"We talked of the Kelpie's Pool. Something like that was the strangeness with me. Black rifts and whirlpools and dead tarns within me, opening up now and again, lifted as by a trembling of the earth, coming up from the past! Angers and broodings, and things seen in flashes—then all gone as the lightning goes, and the mind does not hold what was shown.... I became a man and it ceased. Sometimes I know that in sleep or dream I have been beside a kelpie pool. But I think the better part of me has drained them where they lay under open sky." He laughed, put his hands over his face for a moment, then, dropping them, whistled to the blackbirds aloft in the oak-tree.
"And now?"
"Now there is clean fire in me!" He turned to her; he drew himself nearer over the sward. "Elspeth, Elspeth, Elspeth! do not tell me that you do not know that I love you!"
"Love me—love me?" answered Elspeth. She rose from her earthen chair; she moved as if to leave the place; then she stood still. "Perhaps a part of me knew and a part did not know.... I will try to be honest, for you are honest, Glenfernie! Yes, I knew, but I would not let myself perceive and think and say that I knew.... And now what will I say?"
"Say that you love me! Say that you love and will marry me!"
"I like you and I trust you, but I feel no more, Glenfernie, I feel no more!"
"It may grow, Elspeth—"
Elspeth moved to the stem of the oak beneath which they had been seated. She raised her arm and rested it against the bark, then laid her forehead upon the warm molded flesh in the blue print sleeve. For some moments she stayed so, with hidden face, unmoving against the bole of the tree, like a relief done of old by some wonderful artist. The laird of Glenfernie, watching her, felt, such was his passion, the whole of earth and sky, the whole of time, draw to just this point, hang on just her movement and her word.
"Elspeth!" he cried at last. "Elspeth!"
Elspeth turned, but she stood yet against the tree. Now both arms were lifted; she had for a moment the appearance of one who hung upon the tree. Her eyes were wet, tears were upon her cheek. She shook them off, then left the oak and came a step or two toward him. "There is something in my brain and heart that tells me what love is. When I love I shall love hard.... I have had fancies.... But, like yours, Glenfernie, their times are outgrown and gone by.... It's clear to try. I like you so much! but I do not love now—and I'll not wed and come to Glenfernie House until I do."