"Yes, two years before the massacre of St. Bartholomew."
"And here is one for men about to go into battle for God and their faith." The hostess looked up. Her guest's face was stern, stirred as with some deep emotion, her eyes full of tears.
She had been thinking, as she lay still and listened to Mary Swanwick's comments, of death for a man's personal belief, for his faith, of death with honor. She was experiencing, of a sudden, that failure of self-control which is the sure result of bodily weakness; for, with the remembrance of her husband's murder, she recalled, amid natural feelings of sorrow, the shame with which she had heard of his failure at once to declare his rank when facing death. For a moment she lay still. "I shall be better in a moment," she said.
"Ah, what have I done?" cried Mrs. Swanwick, distressed, as she took the thin, white hand in hers. "Forgive me."
"You have done nothing—nothing. Some day I shall tell you; not now." She controlled herself with effectual effort, shocked at her own weakness, and surprised that it had betrayed her into emotion produced by the too vivid realization of a terrible past. She never did tell more of it, but the story came to the Quaker dame on a far-off day and from a less reserved personage.
At this moment Margaret entered. Few things escaped the watchful eyes that were blue to-day and gray to-morrow, like the waters of the broad river that flowed by her home. No sign betrayed her surprise at the evident tremor of the chin muscles, the quick movement of the handkerchief from the eyes, tear-laden, the mother's look of sympathy as she dropped the hand left passive in her grasp. Not in vain had been the girl's training in the ways of Friends. Elsewhere she was more given to set free her face to express what she felt, but at home and among those of the Society of Friends she yielded with the imitativeness of youth to the not unwholesome discipline of her elders. She quietly announced Aunt Gainor as waiting below stairs.
"Wilt thou see her?" said Mrs. Swanwick.
"Certainly; I have much to thank her for. And tell my son not to come up as yet," for, being Saturday, it was a half-holiday from noon, and having been out for a good walk to stretch his desk-cramped legs, he was singing in the garden bits of French songs and teasing June or watching her skilful hunt for grasshoppers. He caroled gaily as he lay in the shade: