oy to spend it with him. But Tim
had not come, and as he sat waiting, John McIntyre had picked up the
Bible. It was the first time he had opened it of his own accord, and
he had intended merely to glance into it to pass the time. But he had
read on and on, till now the light had faded from the evening skies,
and the bare phantom trees of the Drowned Lands had vanished in the
night. The whip-poor-will that all evening had been mourning on the
hillside, and the loon that had called across the water, were hushed.
The faint stars looked down on the silent blackness of the woods and
the gray mists of the water beyond. But in those mists the lonely man
at the doorway could discern a picture--a scene the Book had just now
revealed to him. It was a weary group of Galilean fishermen
approaching the shore, after a night of fruitless toil, while on the
sands, shrouded in mists, stood One waiting for them in the dawn. One
man in the little boat, straining his eyes to discern that mysterious
Figure, suddenly felt his heart awake. He uttered in a thrilling
whisper, "_It is the Lord_!" And without waiting for a word of reply,
Peter, the disciple, who had so lately denied that One with curses,
flung himself headlong into the sea and swam straight to Him.

John McIntyre's heart swelled. Well he understood the feeling that
prompted Peter's act, for there was in his own homesick soul a longing
to do the same, to plunge through the sea of loss and disappointment
and go back to his denied Master. For this man's long night of storm
and stress and fruitless toil was almost over, too. All unknown to
himself, he had been slowly nearing the shore. The companionship and
artless devotion of the boy--his enemy's child, but his now by all the
rights of love--the kindness of the village folk in spite of rebuffs,
the young doctor's care, and, above all, the tender message of the Book
he had been constrained to read, had combined to guide him to the
harbor. Yes, he was nearing the shore, and though he had not yet been
able to discern Him through the night mists, there stood One waiting
for him just behind the dawn.

Long into the night he sat, filled with a feeling of expectancy. He
was half-consciously waiting for something, he knew not what.
Supposing that same One had been watching for him to return, all this
weary time of sorrow and rebellion? The thought made his breath come
quicker. Could it be possible? Could it be that the sa