Even "poor Archie" found his vocation at last. The day that had meant so much to many had brought him a sort of awakening of mind, an increase of reason and a growth of character. His one strong instinct became a dominating force. He would save life, many lives, so long as he had strength. Sylvia would never care for him, of course; he said to himself that she should at least see what he could do. He remembered with constant longing the wild delight he had felt when he had brought the little child safely to the deck of the ferryboat on the North River, and when, bruised and bleeding, he had stopped the bolting horses in the New York street.
He unfolded his plan to the colonel first, because he was a man, and must understand; then he told his mother. There was nothing to be said against it, except that it was dangerous. He had made up his mind to join a Life-Saving Station on the coast. It was the one thing he could do, and he knew it.
"Of course," he said, with his elementary philosophy, "if I get drowned the first time, there won’t be anything gained. But if I can help to save a few people before that, it won’t matter so much, you know. It’ll be like money, when you get something for it."
The rude bravery of the argument brought a look into Wimpole’s eyes which had not been there for a long time. Helen had a lump in her throat.
"But if anything should happen to you--" she began, and stopped.
"Well, then," answered Archie, "I suppose I’d go to heaven, shouldn’t I? And that would be all right, just the same."
And thereupon he began to whistle thoughtfully. It was very simple in his eyes, and very desirable. Life seemed to him to be man’s first and greatest possession, as it is. For him, its possibilities were small, but he had a dim perception of its value to others, whom he called "clever" in wholesale distinction from himself. It was worth having, worth keeping, and worth saving, for them, at the risk of his own.
As for Miss Rachel Wimpole, as soon as she heard of Harmon’s death, she knew that her brother would marry Helen. She had systematically disapproved of his life-long devotion to a woman beyond his reach, while she had involuntarily respected in him the same unchanging faithfulness which had guarded her own heart against everything else for so many years, a little stronghold of no great importance to the rest of the world, but which held all that was most dear and precious to her. So here and there, in the chaos of the middle ages, some strong, poor gentleman, a mere atom in the wide Holy Empire, may have kept his small castle and his narrow acres of meagre land against all comers.