The White People................................................................................................................................................1

Frances Hodgson Burnett .........................................................................................................................1

Perhaps the things which happened could only have happened to me. I do not know. I never heard of things

like them happening to any one else. But I am not sorry they did happen. I am in secret deeply and strangely

glad. I have heard other people say thingsand they were not always sad people, eitherwhich made me

feel that if they knew what I know it would seem to them as though some awesome, heavy load they had

always dragged about with them had fallen from their shoulders. To most people everything is so uncertain

that if they could only see or hear and know something clear they would drop upon their knees and give

thanks. That was what I felt myself before I found out so strangely, and I was only a girl. That is why I intend

to write this down as well as I can. It will not be very well done, because I never was clever at all, and always

I say that perhaps these things could only have happened to me, because, as I look back over my life, I realize

that it has always been a rather curious one. Even when those who took care of me did not know I was

thinking at all, I had begun to wonder if I were not different from other children. That was, of course, largely

because Muircarrie Castle was in such a wild and remote part of Scotland that when my few relations felt

they must pay me a visit as a mere matter of duty, their journey from London, or their pleasant places in the

south of England, seemed to them like a pilgrimage to a sort of savage land; and when a conscientious one

brought a child to play with me, the little civilized creature was as frightened of me as I was of it. My shyness

and fear of its strangeness made us both dumb. No doubt I seemed like a new breed of inoffensive little

A certain clannish etiquette made it seem necessary that a relation should pay me a visit sometimes, because I

was in a way important. The huge, frowning feudal castle standing upon its battlemented rock was mine; I

was a great heiress, and I was, so to speak, the chieftainess of the clan. But I was a plain, undersized little

child, and had no attraction for any one but Jean Braidfute, a distant cousin, who took care of me, and Angus

Macayre, who took care of the library, and who was a distant relative also. They were both like me in the fact

that they were not given to speech; but sometimes we talked to one another, and I knew they were fond of

When I was a little girl I did not, of course, understand that I was an important person, and I could not have

realized the significance of being an heiress. I had always lived in the castle, and was used to its hugeness, of

which I only knew corners. Until I was seven years old, I think, I imagined all but very poor people lived in

castles and were saluted by every one they passed. It seemed probable that all little girls had a piper who

strode up and down the terrace and played on the bagpipes when guests were served in the dininghall.

My piper's name was Feargus, and in time I found out that the guests from London could not endure the noise

he made when he marched to and fro, proudly swinging his kilts and treading like a stag on a hillside. It was

an insult to tell him to stop playing, because it was his religion to believe that The Muircarrie must be piped

proudly to; and his ancestors had been pipers to the head of the clan for five generations. It was his duty to

march round the dininghall and play while the guests feasted, but I was obliged in the end to make him

believe that he could be heard better from the terrace because when he was outside his music was not

spoiled by the sound of talking. It was very difficult, at first. But because I was his chieftainess, and had

learned how to give orders in a rather proud, stern little voice, he knew he must obey.

Even this kind of thing may show that my life was a peculiar one; but the strangest part of it was that, while I

was at the head of so many people, I did not really belong to any one, and I did not know that this was

unusual. One of my early memories is that I heard an under nursemaid say to another this curious thing:

"Both her father and mother were dead when she was born." I did not even know that was a remarkable thing

to say until I was several years older and Jean Braidfute told me what had been meant.

My father and mother had both been very young and beautiful and wonderful. It was said that my father was

the handsomest chieftain in Scotland, and that his wife was as beautiful as he was. They came to Muircarrie

as soon as they were married and lived a splendid year there together. Sometimes they were quite alone, and

spent their days fishing or riding or wandering on the moor together, or reading by the fire in the library the

ancient books Angus Macayre found for them. The library was a marvelous place, and Macayre knew every

volume in it. They used to sit and read like children among fairy stories, and then they would persuade

Macayre to tell them the ancient tales he knewof the days when Agricola forced his way in among the Men

of the Woods, who would die any savage death rather than be conquered. Macayre was a sort of heirloom

I don't know how it was that I myself seemed to see my young father and mother so clearly and to know how

radiant and wildly in love they were. Surely Jean Braidfute had not words to tell me. But I knew. So I

understood, in a way of my own, what happened to my mother one brilliant late October afternoon when my

father was brought home deadfollowed by the guests who had gone out shooting with him. His foot had

caught in a tuft of heather, and his gun in going off had killed him. One moment he had been the handsomest

young chieftain in Scotland, and when he was brought home they could not have let my mother see his face.

But she never asked to see it. She was on the terrace which juts over the rock the castle is built on, and which

looks out over the purple world of climbing moor. She saw from there the returning party of shooters and

gillies winding its way slowly through the heather, following a burden carried on a stretcher of fir boughs.

Some of her women guests were with her, and one of them said afterward that when she first caught sight of

the moving figures she got up slowly and crept to the stone balustrade with a crouching movement almost

like a young leopardess preparing to spring. But she only watched, making neither sound nor movement until

the cortege was near enough for her to see that every man's head was bowed upon his breast, and not one was

Then she said, quite slowly, "Theyhave taken offtheir bonnets," and fell upon the terrace like a

It was because of this that the girl said that she was dead when I was born. It must have seemed almost as if

she were not a living thing. She did not open her eyes or make a sound; she lay white and cold. The

celebrated physicians who came from London talked of catalepsy and afterward wrote scientific articles

which tried to explain her condition. She did not know when I was born. She died a few minutes after I

I know only one thing more, and that Jean Braidfute told me after I grew up. Jean had been my father's

"I knelt by her bed and held her hand and watched her face for three hours after they first laid her down," she

said. "And my eyes were so near her every moment that I saw a thing the others did not know her well

"The first hour she was like a dead thing aye, like a dead thing that had never lived. But when the hand of

the clock passed the last second, and the new hour began, I bent closer to her because I saw a change stealing

over her. It was not colorit was not even a shadow of a motion. It was something else. If I had spoken what

I felt, they would have said I was lightheaded with grief and have sent me away. I have never told man or

woman. It was my secret and hers. I can tell you, Ysobel. The change I saw was as if she was beginning to

"It was as if to a soundfar, far away at first. But cold and white as stone she lay content, and listened. In

the next hour the far off sound had drawn nearer, and it had become something elsesomething she

sawsomething which saw her. First her young marble face had peace in it; then it had joy. She waited in

her young stone body until you were born and she could break forth. She waited no longer then.

"Ysobel, my bairn, what I knew was that he had not gone far from the body that had held him when he fell.

Perhaps he had felt lost for a bit when he found himself out of it. But soon he had begun to call to her that

was like his own heart to him. And she had heard. And then, being half away from earth herself, she had seen

him and known he was waiting, and that he would not leave for any far place without her. She was so still

It was long before I was old enough to be told anything like this that I began to feel that the moor was in

secret my companion and friend, that it was not only the moot to me, but something else. It was like a thing

alivea huge giant lying spread out in the sun warming itself, or covering itself with thick, white mist which

sometimes writhed and twisted itself into wraiths. First I noticed and liked it some day, perhaps, when it was

purple and yellow with gorse and heather and broom, and the honey scents drew bees and butterflies and

How young was I that afternoon when I sat in the deep window and watched the low, soft whiteness creeping

out and hovering over the heather as if the moor had breathed it? I do not remember. It was such a low little

mist at first; and it crept and crept until its creeping grew into something heavier and whiter, and it began to

hide the heather and the gorse and broom, and then the low young firtrees. It mounted and mounted, and

sometimes a breath of wind twisted it into weird shapes, almost like human creatures. It opened and closed

again, and then it dragged and crept and grew thicker. And as I pressed my face against the windowpane, it

mounted still higher and got hold of the moor and hid it, hanging heavy and white and waiting. That was

what came into my child mind: that it had done what the moor had told it to do; had hidden things which

Strangers say that Muircarrie moor is the most beautiful and the most desolate place in the world, but it never

seemed desolate to me. From my first memory of it I had a vague, half comforted feeling that there was

some strange life on it one could not exactly see, but was always conscious of. I know now why I felt this, but

If I had been older when I first began to see what I did see there, I should no doubt have read things in books

which would have given rise in my mind to doubts and wonders; but I was only a little child who had lived a

life quite apart from the rest of the world. I was too silent by nature to talk and ask questions, even if I had

had others to talk to. I had only Jean and Angus, and, as I found out years later, they knew what I did not, and

would have put me off with adroit explanations if I had been curious. But I was not curious. I accepted

I only six when Wee Brown Elspeth was brought to me. Jean and Angus were as fond of each other in their

silent way as they were of me, and they often went together with me when I was taken out for my walks. I

was kept in the open air a great deal, and Angus would walk by the side of my small, shaggy Shetland pony

and lead him over rough or steep places. Sheltie, the pony, was meant for use when we wished to fare farther

than a child could walk; but I was trained to sturdy marching and climbing even from my babyhood. Because

I so loved the moor, we nearly always rambled there. Often we set out early in the morning, and some simple

food was carried, so that we need not return to the castle until we chose. I would ride Sheltie and walk by

turns until we found a place I liked; then Jean and Angus would sit down among the heather, Sheltie would

be secured, and I would wander about and play in my own way. I do not think it was in a strange way. I think

I must have played as almost any lonely little girl might have played. I used to find a corner among the

bushes and pretend it was my house and that I had little friends who came to play with me. I only remember

one thing which was not like the ordinary playing of children. It was a habit I had of sitting quite still a long

time and listening. That was what I called it"listening." I was listening to hear if the life on the moor made

any sound I could understand. I felt as if it might, if I were very still and listened long enough.

Angus and Jean and I were not afraid of rain and mist and change of weather. If we had been we could have

had little outdoor life. We always carried plaids enough to keep us warm and dry. So on this day I speak of

we did not turn back when we found ourselves in the midst of a sudden mist. We sat down in a sheltered

place and waited, knowing it would lift in time. The sun had been shining when we set out.

