discovered in time what Algonquin was up to. The Woman was now the President of the Red Cross Society in name, as well as in reality, as poor Mrs. Sutherland had withdrawn from all social life since her bitter disappointment over Wallace. And while she was attending a Red Cross meeting in Algonquin, Mrs. Johnnie made her amazing discovery. She called her forces together immediately upon her return home and told them all the deadly plot of the towns-people in a red hot speech that was talked about for years afterwards.

It appeared that the Algonquin people, with their unfailing habit of gobbling up everything that came near them, had calmly appropriated the Victoria Cross hero as their own, just because the company of the Blue Bonnets to which he belonged had drilled for a few months in their town! And they had published all over the countryside that he was an Algonquin boy. He was to be met at the station,—just as if he had nobody belonging to him,—by the Mayor, and the Council, and a member of Parliament, and what not. And there was to be a little girl all dressed up fit to kill, who would hand him a bunch of flowers! To Gavin Grant, who had all the Craig-Ellachie garden waiting for him! And then he was to be taken up to the Town Hall and set down to a banquet, with long speeches by all the preachers in the town, right in the middle of the eating; one of those messed-up affairs where you sat round amongst the dirty dishes and had speeches and singing all mixed up with your meat and potatoes.

Yes, it was true,—every word of it! It was the Algonquin President herself who told her,—that forward woman who was always teaching them how to sew a band on a shirt. And it was all the talk at the Red Cross meeting in town about the wonderful reception that was to be given to their returned soldier.

"Who's the reception for?" says I, "for I hadn't heard of any one in Algonquin that had done anything but dodge the recruiting officer?"

"Why one of our boys won the V. C. at the front," says she, "didn't you hear about it?"

"The V. C.!" says I, gettin' suspicious, "it's the first time I ever heard that any soldier from this town got anything but C. B." says I.

"Oh, yes," says she, as sweet as honey, "why, didn't you see in the papers about Gavin Grant getting the V. C.? He's one of our Algonquin boys. He enlisted here in The Blue Bonnets!"

And then another woman speaks up and says she, "'Why Mrs. Dunn,' says she, 'it's a wonder you don't know Gavin Grant. I think he comes from somewhere near Orchard Glen,' says she!"

"'Well' says I, 'it is a wonder; that's a fact! I don't seem to know as much about him as I thought I did. He's lived almost on the next farm to me since he was the size of a grasshopper,' says I, 'but this is the first time I ever heard that he belonged to Algonquin!' says I."

"Well, I tell you, that blew down their clothes-line in a hurry; especially when I told them that he was to be recepted at his own home on the very day they were planning their spree."

"They got into a terrible sweat, and one of the women ran and telephoned the Mayor's office, and the Mayor came runnin' over as if the town had caught fire. He was in a great sputter I tell you, when I let him know that he'd put his horse into the wrong stall. You'd think it had turned out that Gavin was a German spy."

"'Why, Mrs. Dunn,' says he, 'we've got all our arrangements made,' says he, 'and Mr. Leigh, the member, is spoken for,' says he, 'and, you'll just have to put yours on for the next afternoon,' says he, 'we really can't change now!'"

"'Well,' says I, 'I wouldn't have you stop Corny Leigh from makin' a speech, for all the world,' says I, 'I know how hard it would be on him,' says I, 'but I don't see how you'll manage,' says I, 'seein' that Gavin Grant, V. C., is going' to get off at Silver Creek Crossing, on the other side of Orchard Glen!' says I."

This was an inspiration on The Woman's part, and her audience burst into clapping. Silver Creek was a little station away back in the woods, and Orchard Glen lay midway between it and Algonquin. It was merely a flag station set away in the swamp, and not a fitting place to meet a hero home from the war, but every one agreed that in this emergency it proved a real refuge from the greed of Algonquin. It was a grand notion of The Woman's, and all Orchard Glen fairly held its sides laughing at the enemy's discomfiture.

So there was nothing for the vanquished but a retreat. They accomplished it hastily, and dug themselves in, there to await a later opportunity when Gavin would be received in proper style after Orchard Glen had got over blowing its trumpets.

