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Updated: June 13, 2025
Elsie also wrote a line to say she was glad not to be a lady, and believed that he would get on all the better for not being a lord. Thus it came to pass that when the Rev. Cooper Smith arrived at Ballymena station, the first person he met was Jim McAravey. "I do not know how to thank you, sir, for all the trouble you have taken; I at least was not worthy of it.
"Sit down, mon, and rest yeresel' a bit; ye must be tired," said McAravey, looking over his shoulder as he stalked out of the cottage. "Don't you think you ought to send those children to school, Mrs. McAravey?" asked the clergyman, whose kind heart had been touched, on the occasion of a recent pic-nic, to see the half-drowned little ones toiling amid the heaps of wet and writhing sea-wrack.
Nor would she entertain the idea of deserting the poor old body, though Mrs. McAravey stoically offered to give her up. "I won't stand in your way, Elsie, lass, though I can't bear to think of it; but it's not long I'll be here to trouble anyone, and I'd like to know you were well provided." But Elsie would not be persuaded, nor could her new friends do otherwise than approve her noble resolve.
McAravey, notwithstanding her self-righteous indignation when questioned by the clergyman, had in her heart a belief that religious instruction was the proper thing for children. She remembered the stern discipline of her own early years not, indeed, with any pleasure, but with a firm conviction that severe spiritual as well as physical labour was good for the young.
It cost George Hendrick no slight effort to dismiss his two favourite scholars, nor could he at once see his duty plain in the matter. As for the children they were broken-hearted and rebellious; but the quiet, sympathetic tenderness of their friend at length reconciled them to their lot. Except on this point, McAravey was far more considerate with the children than formerly.
Then he thought he saw the man in the locket looking at him with hard, cold mouth, and then the face grew smaller till it shrunk into the locket, and it was open on the breast of the dead woman as she lay on the sands; and he saw himself and Elsie standing by the body. In a moment he passed into the little figure, and felt himself turning to call Mike McAravey, as he had done so long ago.
It is curious that the name on the ticket is Henderson, while McAravey said the person who brought you and Jim to him was called Davison or Davis, or something like that. Of course it is quite possible the poor creature did not like to give her right name at a pawn office. What do you think?" "I have always felt as if she was my mother," said Elsie; "and I should be glad if it turned out so.
"Well, Elsie, you run on to McAuley's, and ask him to bring down some spirits in case she might be alive still; and lose no time there's a good girl." So saying, Hendrick sprang over the low fence and hurried down the shore. He soon saw through the dusk a tall figure bending over some object on the sand. It rose as he approached, and he at once recognised McAravey.
I did not like to touch her till some one came." Between them they lifted the body into a place of safety, and then McAravey, whose agitation had not diminished, said, with affected indifference "While we are waiting I 'll just drag up a wee lock of that weed; there is no use letting the tide fetch it away again."
McAravey assented, though probably the three young girls had no conception of the sacrifice it was to the invalid thus to consent to her being left alone from ten o'clock of a Sunday morning till nearly five. Elsie soon became a favourite at the rectory. Young and enthusiastic, she thought nothing of the four miles' walk across the rough moorland; nor did it ever occur either to her or Mrs.
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