“Crawford?” inquired Tallisker, “is he at home?”

“Yes, he is at home;” and the servant ushered him into, a carefully-shaded room, where marble statues gleamed in dusk corners and great flowering plants made the air fresh and cool.  It as the first time Tallisker had ever seen a calla lily and he looked with wonder and delight at the gleaming flowers.  And somehow he thought of Helen.  Colin sat in a great leathern chair reading.  He did not lift his head until the door closed and he was sensible the servant had left some one behind.  Then for a moment he could hardly realize who it was; but when he did, he came forward with a glad cry.

“Dominie!  O Tallisker!”

“Just so, Colin, my dear lad.  O Colin, you are the warst man I ever kenned.  You had a good share o’ original sin to start wi’, but what wi’ pride and self-will and ill-will, the old trouble is sairly increased.”

Colin smiled gravely.  “I think you misjudge me, dominie.”  Then refreshments were sent for, and the two men sat down for a long mutual confidence.

Colin’s life had not been uneventful.  He told it frankly, without reserve and without pride.  When he quarrelled with his father about entering Parliament, he left Rome at once, and went to Canada.  He had some idea of joining his lot with his own people there.  But he found them in a state of suffering destitution.  They had been unfortunate in their choice of location, and were enduring an existence barer than the one they had left, without any of its redeeming features.  Colin gave them all he had, and left them with promises of future aid.

Then he went to New York.  When he arrived, there was an intense excitement over the struggle then going on in the little republic of Texas.  He found out something about the country; as for the struggle, it was the old struggle of freedom against papal and priestly dominion.  That was a quarrel for which Scotchmen have always been ready to draw the sword.  It was Scotland’s old quarrel in the New World, and Colin went into it heart and soul.  His reward had been an immense tract of the noble rolling Colorado prairie.  Then he determined to bring the Crawfords down, and plant them in this garden of the Lord.  It was for this end he had written to his father for L4,000.  This sum had sufficed to transplant them to their new home, and give them a start.  He had left them happy and contented, and felt now that in this matter he had absolved his conscience of all wrong.

“But you ought to hae told the laird.  It was vera ill-considered.  It was his affair more than yours.  I like the thing you did, Colin, but I hate the way you did it.  One shouldna be selfish even in a good wark.”

“It was the laird’s own fault; he would not let me explain.”

“Colin, are you married?”

“Yes.  I married a Boston lady.  I have a son three years old.  My wife was in Texas with me.  She had a large fortune of her own.”