But Orchard Glen had to learn that they could not keep Gavin quite to themselves. A reporter from one of the Algonquin weekly papers came out to the village; and later a couple of representatives of Toronto papers. They all had dinner at Craig-Ellachie and they took pictures of the old house, and of the three Aunties in the garden, and another of Auntie Elspie spinning in the door way. And they carried off a photograph of Gavin in his Highland bonnet and kilt, and it was all published in a great page of the Saturday issue, the pictures of the beautiful old home, and the thrilling tale of Gavin's glorious deed, with his picture in the centre of it all, and underneath his battle-cry, "Stand Fast, Craig-Ellachie!"

And the Aunties were so proud and happy, that they could neither eat nor sleep, but just wandered about the house and garden in a happy daze.

And through all the interviews, not one of the clever, keen-scented reporters, discovered that the hero had been just a poor waif from an Orphan Asylum that Auntie Elspie had plucked as a brand from the furnace of Skinflint Jenkins's cruelty.

The Grant Girls were eager to guard the secret, but that required some finesse of which they were entirely incapable. But Mrs. Johnnie Dunn was equal to any occasion, and she managed to be at Craig-Ellachie during the interviews. She kept close to the reporters, answering all their questions, and forestalling any that might be embarrassing. Without making any direct statements that might hurt the tender consciences of the Aunties, she led the newspaper men gently along a train of thought that ended in the firm impression that Gavin was the only child of their brother, with all his virtues and many more of his own. It was a subtle suggestion of The Woman's that made the youngest reporter notice a strong resemblance between Gavin's photograph and Aunt Janet. And indeed The Woman made such a fine story for the visitors, encouraging them along any and every bypath that their imagination might suggest, that not even Auntie Elspie could recognise her quiet, unassuming, reticent boy in the prancing warrior that Mrs. Johnnie Dunn permitted the representatives of the press to create.

The discovery of the perfidy of Algonquin in trying to steal Gavin made some re-arrangement for his reception necessary. As he was to be met at the quiet little nook in the swamp, instead of the noisy station at Algonquin, young Mrs. Martin made her second suggestion. It was that they have their programme and addresses of welcome right there in the open, beside the Silver Creek, and the more informal part, the supper, and some of the performances by the children, on their return.

This new arrangement met with every one's approval; even The Woman felt it would be a good idea to welcome Gavin properly right at the station, as soon as he stepped off. For the papers had all announced that Orchard Glen was preparing a grand home-coming for their hero, and who knew but there might be half-a-dozen reporters on the train to take notes of how they were doing it?

At last the word for which every one was waiting came. Gavin had reached Toronto; the hospital authorities were releasing him for a time, and the day for his home-coming was set! Sandy Lindsay was in Toronto at the time, and he wrote to Christina that he would be up with Gavin. For the hero of the Victoria Cross dreaded this public reception more than German gas, and insisted upon having some support when he was compelled to march into it.

So Sandy took matters in his own hands and telegraphed Mr. Sinclair that Gavin would arrive at Silver Creek on the two-thirty train, on a Friday afternoon, and Orchard Glen sat up half the night before getting ready.

Christina had never taken such a long time dressing in her life as she did that afternoon. At first she was seized with a sudden panic of shyness, and told herself she would not go. She knew the girls gossiped about her sudden change of heart, and her relation to Gavin was no secret. For the Aunties had been too happy to keep from telling, and Mrs. Sutherland had not been guiltless of making Christina's faithlessness public.

The girls were rather inclined to feel sorry for Christina. It did not seem possible that any girl would choose Gavin Grant, even with a Victoria Cross, in preference to Wallace Sutherland with the Ford place, and the only true explanation of the affair was that Wallace had changed. On the other hand, Bell Brown declared that Christina Lindsay was not like other girls and no one could tell what she would do.

So Christina well knew that they were talking about her, and at first she declared she would stay home with her mother and Uncle Neil. But the Aunties made it clear that they expected her to go, and she could not bear that they be disappointed on this the greatest day of their lives. And then Gavin would be disappointed too, and that would be still worse, and she had to confess to her honest heart that Christina would be more disappointed than any one, for she was impatient to see her hero, and quite as eager to go as the Aunties themselves.

