The scene of three years ago when he handed the sword of his self-served and self-defended life to Jesus Christ, and purposed in His heart to follow Him at any cost, was vividly rehearsed in his memory.  Possessions, home, kindred, all things, were nominated in the bond of the whole-hearted surrender to his Lord.  The time had come to hold to those honest terms.

Hubert rose from his seat with a pale face, and a death-like sinking at his heart.  “Yes, Lord Jesus,” he uttered with dry lips, “I am at Thy command.  Forgive my coward halting.  If Thou wilt send me, I will go.”

On the other side of the hall, in her pretty room, Winifred had prayed:  “We have seen the glance of Thine eye, O Lord, and know Thy longing.  Open our eyes to see how we may serve Thee, and strengthen our hearts to bear—­nay, to love!—­Thy will.  If we must give each other up”—­a long pause, broken by storms of weeping, intervened—­“then let us see—­oh, let us see Thy face!”

When Winifred and Hubert first met in the hall next morning some gleams of comfort had already stolen into both their hearts.  He put his arm about her as they descended the stairs together, and at the foot they paused.

“Dear little sister!” he said caressingly.

Her eyes filled at his unusual tenderness; for Hubert’s love, however fervent and well believed-in, was not demonstrative.  She looked up in his face with a long, serious question.  He answered it by asking: 

“Shall I go?—­for Him, Winnie?”

“Yes, Hubert,” she said earnestly, “oh, yes!” But the color flickered in her cheeks and her lips grew white.

They stood for a moment together but neither spoke.  Together they presented afresh their offering to God, and He knew that it was costly.

At breakfast neither spoke of the matter that was uppermost in their hearts.  But later Hubert sought his father in the library and made known to him the step he had taken.

Grief, dismay, and almost anger, struggled in the older man’s heart.  He looked at his son with sorrowful sternness.

“Then—­then, Hubert,” he said very slowly, “you have concluded to leave me.”

A pang shot through Hubert’s heart, keener than any thought of his own pain, but he answered steadily: 

“I have concluded, father, to follow Christ.”

Mr. Gray frowned.  He was not conscious of frowning at the name of Christ, or at so pure a sentiment as that uttered, but grief made him insensible to what he did.

“And is that,” he asked with some irony, “the only way you can find of following Him?  Can no one follow Him at home?”

“I do not see that he can if he is called abroad, father.”

“And are you called?” he asked sharply, still the pain at his heart dulling any sense of shame that he could speak unsympathetically of such a thing.

Hubert answered gently.

“I believe I am, father,” he said.