She looked at him with furtive pride.  There was no showy parading of what he felt, but only the set of the mouth was a little firmer perhaps than usual and the eyes a little softer and glistening.  That was all.

“Ay, Robin,” she said brokenly, unable to hide her pride and weakness.  “I ken a’ that you hinna telt me.  I guessed it years syne; but I’m sure noo.  An’ I’m awfu’ vexed, laddie; ay, I’m awfu’ vexed,” and with that he withdrew to his room, more touched with her simple words of sympathy than anything she had ever said to him in all her previous life.

Mrs. Sinclair went to bed, but she knew her laddie had not done so.  She heard him in his room and knew that in the silence of the night and in the privacy and secrecy of his own room he was fighting out his battle with fate, and she knew that no one could help him—­that only the fiber of his own soul could help him through.

In the morning he rose early and went for a walk, for it was Sunday.  Returning, he found his mother with the latest news of Mysie’s condition.  She waited until the other members of the house had gone out, and then with a sigh observed very quietly but with a world of tender sympathy in her voice: 

“Mysie’s sinkin’ fast, Robin.  I think you should gang ower and see her.  She canna’ last very lang, puir thing, an’ she was askin’ aboot you when I was ower.  I think she wad like to see you.  You’ll gang ower and see her, Rob,” she entreated, a sob in her throat as she spoke.  “She’ll be awfu’ pleased to see you.”

“Ay, I’ll gang ower, mither,” he replied simply.  “I’ll gang ower efter a wee while.”

But it was drawing near to the darkness when he managed to summon sufficient resolution to face the ordeal.

Mysie was lying in the room and he went in to see her—­her whom he would have given his own life to restore to activity and health again.  A low moan occasionally escaped her as she panted and battled for breath and the color came and faded from her cheeks in quick fleeting waves.

Oh God!  Was this Mysie—­this faint apparition of the girl whom he had loved?  Even in the short month when he had seen her in Edinburgh a very great change had been wrought upon her.  The eyes, softly glowing with a quiet radiance as they rested upon his face, were sunk, and the voice faint and weak.  A thin white hand lay upon the coverlet and the great waves of brown hair which had been his pride, were tumbled about the thin face framing it in a tangled oak brown frame of deepest beauty.

She lifted her hand as he approached, a sweet smile breaking through her pain, caught him in radiance of love.  “I’m glad you’ve come, Rob,” she panted.  “I jist wanted to see you again—­an’—­an’ tak’ good-by wi’ you,” and the quick catch in her words gripped his heart as he knelt beside the bed, taking the thin hand between his while the tears started from his eyes and fell upon the white bed cover.