So she put away all her fears, and spent a most unreasonable length of time getting herself ready. She wound her shining braids around her head and put on her best white dress and her white hat, and reverently fastened the purple band on her arm, for the dear ones who would never come home, but who were somewhere near in the free outer ring of being just beyond the painful confines of her life. And when she was all ready, with her golden hair and her eyes so blue, as Gavin had so often sung, she looked very young and fair, and far more beautiful than any Lindsay girl had ever yet looked.

The weather was perfect, such a glorious day of blank blue skies, with the smooth shaven fields lying golden-brown in the sunshine. Here and there a field showed sheaves of wheat standing in khaki-coloured groups like soldiers on guard. Nobody cared that the Air Service of the clouds might bomb them with silver bullets before night, for how could any one stay home and haul in his crop when one of their own boys was coming home bearing the Victoria Cross?

The crowd gathered at the corner, where the order of the procession was to be arranged. Piper Lauchie was there early this time and was marching up and down the store veranda, so that nobody could come in or out, and playing gloriously. Mrs. Johnnie Dunn brought her new car to carry the three Aunties, with a space reserved for Gavin. Mr. Holmes had recently bought a Ford and he came next with the piper, a piece of real Christian sacrifice on the store-keeper's part. He was followed by the ministers, all crowded amicably into one single buggy, where there was no room for denominational differences. Next came the choir, spreading over three big democrats, and following them, the Hendersons' hay wagon with the children piled into it three deep. Ordinary individuals came next without any order of precedence, and as far down the line as possible, Christina sat beside John in their single buggy.

The procession made a brave showing, with the long line of vehicles stretching from the corner away up the hill and down the other side, every one decorated with flags and streamers, and Piper Lauchie standing up in the Holmes' car playing loud enough to be heard in Algonquin.

But not all the rest of the procession together could compare in display with Mrs. Johnnie Dunn's car where the three Aunties sat arrayed as no even the Grant Girls had ever appeared in public. Auntie Elspie wore a sea-green brocaded satin, trimmed with silk fringe; Auntie Flora was in a dazzling silk of an ancient "changeable" variety, that was now purple and now gold, and a wonderful beaded cape of black velvet. And Auntie Janet was in her ruby velvet with a rose silk fringed parasol that turned to flame when the sun struck it. And beside they had the car filled with flowers and each Auntie carried a little posie of rosemary and pinks, Gavin's favourites of all the garden.

"We wanted him to smell the rosemary as soon as he got off the train," explained Auntie Flora, "and then he would feel he was at home."

The procession were a bright and beautiful sight, indeed, and the Grant Girls' faces, so shining and young and eager, were the brightest thing in all the gay throng that started out to bring Gavin home.

Mrs. Johnnie Dunn had them all put into their proper places at last and away they went skimming down the sunny River Road, under the towering elms that fringed the highway, with the golden harvest-fields, where the khaki-coloured sheaves stood up like soldiers on guard, smiling on either hand, and the winding reaches of the Silver Creek peeping out from the green, here and there, with a flash like an unsheathed sword.

The Woman had arranged the programme to be given at the Crossing, so that there was no possibility of anything going wrong. The choirs were to line up, right in front of the place where the train would stop, with the Piper behind them, ready to play at the first sight of the train coming out of the swamp. Indeed the Piper was The Woman's one anxiety. She was afraid he could not be induced to stop in time for the children to come in with their chorus, and she had cautioned Marmaduke to give his old shawl a good jerk and choke him off before it was too late.

It had been arranged, very prettily, that the Piper was to play until the train came to a stop, then he was to stop too, and the children were to burst into "O Canada," and were to sing it with all their might, standing up in the wagon and waving their flags. While this was going on Gavin would be getting off the train and was to be welcomed by the ministers and Dr. McGarry and Mr. Holmes, the special committee appointed for the purpose. Then the committee was to lead him to the car where the Grant Girls were sitting, and while he was meeting them, Marmaduke was to give the signal, and all were to burst into three cheers, and the boys had promised they would be such cheers as had never before wakened up the echoes of the swamp.