Angus and Jean were content to sit and guard me while I amused myself. They knew I would keep near them

and run into no danger. I was not an adventurous child. I was, in fact, in a more than usually quiet mood that

morning. The quiet had come upon me when the mist had begun to creep about and inclose us. I liked it. I

liked the sense of being shut in by the soft whiteness I had so often watched from my nursery window in the

"People might be walking about," I said to Angus when he lifted me from Sheltie's back.

"No, they wouldn't hurt me," I said. I had never been afraid that anything on the moor would hurt me.

I played very little that day. The quiet and the mist held me still. Soon I sat down and began to "listen." After

a while I knew that Jean and Angus were watching me, but it did not disturb me. They often watched me

I had sat listening for nearly half an hour when I heard the first muffled, slow trampling of horses' hoofs. I

knew what it was even before it drew near enough for me to be conscious of the other soundsthe jingling

of arms and chains and the creaking of leather one notices as troopers pass by. Armed and mounted men were

coming toward me. That was what the sounds meant; but they seemed faint and distant, though I knew they

were really quite near. Jean and Angus did not appear to hear them. I knew that I only heard them because I

Out of the mist they rode a company of wildlooking men wearing garments such as I had never seen before.

Most of them were savage and uncouth, and their clothes were disordered and stained as if with hard travel

and fight. I did not knowor even ask myself why they did not frighten me, but they did not. Suddenly I

seemed to know that they were brave men and had been doing some brave, hard thing. Here and there among

them I caught sight of a broken and stained sword, or a dirk with only a hilt left. They were all pale, but their

The man who seemed their chieftain was a lean giant who was darker but, under his darkness, paler than the

rest. On his forehead was a queer, starshaped scar. He rode a black horse, and before him he held close with

his left arm a pretty little girl dressed in strange, rich clothes. The big man's hand was pressed against her

breast as he held her; but though it was a large hand, it did not quite cover a darkred stain on the

embroideries of her dress. Her dress was brown, and she had brown hair and soft brown eyes like a little

The black horse stopped before me. The wild troop drew up and waited behind. The great, lean rider looked

at me a moment, and then, lifting the little girl in his long arms, bent down and set her gently on her feet on

the mossy earth in the mist beside me. I got up to greet her, and we stood smiling at each other. And in that

moment as we stood the black horse moved forward, the muffled trampling began again, the wild company

swept on its way, and the white mist closed behind it as if it had never passed.

Of course I know how strange this will seem to people who read it, but that cannot be helped and does not

really matter. It was in that way the thing happened, and it did not even seem strange to me. Anything might

happen on the mooranything. And there was the fair little girl with the eyes like a doe's.

I knew she had come to play with me, and we went together to my house among the bushes of broom and

gorse and played happily. But before we began I saw her stand and look wonderingly at the darkred stain on

the embroideries on her childish breast. It was as if she were asking herself how it came there and could not

understand. Then she picked a fern and a bunch of the thickgrowing bluebells and put them in her girdle in

I did not really know how long she stayed. I only knew that we were happy, and that, though her way of

playing was in some ways different from mine, I loved it and her. Presently the mist lifted and the sun shone,

and we were deep in a wonderful game of being hidden in a room in a castle because something strange was

going to happen which we were not told about. She ran behind a big gorse bush and did not come back. When

I ran to look for her she was nowhere. I could not find her, and I went back to Jean and Angus, feeling

They were looking at me strangely, and both of them were pale. Jean was trembling a little.

"The little girl the men brought to play with me," I answered, still looking about me.

"The big one on the black horse put her down the big one with the star here." I touched my forehead where

"She's one of the fair ones," she said, kissing and patting me. "She will come again. She'll come often, I dare

say. But she's gone now and we must go, too. Get up, Angus, man. We're for the castle."

If we three had been differentif we had ever had the habit of talking and asking questions we might

surely have asked one another questions as I rode on Sheltie's back, with Angus leading us. But they asked

me nothing, and I said very little except that I once spoke of the wildlooking horsemen and their pale,

I hesitated and stared at him quite a long time. Then I shook my head and answered, slowly, "Nno."

Because I realized then, for the first time, that we had said no words at all. But I had known what she wanted

me to understand, and she had known what I might have said to her if I had spokenand no words were

They took me home to the castle, and I was given my supper and put to bed. Jean sat by me until I fell asleep;

she was obliged to sit rather a long time, because I was so happy with my memories of Wee Brown Elspeth

and the certainty that she would come again. It was not Jean's words which had made me sure. I knew.

She came many times. Through all my childish years I knew that she would come and play with me every

few daysthough I never saw the wild troopers again or the big, lean man with the scar. Children who play

together are not very curious about one another, and I simply accepted her with delight. Somehow I knew that

she lived happily in a place not far away. She could come and go, it seemed, without trouble. Sometimes I

found heror she found me upon the moor; and often she appeared in my nursery in the castle. When we

were together Jean Braidfute seemed to prefer that we should be alone, and was inclined to keep the

undernurse occupied in other parts of the wing I lived in. I never asked her to do this, but I was glad that it

was done. Wee Elspeth was glad, too. After our first meeting she was dressed in soft blue or white, and the

red stain was gone; but she was always Wee Brown Elspeth with the doelike eyes and the fair, transparent

face, the very fair little face. As I had noticed the strange, clear pallor of the rough troopers, so I noticed that

she was curiously fair. And as I occasionally saw other persons with the same sort of fairness, I thought it

was a purity of complexion special to some, but not to all. I was not fair like that, and neither was any one

It was when I was ten years old that Wee Elspeth ceased coming to me, and though I missed her at first, it

It was then that Angus Macayre began to be my tutor. He had been a profound student and had lived among

books all his life. He had helped Jean in her training of me, and I had learned more than is usually taught to

children in their early years. When a grand governess was sent to Muircarrie by my guardian, she was

amazed at the things I was familiar with, but she abhorred the dark, frowning castle and the loneliness of the

place and would not stay. In fact, no governess would stay, and so Angus became my tutor and taught me old

Gaelic and Latin and Greek, and we read together and studied the ancient books in the library. It was a

strange education for a girl, and no doubt made me more than ever unlike others. But my life was the life I

When my guardian decided that I must live with him in London and be educated as modern girls were, I tried

to be obedient and went to him; but before two months had passed my wretchedness had made me so ill that

the doctor said I should go into a decline and die if I were not sent back to Muircarrie.

"It's not only the London air that seems to poison her," he said when Jean talked to him about me; "it is

As I have said before, I had been an unattractive child and I was a plain, uninteresting sort of girl. I was shy

and could not talk to people, so of course I bored them. I knew I did not look well when I wore beautiful

clothes. I was little and unimportant and like a reed for thinness. Because I was rich and a sort of chieftainess

I ought to have been tall and rather stately, or at least I ought to have had a bearing which would have made it

impossible for people to quite overlook me. But; any one could overlook mean insignificant, thin girl who

slipped in and out of places and sat and stared and listened to other people instead of saying things herself; I

liked to look on and be forgotten. It interested me to watch people if they did not notice me.

Of course, my relatives did not really like me. How could they? They were busy in their big world and did

not know what to do with a girl who ought to have been important and was not. I am sure that in secret they

After that the life I loved went on quietly. I studied with Angus, and made the book walled library my own

room. I walked and rode on the moor, and I knew the people who lived in the cottages and farms on the

estate. I think they liked me, but I am not sure, because I was too shy to seem very friendly. I was more at

home with Feargus, the piper, and with some of the gardeners than I was with any one else. I think I was

lonely without knowing; but I was never unhappy. Jean and Angus were my nearest and dearest. Jean was of

good blood and a stanch gentlewoman, quite sufficiently educated to be my companion as she had been my

It was Jean who told Angus that I was giving myself too entirely to the study of ancient books and the history

"She is living today, and she must not pass through this life without gathering anything from it."

"This life," she put it, as if I had passed through others before, and might pass through others again. That was

always her way of speaking, and she seemed quite unconscious of any unusualness in it.

"You are a wise woman, Jean," Angus said, looking long at her grave face. "A wise woman."

He wrote to the London bookshops for the best modern books, and I began to read them. I felt at first as if

they plunged me into a world I did not understand, and many of them I could not endure. But I persevered,

and studied them as I had studied the old ones, and in time I began to feel as if perhaps they were true. My

chief weariness with them came from the way they had of referring to the things I was so intimate with as

though they were only the unauthenticated history of a life so long passed by that it could no longer matter to

any one. So often the greatest hours of great lives were treated as possible legends. I knew why men had died

or were killed or had borne black horror. I knew because I had read old books and manuscripts and had heard

the stories which had come down through centuries by word of mouth, passed from father to son.

But there was one man who did not write as if he believed the world had begun and would end with him. He

knew he was only one, and part of all the rest. The name I shall give him is Hector MacNairn. He was a

Scotchman, but he had lived in many a land. The first time I read a book he had written I caught my breath

with joy, again and again. I knew I had found a friend, even though there was no likelihood that I should ever

see his face. He was a great and famous writer, and all the world honored him; while I, hidden away in my

castle on a rock on the edge of Muircarrie, was so far from being interesting or clever that even in my

grandest evening dress and tiara of jewels I was as insignificant as a mouse. In fact, I always felt rather silly

when I was obliged to wear my diamonds on state occasions as custom sometimes demanded.

Mr. MacNairn wrote essays and poems, and marvelous stories which were always real though they were

called fiction. Wheresoever his story was placedhowsoever remote and unknown the sceneit was a real

place, and the people who lived in it were real, as if he had some magic power to call up human things to

breathe and live and set one's heart beating. I read everything he wrote. I read every word of his again and

again. I always kept some book of his near enough to be able to touch it with my hand; and often I sat by the

fire in the library holding one open on my lap for an hour or more, only because it meant a warm, close

companionship. It seemed at those times as if he sat near me in the dim glow and we understood each other's

thoughts without using words, as Wee Brown Elspeth and I had understood only this was a deeper thing.

