they were sulky, and expressed no sympathy for Liot's
disappointment, loss, and suffering. They had become superstitious
about him, and they speculated and wondered at the ill luck that
always drove him back to Skye. Roy Hunish, a very old man, spoke for
the rest when he said, "It seems to me, Liot Borson, that the Lord
has not sent you to Stornoway; he is against the journey." And
Liot answered sadly: "He is against all I desire."

When they had been warmed and fed and rested in one of the nearest
cottages, Liot took David in his arms and went back to his old hut.
He put the sleeping child in the bunk, and then sat down on the
cold, dark hearthstone. What Hunish expressed so plainly was the
underlying thought in his own heart. He could not escape from a
conclusion so tragically manifested. In sorrow too great for
tears, he compelled himself to resign all his hopes and dreams--a
renunciation as bitter as wormwood, but not as cruelly bitter as
the one it included; for his rejection was also the rejection of
his son. God had not forgiven him, nor had he accepted David's
dedication to his service, for he had stripped him of all means
to accomplish it. He might have permitted him to reach Stornoway and
leave the boy among his kindred; he had chosen rather to include
David in the sin of his father. This was the thought that wounded
his heart like a sword. He went to the sleeping boy and kissed his
face, weeping most of all for the sorrow he had brought on the
innocent one.

If this earth be a penal world, Liot that night went down to one of
its lowest hells. Sorrow of many kinds brutally assailed him. He
hid nothing from his consciousness. He compelled himself to see
over again the drowning of Bele--that irreparable wrong which had
ruined all his happiness; he compelled himself to stand once more by
Karen's coffin, and listen to his own voice calling God to witness
his innocence; he compelled himself to admit that he had thought God
had forgotten his sin of seven years ago. And when these things had
been thought out to the end, his heart was so full that he quite
unconsciously gave utterance to his thoughts in audible speech. The
tones of his voice in the darkness were like those of a man praying,
and the hopeless words filled the sorrowful room with a sense of
suffering:

"So, then, it is for a life-sentence that I am sent here. There is
to be no pardon till I have dreed out the years appointed me in the
gust and pover