He spoke cheerfully and readily as if he were repeating a lesson well learned, but he could not humbug me. I felt the heartache in the cheerful tone.
‘Tell me about her,’ I said, for I knew that if he would talk it would do him good. And talk he did, often forgetting me, till, as I listened, I found myself looking again into the fathomless eyes, and hearing again the heart-searching voice. I saw her go in and out of the little red-tiled cottages and down the narrow back lanes of the village; I heard her voice in a sweet, low song by the bed of a dying child, or pouring forth floods of music in the great new hall of the factory town near by. But I could not see, though he tried to show me, the stately gracious lady receiving the country folk in her home. He did not linger over that scene, but went back again to the gate-cottage where she had taken him one day to see Billy Breen’s mother.
‘I found the old woman knew all about me,’ he said, simply enough; ‘but there were many things about Billy she had never heard, and I was glad to put her right on some points, though Mrs. Mavor would not hear it.’
He sat silent for a little, looking into the coals; then went on in a soft, quiet voice—
‘It brought back the mountains and the old days to hear again Billy’s tones in his mother’s voice, and to see her sitting there in the very dress she wore the night of the League, you remember—some soft stuff with black lace about it—and to hear her sing as she did for Billy—ah! ah!’ His voice unexpectedly broke, but in a moment he was master of himself and begged me to forgive his weakness. I am afraid I said words that should not be said—a thing I never do, except when suddenly and utterly upset.
‘I am getting selfish and weak,’ he said; ‘I must get to work. I am glad to get to work. There is much to do, and it is worth while, if only to keep one from getting useless and lazy.’
‘Useless and lazy!’ I said to myself, thinking of my life beside his, and trying to get command of my voice, so as not to make quite a fool of myself. And for many a day those words goaded me to work and to the exercise of some mild self-denial. But more than all else, after Craig had gone back to the mountains, Graeme’s letters from the railway construction camp stirred one to do unpleasant duty long postponed, and rendered uncomfortable my hours of most luxurious ease. Many of the old gang were with him, both of lumbermen and miners, and Craig was their minister. And the letters told of how he laboured by day and by night along the line of construction, carrying his tent and kit with him, preaching straight sermons, watching by sick men, writing their letters, and winning their hearts; making strong their lives, and helping them to die well when their hour came. One day, these letters proved too much for me, and I packed away my paints and brushes, and made my vow unto the Lord that I would be ‘useless and lazy’ no longer, but would do something with myself. In consequence, I found myself within three weeks walking the London hospitals, finishing my course, that I might join that band of men who were doing something with life, or, if throwing it away, were not losing it for nothing. I had finished being a fool, I hoped, at least a fool of the useless and luxurious kind. The letter that came from Graeme, in reply to my request for a position on his staff, was characteristic of the man, both new and old, full of gayest humour and of most earnest welcome to the work.
Mrs. Mavor’s reply was like herself—
‘I knew you would not long be content with the making of pictures, which the world does not really need, and would join your friends in the dear West, making lives that the world needs so sorely.’
But her last words touched me strangely—