he
was ready to lie to Brownrig, rather than say anything that might give
him a clue by which the hiding-place of Allison Bain might be
discovered, still lying could not be easy work to unaccustomed lips, and
he said to himself, "the less of it the better." So he did not
encourage Brownrig when they met, and he kept out of his way whenever it
was possible for him to do so. But he pitied the man. He was sorry for
the misery for which there could be no help, since Allison Bain feared
him, even if she did not hate him. He pitied him, but he could not help
him to gain his end. Whether it were right or whether it were wrong, it
was all the same to John. He could not betray to her enemy the woman
who had trusted her cause in his hands.

But while he pitied him, Brownrig's persistence in seeking him irritated
him almost beyond his power to endure. And the worst of it to John was,
that he could not put it all out of his thoughts when Brownrig had
turned his back upon the town, and had gone to his own place.

He grew restless and irritable. He could not forget himself in his work
as he had been able to do at first, nor fix his attention upon it at
all, at times. He read the same page over and over again, and knew not
what he read; or he sat for many minutes together, without turning a
leaf, as his mother sometimes saw, with much misgiving as to how it was
all to end. And when it came to this with him, it was time for her to
speak.

"John, my lad," she said suddenly one night, and in her voice was the
mother's sharpness which is so delightful to hear and so effectual when
it is heard only at long intervals; "John, my lad, shut your book and
put on your coat, and take Robin with you for a run on the sands, and
then go to your bed."

John's dazed eyes met hers for a moment. Then he laughed and rose,
yawning and stretching his arms above his head.

"You are right, mother, as you always are. We'll away to the links;"
and his cheerful voice calling up-stairs for Robin to come down at once,
was music to the ears of his mother.

"There's not much wrong with him," she said to herself hopefully.
"He'll win through, and begin again, when once he is fairly free."

She meant that when "those weary examinations" were all over, he would
have time to rest and come to himself, and be ready for his work,
whatever it was to be. And--hopeful old mother that she was--she meant
more than that. She meant, that before this son of