And then the Orchard Glen boys began to answer the call, one by one; Burke and Trooper, and Christina's brothers. Tommy Holmes and Charlie Henderson, and Bruce McKenzie, and he was like Gareth in the story Auntie Flora had so often told him, Gareth who had to work in the kitchen, while his brother-knights rode clanking past him through the doorway, out into the world of mighty deeds, out to meet Death on the Field of Glory. Those were the days when he had to repeat "Stand fast, Craig-Ellachie" over and over again as he went about his peaceful tasks. It brought him little comfort, for it was not to stand fast that he wanted, but to spring forward in answer to the call to the hazardous task, to death itself, the call which through the ages has always summoned the high heart. Sometimes the acutest misery would seize him at the thought that persistently haunted him, the fear that if he had been really a Grant he would have seen his duty more clearly and would already be in the battle line. Perhaps there was some necessary spirit left out of him, some saving quality which his degraded parents could not hand down to him. If he had been of better blood might he not have paid no attention to tears and partings but have thrown away everything in the glorious chance of dying in the greatest cause for which the world had ever struggled? He argued the question from every point, and yet he could not find it in his soul to leave his Aunts. He watched them intently to see if they would drop any hint of their opinion in the matter. But while they highly admired Trooper and commended the Lindsay boys, saying that not even the ministry should keep Neil at home, he could not elicit from them the smallest hint that they thought he was called to enlist. And so he set his teeth, determined to Stand Fast though his heart should break. But he was ashamed to be seen in public and he grew more shy and reticent as the hard days dragged on. Gradually he dropped out of all the activities that used to take him to the village. When he went he always saw Christina and Wallace Sutherland together, and that sight added to his misery. And finally he could not bear to hear himself sing. He looked down at his big brawny hands and arms and felt ashamed that he should be standing in a safe and peaceful place, singing! He choked at the thought. He sometimes wished he were not so big and strong. If he were small and weak like Willie Brown or even had one leg like Duke it would be easier to bear.