When a man lights a fire for a poor little bird,
It shows that those beautiful words he has heard,
That never a sparrow can fall to the ground
But a wound in the heart of his Maker be found.
When Ralph St. Jermyn had arrived at the Scotts’ there were assembled, within reasonable distance, what Aunt Elsie would have called all Diana’s admirers, and Marcus, having expressed a wish to see them all together, so that he might judge of them, Diana set about to make plans so that he might have the opportunity he sought.
Her mind being full of islands, having heard much of one from Miles Hastings, she bethought herself of a bird-island that lay out to sea at some distance from the end of the Loch, and on that island she proposed Uncle Marcus and the other men should spend some time together. Marcus was perfectly willing. He was interested in sea-birds and loved the sea; moreover, he was always anxious to do anything Diana asked him to do, in the hope, perhaps, that Aunt Elsie would have proved in like circumstances less amenable. There was always that incentive to an extreme amiability.
Uncle Marcus said he would ask St. Jermyn to join them and stay the night; but Diana must understand it was late in the season for young birds to be hatched. It was very unlikely there would be any. Diana didn’t mind that—a bird was a bird, no matter its age. She had a good deal to say to Miles Hastings on the subject of islands. She dwelt on them particularly at those times when he wanted to talk of other things—emphasizing rather persistently, he thought, the fact that whereas one man on an island was as helpless as a new-born babe, another was useful, resourceful, and undefeated. He said he understood: Uncle Marcus would be rather useless, St. Jermyn more so. “But you,” said Diana, “would make soup out of birds’ nests?”
He questioned it, but she persisted and went so far as to predict that he would serve it up in the half of a cocoanut shell, to which he readily agreed, such things being usually found on the islands of Scotland.
“Wait and see,” she said.
He was waiting as it was, and growing daily more and more hopeless; just as surely as Diana was growing more and more delightful, and, of course, more and more beautiful. Any girl may do that, is bound to do it, in the eyes at least of the man who loves her. With Mr. Maitland, Hastings felt he made no progress. He was polite, as a host is almost in duty bound to be, but he never talked about Diana as Hastings would have liked him to talk: never left them alone together, as Hastings would have liked to be left. He very often, on the contrary, prevented them being alone and Diana unfortunately did not seem to notice it. Hastings wondered in what way he might propitiate his host. He might save him from drowning, but it was hardly likely Mr. Maitland would place himself in that particular danger, thereby affording Hastings the opportunity he so earnestly sought. He might save Diana from drowning, but even to benefit himself he would not let her risk that peril by water.