d
cause for anxiety on his account, so instead of speaking he laid his arm
over his sister's neck. She struggled with herself a moment, unable to
speak.

"Graeme," said Will, softly, "we cannot keep Harry safe from evil, and
He who can is able to keep him safe there as well as here."

"I know it; I say it to myself twenty times a day. That is, I say it in
words; but I do not seem to get the comfort I might from them."

"But, Graeme, Harry has been very little away this winter, and I had
thought--"

"I know, dear, and I have been quite hopeful about him till lately.
But, oh, Will! it won't bear talking about. We can only wait
patiently."

"Yes, Graeme, we can pray and trust, and you are exaggerating to
yourself Harry's danger, I think. What has happened to make you so
faint-hearted, dear?"

"What should have happened, Will? I am tired--for one thing--and
something is wrong I know."

She paused to struggle with her tears.

"Somehow, I don't feel so anxious about Harry as you do, Graeme. He
will come back again. I am sure this great sorrow is not waiting you."

He paused a moment, and then added, hesitatingly,--

"I have had many thoughts since I sat down here, Graeme. I think one
needs--it does one good, to make a pause to have time to look back and
to look forward. Things change to us; we get clearer and truer views of
life, alone in the dark, with nothing to withdraw our thoughts from the
right and the wrong of things, and we seem to see more clearly how true
it is, that though we change God never changes. We get courage to look
our troubles fairly in the face, when we are alone with God and them."

Still Graeme said nothing, and Will added,--

"Graeme, you must take hope for Harry. And there is nothing else, is
there?--nothing that you are afraid to look at--nothing that you cannot
bring to the one place for light and help?"

She did not answer for a minute.

"No, Will, I hope not. I think not. I daresay--I am quite sure that
all will be for the best, and I shall see at some time."

Not another word was said till Graeme rose and drawing aside the
curtains, let in on them the dim dawn of a bleak March morning.

In a few more days Will was down-stairs again. Not in his accustomed
corner among his books, but in the arm-chair in the warmest place by the
fire, made much of by Rose and them all. It seemed a long time since he
had been among them. A good many things had happened during the