Mitty Wright, who did Mrs. Sutherland's washing, reported that the way his mother waited on the young gentleman and babied him was a caution, and the Doctor was nearly as bad, running up and down stairs, scolding one minute and giving medicine the next. The patient responded to the good nursing and before the middle of January he was able to be outdoors again. He convalesced very happily, especially after he was able to walk as far as the Lindsay hill. Uncle William showed no sign of repentance, though Mrs. Sutherland told him how near to death's door the boy had been, but Wallace did not seem disturbed. The evil provided by Uncle Peter's war-distemper was sufficient unto the day without worrying over Uncle William. The old man would come round yet, Wallace felt sure, and meanwhile he was having a very pleasant time and Orchard Glen with Christina in it was a very delightful place.
Jimmie came stamping in one wild boisterous evening when February had began to shout across the country from hill to hill and turn the world into a whirling whiteness.
It was Friday evening and he was earlier than usual as Mrs. Johnnie Dunn had given him a lift more than half way in her cutter. And she had so much Red Cross truck piled into it, he complained, that his feet stuck out into the drifts all the way home.
He had stopped at the postoffice for the mail, and there was a letter from Neil. His regular Tuesday letter had come as usual and a second one was rather surprising.
Christina ran with it into the sitting room where her mother was sewing overtime on a couple of hospital shirts that The Woman said had to be ready for Monday, and not a minute later.
"A letter from Neily," Mrs. Lindsay said, stopping her work and taking off her spectacles to await the reading. "What will he be wanting to say at this time o' the week?"
Christina tore it open and went to the window to catch the last light of the short winter day. The letter started as usual with the weekly budget of college news. Every one was speeding up, now, for Spring and exams, had just turned the last corner and were coming straight at them. Sandy's new room was something superfine and much warmer than the last, but board wasn't getting any better. They were all longing for a taste of Mother's biscuits and Christine's pies. And then the letter fell back into reminiscences of old days, as Neil's letters had a habit of doing.
"Do you remember, Mother, when we were little and any danger threatened, I was always the shy one who ran and got behind your skirts? And do you remember you were always saying to John and me, and especially to me, 'Lads must be brave?' It was not so bad, I remember your saying, if Ellen or Mary were to take fright when a stranger came to the house, or Mr. Sinclair called to hear our Catechism, but it was a real disgrace for a boy. 'Lads must be brave' was your slogan. And many a time it has braced me in hard places since. Out on the prairie, for instance, when it was deadly lonesome, and the work seemed to be no use, and down here in the city when I gave out my text the night I preached in Hamilton Street Church, and looked up and saw old Professor Johnstone sitting straight in front of me, looking at his boots. I tell you, Mother, the consolations of religion were not so upholding at such moments as your 'Lads must be brave.'
"And how it has been 'dingin' in my ears these days to fairly deeve me," as Tremendous K. would say. "The bugle calls it every morning when the boys march out on the campus. I see it in every headline of the paper; I hear it in every call for men, and I'm afraid I haven't wanted to listen. I have wanted my life to run along a smooth road, the one I have planned for myself; a fine church with a big salary, plenty of time to study and a little to travel, and you sitting in the Manse pew with the best silk dress in the church. That has been my programme. But the pleasant road was not the way the Master went, and the servant cannot choose. He trod the hard way, and there is not the slightest doubt in my mind which way He wants me to go. I know you are guessing already at what I am going to ask of you. And now I must turn upon you with your own slogan and say, 'Mothers must be brave!' Oh, how brave and gallant they must be in these days, only they can know. But I know you, Mother, well enough to tell that you will say yes when I ask you to be brave enough to let me enlist. It is not a matter of choice with me, I am constrained. Woe is me if I go not to Belgium!"
"I wish I could say this is all I am asking you to give up. Is it too much that we ask you to let Sandy go, too? He is more eager than I and saw his duty clearly from the first. We both realise that yours is the hardest part. But your sons couldn't be slackers. And after all the war may not last so long, and we'll be home before you know it. Sandy will likely be a general, and who knows but I may get to be a lance-corporal!"