I had felt near him in this way for several years, and every year he had grown more famous, when it happened

that one June my guardian, Sir Ian, required me to go to London to see my lawyers and sign some important

documents connected with the management of the estate. I was to go to his house to spend a week or more,

attend a DrawingRoom, and show myself at a few great parties in a proper manner, this being considered

my duty toward my relatives. These, I believe, were secretly afraid that if I were never seen their world

would condemn my guardian for neglect of his charge, or would decide that I was of unsound mind and

intentionally kept hidden away at Muircarrie. He was an honorable man, and his wife was a wellmeaning

woman. I did not wish to do them an injustice, so I paid them yearly visits and tried to behave as they wished,

much as I disliked to be dressed in fine frocks and to wear diamonds on my little head and round my thin

It was an odd thing that this time I found I did not dread the visit to London as much as I usually did. For

some unknown reason I became conscious that I was not really reluctant to go. Usually the thought of the

days before me made me restless and lowspirited. London always seemed so confused and crowded, and

made me feel as if I were being pushed and jostled by a mob always making a tiresome noise. But this time I

felt as if I should somehow find a clear place to stand in, where I could look on and listen without being

bewildered. It was a curious feeling; I could not help noticing and wondering about it.

I knew afterward that it came to me because a change was drawing near. I wish so much that I could tell

about it in a better way. But I have only my own way, which I am afraid seems very like a schoolgirl's.

Jean Braidfute made the journey with me, as she always did, and it was like every other journey. Only one

incident made it different, and when it occurred there seemed nothing unusual in it. It was only a bit of sad,

everyday life which touched me. There is nothing new in seeing a poor woman in deep mourning.

Jean and I had been alone in our railway carriage for a great part of the journey; but an hour or two before we

reached London a man got in and took a seat in a corner. The train had stopped at a place where there is a

beautiful and wellknown cemetery. People bring their friends from long distances to lay them there. When

one passes the station, one nearly always sees sad faces and people in mourning on the platform.

There was more than one group there that day, and the man who sat in the corner looked out at them with

gentle eyes. He had fine, deep eyes and a handsome mouth. When the poor woman in mourning almost

stumbled into the carriage, followed by her child, he put out his hand to help her and gave her his seat. She

had stumbled because her eyes were dim with dreadful crying, and she could scarcely see. It made one's heart

stand still to see the wild grief of her, and her unconsciousness of the world about her. The world did not

matter. There was no world. I think there was nothing left anywhere but the grave she had just staggered

blindly away from. I felt as if she had been lying sobbing and writhing and beating the new turf on it with her

poor hands, and I somehow knew that it had been a child's grave she had been to visit and had felt she left to

It was because I thought this that I wished she had not seemed so unconscious of and indifferent to the child

who was with her and clung to her black dress as if it could not bear to let her go. This one was alive at least,

even if she had lost the other one, and its little face was so wistful! It did not seem fair to forget and ignore it,

as if it were not there. I felt as if she might have left it behind on the platform if it had not so clung to her skirt

that it was almost dragged into the railway carriage with her. When she sank into her seat she did not even lift

the poor little thing into the place beside her, but left it to scramble up as best it could. She buried her swollen

face in her handkerchief and sobbed in a smothered way as if she neither saw, heard, nor felt any living thing

How I wished she would remember the poor child and let it comfort her! It really was trying to do it in its

innocent way. It pressed close to her side, it looked up imploringly, it kissed her arm and her crape veil over

and over again, and tried to attract her attention. It was a little, lilyfair creature not more than five or six

years old and perhaps too young to express what it wanted to say. It could only cling to her and kiss her black

dress, and seem to beg her to remember that it, at least, was a living thing. But she was too absorbed in her

anguish to know that it was in the world. She neither looked at nor touched it, and at last it sat with its cheek

against her sleeve, softly stroking her arm, and now and then kissing it longingly. I was obliged to turn my

face away and look out of the window, because I knew the man with the kind face saw the tears well up into

The poor woman did not travel far with us. She left the train after a few stations were passed. Our

fellowtraveler got out before her to help her on to the platform. He stood with bared head while he assisted

her, but she scarcely saw him. And even then she seemed to forget the child. The poor thing was dragged out

by her dress as it had been dragged in. I put out my hand involuntarily as it went through the door, because I

was afraid it might fall. But it did not. It turned its fair little face and smiled at me. When the kind traveler

returned to his place in the carriage again, and the train left the station, the black draped woman was

My guardian was a man whose custom it was to give large and dignified parties. Among his grand and

fashionable guests there was nearly always a sprinkling of the more important members of the literary world.

The night after I arrived there was to be a particularly notable dinner. I had come prepared to appear at it.

Jean had brought fine array for me and a case of jewels. I knew I must be "dressed up" and look as important

as I could. When I went upstairs after tea, Jean was in my room laying things out on the bed.

"The man you like so much is to dine here tonight, Ysobel," she said. "Mr. Hector MacNairn."

I believe I even put my hand suddenly to my heart as I stood and looked at her, I was so startled and so glad.

"You must tell him how much you love his books," she said. She had a quiet, motherly way.

"There will be so many other people who will want to talk to him," I answered, and I felt a little breathless

"Don't be afraid of him," was her advice. "The man will be like his books, and they're the joy of your life."

She made me look as nice as she could in the new dress she had brought; she made me wear the Muircarrie

diamonds and sent me downstairs. It does not matter who the guests were; I scarcely remember. I was taken

in to dinner by a stately elderly man who tried to make me talk, and at last was absorbed by the clever woman

I found myself looking between the flowers for a man's face I could imagine was Hector MacNairn's. I

looked up and down and saw none I could believe belonged to him. There were handsome faces and

individual ones, but at first I saw no Hector MacNairn. Then, on bending forward a little to glance behind an

epergne, I found a face which it surprised and pleased me to see. It was the face of the traveler who had

helped the woman in mourning out of the railway carriage, baring his head before her grief. I could not help

Old Lord Armour looked across and answered with an amiable smile. "It is the author the world is talking of

No one but myself could tell how glad I was. It seemed so right that he should be the man who had

understood the deeps of a poor, passing stranger woman's woe. I had so loved that quiet baring of his head!

All at once I knew I should not be afraid of him. He would understand that I could not help being shy, that it

was only my nature, and that if I said things awkwardly my meanings were better than my words. Perhaps I

should be able to tell him something of what his books had been to me. I glanced through the flowers

againand he was looking at me! I could scarcely believe it for a second. But he was. His eyeshis

wonderful eyesmet mine. I could not explain why they were wonderful. I think it was the clearness and

understanding in them, and a sort of great interestedness. People sometimes look at me from curiosity, but

I could scarcely look away, though I knew I must not be guilty of staring. A footman was presenting a dish at

my side. I took something from it without knowing what it was. Lord Armour began to talk kindly. He was

saying beautiful, admiring things of Mr. MacNairn and his work. I listened gratefully, and said a few words

myself now and then. I was only too glad to be told of the great people and the small ones who were moved

I could not help turning and looking up. "It is as if a great, great genius were one's friend as if he talked

Old Lord Armour looked at me quite thoughtfully, as if he saw something new in me.

"That is a good way of putting it, Miss Muircarrie," he answered. "MacNairn would like that. You must tell

I did not mean to glance through the flowers again, but I did it involuntarily. And I met the other eyesthe

wonderful, interested ones just as I had met them before. It almost seemed as if he had been watching me. It

might be, I thought, because he only vaguely remembered seeing me before and was trying to recall where

When my guardian brought his men guests to the drawingroom after dinner, I was looking over some old

prints at a quiet, small table. There were a few minutes of smiling talk, and then Sir Ian crossed the room

"Mr. MacNairn tells me you traveled together this afternoon without knowing each other," he said. "He has

heard something of Muircarrie and would like to hear more, Ysobel. She lives like a little ghost all alone in

I think he left us alone together because he realized that we should get on better without a companion.

Mr. MacNairn sat down near me and began to talk about Muircarrie. There were very few places like it, and

he knew about each one of them. He knew the kind of things Angus Macayre knewthe things most people

had either never heard of or had only thought of as legends. He talked as he wrote, and I scarcely knew when

he led me into talking also. Afterward I realized that he had asked me questions I could not help answering

because his eyes were drawing me on with that quiet, deep interest. It seemed as if he saw something in my

I think I saw this expression first when we began to speak of our meeting in the railway carriage, and I

"It was such a little thing and it did so want to comfort her! Its white little clinging hands were so pathetic

He did not start, but he hesitated in a way which almost produced the effect of a start. Long afterward I

"The child!" he said. "Yes. But I was sitting on the other side. And I was so absorbed in the poor mother that

"It was not six years old, poor mite," I answered. "It was one of those very fair children one sees now and

"The White People?" he repeated quite slowly after me. "You don't mean that she was not a Caucasian?

That made me feel a trifle shy again. Of course he could not know what I meant. How silly of me to take it

"I beg pardon. I forgot," I even stammered a little. "It is only my way of thinking of those fair people one

sees, those very fair ones, you knowthe ones whose fairness looks almost transparent. There are not many

of them, of course; but one can't help noticing them when they pass in the street or come into a room. You

must have noticed them, too. I always call them, to myself, the White People, because they are different from

the rest of us. The poor mother wasn't one, but the child was. Perhaps that was why I looked at it, at first. It

was such a lovely little thing; and the whiteness made it look delicate, and I could not help thinking" I

"You thought that if she had just lost one child she ought to take more care of the other," he ended for me.

There was a deep thoughtfulness in his look, as if he were watching me. I wondered why.

"I wish I had paid more attention to the little creature," he said, very gently. "Did it cry?"

