om Sunday Mass, and I noticed with some
surprise that he received Holy Communion at least once and sometimes
more frequently every week, but always on a week-day, when our
congregation consisted chiefly of our household and Bell.

"I suppose Archie 'Gairdener' finds it more convenient to come to the
Sacraments on a week-day," I remarked one day to Val, "because of the
late hour of Mass on Sunday."

"Scarcely that," was his quiet answer. "I happen to know from other
sources that he still keeps up the old practice he found in use when he
first came here. In those days no one dreamed of breaking fast on a
Sunday until the priest himself did. Every one came to Mass fasting,
as Archie still does--though I believe he is the only one nowadays."

During the two or three years that followed I saw a good deal of
Archie. We became such cronies, indeed, that Val was considerably
amused that I should take so much pleasure in the company of one with
whom I could have few ideas in common. But there was something that
attracted me to the old fellow from the first, which I can not define
in words.

A severe winter made it almost impossible for the old man to get to
Sunday Mass at all; he would do his best, but it was evident, as I
could see more plainly in my visits, that he was growing very feeble.
I happened to be seedy myself at that time, and did not manage to get
out so frequently as before, owing to the trying weather.

It came with no surprise when Val told me in early spring that Archie
was growing worse, and that the doctor gave little hope of his
regaining strength; in the circumstances, Val thought it well not to
delay the Last Sacraments any longer. I tried to accompany him when he
went to the old mill for that purpose, but I had to give it up. It was
about a week later that I was able to visit the old man.

Winter seemed to have departed for good on that day in mid-April. A
bright sun was shining; deluded little birds were flitting about as
though summer had come; even on the hill the air was mild and balmy.

The brooding silence seemed accentuated in the neighborhood of Archie's
hermitage. An unusual sign of life was to be seen at the mill-house
itself; smoke was rising from the extemporized chimney; for Bell, as I
knew, had installed herself as nurse and was doing her best to render
the last days of the old recluse more restful than they could have been
during his more active period.

It was Bell who ans