Part 31 (1/2)

Carmichael flushed uneasily, and Kate supposed that he was sympathising with their losses.

”I hope to be a busy woman soon, with lots of work, and I shall use every one of my little sc.r.a.ps of knowledge. How do you think I shall acquit myself in my new role?”

It was a little hard on Carmichael, who was thinking of a countess, while Kate meant a governess.

”You need not ask me how I think you will do as . . . in any position, and I . . . wish you every success, and . . . (with a visible effort) happiness.”

He spoke so stiffly that Kate sought about for reasons, and could only remember their quarrel and imagine he retained a grudge--which she thought was rather ungenerous.

”It occurs to me that one man ought to be thankful when we depart, for then he will be able to call Queen Mary names every Sunday without a misguided Jacobite girl dropping in to create a disturbance.”

”Drumtochty will have to form its own opinion of poor Mary without my aid,” and Carmichael smiled sadly in pardon of the past, ”for it is likely, although no one knows this in the Glen, that I shall soon be far away.”

”Leaving Drumtochty? What will Marjorie do without you, and Dr.

Davidson, and . . . all the people?” Then, remembering Janet's gossip, and her voice freezing, ”I suppose you have got a better or more convenient living. The Glen is certainly rather inaccessible.”

”Have I done anything, Miss Carnegie, to justify you in thinking that I would leave the Glen, which has been so good to me, for . . . worldly reasons? There is enough to support an unmarried man, and I am not likely to . . . to marry,” said Carmichael, bitterly; ”but there are times when it is better for a man to change his whole surroundings and make a new life.”

It was clear that the Bailie's daughter was a romance of Janet's Celtic imagination, and Kate's manner softened.

”The Rabbi's death and . . . your difference of opinion--something about doctrine, was n't it? we were from home--must have been a great trial, and, as there was no opportunity before, let me say how much we sympathised with you and . . . thought of you.

”Do you think, however, Mr. Carmichael”--she spoke with hesitation, but much kindness--”that you ought to fling up your work here on that account? Would not the Rabbi himself have wished you to stick to your post? . . . and all your friends would like to think you had been . . .