When I returned Betty was quietly in bed; and Willie had made the tea with ordinary water. He was somewhat more composed, but I could see his hand shake when he tried to pour out the first cup. He "skailed" it all over the cloth, and then was angered with himself for what he called his "trimlin' auld banes."
But I never knew or suspected Willie's secret till that awful Sabbath day, when the cross that he had borne so long hidden from the eyes of men, was suddenly lifted high in air.
Then all at once Willie towered like a giant, and the bowed shoulders seemed to support a grey head about which had become visible an apparent aureole.
It was the day of High Communion, and the solemn services were drawing to a yet more solemn close. The elements had been dispensed and the elders were back again in their places. Mr. Osbourne had Dr. Landsborough of Portmarnock assisting him that day—a tall man with a gracious manner, and the only man who could give an after-communion address without his words being resented as an intrusion.
"It is always difficult," he said, "to disturb the peculiarly sacred pause which succeeds the act of communion by any words of man——"
He had got no farther when he stopped, and the congregation regarded him with the strained attention which a beautiful voice always compels. The beadle was sitting in all the reasonable pride of his dignity in the first pew to the right of the Session. When Dr. Landsborough stopped, the congregation followed the direction of his eyes.
The door at the back of the kirk was seen to be open and a woman stood there, dishevelled, wild-eyed, a black bottle in her shaking hand, a red shawl about her head.
It was Betty McNair.
"Willie!" she cried aloud in the awful silence, "Willie, come forth—you that lockit me in the back kitchin, an' thocht to stop me frae the saicrament—I hae deceived ye, Willie McNair, clever man as ye think yersel'!"
I was in the corner pew opposite Willie (being, of course, a non-communicant at that date), so that I could see his face. At the first sound of that voice his countenance worked as if it would change its shape, but in a moment I saw him grip the book-board and stand up. Then he went quietly down the aisle to where his wife stood, gabbling wild and wicked words, and laughing till it turned the blood cold to hear her in that sacred place, and upon that solemn occasion.