Ah! well, that does not explain it altogether. It was the Lord Himself who spoke to her by the voice of His servant revealing Himself to her, through His own familiar Word in a new way. After that she could say of Him, “Whose I am and whom I serve,” and her life took a new meaning. It was His who “had bought her with a price.” All that she had done hitherto for pity’s sake, she did now for His sake. “To one of the least of these,” He had said. The world was full of “these little ones” of His, and there were some of them in Portie even, and henceforth they were to be her care.
Her outward life did not change much however. Except that at first she “whiles” went to “the little kirkie,” and afterwards went there altogether, there was no difference that could be named by her little world generally. Her brother saw a difference, and so did the poor folk who shared her care and kindness. Her eye was brighter and her step lighter, and the look of suffering she had lately worn was giving place to a look of patient even cheerful peacefulness that was good to see. She had more words, too, at her command. Not for her brother—at least not for him at first. But the impulse which her new love for her Master had given her, was strong enough to overcome the silence natural to her, and “good words” gently and yet strongly spoken went with her gifts now, and sometimes they were received as gladly as her gifts. But that she should cast in her lot with the handful of “newfangled folk” in Stott’s Lane was a pain and a humiliation to her brother which it took years to outlive.
Their outward life went on as it had done before for a good while, and then her brother married. His wife was of a family which had had a name and a place in the countryside for generations; but George Dawson found her earning her bread as a teacher in a school in Aberdeen, and married her “for pure love,” Portie folk said; and some who had known him best, expected no such thing of George Dawson.
It was doubtful whether his love for her or his pride in her was strongest. He did not take her to the house above the shop where he and his sister had lived so long, but to a fine house at the head of the High-street in a far pleasanter part of the town, and there they began their married life together. Jean did not go with them, though they both wished it. It was better for them to be alone, she said, and as well for her. So she staid still in the house above the shop, making a home for the young men employed in the business, keeping a wise and watchful eye on them and on the business also. After a few years, when her sister-in-law became delicate, and there were little children needing her care, she, with greater self-denial than any guessed, gave up her independent life and went home to them for a while, and lightened the mother’s care for them and for the home as well, and found her reward in knowing that her work was not vain.
But when more years had passed, and her brother, a richer man than she knew, bought the small estate of Saughleas, and took his family there, she did not go with them. She was getting on in years, she was too old to begin a new life in new circumstances, and the bairns were getting beyond the need of her care. So she went to a home of her own that looked out upon the sea, and set herself with wisdom and patience and loving kindness to the work which her Master had given her to do.
Chapter Two.
The Brother’s Sorrow.
George Dawson had been very successful in life. He was not an old man when he took possession of his estate of Saughleas. He had many years before him in which to enjoy the fruit of his labours, he told himself, and he exulted in the thought.