to him from the
beautiful archaic inheritance of his Church. He strode along hearing
them again and again in the dying storm.

So, I do stretch my hands
To Thee my help alone;
Thou only understands
All my complaint and moan.

He listened to the prayer on the wind, which seemed to offer it for him,
listened and was gravely touched. But he himself was far from the throes
of supplication. He was looking for the forces of his soul; and by the
time he reached Dr Drummond's door we may suppose that he had found
them.

Sarah who let him in, cried, "How wet you are, Mr Finlay!" and took his
overcoat to dry in the kitchen. The Scotch ladies, she told him, and
Mrs Forsyth, had gone out to tea, but they would be back right away, and
meanwhile "the Doctor" was expecting him in the study--he knew the way.

Finlay did know the way but, as a matter of fact, there had been time
for him to forget it; he had not crossed Dr Drummond's threshold since
the night on which the Doctor had done all, as he would have said, that
was humanly possible to bring him, Finlay, to reason upon the matter of
his incredible entanglement in Bross. The door at the end of the passage
was ajar however, as if impatient; and Dr Drummond himself, standing in
it, heightened that appearance, with his "Come you in, Finlay. Come you
in!"

The Doctor looked at the young man in a manner even more acute, more
shrewd, and more kindly than was his wont. His eye searched Finlay
thoroughly, and his smile seemed to broaden as his glance travelled.

"Man," he said, "you're shivering," and rolled him an armchair near the
fire. ("The fellow came into the room," he would say, when he told the
story afterward to the person most concerned, "as if he were going to
the stake!") "This is extraordinary weather we are having, but I think
the storm is passing over."

"I hope," said Finlay, "that my aunt and Miss Cameron are well. I
understand they are out."

"Oh, very well--finely. They're out at present, but you'll see them
bye-and-bye. An excellent voyage over they had--just the eight days. But
we'll be doing it in less than that when the new fast line is running to
Halifax. But four days of actual ocean travelling they say now it will
take. Four days from imperial shore to shore! That should incorporate
us--that should bring them out and take us home."

The Doctor had not taken a seat himself, but was pacing the study, his
thumbs in his waistcoat pocket