So through July and August, Ray toiled about the farm, or sat and read on the seashore. Then September came, and he must soon get ready to return to Easton for his last year at Clinton Academy. He decided to spend a few days with George at Wenton, and with friends in Afton, before his return; and so this would be his last night at the farm. After supper, he strolled down to the shore alone, and, sitting down upon the little wharf, he looked up toward Afton, which could be dimly seen in the fast fading twilight.
His mind soon became busy with the reminiscences of the past few years. How often had he gone up that bay to Afton! Just down around that point Edward Lawton had come on the night of the storm, and he had gone out to save him. How good God had been to Edward and himself! How gracious God had been to his loved ones! George and the girls were all serving Christ. The father had died trusting in the Saviour. Where were Tom and Dick? Nothing had been heard of them since they, four years before, had escaped from the county jail. Were they alive? Had God reached and saved them also? How he would like to know! An overwhelming sense of the Master's nearness and the Master's goodness came over him; and for a while he sat there absorbed in these contemplations, and rejoicing in his soul.
Then his mood changed. A bright gleam came into his eye, a smile played upon his lips. Another friend had come to mind—Daisy Lawton. Daisy was a great deal in Ray's thoughts lately—more than he himself perhaps realized. He recalled her narrow escape at the picnic, and somehow he felt a thrill of satisfaction deep down in his heart that it was his father who had saved her, though at the expense of his own life. Had not that act in a measure atoned for the stain that had rested upon his father's name? Would he not dare now to speak of a matter that had long been hid in his heart, and which he had felt he dare not make known with that father's disgrace still resting upon him? It certainly seemed to him that the father's heroic death altered the whole situation. He could not help feeling it did. Anyway, by-and-by he would venture to speak to Daisy of this matter which so intimately concerned him at least. Nor did he think that she would be altogether indifferent respecting it. "What a friend she has been to me all these years!" he thought, his heart swelling with joy and gratitude. There was, as the reader has already discovered, a deeper feeling there—a feeling of deep, passionate love. He was slowly waking up to it; but he did not know it was to cost him the greatest struggle of his life.
His thoughts so pre-occupied his mind he did not notice that the shades of night had already fallen heavily around, and that a dense fog, drenching everything it touched, was slowly rolling up the bay. Nor did he notice that a boat, with a single oarsman therein, was pulling down the harbor directly toward him, until he heard his name called.
Looking up almost in alarm at the suddenness of the call, he saw the boat had stopped a rod or two away; and the occupant, whoever he was, now called again:
"Ray, is that you?"
There was something familiar in those tones, and yet Ray could not tell who it was. He promptly answered, however:
"Yes; but who are you?"
The boatman, instead of replying, resumed his oars and came directly into the wharf. Jumping out of the boat, he fastened it to a ring in the dock, and then turned and faced the lad.
"Ray, don't you know me?" he asked.