John moved the light again, so that it fell on Allison’s face, and then went and stood in the shadow, leaning on the back of his mother’s chair. Allison stood for a moment silent, and both mother and son regarded her with interest and with surprise as well.
This was quite a different Allison, Mrs Beaton thought, from the one who went up and down the street, heeding no one, seeing nothing unless the child Marjorie was in her arms to call her attention to whatever there might be to see. She seemed eager and anxious, full of determination and energy. She had not at all the air of one who had been accustomed to go and come at the bidding of other folk.
“It is the true Allison at last,” said John to himself.
“Her gown has something to do with it,” thought Mrs Beaton, and perhaps it had. Her gown was black, and hung in straight folds about her. A soft, white kerchief showed above the edge of it around her throat, and her Sunday cap, less voluminous and of lighter material than those which she wore about her work, let her shining hair be seen.
“A strong and beautiful woman,” John said to himself. His mother was saying it also; but with a better knowledge of a woman’s nature, and a misgiving that some great trouble had brought her there, she added:
“May God help her, whatever it may be. Allison, sit down,” she said after waiting a minute for her to speak.
“It is that my heart is beating so fast that I seem to be in a tremble,” said Allison, clasping her hands on her side.
“Sit down, my dear,” said Mrs Beaton kindly. “Not yet. It is only a few words that I must say, I have had great trouble in my life. I have trouble yet—that must be met. And it came into my mind when I was sitting in the kirk that you might maybe help me, and—keep my heart from breaking altogether,” said she; then lifting her eyes to John’s face she asked, “Have ye ever been in the tollbooth at Aberdeen? It is there my Willie is, whom I would fain save.”
John’s mother felt the start her son gave at the words. Even she uttered a word of dismay.
“I must tell you more,” said Allison eagerly. “Yes, he did wrong. But he had great provocation. He struck a man down. At first they thought the man might die. But he didna die. My mother died, and my father, but this man lived. Willie was tried for what he had done, and though all in the countryside were ready to declare that Brownrig had gotten only what he well deserved, they sentenced the lad to a long year and a half in the tollbooth, and there he has been all this time. A long time it has been to me, and it has been longer to him. It is near over now, thank God.”