"No," I answered. "It only clung to her and patted her black sleeve and kissed it, as if it wanted to comfort

her. I kept expecting it to cry, but it didn't. It made me cry because it seemed so sure that it could comfort her

if she would only remember that it was alive and loved her. I wish, I wish death did not make people feel as if

it filled all the worldas if, when it happens, there is no life left anywhere. The child who was alive by her

I had never said as much to any one before, but his watching eyes made me forget my shy worldlessness.

"I never saw it," I answered. "I have never even seen any one dangerously ill. I It is as if I can't believe it."

"You can't believe it? That is a wonderful thing," he said, even more quietly than before.

"How that poor mother believed it!" I said, remembering her swollen, distorted, sobbing face. "She believed

"I wonder what would have happened if you had spoken to her about the child?" he said, slowly, as if he were

"I'm a very shy person. I should never have courage to speak to a stranger," I answered.

"It was clinging to her dress when she walked away down the platform," I went on. "I dare say you noticed it

"Not as you did. I wish I had noticed it more," was his answer. "Poor little White One!"

That led us into our talk about the White People. He said he did not think he was exactly an observant person

in some respects. Remembering his books, which seemed to me the work of a man who saw and understood

everything in the world, I could not comprehend his thinking that, and I told him so. But he replied that what

I had said about my White People made him feel that he must be abstracted sometimes and miss things. He

did not remember having noticed the rare fairness I had seen. He smiled as he said it, because, of course, it

was only a little thing that he had not seen that some people were so much fairer than others.

"But it has not been a little thing to you, evidently. That is why I am even rather curious about it," he

explained. "It is a difference definite enough to make you speak almost as if they were of a different race

I sat silent a few seconds, thinking it over. Suddenly I realized what I had never realized before.

"Do you know," I said, as slowly as he himself had spoken, "I did not know that was true until you put it into

words. I am so used to thinking of them as different, somehow, that I suppose I do feel as if they were almost

like another race, in a way. Perhaps one would feel like that with a native Indian, or a Japanese."

"I dare say that is a good simile," he reflected. "Are they different when you know them well?"

I was quite startled myself. Suddenly he looked pale, and his breath caught itself.

"I said Wee Elspeth, Wee Brown Elspeth. She was only a child who played with me," I stammered, "when I

He pulled himself together almost instantly, though the color did not come back to his face at once and his

"I beg your pardon," he apologized. "I have been ill and am rather nervous. I thought you said something you

could not possibly have said. I almost frightened you. And you were only speaking of a little playmate.

"I was only going to say that she was fair like that, fairer than any one I had ever seen; but when we played

I told him about the misty day on the moor, and about the pale troopers and the big, lean leader who carried

Elspeth before him on his saddle. I had never talked to any one about it before, not even to Jean Braidfute.

But he seemed to be so interested, as if the little story quite fascinated him. It was only an episode, but it

brought in the weirdness of the moor and my childish fancies about the things hiding in the white mist, and

the castle frowning on its rock, and my baby face pressed against the nursery window in the tower, and

Angus and the library, and Jean and her goodness and wise ways. It was dreadful to talk so much about

oneself. But he listened so. His eyes never left my facethey watched and held me as if he were enthralled.

"I wonder who they werethe horsemen?" he pondered. "Did you ever ask Wee Elspeth?"

"We were both too little to care. We only played," I answered him. "And they came and went so quickly that

"They seem to have been a strange lot. Wasn't Angus curious about them?" he suggested.

"Angus never was curious about anything," I said. "Perhaps he knew something about them and would not

tell me. When I was a little thing I always knew he and Jean had secrets I was too young to hear. They hid

sad and ugly things from me, or things that might frighten a child. They were very good."

I think any one would have been pleased to find herself talking quietly to a great genius as quietly as if he

were quite an ordinary person; but to me the experience was wonderful. I had thought about him so much and

with such adoring reverence. And he looked at me as if he truly liked me, even as if I were something

newa sort of discovery which interested him. I dare say that he had never before seen a girl who had lived

I believe Sir Ian and his wife were pleased, too, to see that I was talking. They were glad that their guests

should see that I was intelligent enough to hold the attention even of a clever man. If Hector MacNairn was

interested in me I could not be as silly and dull as I looked. But on my part I was only full of wonder and

happiness. I was a girl, and he had been my only hero; and it seemed even as if he liked me and cared about

He was not a man who had the air of making confidences or talking about himself, but before we parted I

seemed to know him and his surroundings as if he had described them. A mere phrase of his would make a

picture. Such a few words made his mother quite clear to me. They loved each other in an exquisite, intimate

way. She was a beautiful person. Artists had always painted her. He and she were completely happy when

they were together. They lived in a house in the country, and I could not at all tell how I discovered that it

was an old house with beautiful chimneys and a very big garden with curious high walls with corner towers

round it. He only spoke of it briefly, but I saw it as a picture; and always afterward, when I thought of his

mother, I thought of her as sitting under a great and ancient appletree with the long, lateafternoon shadows

stretching on the thick, green grass. I suppose I saw that just because he said:

"Will you come to tea under the big apple tree some afternoon when the late shadows are like velvet on the

When we rose to go and join the rest of the party, he stood a moment and glanced round the room at our

"Are there any of your White People here tonight?" he said, smiling. "I shall begin to look for them

I glanced over the faces carelessly. "There are none here tonight," I answered, and then I flushed because he

had smiled. "It was only a childish name I gave them," I hesitated. "I forgot you wouldn't understand. I dare

I do not think he knew that he put out his hand and gently touched my arm, as one might touch a child to

"You don't know," he said in his low, slow voice, "how glad I am that you have talked to me. Sir Ian said you

"You care about places like Muircarrie. That is why," I answered, feeling at once how much he understood. "I

care for Muircarrie more than for all the rest of the world. And I suppose you saw it in my face. I dare say

"Yes," he said, "it is in your eyes. It was what I saw and found myself wondering about when I watched you

in the train. It was really the moor and the mist and the things you think are hidden in it."

"Did you watch me?" I asked. "I could not help watching you a little, when you were so kind to the poor

"It was the far look in your face I watched," he said. "If you will come to tea under the big appletree I will

"Indeed I will come," I answered. "Now we must go and sit among the other people those who don't care

I went to tea under the big appletree. It was very big and old and wonderful. No wonder Mr. MacNairn and

his mother loved it. Its great branches spread out farther than I had ever seen the branches of an appletree

spread before. They were gnarled and knotted and beautiful with age. Their shadows upon the grass were

velvet, deep and soft. Such a tree could only have lived its life in such a garden. At least it seemed so to me.

The high, dimcolored walls, with their curious, low corner towers and the leafage of the wall fruits spread

against their brick, inclosed it embracingly, as if they were there to take care of it and its beauty. But the tree

itself seemed to have grown there in all its dignified loveliness of shadow to take care of Mrs. MacNairn, who

I have heard clever literary people speak of Mrs. MacNairn as a "survival of type." Sometimes clever people

bewilder me by the terms they use, but I thought I understood what they meant in her case. She was quite

unlike the modern elderly woman, and yet she was not in the least oldfashioned or demodee. She was only

When she rose from her chair under the appletree boughs and came forward to meet me that afternoon, the

first things which struck me were her height and slenderness and her light step. Then I saw that her clear

profile seemed cut out of ivory and that her head was a beautiful shape and was beautifully set. Its every turn

and movement was exquisite. The mere fact that both her long, ivory hands enfolded mine thrilled me. I

wondered if it were possible that she could be unaware of her loveliness. Beautiful people are thrilling to me,

and Mrs. MacNairn has always seemed more so than any one else. This is what her son once said of her:

"She is not merely beautiful; she is Beauty Beauty's very spirit moving about among us mortals; pure

She drew me to a chair under her tree, and we sat down together. I felt as if she were glad that I had come.

The watching look I had seen in her son's eyes was in hers also. They watched me as we talked, and I found

myself telling her about my home as I had found myself telling him. He had evidently talked to her about it

himself. I had never met any one who thought of Muircarrie as I did, but it seemed as if they who were

I was happy. In my secret heart I began to ask myself if it could be true that they made me feel a little as if I

somehow belonged to some one. I had always seemed so detached from every one. I had not been miserable

about it, and I had not complained to myself; I only accepted the detachment as part of my kind of life.

Mr. MacNairn came into the garden later and several other people came in to tea. It was apparently a sort of

daily customthat people who evidently adored Mrs. MacNairn dropped in to see and talk to her every

afternoon. She talked wonderfully, and her friends' joy in her was wonderful, too. It evidently made people

happy to be near her. All she said and did was like her light step and the movements of her delicate, fine

headgracious and soft and arrestingly lovely. She did not let me drift away and sit in a corner looking on,

as I usually did among strangers. She kept me near her, and in some subtle, gentle way made me a part of all

that was happeningthe talk, the charming circle under the spreading boughs of the appletree, the charm of

everything. Sometimes she would put out her exquisite, long fingered hand and touch me very lightly, and

There was an interesting elderly man who came among the rest of the guests. I was interested in him even

before she spoke to me of him. He had a handsome, aquiline face which looked very clever. His talk was

brilliantly witty. When he spoke people paused as if they could not bear to lose a phrase or even a word. But

in the midst of the trills of laughter surrounding him his eyes were unchangingly sad. His face laughed or

"He is the greatest artist in England and the most brilliant man," Mrs. MacNairn said to me, quietly. "But he

is the saddest, too. He had a lovely daughter who was killed instantly, in his presence, by a fall. They had

been inseparable companions and she was the delight of his life. That strange, fixed look has been in his eyes

We were walking about among the flower beds after tea, and Mr. MacNairn was showing me a cloud of

blue larkspurs in a corner when I saw something which made me turn toward him rather quickly.

