“I don’t say you don’t love him,” Donal went on; “but how you can love him and believe such things of him, I don’t understand. Whoever taught them first was a terrible liar against God, who is lovelier than all the imaginations of all his creatures can think.”
Lady Arctura swept from the room—though she was trembling from head to foot. At the door she turned and called Davie. The boy looked up in his tutor’s face, mutely asking if he should obey her.
“Go,” said Donal.
In less than a minute he came back, his eyes full of tears.
“Arkie says she is going to tell papa. Is it true, Mr. Grant, that you are a dangerous man? I do not believe it—though you do carry such a big knife.”
Donal laughed.
“It is my grandfather’s skean dhu,” he said: “I mend my pens with it, you know! But it is strange, Davie, that, when a body knows something other people don’t, they should be angry with him! They will even think he wants to make them bad when he wants to help them to be good!”
“But Arkie is good, Mr. Grant!”
“I am sure she is. But she does not know so much about God as I do, or she would never say such things of him: we must talk about him more after this!”
“No, no, please, Mr. Grant! We won’t say a word about him, for Arkie says except you promise never to speak of God, she will tell papa, and he will send you away.”