"What was he like?" exclaimed several at once, while all kept their eyes upon the cliff above.
"There! there! Did you see it?" Several avowed that they saw it stealing along the very brow of the hill; but all agreed that it passed so swiftly that they could not tell just what they saw.
"It was just so with the one I saw to-day," said the former speaker. "I was on the ledge by the old eagle's nest, gathering my flowers. A tall being passed below me on the path, dressed so beautifully that I know it was none of us, and had dealings with none of us. It seemed anxious not to be seen; for my little cry of surprise caused it to vanish as if it melted into the foam of the stream as it plunges into the pool."
"That was just like the Vili," interposed one. "They live under the river's bank. They talk in the murmur of the streams. Old Mirko, who used to work much in the mill, learned to understand what they said. Did this one you saw have long hair? The Vili, Mirko said, always did."
"I cannot say," replied the girl, "for its head was hidden in a blossoming laurel bush between it and me."
"It was one," cried another, "for there are no blossoming laurels yet. It was its long white hair waving in the wind, that you saw."
"Let us go down to the pool!" proposed one, "maybe we can see it again."
"No! No!" cried the others, in a chorus of tremulous voices.
"No, indeed," said one of the larger girls, "for it might be they are eating, or they are dancing the Kolo—which they always do as the sun goes down, and if any body sees them then they get angry, and will come to your house and look at you with the evil eye."
Hasting home with their bowls of water crowned with flowers, they told their story to the stargeshina.