“I did not forget her. I was feared for the child, though I would not say that to you. Barbara told me she had fret all night, and when I said it would be for her mother, the woman shook her head in a way that made me tremble. I was on my way to see her and you when I met the minister, and he sent me the other way.”
“Why did you not tell him that you feared for Vala?”
“I said that, and he said, ‘Nanna will be able to care for the little one; but there is a strong man needed to care for her husband; Nicol Sinclair will be hard to manage.’ And then he minded me of the man’s sinful life, and he said peradventure it might be the purpose of God even yet to give him another opportunity for repentance through me.”
“If he had known Nicol Sinclair as I–”
“Yes, Nanna, but it is an awful thing to die eternally. If I could help to save any one from such a fate, even my worst enemy,–even your enemy and Vala’s,–what should I have done? Tell me.”
“Just what you did. You have done right. Yes; though the man killed Vala, you have done right! You have done right!”
“I knew that would be your last word.”
“Did he have one good thought, one prayer, to meet death with?”
“He did not. It was a wild night when he was in the dead thraws–a wild night for the flitting; and he went out in storm and darkness, and the sea carried him away.”
“God have mercy upon him! I have not a tear left for Nicol Sinclair.”