When Gavin was properly seated, both the choirs, and indeed everybody, were to join in singing his regimental song, "All the Blue Bonnets are over the Border."

And when that was finished Mr. Sinclair was to read the address, and Mr. Wylie and the Baptist minister were to say a few words, and if Auntie Elspie could make him, Gavin was then to step out upon the platform and give his reply. And Auntie Elspie had promised to do her best, but would give no assurance of success.

When this was over, there was to be another patriotic song by the choirs, then the Piper could have a chance again, and every one was to climb back into their rigs, and they would all go back home and have such a supper as nobody would believe until they saw it!

It was really to be a fine welcome home, and Orchard Glen could not help feeling some regret, that Algonquin's mean habit of hero-snatching should have prevented the whole town witnessing the splendid scene.

When they all drew up with much noise and dust at Silver Creek Crossing, the crowd made a great stir in the lonely place, and the sound of their gay voices echoed far away into the swamp as they arranged themselves around the tiny platform, and along the green bank of the stream.

Willie Meek, the one inhabitant of the lonely place, came out of his tiny habitation with a tattered cloth on a stick and stood ready to flag the train. And then when every one was ready and waiting, of course the Martin children were constrained to stir up trouble! As soon as the children's choir was put into its proper place, these two "limbs," as Mrs. Johnnie Dunn called them, slipped away from the confines of the hay wagon, and no one missed them till a terrible scream from the crossing bridge announced that one of them had fallen into the creek.

Mrs. Martin echoed the scream and called out as she always did in time of disaster, "Oh, Alfred!" And Alfred left his horses and ran to the rescue. Willie Meek dropped his flag and Piper Lauchie dropped his pipes, and joined the crowd that was pulling the eldest Martin out of the soft mud and water of the creek. And at the same moment the shriek of the train just on the other side of the bend came thrilling through the woods. Tremendous K. saw that there was nobody to flag the train and he rushed gallantly onto the track, waving his hands and shouting on the monster to stop.

But they might have known that the train would stop if there had been no one there at all. For all the way from Toronto hadn't two returned soldiers been tormenting the conductor with warnings to stop at Silver Creek Crossing, if he valued his life. And at every station he would come into then and say hopefully, "Only six more stops, boys," or "Just five more, and we're there," and finally it had been "Silver Creek comes next," and, with fine sarcasm, "Did you say you wanted to get off there?"

And so, when the train swept round the bend out of the swamp, with a shriek and a roar, and came thundering down upon the Crossing, there was no need for Tremendous K., who, nevertheless, stood his ground in the middle of the track, waving his arms to be quite sure there was no danger of its tearing through, and carrying Gavin on to Algonquin.

The roaring monster stopped with a grumbling of brakes and an impatient hissing of steam, with Gavin's car right in front of the waiting crowd. All eyes were turned upon the two khaki-clad figures. The young officer was in the background, the kilted figure was on the step. Gavin was leaning far out, his eager eyes sweeping the crowd. He looked very tall and very, very thin, with a red spot burning on either sunken cheek, but his eyes were bright and he stood up very straight and looked a gallant figure for all he held a heavy stick in his one hand, and his poor empty sleeve was tucked into his pocket.

And at the sight of him Auntie Elspie gave a cry, and before any of the committee could get near him, Gavin had fairly fallen off the car platform, and at the same moment the three Aunties had tumbled from the car where they were supposed to sit decorously, and the four were in each other's arms, and the Grant Girls were crying over their battered hero, as they had not cried even when they heard he was lying dead on the battlefield of France. And Gavin, half-laughing, half-crying, himself, was trying to gather the three of them into his one poor arm which was needed so badly for his supporting stick!

And all Orchard Glen stood and looked on in dead silence, with a lump in every throat and a mist in every eye, and everybody forgot entirely that there was such a thing as a programme to be followed.

Finally, Mr. Sinclair and Dr. McGarry led the Aunties back to the car and as Gavin climbed in he cried out, "Oh, Auntie Flora, I'm really home. I smell the garden." And the Aunties took to crying harder than ever.

