Glancing up at it, I knew not why, as I turned to go down the hill again, I saw a corner of the blind drawn aside and a face peeping out—­whose, I could not tell.  This was uncomfortable—­for what could be taking me there at such a time?  But I walked steadily away, certain I could not escape recognition, and determining to refer to this ill-considered visit when I called the next day.  I would not put it off till Monday, I was resolved.

I lingered on the bridge as I went home.  Not a light was to be seen in the village, except one over Catherine Weir’s shop.  There were not many restless souls in my parish—­not so many as there ought to be.  Yet gladly would I see the troubled in peace—­not a moment, though, before their troubles should have brought them where the weary and heavy-laden can alone find rest to their souls—­finding the Father’s peace in the Son—­the Father himself reconciling them to Himself.

How still the night was!  My soul hung, as it were, suspended in stillness; for the whole sphere of heaven seemed to be about me, the stars above shining as clear below in the mirror of the all but motionless water.  It was a pure type of the “rest that remaineth”—­rest, the one immovable centre wherein lie all the stores of might, whence issue all forces, all influences of making and moulding.  “And, indeed,” I said to myself, “after all the noise, uproar, and strife that there is on the earth, after all the tempests, earthquakes, and volcanic outbursts, there is yet more of peace than of tumult in the world.  How many nights like this glide away in loveliness, when deep sleep hath fallen upon men, and they know neither how still their own repose, nor how beautiful the sleep of nature!  Ah, what must the stillness of the kingdom be?  When the heavenly day’s work is done, with what a gentle wing will the night come down!  But I bethink me, the rest there, as here, will be the presence of God; and if we have Him with us, the battle-field itself will be—­if not quiet, yet as full of peace as this night of stars.”  So I spoke to myself, and went home.

I had little immediate comfort to give my young guest, but I had plenty of hope.  I told him he must stay in the house to-morrow; for it would be better to have the reconciliation with his father over before he appeared in public.  So the next day neither Weir was at church.

As soon as the afternoon service was over, I went once more to the Hall, and was shown into the drawing-room—­a great faded room, in which the prevailing colour was a dingy gold, hence called the yellow drawing-room when the house had more than one.  It looked down upon the lawn, which, although little expense was now laid out on any of the ornamental adjuncts of the Hall, was still kept very nice.  There sat Mrs Oldcastle reading, with her face to the house.  A little way farther on, Miss Oldcastle sat, with a book on her knee, but her gaze fixed on the wide-spread landscape before her, of which, however, she seemed to be as inobservant as of her book.  I caught glimpses of Judy flitting hither and thither among the trees, never a moment in one place.