"There is one!" I said. "Do look at her! Now you see what I mean! The girl standing with her hand on Mr. Le

Mr. Le Breton was the brilliant man with the sad eyes. He was standing looking at a mass of

whiteandpurple iris at the other side of the garden. There were two or three people with him, but it seemed

as if for a moment he had forgotten themhad forgotten where he was. I wondered suddenly if his daughter

had been fond of irises. He was looking at them with such a tender, lost expression. The girl, who was a

lovely, fair thing, was standing quite close to him with her hand in his arm, and she was smiling, toosuch a

"Mr. Le Breton!" Mr. MacNairn said in a rather startled tone. "The girl with her hand in his arm?"

"And she has that transparent look. It is so lovely. Don't you think so? SHE is one of the White People."

He stood very still, looking across the flowers at the group. There was a singular interest and intensity in his

"Yees," he said, slowly, at last, "I do see what you meanand it IS lovely. I don't seem to know her well.

I asked Mrs. MacNairn later who the girl was, but she didn't seem to recognize my description of her. Mr. Le

"The tall, very fair one in the misty, pale gray dress," I said. "She was near Mr. Le Breton when he was

looking at the irisbed. You were cutting some roses only a few yards away from her. That VERY fair girl?"

"Mildred Keith is fair," she reflected, "but she was not there then. I don't recall seeing a girl. I was cutting

some buds for Mrs. Anstruther. I" She paused again and turned toward her son, who was standing

"It was not Mildred Keith," he said. "Miss Muircarrie is inquiring because this girl was one of those she calls

There was a second's silence before Mrs. MacNairn smilingly gave me one of her light, thrilling touches on

"Ah! I remember," she said. "Hector told me about the White People. He rather fancied I might be one."

I am afraid I rather stared at her as I slowly shook my head. You see she was almost one, but not quite.

"I was so busy with my roses that I did not notice who was standing near Mr. Le Breton," she said. "Perhaps

it was Anabel Mere. She is a more transparent sort of girl than Mildred, and she is more blond. And you don't

I remained in London several weeks. I stayed because the MacNairns were so good to me. I could not have

told any one how I loved Mrs. MacNairn, and how different everything seemed when I was with her. I was

never shy when we were together. There seemed to be no such thing as shyness in the world. I was not shy

with Mr. MacNairn, either. After I had sat under the big appletree boughs in the walled garden a few times I

realized that I had begun to belong to somebody. Those two marvelous people cared for me in that way in

a way that made me feel as if I were a real girl, not merely a queer little awkward ghost in a faraway castle

which nobody wanted to visit because it was so dull and desolate and far from London. They were so clever,

and knew all the interesting things in the world, but their cleverness and experience never bewildered or

"You were born a wonderful little creature, and Angus Macayre has filled your mind with strange, rich

furnishings and marvelous color and form," Mrs. MacNairn actually said to me one day when we were sitting

together and she was holding my hand and softly, slowly patting it. She had a way of doing that, and she had

also a way of keeping me very near her whenever she could. She said once that she liked to touch me now

and then to make sure that I was quite real and would not melt away. I did not know then why she said it, but

Sometimes we sat under the appletree until the long twilight deepened into shadow, which closed round us,

and a nightingale that lived in the garden began to sing. We all three loved the nightingale, and felt as though

it knew that we were listening to it. It is a wonderful thing to sit quite still listening to a bird singing in the

dark, and to dare to feel that while it sings it knows how your soul adores it. It is like a kind of worship.

We had been sitting listening for quite a long time, and the nightingale had just ceased and left the darkness

an exquisite silence which fell suddenly but softly as the last note dropped, when Mrs. MacNairn began to

I don't remember just how she began, and for a few minutes I did not quite understand what she meant. But as

she went on, and Mr. MacNairn joined in the talk, their meaning became a clear thing to me, and I knew that

they were only talking quite simply of something they had often talked of before. They were not as afraid of

The Fear as most people are, because they had thought of and reasoned about it so much, and always calmly

By The Fear they meant that mysterious horror most people feel at the thought of passing out of the world

How quiet, how still it was inside the walls of the old garden, as we three sat under the boughs and talked

about it! And what sweet night scents of leaves and sleeping flowers were in every breath we drew! And how

"If one had seen or heard one little thing, if one's mortal being could catch one glimpse of light in the dark,"

Mrs. MacNairn's low voice said out of the shadow near me, "The Fear would be gone forever."

"Perhaps the whole mystery is as simple as this," said her son's voice "as simple as this: that as there are tones

of music too fine to be registered by the human ear, so there may be vibrations of light not to be seen by the

human eye; form and color as well as sounds; just beyond earthly perception, and yet as real as ourselves, as

There was an intenseness which was almost a note of anguish in Mrs. MacNairn's answer, even though her

voice was very low. I involuntarily turned my head to look at her, though of course it was too dark to see her

"Oh!" she said, "if one only had some shadow of a proof that the mystery is only that WE cannot see, that

WE cannot hear, though they are really quite near us, with usthe ones who seem to have gone away and

whom we feel we cannot live without. If once we could be sure! There would be no Fearthere would be

"Dearest"he often called her "Dearest," and his voice had a wonderful sound in the darkness; it was caress

and strength, and it seemed to speak to her of things they knew which I did not"we have vowed to each

other that we WILL believe there is no reason for The Fear. It was a vow between us."

"Ysobel told me the first night we met that it seemed as if she could not believe in it."

"It never seems real to me at all," I said. "Perhaps that is because I can never forget what Jean told me about

my mother lying still upon her bed, and listening to some one calling her." (I had told them Jean's story a few

"I could not tell you that. I never asked myself HOW it was. But I KNEW. We both KNEW. Perhaps"I

hesitated"it was because in the Highlands people often believe things like that. One hears so many stories

all one's life that in the end they don't seem strange. I have always heard them. Those things you know about

people who have the second sight. And about the seals who change themselves into men and come on shore

and fall in love with girls and marry them. They say they go away now and then, and no one really knows

where but it is believed that they go back to their own people and change into seals again, because they must

plunge and riot about in the sea. Sometimes they come home, but sometimes they do not.

"A beautiful young stranger, with soft, dark eyes, appeared once not far from Muircarrie, and he married a

boatman's daughter. He was very restless one night, and got up and left her, and she never saw him again; but

a few days later a splendid dead seal covered with wounds was washed up near his cottage. The fishers say

that his people had wanted to keep him from his land wife, and they had fought with him and killed him. His

wife had a son with strange, velvet eyes like his father's, and she couldn't keep him away from the water.

When he was old enough to swim he swam out one day, because he thought he saw some seals and wanted to

get near them. He swam out too far, perhaps. He never came back, and the fishermen said his father's people

had taken him. When one has heard stories like that all one's life nothing seems very strange."

"Nothing really IS strange," said Hector MacNairn. "Again and again through all the ages we have been told

the secrets of the gods and the wonders of the Law, and we have revered and echoed but never believed.

When we believe and know all is simple we shall not be afraid. You are not afraid, Ysobel. Tell my mother

I turned my face toward her again in the darkness. I felt as if something was going on between them which he

somehow knew I could help them in. It was as though he were calling on something in my nature which I did

not myself comprehend, but which his profound mind saw and knew was stronger than I was.

Suddenly I felt as if I might trust to him and to It, and that, without being troubled or anxious, I would just

say the first thing which came into my mind, because it would be put there for me by some power which

could dictate to me. I never felt younger or less clever than I did at that moment; I was only Ysobel

Muircarrie, who knew almost nothing. But that did not seem to matter. It was such a simple, almost childish

"The feeling you call The Fear has never come to me," I said to her. "And if it had I think it would have

melted away because of a dream I once had. I don't really believe it was a dream, but I call it one. I think I

really went somewhere and came back. I often wonder why I came back. It was only a short dream, so simple

that there is scarcely anything to tell, and perhaps it will not convey anything to you. But it has been part of

my lifethat time when I was Out on the Hillside. That is what I call The Dream to myself, `Out on the

Hillside,' as if it were a kind of unearthly poem. But it wasn't. It was more real than anything I have ever felt.

It was realreal! I wish that I could tell it so that you would know how real it was."

I felt almost piteous in my longing to make her know. I knew she was afraid of something, and if I could

make her know how REAL that one brief dream had been she would not be afraid any more. And I loved her,

"I was asleep one night at Muircarrie," I went on, "and suddenly, without any preparatory dreaming, I was

standing out on a hillside in moonlight softer and more exquisite than I had ever seen or known before.

Perhaps I was still in my nightgownI don't know. My feet were bare on the grass, and I wore something

light and white which did not seem to touch me. If it touched me I did not feel it. My bare feet did not feel the

"It was a low hill I stood on, and I was only on the side of it. And in spite of the thrilling beauty of the moon,

all but the part I stood on melted into soft, beautiful shadow, all below me and above me. But I did not turn to

look at or ask myself about anything. You see the difficulty is that there are no earthly words to tell it! All my

being was ecstasypure, light ecstasy! Oh, what poor words But I know no others. If I said that I was

happyHAPPY! it would be nothing. I WAS happiness itself, I WAS pure rapture! I did not look at the

beauty of the night, the sky, the marvelous melting shadow. I was PART of it all, one with it. Nothing held

me nothing! The beauty of the night, the light, the air WERE what I was, and I was only thrilling ecstasy and

"Oh, I cannot make it real! I was only there such a short, short time. Even if you had been with me I could not

have found words for it, even then. It was such a short time. I only stood and lifted my face and felt the joy of

it, the pure marvel of joy. I only heard myself murmuring over and over again: `Oh, how beautiful! how

"And then a marvel of new joy swept through me. I said, very softly and very slowly, as if my voice were

"I began to sink softly down, with the heavenliest feeling of relaxation and repose, as if there existed only the

soul of beautiful rest. I sank so softlyand just as my cheek almost touched the grass the dream was over!"

