‘I believe you’re right about yourself. You always were a luxurious beggar. But that’s not where it catches me.’
We sat and smoked and talked of other things for an hour, and then turned in. As I was dropping off I was roused by Graeme’s voice—
‘Are you going to the preparatory service on Friday night?’
‘Don’t know,’ I replied rather sleepily.
‘I say, do you remember the preparatory service at home?’ There was something in his voice that set me wide awake.
‘Yes. Rather terrific, wasn’t it? But I always felt better after it,’ I replied.
‘To me’—he was sitting up in bed now—‘to me it was like a call to arms, or rather like a call for a forlorn hope. None but volunteers wanted. Do you remember the thrill in the old governor’s voice as he dared any but the right stuff to come on?’
‘We’ll go in on Friday night,’ I said.
And so we did. Sandy took a load of men with his team, and Graeme and I drove in the light sleigh.
The meeting was in the church, and over a hundred men were present. There was some singing of familiar hymns at first, and then Mr. Craig read the same story as we had heard in the stable, that most perfect of all parables, the Prodigal Son. Baptiste nudged Sandy in delight, and whispered something, but Sandy held his face so absolutely expressionless that Graeme was moved to say—