Then all the mothers, who were weeping in sympathy, came and hugged and kissed him, and shed tears over him, and all the rest left their appointed places and crowded round the hero to get in a word of welcome, and speakers and choir and everybody got all mixed up in hopeless confusion.

Nobody noticed that the train had pulled out again, and that every one on board (and who knew but half of them might be newspaper reporters?) had seen the Orchard Glen had done nothing but stand and stare in perfect silence when one of their boys came home bearing the Victoria Cross, and what would the people of Algonquin say when they heard?

But nobody thought of all this just yet, not even The Woman, for she too was crying over Gavin's empty sleeve, and thinking of the one who would never come back. Every one was coming up to shake his hand now and Gavin's eyes were wandering searchingly over the crowd, even when Marmaduke and Tremendous K. and the minister were making him welcome.

And suddenly the restless, hungry look was replaced by a flash of rapture, for Christina, all flushed and trembling, and looking more beautiful than any one would have dreamed she could look, came forward, hanging tightly to Sandy's arm. She forgot all about the crowd for just a moment, when she took his one hand in both hers, and whispered, "Oh, Gavin!" And he looked at her with his eyes shining and said with equal incoherence, "Oh, Christine!"

They stood for a moment looking into each other's eyes, the world blotted out, and remembered the night they parted. And they did not say what they had expected to say at all. For Gavin whispered, looking at her dress, "You are wearing my pin." And she looked down for her ring, and remembered that the hand that had worn it was gone! And she could only look at him with the tears welling up in her eyes, and then she was pushed on to make room for Tilly who was crying her pretty eyes out for no reason at all. It was not much of an interview, but it was a very great deal to the lovers, and the red spot that had faded from Gavin's cheeks at the first sight of Christina, flamed up again, and he rallied Tilly gaily and asked her was she sorry that he had come home?

And when the mothers had all kissed him and bewailed him and rejoiced over him again, and they had all climbed into their cars and buggies, and Piper Lauchie had tuned up for a homeward march, The Woman suddenly remembered that there had been no singing and no addresses and no programme and nothing but dead silence and tears to welcome the hero of the Victoria Cross on his return from the war!

It was perfectly outrageous, and not to be tolerated for a moment. She sprang from her car, leaving Gavin and his Aunts to themselves, and shouted to Tremendous K. and Mr. Sinclair and Mr. Holmes to come right back and do it all over again!

But nobody paid the slightest attention. The procession was already moving down the road without the slightest regard to order. The strain had been removed, and everybody seemed seized with a joyous madness. Even Mr. Sinclair waved his hat and laughed at her as his buggy swung past, leaving the hero in the rear.

Then Marmaduke forsook his companions and without asking permission scrambled into her car with Gavin, and sat on the silk fringe of Auntie Elspie's dress, and shouted and waved encouragement to every one that passed while The Woman screamed expostulations.

"Never mind," he roared, to each one, "we didn't forget to flag the train!" and from each buggy and car the long delayed cheers burst forth.

In spite of all her efforts the procession dashed away. Though it wasn't a real procession at all, but a joyous scramble, with every one getting in every one else's way. The children would not go back into their hay-wagon, but scrambled all over into the best cars, and the girls in the choir got mixed up with the boys in single buggies, and a crowd of foolish young fellows got into Mr. Holmes' car with the Piper, and actually persuaded that staid and proper pillar of the Baptist Church to race with Dr. McGarry. And the Piper was so shaken up he couldn't play at all. And young Mr. Martin's horse took fright at the noise and confusion, and nearly ran away, and just escaped throwing all the children into the ditch. And so they all scampered gaily, helter-skelter, back to the village, the hero far in the rear, hidden in clouds of dust, with his friends gambolling ahead. And indeed Gavin's homecoming was no more like a triumphal procession than any of the foot-ball games in which he used to take part in the river pasture.

