Nothing!

How far away the afternoon seems; that quiet sunny walk beneath the
pines. His friend is at his books, no doubt, with the silver candles, and
the open pages, and his own neat manuscript growing under his white
scholarly fingers. And Isabel; at her needlework before the fire.--How
peaceful and harmless and sweet it all is! And down there, not fifty
yards away, is the village; every light out by now; and the children and
parents, too, asleep.--Ah! what will the news be when they wake
to-morrow?--And that strange talk this afternoon, of the Saviour and His
Cup of pain, and the squalor and indignity of the Passion! Ah! yes, he
could suffer with Jesus on the Cross, so gladly, on that Tree of
Life--but not with Judas on the Tree of Death!

And the minister dropped his face lower, over the edge of his desk; and
the hot tears of misery and self-reproach and impotence began to run.
There was no help, no help anywhere. All were against him--even his wife
herself; and his Lord.

Then with a moan he lifted his hot face into the dusk.

"Jesus," he cried in his soul, "Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest
that I love Thee."

There came a tapping on the door; and the door opened an inch.

"It is time," whispered his wife's voice.

CHAPTER VIII

THE TAKING OF MR. STEWART

They were still sitting over the supper-table at the Hall. The sun had
set about the time they had begun, and the twilight had deepened into
dark; but they had not cared to close the shutters as they were to move
so soon. The four candles shone out through the windows, and there still
hung a pale glimmer outside owing to the refraction of light from the
white stones of the terrace. Beyond on the left there sloped away a high
black wall of impenetrable darkness where the yew hedge stood; over that
was the starless sky. Sir Nicholas' study was bright with candlelight,
and the lace and jewels of Lady Maxwell (for her sister wore none) added
a vague pleasant sense of beauty to Mr. Stewart's mind; for he was one
who often fared coarsely and slept hard. He sighed a little to himself as
he looked out over this shining supper-table past the genial smiling face
of Sir Nicholas to the dark outside; and thought how in less than an hour
he would have left the comfort of this house for the grey road and its
hardships again. It was extraordinarily sweet to him (for he was a man of
taste and a natural inc