"No. I came back. In my sleep I suddenly found myself creeping into my bed again as if I had been away

somewhere. I was wondering why I was there, how I had left the hillside, when I had left it. That part WAS a

"The words are all wrong," I said. "It is because we have no words to describe that. But have I made you feel

it at all? Oh! Mrs. MacNairn, have I been able to make you know that it was not a dream?"

She lifted my hand and pressed it passionately against her cheek, and her cheek, too, was wetwet.

"No, it was not a dream," she said. "You came back. Thank God you came back, just to tell us that those who

do not come back stand awakened in that ecstasyin that ecstasy. And The Fear is nothing. It is only The

Dream. The awakening is out on the hillside, out on the hillside! Listen!" She started as she said it. "Listen!

He sent forth in the dark a fountaina rising, aspiring fountainof golden notes which seemed to reach

heaven itself. The night was made radiant by them. He flung them upward like a shower of stars into the sky.

We sat and listened, almost holding our breath. Oh! the nightingale! the nightingale!

"Good night! good night!" he said, and went away. I felt somehow that he had left us together for a purpose,

but, oh, I did not even remotely dream what the purpose was! But soon she told me, almost in a whisper.

"We two have been more to each other than mere mother and son. We have been sufficient for each other.

But he began to love you that first day when he watched you in the railway carriage. He says it was the far

"I began to love him, too," I said. And I was not at all ashamed or shy in saying it.

"We three might have spent our lives together," she went on. "It would have been a perfect thing.

Butbut" She stood up as if she could not remain seated. Involuntarily I stood up with her. She was

trembling, and she caught and held me in her arms. "He cannot stay, Ysobel," she ended.

"Oh! the time will come," she said, "when people who love each other will not be separated, when on this

very earth there will be no pain, no grief, no age, no deathwhen all the world has learned the Law at last.

But we have not learned it yet. And here we stand! The greatest specialists have told us. There is some fatal

flaw in his heart. At any moment, when he is talking to us, when he is at his work, when he is asleep, he

My own heart stood still for a second. Then there rose before me slowly, but clearly, a visionthe vision

I clung to her with both arms and held her tight. I understood now why they had talked about The Fear. These

two who were almost one soul were trying to believe that they were not really to be torn apartnot really.

They were trying to heap up for themselves proof that they might still be near each other. And, above all, his

effort was to save her from the worst, worst woe. And I understood, too, why something wiser and stronger

But it was as she said; the world had not learned the Secret yet. And there we stood. We did not cry or talk,

but we clung to each otherwe CLUNG. That is all human creatures can do until the Secret is known. And

"O nightingale! O nightingale!" she said in her low wonder of a voice. "WHAT are you trying to tell us!"

What I feel sure I know by this time is that all the things we think happen by chance and accident are only

part of the weaving of the scheme of life. When you begin to suspect this and to watch closely you also begin

to see how trifles connect themselves with one another, and seem in the end to have led to a reason and a

meaning, though we may not be clever enough to see it clearly. Nothing is an accident. We make everything

happen ourselves: the wrong things because we do not know or care whether we are wrong or right, the right

ones because we unconsciously or consciously choose the right even in the midst of our ignorance.

I dare say it sounds audacious for an ordinary girl to say such things in an ordinary way; but perhaps I have

said them in spite of myself, because it is not a bad thing that they should be said by an everyday sort of

person in simple words which other everyday people can understand. I am only expressing what has

gradually grown into belief in my mind through reading with Angus ancient books and modern ones books

about faiths and religions, books about philosophies and magics, books about what the world calls marvels,

but which are not marvels at all, but only workings of the Law most people have not yet reasoned about or

Angus had read and studied them all his life before he began to read them with me, and we talked them over

together sitting by the fire in the library, fascinated and staring at each other, I in one highbacked chair and

he in another on the opposite side of the hearth. Angus is wonderfulwonderful! He KNOWS there is no

such thing as chance. He KNOWS that we ourselves are the working of the Law and that we ourselves

could work what now are stupidly called "miracles" if we could only remember always what the Law is.

What I intended to say at first was merely that it was not by chance that I climbed to the shelf in the library

that afternoon and pushed aside the books hiding the old manuscript which told the real story of Dark

Malcolm of the Glen and Wee Brown Elspeth. It seemed like chance when it happened, but it was really the

first step toward my finding out the strange, beautiful thing I knew soon afterward.

From the beginning of my friendship with the MacNairns I had hoped they would come and stay with me at

Muircarrie. When they both seemed to feel such interest in all I told them of it, and not to mind its wild

remoteness, I took courage and asked them if they would come to me. Most people are bored by the prospect

of life in a feudal castle, howsoever picturesquely it is set in a place where there are no neighbors to count on.

Its ancient stateliness is too dull. But the MacNairns were more allured by what Muircarrie offered than they

were by other and more brilliant invitations. So when I went back to the castle I was only to be alone a week

Jean and Angus were quite happy in their quiet way when I told them who I was expecting. They knew how

glad I was myself. Jean was full of silent pleasure as she arranged the rooms I had chosen for my guests,

rooms which had the most sweeping view of the moor. Angus knew that Mr. MacNairn would love the

library, and he hovered about consulting his catalogues and looking over his shelves, taking down volumes

here and there, holding them tenderly in his long, bony old hand as he dipped into them. He made notes of the

manuscripts and books he thought Mr. MacNairn would feel the deepest interest in. He loved his library with

all his being, and I knew he looked forward to talking to a man who would care for it in the same way.

He had been going over one of the highest shelves one day and had left his stepladder leaning against it

when he went elsewhere. It was when I mounted the steps, as I often did when he left them, that I came upon

the manuscript which related the old story of Dark Malcolm and his child. It had been pushed behind some

volumes, and I took it out because it looked so old and yellow. And I opened at once at the page where the

At first I stood reading, and then I sat down on the broad top of the ladder and forgot everything. It was a

savage history of ferocious hate and barbarous reprisals. It had been a feud waged between two clans for

three generations. The story of Dark Malcolm and Ian Red Hand was only part of it, but it was a gruesome

thing. Pages told of the bloody deeds they wrought on each other's houses. The one human passion of Dark

Malcolm's life was his love for his little daughter. She had brown eyes and brown hair, and those who most

loved her called her Wee Brown Elspeth. Ian Red Hand was richer and more powerful than Malcolm of the

Glen, and therefore could more easily work his cruel will. He knew well of Malcolm's worship of his child,

and laid his plans to torture him through her. Dark Malcolm, coming back to his rude, small castle one night

after a raid in which he had lost followers and weapons and strength, found that Wee Brown Elspeth had been

carried away, and unspeakable taunts and threats left behind by Ian and his men. With unbound wounds,

broken dirks and hacked swords, Dark Malcolm and the remnant of his troop of fighting clansmen rushed

"Neither men nor weapons have we to win her back," screamed Dark Malcolm, raving mad, "but we may die

fighting to get near enough to her to drive dirk into her little breast and save her from worse."

They were a band of madmen in their black despair. How they tore through the black night; what unguarded

weak spot they found in Ian's castle walls; how they fought their way through it, leaving their dead bodies in

the path, none really ever knew. By what strange chance Dark Malcolm came upon Wee Brown Elspeth,

craftily set to playing hideandseek with a child of Ian's so that she might not cry out and betray her

presence; how, already wounded to his death, he caught at and drove his dirk into her child heart, the story

only offers guesses at. But kill and save her he did, falling dead with her body held against his breast, her

brown hair streaming over it. Not one living man went back to the small, rude castle on the Glennot one.

I sat and read and read until the room grew dark. When I stopped I found that Angus Macayre was standing

in the dimness at the foot of the ladder. He looked up at me and I down at him. For a few moments we were

"It is the tale of Ian Red Hand and Dark Malcolm you are reading?" he said, at last.

Angus nodded his head with a sad face. "It was the only way for a father," he said. "A hound of hell was Ian.

I touched the manuscript with my hand questioningly. "Did this fall at the back there by accident," I asked,

"I did," he answered. "It was no tale for a young thing to read. I have hidden many from you. You were

Then I sat and thought over past memories for a while and the shadows in the room deepened.

"Why," I said, laggingly, after the silence "why did I call the child who used to play with me `Wee Brown

"It was your own fancy," was his reply. "I used to wonder myself; but I made up my mind that you had heard

some of the maids talking and the name had caught your ear. That would be a child's way."

I put my forehead in my hands and thought again. So many years had passed! I had been little more than a

baby; the whole thing seemed like a halfforgotten dream when I tried to recall itbut I seemed to dimly

"Who were the wild men who brought her to me firstthat day on the moor?" I said. "I do remember they

had pale, savage, exultant faces. And torn, stained clothes. And broken dirks and swords. But they were glad

"I did not see them. The mist was too thick," he answered. "They were some wild hunters, perhaps."

"It gives me such a strange feeling to try to remember, Angus," I said, lifting my forehead from my hands.

"Don't try," he said. "Give me the manuscript and get down from the stepladder. Come and look at the list of

I did as he told me, but I felt as if I were walking in a dream. My mind seemed to have left my body and gone

back to the day when I sat a little child on the moor and heard the dull sound of horses' feet and the jingling

I felt as if Angus were in a queer, halfawake mood, tooas if two sets of thoughts were working at the

same time in his mind: one his thoughts about Hector MacNairn and the books, the other some queer

When I was going to leave the library and go upstairs to dress for dinner he said a strange thing to me, and

"There is a thing Jean and I have often talked of telling you," he said. "We have not known what it was best

to do. Times we have been troubled because we could not make up our minds. This Mr. Hector MacNairn is

no common man. He is one who is great and wise enough to decide things plain people could not be sure of.

Jean and I are glad indeed that he and his mother are coming. Jean can talk to her and I can talk to him, being

a man body. They will tell us whether we have been right or wrong and what we must do."

"They are wise enough to tell you anything,' I answered. "It sounds as if you and Jean had known some big

secret all my life. But I am not frightened. You two would go to your graves hiding it if it would hurt me."

