ight perhaps break the blow
to his family."

"What then do you advise me to do?"

"Ragnor intends to go back with you and myself to Edinburgh. He will
see your father and offer to buy you a commission as ensign in a good
infantry regiment. We will ask your father if he will join in the
plan."

"My father will not join in anything to help me. How much will an
ensign's commission cost?"

"I think four or five hundred pounds. Ragnor would pay half, if your
father would pay half."

Then Ian rose to his feet, and his eyes blazed with a fire no one had
ever seen there before. "Bishop," he said, "I thank you for all you
propose, but if I go to the trenches at Redan or the camp at
Sebastopol, I will go on John Macrae's authority and personality. I
have one hundred pounds, that is sufficient. I can learn all the great
things you expect me to learn there better among the rankers than the
officers. I have known the officers at Edinburgh Castle. They were not
fit candidates for a bishopric."

The good man looked sadly at the angry youth and answered, "Go and
talk the matter over with Thora."

"I will. Surely she will be less cruel."

"What do you wish, considering present circumstances?"

"I want the marriage carried out, devoid of all but its religious
ceremony. I want to spend one month in the home prepared for us, and
then I will submit to the punishment and schooling proposed."

"No, you will not. Do not throw away this opportunity to retrieve your
so far neglected, misguided life. There is a great man in you, if you
will give him space and opportunity to develop, John. This is the wide
open door of Opportunity; go through, and go up to where it will lead
you. At any rate do whatever Thora advises. I can trust you as far as
Thora can." Then he held out his hand, and Ian, too deeply moved to
speak, took it and left the cathedral without a word.

He found Thora alone in the parlour. She had evidently been weeping
but that fact did not much soothe his sense of wrong and injustice. He
felt that he had been put aside in some measure. He was not sure that
even now Thora had been weeping for his loss. He told himself, she was
just as likely to have been mourning for Boris. He felt that he was
unjustly angry but, oh, he was so hopeless! Every one was ready to
give him advice, no one had said to him those little words of loving
sympathy for which his heart was hungry. He had felt it to be his duty
to try and console Thora