She gave a bound, like a young deer, and prepared to start for a swift run back, but the young man called her.
“Matt, come here.”
She came up to him. He put his arm about her shoulders, bent over her upturned face, and kissed her. In her impulsive way. Matt returned the kiss ardently, then to his amazement, she gave one strange look into his eyes—blushed violently, and hung her head.
“Come, give me another, Matt,” he said.
But Matt would not comply. With one jerk she freed herself from him; then, swift as lightning, she ran back across the hills towards the sea.
CHAPTER VII.—MATT GROWS MATRIMONIAL.
That night the young man of the caravan had curious dreams, and throughout them all moved, like a presiding fairy, Matt of Abertaw. Sometimes he was wandering on stormy shores, watching the wrecks of mighty argosies; again, he was in mysterious caverns underneath the ground, searching for and finding buried treasure; still again, he was standing on the decks of storm-tossed vessels, while the breakers thundered close at hand, and the bale-fires burned on the lonely headlands. But at all times, and in all places, Matt was his companion.
And curiously enough, Matt in his dream was very different to the Matt of waking reality—taller and brighter—in fact, as beautiful as a vision can be; so that his spirit was full of a strange sensation of love and pity, and the touch of the warm little hand filled his imagination with mysterious joy. So vivid did this foolish dream become at last, that he found himself seated on a sunny rock by the sea, by Matt’s side; and he was talking to her like a lover, with his arm around her waist; and she turned to him, with her great eyes fixed on his, and kissed him over and over again, so passionately—that he awoke!