It was an hour before midnight when Oona awoke. So often had she slept
in the woods, through the hot summer nights, that there was nothing
strange or terrifying in the blackness of darkness about her. She could
smell the pungent odour of the bracken, and, somewhere near, wild mint.
The keen fragrance of the pines and firs everywhere prevailed.
Ah, she was in the forest: how warm and sweet it was! Where was Nial?
Scarce more than this drifted through her mind; then the heaviness of
sleep came upon her again.
The night waned. Dawn broke upon the eastern hills. Slowly the light
travelled downward beyond the crests of the mountains. It reached the
forest, and spread an unshimmering sheen over it, like the silver calm
on a green sea. Then, out of the sky a marvellous flower grew. It was a
dusky, rosy grey at first, as it lifted through the blue-black heaven,
already steel-blue in the east. Green folds of pink uncurled and fell
languidly on each side: drooping petals. There was a stir and quiver;
then a shaft of gold, another, and another. Suddenly it was as though
the heart of the flower burst. In the yellow mist and radiance,
wherefrom tall, waving foliage of golden fire moved as though fanned by
a wind from within, a cloud of glowing flakes arose. These may have been
the wild bees that make the honey of Magh Mell, or the birds of Angus
Óg, beloved youth-god of the yellow hair. Then the golden heart of the
miracle swelled, with a mighty suspiration. Petals of rose and
gold-green and pale pink as of shells unclosed from it. The vast blue
flower was aureoled now with an ascendant glory.
One by one the stars melted into heaven. Low in the south-west a planet
seemed to divide, then to close again, in a nebulous gleaming haze. Then
this night-bloom slowly paled, dwindled, and sank into a deep gulf. An
indescribable fragrance, an almost inaudible rustling sound--faint, as
the roar of the rushing world is faint beyond all ears to hear--filled
the air. The pulse of the world quickened. The green earth sighed, and
was awake.
Through her sleep Oona heard the croodling of doves. Then a bleating
fawn in a fern-covert close by made her stir. Suddenly she half-rose,
stared about her, and felt the breath of the cool wind that, too, had
been awakened by the sun, and was now sighing softly through the
pine-glades.
Then in a moment there came upon her the remembrance of what had
happened.
With a cry she sprang to her feet. What of her foster-father? Had he
awaked in the gloaming and found the woman Anabal beside him? Had he
made peace, or was his anger even now brooding terribly? Who had seen
him home? What would he say--what would Sorcha say? Perhaps, even, he
had fallen into the Linn, or, it might be, he had tried to make his way
home alone through the forest, and now lay somewhere in its depths,
blind and baffled.
Thus was the child wrought. But what could she do? she wondered. Should
she make her way swiftly through the forest and up Wester Iolair to
Màm-Gorm, and there see if her foster-father was in his bed and asleep?
What would he say and do? Once she had seen him in a passionate rage,
and her heart shook at the remembrance. Perhaps he would kill her. Does
it hurt much to be killed? she wondered. Then she thought of Nial. If
she could find him, he could discover for her that which she feared to
seek herself. Where would he be? For nights past he had not been seen at
Màm-Gorm. He might be high upon the mountain, perhaps at Murdo's remote
sheiling on Ben Iolair, by Sgòrr Glan. He might be at the cave,
Uav-an-teine: the great hollow cavern, dry even in winter weather, which
lay but a short way above the Linn o' Mairg.
Yes, that was likeliest. Nial loved the place. There he might sleep
where no dew nor rain could touch him, and with the sound of Mairg Water
to be his lullaby through the dark. She would seek him there. But first
she would go to the Linn, so that she might know that her foster-father
no longer lay by the stream-side.
The heart of the birdeen lightened as she walked swiftly through the
dewy fern. She began to call back to the cushats and other birds as they
uttered their matin cries. Then she laughed, and broke into snatches of
song.
The light was streaming down the Strath as she emerged into the open
glade above the Linn. Here, among the trees on the slope and in the many
cavernous rocks and bosky hollows, deep shadows still lingered. It would
be nigh upon an hour before the morning twilight waned hence.
A glance showed her that there was no one at the Linn. She ran down
close to it, and peered eagerly here and there, on either side. There
was no one visible. With a sigh of relief she was about to step forward
to take a sunrise peep into the Pool below the Linn, for the great
salmon she had never yet been able to descry, when she stopped, because
of the croaking of a raven.
It was not lucky to go athwart the croaking of a fee-ach' at sunrise.
The great black bird swung on an outspread bough of a hazel, close to
the Kelpie's Pool, and croaked with harsh, monotonous reiteration. Oona
stooped, lifted a stone, and threw it at the raven, who watched her
closely.
"Fitheach! fitheach! The way of the sun to you! Be off, be off!"
_Croak! croak!_
"Black fēē-ach, black fēē-ach, go where the dead are, and do not cross
my way, or I will put a _rosad_ upon thee!"
_Croak! croak! croak!_
Half angry, half glad, the child threw another stone; then turned,
leaped from stone to stone till she gained the grass again, and then
went singing low toward the cave called the Uav-an-teine.
