"I don't want them kept quiet,"—said Reay, holding her hand very hard—"And I'm not tired. I've only been thinking."
"Ah! Of your book?"
"Yes. Of my book."
He went then, and came no more to the cottage till a week later when it was New Year's Eve. This they celebrated very quietly—just they three alone. Mary thought it somewhat imprudent for "old David" to sit up till midnight in order to hear the bells "ring out the Old, ring in the New"—but he showed a sudden vigorous resolution about it which was not to be gainsaid.
"Let me have my way, my dear,"—he implored her—"I may never see another New Year!"
"Nonsense, David!" she said cheerily—"You will see many and many a one, please God!"
"Please God, I shall!" he answered, quietly—"But if it should not please God—then—"
"There!—you want to stay up, and you shall stay up!" she declared, smiling—"After all, as Mr. Reay is with us, the time won't perhaps seem so long for you."
"But for you,"—put in Angus—"it will seem very long won't it!"
"Oh, I always sit up for the coming-in of the New Year,"—she replied—"Father used to do it, and I like to keep up all father's ways. Only I thought David might feel too tired. You must sing to us, Mr. Reay, to pass the hours away."