“My dear lassie,” said her old friend, “they are safe in God’s hands.”
“Yes, they would be safe there, even if we were never to see them again. But O, Miss Jean!—”
“Ay, lassie! Try ye and measure the blessedness o’ that knowledge. It is no’ in the power o’ evil to harm them, whatever may befall. And, my dear, we have no reason to doubt that we shall see them again. They may be in at any moment, as my brother says.”
“I might licht the lamp, mem,” said Nannie at the door.
“There is no haste,” said Miss Jean.
“Only its e’erie like sitting in the dark when folk ha’e anxious thoughts for company. Though there’s no occasion as yet. What’s a day and a nicht! Many a boat has come hame safe eneuch after many days and nichts. They may be in at any minute, and I maun keep the kettle boiling, for they’ll be baith cauld and hungry.”
Then Nannie retreated to her kitchen, doubtful as to the comfort she could give since her own fears were so strong.
Mr Dawson went to the pier head, but he did not linger long, he turned and wandered up and down the sands in the gathering darkness. The fears which he had refused to acknowledge during the day, he could no longer put away from him. The sickness of the heart with which he had slept and waked so many a night and morning in past years, came back again, strange yet familiar. Was it never to leave him more? Was the time coming when the happiness of the last two years would seem to him like a dream?
How many fathers had wandered up and down Portie sands, waiting for sons who had never returned! Who was he that he should escape what so many a better man had endured?
But it had not come to that with him yet. Surely God would be merciful to him, and spare so good a man as George to do His own work in the world. He was afraid to be angry, afraid to utter the rebellious words that rose to his lips, lest God should judge him for them.