Rahal Ragnor had never kept it. It had been only a remnant of popery to her. Long before the Free Kirk had been born, she and all her family had been Dissenters of some kind or other. And yet her life and her home were affected by this Episcopal "In Memoriam" in a great number of small, dominating ways, so that in the course of years she had learned to respect a ceremonial that she did not endorse. For she knew that no one kept Lent with a truer heart than Conall Ragnor, and that the Lenten services in the cathedral interfered with his business to an extent nothing purely temporal would have been permitted to do. So, after the little dance given to Boris, there was a period of marked quietness in Kirkwall. It was as if some mighty Hand had been laid across the strings of Life and softened and subdued all their reverberations. There was no special human influence exerted for this purpose, yet no one could deny the presence of some unseen, unusual element. "Every day seems like Sabbath Day," said Thora. "It is Lent," answered Rahal. "And after Lent comes Easter, dear Mother." "That is the truth." In the meantime Boris had gone to Edinburgh on the bark _Sea Gull_ to complete his cargo of Scotch ginghams and sewed muslins, native jewelry and table delicacies. Perhaps, indeed, the minimum notice accorded Lent in the metropolitan city had something to do with this journey, which was not a usual one; but after the departure of the _Sea Gull_ the Ragnor household had settled down to a period of domestic quiet. The Master had to make up the hours spent in the cathedral by a longer stay in the store, and the women at this time generally avoided visiting; they felt--though they did not speak of it--the old prohibition of unkind speech, and the theological quarrel was yet so new and raw that to touch it was to provoke controversy, instead of conversation. It was at such vacant times that old Adam Vedder's visits were doubly welcome. One day in mid-Lent he came to the Ragnor house, when it was raining with that steady deliberation that gives no hope of anything better. Throwing off his waterproof outer garments, he left them to drip dry in the kitchen. An old woman, watching him, observed: "Thou art wetting the clean floor, Master Vedder," and he briskly answered: "That is thy business, Helga, not mine. Is thy mistress in the house?" "Would she be out, if she had any good sense left?" "How can a man tell what a woman will do? Where is thy mistress?" and he spoke in a tone so imperative, that she answered with shrinking humility: "I ask thy favour. Mistress Ragnor is in the right-hand parlour. I will look after thy cloak." "It will be well for thee to do that." Then Adam went to the right-hand parlour and found Rahal sitting by the fire sewing. "I am glad to see thee, Rahal," he said. "I am glad to see thee always--more at this time than at any other." "Well, that is good, but why at this time more than at any other?"