call the bwoy Clem, tu. Be you shamed
of him as he lies here? Be you feared of anything the airth can do to
you when you look at him? Do 'e think Heaven's allus hard? No, I tell
'e, not to the young--not to the young. The wind's mostly tempered to
the shorn lamb, though the auld ewe do oftentimes sting for it, an' get
the seeds o' death arter shearing. Wait, and be strong, till you feel
Clem's baaby in your arms. That'll be reward enough, an' you won't care
no more for the world then. His son, mind; who be you to take life, an'
break the buds of Clem's plantin'? Worse than to go in another's garden
an' tear down green fruit."

So she pleaded volubly, with an electric increase of vitality, and
continued to pour out a torrent of words, until Chris solemnly promised,
before God and the dead, that she would not take her life. Having done
so, some new design informed her.

"I must go," she said; "the moon has set and dawn is near. Dying be so
easy; living so hard. But live I will; I swear it, though theer's awnly
my poor mad brain to shaw how."

"Clem's son, mind. An' let me be the first to see it, for I feel't will
be the gude pleasure of God I should."

"An' you promise to say no word, whatever betides, an' whatever you
hear?"

"Dumb I'll be, as him theer--dumb, countin' the weeks an' months."

"Day's broke, an' I must go home-along," said Chris. She repeated the
words mechanically, then moved away without any formal farewell. At the
door she turned, hastened back, kissed the dead man's face again, and
then departed, while the other woman looked at her but spoke no more.

Alone, with the struggle over and her object won, the mother shrank and
dwindled again and grew older momentarily. Then she relapsed into the
same posture as before, and anon, tears bred of new thoughts began to
trickle painfully from their parched fountains. She did not move, but
let them roll unwiped away. Presently her head sank back, her cap fell
off and white hair dropped about her face.

Fingers of light seemed lifting the edges of the blind. They gained
strength as the candle waned, and presently at cock-crow, when
unnumbered clarions proclaimed morning, grey dawn with golden eyes
brightened upon a dead man and an ancient woman fast asleep beside him.

CHAPTER XVII

MISSING

John Grimbal, actuated by some whim, or else conscious that under the
circumstances decorum demanded his attendance, was present at the
funeral of Clement