the friendship of the three was never broken. i will not say that, as she lay awake in the dark, the eyes of alexa never renewed the tears of that autumn night on which she turned her back upon the pride of self, but her tears were never those of bitterness, of self-scorn, or of self-pity.
“if i am to be pitied,” she would say to herself, “let the lord pity me! i am not ashamed, and will not be sorry. i have nothing to resent; no one has wronged me.”
andrew died in middle age. his wife said the master wanted him for something nobody else could do, or he would not have taken him from her. she wept and took comfort, for she lived in expectation.
one night when she and alexa were sitting together at potlurg, about a month after his burial, speaking of many things with the freedom of a long and tried love, alexa said, after a pause of some duration:
“were you not very angry with me then, dawtie?”
“when, ma'am?”
“when andrew told you.”
“told me what, ma'am? i must be stupid to-night, for i can't think what you mean.”
“when he told you i wanted him, not knowing he was yours.”
“i ken naething o' what ye're mintin' at, mem,” persisted dawtie, in a tone of bewilderment.
“oh! i thought you had no secrets from one another.”
“i don't know that we ever had—except things in his books that he said were god's secrets, which i should understand some day, for god was telling them as fast as he could get his children to understand them.”
“i see,” sighed alexa; “you were made for each other. but this is my secret, and i have the right to tell it. he kept it for me to tell you. i thought all the time you knew it.”
“i don't want to know anything andrew would not tell me.”
“he thought it was my secret, you see, not his, and that was why he did not tell you.”
“of coarse, ma'am. andrew always did what was right.”
“well, then, dawtie—i offered to be his wife if he would have me.”
“and what did he say?” asked dawtie, with the composure of one listening to a story learned from a book.
“he told me he couldn't. but i'm not sure what he said. the words went away.”
“when was it he asked you?” said dawtie, sunk in thought.
“the night but one before the trial,” answered alexa.
“he micht hae ta'en you, then, i'stead o' me—a lady an' a'. oh, mem! do you think he took me 'cause i was in trouble? he micht hae been laird himsel'.”
“dawtie! dawtie!” cried alexa. “if you think that would have weighed with andrew, i ought to have been his wife, for i know him better than you.”
dawtie smiled at that.
“but i do know, mem,” she said, “that andrew was fit to cast the lairdship frae him to comfort ony puir lassie. i would ha' lo'ed him a' the same.”
“as i have done, dawtie,” said alexa, solemnly. “but he wouldn't have thrown me away for you, if he hadn't loved you, dawtie. be sure of that. he might have made nothing of the lairdship, but he wouldn't have made nothing of me.”
“that's true, mem. i dinna doobt it.”
“i love him still—and you mustn't mind me saying it, dawtie. there are ways of loving that are good, though there be some pain in them. thank god, we have our children to look after. you will let me say our children, won't you, dawtie?”
some thought alexa hard, some thought her cold, but the few that knew her knew she was neither; and some of my readers will grant that such a friend as andrew was better than such a husband as george.