But whatever faults The Woman or Tremendous K. might have found with his reception, it was perfect in Gavin's eyes and the eyes of the three Aunties. For all its mistakes were but the result of the overwhelming sympathy and joy of his friends, and relief that the Aunties had not, after all, lost the light of their eyes. And indeed if no one had met him but had left him to find his way to Craig-Ellachie alone, and afterwards over the hills to Christina, Gavin would have been perfectly happy. For he was still much the same shy boy who had gone away, with no thought of glory or public notice, but only a simple desire to do his duty. He was not a boy any more, for he had been through scenes that make men old, and the remembrance of them lingered in his deep eyes, and showed in a new staidness of manner. But he was the same simple-hearted Gavin, reticent and unassuming and in his heart he almost could wish, except for the joy it gave his Aunties, that he had never heard of the Victoria Cross. He had only done his duty, he repeated over and over, and all the men at the Front were doing that.

And so he lay back among the cushions, surrounded by flowers, his one hand in Auntie Elspie's, and looked with shining eyes, not at the beautiful familiar bits of landscape which were passing, and to which the Aunties were calling his attention, but at the gleam of a golden-brown head that was occasionally visible from John Lindsay's buggy. Marmaduke pointed out this and that historical landmark; the hill where they used to go coasting in winter; the old burnt stump up which Gavin had climbed to get the hawk's nest one day at recess; the hole below the mill where the teacher forbade them to swim and into which they all plunged at noon quite regularly, and Gavin smiled and nodded, and saw nothing but the gleam of gold ahead.

Whatever had been wrong with the reception and the procession, no fault could be found with the supper. It had been set outdoors on the church lawn, and the tables were so ladened with chicken and ham and jellies and salads and cake and pie, that instinctively the men took off their coats before sitting down to the attack. And after everything was eaten nobody seemed able either to hear or make a speech. And there was no music and no programme, for the juvenile choir, after gorging itself in a truly dangerous fashion, went out into the dust of the village street, and played tag and hide-and-seek, and not even the Pied Piper, himself, could have collected them again. And the other choir was either waiting on the tables, or eating so much that they couldn't sing either.

The address was read, but there was so much noise and joyous running to and fro that not even Gavin heard it. And his speech was as short as a speech could possibly be, just a word of thanks for himself and his Aunts and his oft reiterated statement, he had only done his duty, and all the fellows at the Front, and many at home were doing that.

But everybody had a grand time, nevertheless, such a time of laughing and talking and eating together as had not been experienced in Orchard Glen since the fell day the Piper came to rend the village asunder,—the Piper, who was at this very moment cementing it again with "Tullochgorum," which he was blowing uproariously as he marched up and down in front of the Methodist Church!

When Christina reached home she found there was little work to be done. Uncle Neil and Mitty had come home early and had already finished the milking. Sandy was tired and had stretched himself in the hammock, to have a talk with his mother. Contrary to her custom Christina did not lay aside her white dress for a plainer garb. She spent a long time rearranging the shining crown of her braids, and when the shadows of the poplars began to stretch across the garden, she slipped away through the barn-yard and up the back lane, up to the sun-lit hill top, where Gavin had promised to meet her.

The peace of evening was falling with the dew. From far down in the village came the sound of children's voices, beyond the orchards a binder was singing its way through the golden fields. Up on the hill top there was a sense of remoteness from the world, all sound and movement seemed far away. Only the vesper sparrows were here, filling the amber twilight with their soft murmurs, and away in the dim green aisles of the Slash a phoebe was calling sweetly. Christina came up into the light of the setting sun, and when Gavin's eyes first spied her, its rays were lighting up her white gown and touching her uncovered head to pure gold. He took off his Scotch bonnet at the sight of her.

There was an old heavy gate opening from his fields, and Christina, who was lingering that Gavin might come to her, saw that he was trying vainly to open it with his one hand, his stick held under what remained of his poor left arm. She forgot all her shyness and her pride at the sight, forgot everything but that Gavin needed her, and ran swiftly to him, down the green woodland pathway.

She took the heavy gate in her strong, brown hands and pushed it back.

"Oh, Gavin," she cried radiantly, "I will have to be your other hand, won't I?"

Even Gavin's unready tongue could not miss this great opportunity, "Yes, you will be everything,—my whole life, Christine," he murmured.

The heavy gate between them was open at last. It had been a long, hard climb, up their separate hills of suffering and self-sacrifice, but they had come up steadily and bravely. And now they met, and stood hand in hand, on the rosy hill-top.



THE END