"Eh, bairn!" he said, suddenly, in a queer, moved way. "Eh, bairn!" And he took hold of both my hands and

kissed them, pressing them quite long and emotionally to his lips. But he said nothing else, and when he

It was wonderful when Mr. MacNairn and his mother came. It was even more beautiful than I had thought it

would be. They arrived late in the afternoon, and when I took them out upon the terrace the sun was

reddening the moor, and even the rough, gray towers of the castle were stained rosecolor. There was that

lovely evening sound of birds twittering before they went to sleep in the ivy. The glimpses of gardens below

seemed like glimpses of rich tapestries set with jewels. And there was such stillness! When we drew our three

chairs in a little group together and looked out on it all, I felt as if we were almost in heaven.

"Yes," his mother added, in her lovely, lovely voice. "It is what made you Ysobel."

It was so angelic of them to feel it all in that deep, quiet way, and to think that it was part of me and I a part

of it. The climbing moon was trembling with beauty. Tender evening airs quivered in the heather and fern,

Ever since the night when Mrs. MacNairn had held me in her arms under the appletree while the nightingale

sang I had felt toward her son as if he were an archangel walking on the earth. Perhaps my thoughts were

exaggerated, but it seemed so marvelous that he should be moving among us, doing his work, seeing and

talking to his friends, and yet that he should know that at any moment the great change might come and he

might awaken somewhere else, in quite another place. If he had been like other men and I had been like other

girls, I suppose that after that night when I heard the truth I should have been plunged into the darkest woe

and have almost sobbed myself to death. Why did I not? I do not know except except that I felt that no

darkness could come between us because no darkness could touch him. He could never be anything but alive

alive. If I could not see him it would only be because my eyes were not clear and strong enough. I seemed to

I was full of this feeling as we sat together on the terrace and watched the moon. I could scarcely look away

from him. He was rather pale that evening, but there seemed to be a light behind his pallor, and his eyes

seemed to see so much more than the purple and yellow of the heather and gorse as they rested on them.

After I had watched him silently for a little while I leaned forward and pointed to a part of the moor where

"That is where I was sitting when Wee Brown Elspeth was first brought to me," I said.

He sat upright and looked. "Is it?" he answered. "Will you take me there tomorrow? I have always wanted

"Would you like to go early in the morning? The mist is more likely to be there then, as it was that day. It is

"Wee Brown Elspeth seems very near me this evening," I said. "I feel as if" I broke off and began again. "I

have a puzzled feeling about her. This afternoon I found some manuscript pushed behind a book on a high

shelf in the library. Angus said he had hidden it there because it was a savage story he did not wish me to

read. It was the history of the feud between Ian Red Hand and Dark Malcolm of the Glen. Dark Malcolm's

child was called Wee Brown Elspeth hundreds of years ago five hundred, I think. It makes me feel so

"It was a bloody story," he said. "I heard it only a few days before we met at Sir Ian's house in London."

"Yes. Perhaps the one you played with was a little descendant who had inherited her name," he answered, a

I put my hand up to my forehead and rubbed it unconsciously. I could not help seeing a woesome picture.

"Poor little soul, with the blood pouring from her heart and her brown hair spread over her dead father's

breast!" I stopped, because a faint memory came back to me. "Mine," I stammered"minehow

strange!had a great stain on the embroideries of her dress. She looked at itand looked. She looked as if

she didn't like itas if she didn't understand how it came there. She covered it with ferns and bluebells."

I felt as if I were being drawn away into a dream. I made a sudden effort to come back. I ceased rubbing my

"I must ask Angus and Jean to tell me about her," I said. "Of course, they must have known. I wonder why I

It was a strange look I met when I involuntarily turned toward himsuch an absorbed, strange, tender look!

I knew he sat quite late in the library that night, talking to Angus after his mother and I went to our rooms.

Just as I was falling asleep I remember there floated through my mind a vague recollection of what Angus

had said to me of asking his advice about something; and I wondered if he would reach the subject in their

talk, or if they would spend all their time in poring over manuscripts and books together.

The moor wore its most mysterious look when I got up in the early morning. It had hidden itself in its softest

snows of white, swathing mist. Only here and there dark firtrees showed themselves above it, and now and

then the whiteness thinned or broke and drifted. It was as I had wanted him to see itjust as I had wanted to

We had met in the hall as we had planned, and, wrapped in our plaids because the early morning air was cold,

we tramped away together. No one but myself could ever realize what it was like. I had never known that

there could be such a feeling of companionship in the world. It would not have been necessary for us to talk

at all if we had felt silent. We should have been saying things to each other without words. But we did talk as

we walkedin quiet voices which seemed made quieter by the mist, and of quiet things which such voices

We crossed the park to a stile in a hedge where a path led at once on to the moor. Part of the park itself had

once been moorland, and was dark with slender firs and thick grown with heather and broom. On the moor

the mist grew thicker, and if I had not so well known the path we might have lost ourselves in it. Also I knew

by heart certain little streams that rushed and made guiding sounds which were sometimes loud whispers and

sometimes singing babbles. The damp, sweet scent of fern and heather was in our nostrils; as we climbed we

"There is a sort of unearthly loveliness in it all," Hector MacNairn said to me. His voice was rather like his

"We might be ghosts," I answered. "We might be some of those the mist hides because they like to be

"No. I think I am sure of that. I should feel that it was only like myself, and, if I could hear, might tell me

"Only what everybody wants to knowthat it is really AWAKENING free, ready for wonderful new things,

finding oneself in the midst of wonders. I don't mean angels with harps and crowns, but beauty such as we

see now; only seeing it without burdens of fears before and behind us. And knowing there is no reason to be

afraid. We have all been so afraid. We don't know how afraid we have beenof everything."

I stopped among the heather and threw my arms out wide. I drew in a great, joyous morning breath.

"Free like that! It is the freeness, the light, splendid freeness, I think of most."

"As for beauty," I almost whispered, in a sort of reverence for visions I remembered, "I have stood on this

moor a thousand times and seen loveliness which made me tremble. One's soul could want no more in any

life. But `Out on the Hillside' I KNEW I was part of it, and it was ecstasy. That was the freeness."

We brushed through the heather and the bracken, and flowerbells shook showers of radiant drops upon us.

The mist wavered and sometimes lifted before us, and opened up mystic vistas to veil them again a few

minutes later. The sun tried to break through, and sometimes we walked in a golden haze.

We fell into silence. Now and then I glanced sidewise at my companion as we made our soundless way over

the thick moss. He looked so strong and beautiful. His tall body was so fine, his shoulders so broad and

splendid! How could it be! How could it be! As he tramped beside me he was thinking deeply, and he knew

he need not talk to me. That made me gladthat he should know me so well and feel me so near. That was

what he felt when he was with his mother, that she understood and that at times neither of them needed

Until we had reached the patch of gorse where we intended to end our walk we did not speak at all. He was

thinking of things which led him far. I knew that, though I did not know what they were. When we reached

the golden blaze we had seen the evening before it was a flame of gold again, becauseit was only for a few

As we stood in the midst of it togetherOh! how strange and beautiful it was!Mr. MacNairn came back.

That was what it seemed to methat he came back. He stood quite still a moment and looked about him, and

then he stretched out his arms as I had stretched out mine. But he did it slowly, and a light came into his face.

"If, after it was over, a man awakened as you said and found himselfthe self he knew, but light, free,

splendidremembering all the ages of dark, unknowing dread, of horror of some black, aimless plunge, and

suddenly seeing all the childish uselessness of ithow he would stand and smile! How he would stand and

Never had I understood anything more clearly than I understood then. Yes, yes! That would be it.

He was smiling himself, the golden gorse about him already losing its flame in the light returning

mistwraiths closing again over it, when I heard a sound far away and high up the moor. It sounded like the

"We shall be shut in again," he said. "How mysterious it is, this opening and closing! I like it more than

He spread the plaid we had brought to sit on, and laid on it the little strapped basket Jean had made ready for

us. He shook the mist drops from our own plaids, and as I was about to sit down I stopped a moment to listen.

"That is a tune I never heard on the pipes before," I said. "What is a piper doing out on the moor so early?"

He listened also. "It must be far away. I don't hear it," he said. "Perhaps it is a bird whistling."

"It is far away," I answered, "but it is not a bird. It's the pipes, and playing such a strange tune. There! It has

But it was not silent long; I heard the tune begin again much nearer, and the piper was plainly coming toward

The mist was clearing, and floated about like a thin veil through which one could see objects. At a short

distance above us on the moor I saw something moving. It was a man who was playing the pipes. It was the

piper, and almost at once I knew him, because it was actually my own Feargus, stepping proudly through the

heather with his step like a stag on the hills. His head was held high, and his face had a sort of elated delight

in it as if he were enjoying himself and the morning and the music in a new way. I was so surprised that I rose

I knew he heard me, because he turned and looked at me with the most extraordinary smile. He was usually a

rather gravefaced man, but this smile had a kind of startling triumph in it. He certainly heard me, for he

whipped off his bonnet in a salute which was as triumphant as the smile. But he did not answer, and actually

When I rose Mr. MacNairn had risen, too. When I turned to speak in my surprise, he had fixed on me his

"Imagine its being Feargus at this hour!" I exclaimed. "And why did he pass by in such a hurry without

answering? He must have been to a wedding and have been up all night. He looked" I stopped a second

"Pale! That won't dothough he certainly didn't look ill." I laughed again. "I'm laughing because he looked

"Quite sure. No one else is the least like Feargus. Didn't you see him yourself?"

"I don't know him as well as you do; and there was the mist," was his answer. "But he certainly was not one

I wondered why he looked as he did when he took my hand and drew me down to my place on the plaid

again. He did not let it go when he sat down by my side. He held it in his own large, handsome one, looking

down on it a moment or so; and then he bent his head and kissed it long and slowly two or three times.

