I told him to be comforted, that all would be well, and by-and-by he began to believe what he so much wished. 'I have looked forward to this for so long,' he said. 'I have had so much hardship and suffering. For two years we were in an Indian prison, and I should not have cared to live, only for the thought that Hildred would grieve for me. And now to see her so changed, so white and strange.' 'You frightened her, poor child. Remember that she had long given up the hope of seeing you again.' 'You had not.' 'Ah, Cuthbert, that was so different.' He gave a long sigh. 'Perhaps I had better not have come back at all. I had better not have lived.' 'But you must live now, for your little Hildred's sake.' I could say it with no sharp pang at my heart. A great peacefulness came over me, like the evening air after a storm. That night, as I sat up alone beside my father's bed, I prayed for Cuthbert and Hildred. For myself I only needed to thank God for His mercy to me. It was scarcely light the next morning when Jock's low whistle under the window called me out to him. Hildred had sent him, he said, to tell me to go and speak to her. She was in the chapel, waiting for me. Day had not long broken outside. Inside the ruined aisle of the chapel was full of shadows still, but through the great window facing the east we could see the dawn brighten and grow strong. Hildred had chosen a strange place of meeting. Here all told how earthly joy and earthly sorrow vanish and pass away. Beneath our feet, as we trod the broken pavement, were the graves of men whose hopes and fears had long been over; their very names were worn away by the footsteps of later generations. Deep and unbroken seemed the repose of the happy dead. What matter now to them how heavy the cross had been, so that they had won the crown? What matter how hard and long the battle had been once, so that they had been faithful unto death? A thrill of awe crossed me as I looked up the solemn aisle in the grey morning light. There too the sculptured angel that in my childhood I used to call my mother, looked down gravely with outstretched wings, as if she were watching over her son in this the crisis of his life. Hildred was there, leaning against an old carved tomb. She was quite white, and her eyes had a scared and weary look as she raised them to me. I am afraid that I spoke the more sternly, for the love I felt for her, the great longing I had to take her to my heart and comfort her. 'Well, Hildred,' I said, gravely, 'you sent for me.' 'I was so frightened,' she whispered. 'Oh Willie, tell me what I ought to do.' 'Your duty.' Just as she used to do when she was a child, she covered her face and shrank down on to the ground. 'But it is so hard to do one's duty--so hard.' 'Oh child,' I answered, from my heart, 'it is hard, but God is good.'