The arch of it was still in shadow, and the bracken on the brow of the
arch: though the rowan that leaned forward into the air bathed its upper
branches in sunlight. On the smooth thyme-set sward beyond, the yellow
shine lay; so warm, that the butterflies hovered in and out of the
golden area.
With cautious steps Oona advanced. If Nial were there she wished to
surprise him while he slept.
She crawled to one side of the sunswept cave, within which was still a
warm dusk. Surely that was the sound of breathing? Yes; she could hear
the steady rise and fall, faint though it was. With a smile she moved
forward.
Suddenly she stood as one changed into stone. What was this: what did it
mean? No sign of Nial was there. But, among dried bracken and dead
leaves, blown or drifted there in autumnal days, and forming a place of
rest fit for the weariest deer that ever leaped before the baying
hounds, lay two figures, clasped in one another's arms.
For a moment the idea flashed across Oona's mind that the sleepers were
Torcall and Anabal. Then she knew who they were, for who had such a mass
of lovely dark-brown hair as Sorcha? what man of the Strath had the
curly yellow hair of Alan? So that was where the lovers met! Once or
twice, within these last few cloudless days and nights, she knew that
Sorcha, when at length the restless lapwings had ceased their querulous
crying in the moonlight, had slipped quietly from the house. She knew,
too, that once at least Sorcha did not return till sunrise, for she had
been awake, and had risen, and had seen her sister moving slow through
the dew, with so wonderful a look in her eyes, so beautiful, so strange,
that she had not dared to speak, and had fled back to her bed, with a
sob in her throat, she knew not why.
She smiled, and pondered how best to startle them. How she wished Nial
were here also, so that he might laugh when Alan and Sorcha suddenly
awoke, and found themselves observed!
But, as she looked, the change that had already been at work in her of
late, swayed her mood otherwise.
She rose to her feet, and leaned against the green mossy boulder at the
side of the cave. For a while she stood thus, her eyes intent upon the
lovers. How beautiful Sorcha's face was, faint-flushed like that! What a
new, strange light upon her face! And Alan: how tall and strong he was,
how bonnie the rippling gold hair of his head! His fair face, whiter now
than she had ever seen it, seemed cut out of stone, so sharp were the
outlines. Thus, she thought, must Angus Óg seem: Angus, the fairest
youth of the world, whom none sees now, for he is of the Ancient People,
who, though still among us, are invisible to mortal eyes. Often had
Sorcha told her of him: sure, now, this was he?
Instinctively, she looked to see if white birds hovered anywhere. For
the olden tale said that the kisses of Angus Óg became white birds, and
that these flew abroad continually, to nest in lovers' hearts till the
moment came when, on meeting lips of love, their invisible wings should
become kisses again.
No, there were no birds: none, at least, for her eyes to see.
The hot sunlight moved upon her bare feet. Soon it would reach her
waist, she knew, if she stood brooding there: and when it did that, the
glow would be upon the face of Alan, and he would awake.
A sudden fantasy took her. Almost she had laughed aloud. When she moved
into the space opposite the cave it was as though she waded in sunshine.
Everywhere in the light the dew shone, filled with unburning fire.
She crossed the sunspace, to where a mass of honeysuckle drooped over a
wild brier. With deft fingers she made a crown of this, starred with
some pink wild-roses, plucked from a low bush beyond the brier; then of
the dusky yellow honeysuckle wove a garland.
Decorated thus, and with sparkling eyes, she turned and faced the cave
again. Soundlessly she began to dance.
At first it was the mere joy of her laughing glee. Soon, she hoped Alan
or Sorcha would wake. Ah, then, how she would laugh, to see them stare
confusedly at her, dancing there in the sunlight!
But as she wavered to and fro in the sunsea, a dreamy pleasure moved her
to half-forgetfulness of where she was. A mavis on the rowan over the
cave began to sing, the strange late song that sometimes wells forth in
silent August; at first, long, sweet, vibrant notes, then a swift
gurgling music, and then, as his heart warmed against the sun, more and
more wildly sweet, till the hot air swung with the intoxication of his
rapture.
More and more, too, was Oona rapt as she wavered to and fro. The swift
rhythm of her joyous dance wrought her as with a spell. A dream lay in
her eyes, now set far away--far away, where Angus Óg was, and where the
sun rose and the moon waxed and waned to the singing of the white merle.
The sunlight seemed to drift her onward, as though she were a dancing
wave on the forehead of the tide. Soon she was past the cave, and still,
as the sunbeams flickered, she leaped and swayed, rapt in an ecstasy
beyond thought or heed.
Suddenly, the thrush ceased. There was a whirr of wings: then a sharp,
quickly repeated strident cry.
Another second, and Oona was a laughing child again, crouched low in the
bracken. Alan or Sorcha was awake, and had stirred!
Ah, no, she thought, she would not let them see her now. True, they
might hear her, where she lay panting like a young bird escaped from a
hawk! As soundlessly as she could, for her quick breathing and the
rustle of the bracken, she half-crawled, half-ran, back the way she had
come. Soon she was safe, for the pines enclosed her, and then the
beeches and birks near the water-slope. From behind a vast beech-bole
she watched to see if she were pursued, or seen. But no one came. All
was as before: only, the thrush did not venture back to the rowan, which
now threw its flickering fingerlike shadows on the smooth turf below, in
front of the cave.