"Can't we get off to-night?" inquired Ranald, eagerly. "We could get out ten miles or so.""Yes," replied Yankee. "There's a good place to stop, about ten miles out. I think we had better go along the river road, and then take down through the Russell Hills to the Nation Crossing."In half an hour they were off on their two days' trip to the Indian Lands. And two glorious days they were. The open air with the suggestion of the coming fall, the great forests with their varying hues of green and brown, yellow and bright red, and all bathed in the smoky purple light of the September sun, these all combined to bring to Ranald's heart the rest and comfort and peace that he so sorely needed. And when he drove into his uncle's yard in the late afternoon of the second day, he felt himself more content to live the life appointed him; and if anything more were needed to strengthen him in this resolution, and to fit him for the fight lying before him, his brief visit to his home brought it to him.
It did him good to look into the face of the great Macdonald Bhain once more, and to hear his deep, steady voice welcome him home. It was the face and the voice of a man who had passed through many a sore battle, and not without honor to himself. And it was good, too, to receive the welcome greetings of his old friends and to feel their pride in him and their high expectation of him. More than ever, he resolved that he would be a man worthy of his race.
His visit to the manse brought him mingled feelings of delight and perplexity and pain. The minister's welcome was kind, but there was a tinge of self-complacent pride in it. Ranald was one of "his lads," and he evidently took credit to himself for the young man's success. Hughie regarded him with reserved approval. He was now a man and teaching school, and before committing himself to his old-time devotion, he had to adjust his mind to the new conditions.
But before the evening was half done Ranald had won him once more.
His tales of the West, and of how it was making and marring men, of the nation that was being built up, and his picture of the future that he saw for the great Dominion, unconsciously revealed the strong manhood and the high ideals in the speaker, and Hughie found himself slipping into the old attitude of devotion to his friend.
But it struck Ranald to the heart to see the marks of many a long day's work upon the face of the woman who had done more for him than all the rest of the world. Her flock of little children had laid upon her a load of care and toil, which added to the burden she was already trying to carry, was proving more than her delicate frame could bear. There were lines upon her face that only weariness often repeated cuts deep; but there were other lines there, and these were lines of heart pain, and as Ranald watched her closely, with his heart running over with love and pity and indignation for her, he caught her frequent glances toward her first born that spoke of anxiety and fear.
"Can it be the young rascal is bringing her anything but perfect satisfaction and joy in return for the sacrifice of her splendid life?" he said to himself. But no word fell from her to show him the secret of her pain, it was Hughie's own lips that revealed him, and as the lad talked of his present and his future, his impatience of control, his lack of sympathy to all higher ideals, his determination to please himself to the forgetting of all else, his seeming unconsciousness of the debt he owed to his mother, all these became easily apparent. With difficulty Ranald restrained his indignation. He let him talk for some time and then opened out upon him. He read him no long lecture, but his words came forth with such fiery heat that they burned their way clear through all the faults and flimsy selfishness of the younger man till they reached the true heart of him. His last words Hughie never forgot.
"Do you know, Hughie," he said, and the fire in his eyes seemed to burn into Hughie's, "do you know what sort of woman you have for a mother? And do you know that if you should live to be a hundred years, and devoted every day of your life to the doing of her pleasure, you could not repay the debt you owe her? Be a man, Hughie. Thank God for her, and for the opportunity of loving and caring for her."The night of his first visit to the manse Ranald had no opportunity for any further talk with the minister's wife, but he came away with the resolve that before his week's visit was over, he would see her alone. On his return home, however, he found waiting him a telegram from Colonel Thorp, mailed from Alexandria, announcing an early date for the meeting of shareholders at Bay City, so that he found it necessary to leave immediately after the next day, which was the Sabbath. It was no small disappointment to him that he was to have no opportunity of opening his heart to his friend. But as he sat in his uncle's seat at the side of the pulpit, from which he could catch sight of the minister's pew, and watched the look of peace and quiet courage grow upon her face till all the lines of pain and care were quite smoothed out, he felt his heart fill up with a sense of shame for all his weakness, and his soul knit itself into the resolve that if he should have to walk his way, bearing his cross alone, he would seek the same high spirit of faith and patience and courage that he saw shining in her gray-brown eyes.
After the service he walked home with the minister's wife, seeking opportunity for a few last words with her. He had meant to tell her something of his heart's sorrow and disappointment, for he guessed that knowing and loving Kate as she did, she would understand its depth and bitterness. But when he told her of his early departure, and of the fear that for many years he could not return, his heart was smitten with a great pity for her. The look of disappointment and almost of dismay he could not understand until, with difficulty, she told him how she had hoped that he was to spend some weeks at home and that Hughie might be much with him.