I had known that some day when we were at Muircarrie together he would tell me what his mother had told

meabout what we three might have been to one another. I trembled with happiness at the thought of

He held my hand and stroked it. "My mother told you, Ysobelwhat I am waiting for?" he said.

"Yes. I love you, too. My whole life would have been heaven if we could always have been together," was

He drew me up into his arms so that my cheek lay against his breast as I went on, holding fast to the rough

tweed of his jacket and whispering: "I should have belonged to you two, heart and body and soul. I should

never have been lonely again. I should have known nothing, whatsoever happened, but tender joy."

"Whatsoever happens now, Ysobel, know nothing but tender joy. I think you CAN. `Out on the Hillside!' Let

"Yes, yes," I said; " `Out on the Hillside.' " And our two faces, damp with the sweet mist, were pressed

The mist had floated away, and the moor was drenched with golden sunshine when we went back to the

castle. As we entered the hall I heard the sound of a dog howling, and spoke of it to one of the menservants

Gelert was a beautiful sheepdog who belonged to Feargus and was his heart's friend. I allowed him to be

"It is Gelert, miss. He is howling for his master. We were obliged to shut him in the stables."

I was stopped because I found Angus Macayre almost at my elbow. He had that moment come out of the

`Will ye come with me?" he said, and led me back to the room he had just left. He kept his hand on my arm

when we all stood together inside, Hector and I looking at him in wondering question. He was going to tell

"It is a sad thing you have to hear," he said. "He was a fine man, Feargus, and a most faithful servant. He

went to see his mother last night and came back late across the moor. There was a heavy mist, and he must

have lost his way. A shepherd found his body in a tarn at daybreak. They took him back to his father's home."

I looked at Hector MacNairn and again at Angus. "But it couldn't be Feargus," I cried. "I saw him an hour

ago. He passed us playing on his pipes. He was playing a new tune I had never heard before a wonderful,

Angus stood still and watched me. They both stood still and watched me, and even in my excitement I saw

"You said you did not hear him at first, but you surely saw him when he passed so near," I protested. "I called

to him, and he took off his bonnet, though he did not stop. He was going so quickly that perhaps he did not

Then he and Angus exchanged glances, as if asking each other to decide some grave thing. It was Hector

"No," he answered, very quietly, "I neither saw nor heard him, even when he passed. But you did."

"I did, quite plainly," I went on, more and more bewildered by the way in which they kept a sort of tender,

awed gaze fixed on me. "You remember I even noticed that he looked pale. I laughed, you know, when I said

Just then my breath caught itself and I stopped. I began to remember thingshundreds of things.

"Neither Jean nor I ever saw Wee Brown Elspeth," he said"neither Jean nor I. But you did. You have

I stammered out a few words, half in a whisper. "I have always seen what you others could not see?

But I was not frightened. I suppose I could never tell any one what strange, wide, bright places seemed

suddenly to open and shine before me. Not places to shrink back fromoh no! no! One could be sure,

thenSURE! Feargus had lifted his bonnet with that extraordinary triumph in his lookeven Feargus, who

Angus and Jean had known all my life. A very old shepherd who had looked in my face when I was a baby

had said I had the eyes which "SAW." It was only the saying of an old Highlander, and might not have been

remembered. Later the two began to believe I had a sight they had not. The night before Wee Brown Elspeth

had been brought to me Angus had read for the first time the story of Dark Malcolm, and as they sat near me

on the moor they had been talking about it. That was why he forgot himself when I came to ask them where

the child had gone, and told him of the big, dark man with the scar on his forehead. After that they were sure.

They had always hidden their knowledge from me because they were afraid it might frighten me to be told. I

had not been a strong child. They kept the secret from my relatives because they knew they would dislike to

hear it and would not believe, and also would dislike me as a queer, abnormal creature. Angus had fears of

what they might do with doctors and severe efforts to obliterate from my mind my "nonsense," as they would

"It was better that you should go on thinking it only a simple, natural thing," Angus said. "And as to natural,

what IS natural and what is not? Man has not learned all the laws of nature yet. Nature's a grand, rich, endless

thing, always unrolling her scroll with writings that seem new on it. They're not new. They were always

written there. But they were not unrolled. Never a law broken, never a new law, only laws read with stronger

Angus and I had always been very fond of the Biblethe strange old temple of wonders, full of all the

poems and tragedies and histories of man, his hates and battles and loves and follies, and of the Wisdom of

the universe and the promises of the splendors of it, and which even those of us who think ourselves the most

believing neither wholly believe nor will understand. We had pored over and talked of it. We had never

thought of it as only a pious thing to do. The book was to us one of the mystic, awe inspiring, prophetic

That was what made me say, half whispering: "I have wondered and wondered what it meant that verse in

Isaiah: `Behold the former things are come to pass and new things do I declare; before they spring forth I tell

"Aye, aye!" said Angus; "it is full of such deep sayings, and none of us will listen to them."

"It has taken man eons of time," Hector MacNairn said, thinking it out as he spoke "eons of time to reach

the point where he is beginning to know that in every stock and stone in his path may lie hidden some power

he has not yet dreamed of. He has learned that lightning may be commanded, distance conquered, motion

chained and utilized; but he, the one CONSCIOUS force, has never yet begun to suspect that of all others he

may be the one as yet the least explored. How do we know that there does not lie in each of us a wholly

natural but, so far, dormant power of sighta power to see what has been called The Unseen through all the

Ages whose sightlessness has made them Dark? Who knows when the Shadow around us may begin to clear?

Oh, we are a dull lotwe human thingswith a queer, obstinate conceit of ourselves."

"Complete we think we are," Angus murmured half to himself . "Finished creatures! And look at us! How

many of us in a million have beauty and health and full power? And believing that the law is that we must

crumple and go to pieces hour by hour! Who'd waste the time making a clock that went wrong as often? Nay,

nay! We shall learn better than this as time goes on. And we'd better be beginning and setting our minds to

work on it. 'Tis for us to dothe minds of us. And what's the mind of us but the Mind that made us? Simple

and straight enough it is when once you begin to think it out. The spirit of you sees clearer than we do, that's

all," he said to me. "When your mother brought you into the world she was listening to one outside calling to

At night Hector MacNairn and his mother and I sat on the terrace under stars which seemed listening things,

"When the poor mother stumbled into the train that day," was one of the things Hector told me, "I was

thinking of The Fear and of my own mother. You looked so slight and small as you sat in your corner that I

thought at first you were almost a child. Then a far look in your eyes made me begin to watch you. You were

so sorry for the poor woman that you could not look away from her, and something in your face touched and

puzzled me. You leaned forward suddenly and put out your hand protectingly as she stepped down on to the

"That night when you spoke quite naturally of the child, never doubting that I had seen it, I suddenly began to

suspect. Because of The Fear"he hesitated"I had been reading and thinking many things new to me. I

did not know what I believed. But you spoke so simply, and I knew you were speaking the truth. Then you

spoke just as naturally of Wee Brown Elspeth. That startled me because not long before I had been told the

tale in the Highlands by a fine old storyteller who is the head of his clan. I saw you had never heard the

"He came home and told me about you," Mrs. MacNairn said. "His fear of The Fear was more for me than for

himself. He knew that if he brought you to me, you who are more complete than we are, clearereyed and

nearer, nearer, I should begin to feel that he was not goingout. I should begin to feel a reality and nearness

myself. Ah, Ysobel! How we have clung to you and loved you! And then that wonderful afternoon! I saw no

girl with her hand through Mr. Le Breton's arm; Hector saw none. But you saw her. She was THERE!"

"Yes, she was there," I answered. "She was there, smiling up at him. I wish he could have known."

What does it matter if this seems a strange story? To some it will mean something; to some it will mean

nothing. To those it has a meaning for it will open wide windows into the light and lift heavy loads. That

would be quite enough, even if the rest thought it only the weird fancy of a queer girl who had lived alone

and given rein to her silliest imaginings. I wanted to tell it, howsoever poorly and ineffectively it was done.

Since I KNEW I have dropped the load of agesthe black burden. Out on the hillside my feet did not even

feel the grass, and yet I was standing, not floating. I had no wings or crown. I was only Ysobel out on the

For three weeks that were like heaven we three lived together at Muircarrie. We saw every beauty and shared

After one lovely day we had spent on the moor in a quiet dream of joy almost strange in its perfectness, we

came back to the castle; and, because the sunset was of such unearthly radiance and changing wonder we sat

on the terrace until the last soft touch of gold had died out and left the pure, still, clear, long summer twilight.

When Mrs. MacNairn and I went in to dress for dinner, Hector lingered a little behind us because the silent

I came down before his mother did, and I went out upon the terrace again because I saw he was still sitting

there. I went to the stone balustrade very quietly and leaned against it as I turned to look at him and speak.

Then I stood quite still and looked longfor some reason not startled, not anguished, not even feeling that he

had gone. He was more beautiful than any human creature I had ever seen before. But It had happened as

they said it would. He had not ceasedbut something else had. Something had ceased.

It was the next evening before I came out on the terrace again. The day had been more exquisite and the

sunset more wonderful than before. Mrs. MacNairn was sitting by her son's side in the bedroom whose

windows looked over the moor. I am not going to say one word of what had come between the two sunsets.

Mrs. MacNairn and I had clungand clung. We had promised never to part from each other. I did not quite

know why I went out on the terrace; perhaps it was because I had always loved to sit or stand there.

This evening I stood and leaned upon the balustrade, looking out far, far, far over the moor. I stood and gazed

and gazed. I was thinking about the Secret and the Hillside. I was very quietas quiet as the twilight's self.

And there came back to me the memory of what Hector had said as we stood on the golden patch of gorse

when the mist had for a moment or so blown aside, what he had said of man's awakening, and, remembering

I did not turn suddenly, but slowly. I was not startled in the faintest degree. He stood there close to me as he

I have seen him many times since. I shall see him many times again. And when I see him he always