"I love you—God knows how I love you!" was all that he found to say. And then, "God keep my little lass!"
There came a strange hush in his ears, and the next moment he found himself outside, breasting the cool airs of the night as if they had been the waves of the tide-race, and listening to the voice of Bess Landsborough, which carried no more meaning to his ears than if it had been the crying of a seagull rookery upon the rocks of Lianacraig.
"Come back to-night and I will meet you at the shore-side," was all that disentangled itself from the meaningless turmoil of his guide's words. For the fragrance of his love's lips was yet on his, and he was wondering how long the memory of it would stay with him.
Without even waiting to take off his clothes, Wat pushed out into the channel of the sea-passage. He swam as easily and unconsciously as though he had been floating in some world of dreams, in which he found himself finned like a fish. And when he came to himself he was lying under the shelter of his boat in the cove of his own green islet of Fiara, trying to recall the look that he had seen in his love's eyes in the gloom of Bess Landsborough's guest-chamber. But though he buried his head in his hands, and laid his hands on the sand to shut out the sky and the shining breakers, he could not recall the similitude of it. Only he knew that it had been most wonderful, and that his eyes had never seen anything like it before.
[CHAPTER XXXIII]
AN ANCIENT LOVE AFFAIR
When Wat awoke on the island and stirred his cramped limbs, on which the sun had already dried his wet clothes, in the warm and briskly stirring airs of the summer morning, he could hardly believe in the reality of his experiences of the night. One by one he remembered the passage of the cave, the Highland sentinel sleeping by his dying fire, his new and kindly protector, Bess Landsborough. Then last of all, and suddenly overflowing all his heart with mighty love (even as a volcano, Askja or Vatna, pours without warning its burning streams over icy provinces), the meeting with his love in the dusky undercloud of night rushed upon his memory and filled all his soul with a swift and desperate joy.
What wonder that the sweet, low voice he had heard call him "love" out of the darkness should in the broad common day scarce seem real to poor Wat Gordon of Lochinvar? He had passed through so many things to hear it. Also, ever since the death of Little Marie, he knew the accent of the voice that speaks not for the sake of "making love," but which unconsciously and inevitably reveals love in every syllable.
Wat had made love in his time, and ladies of beauty and repute not a few—my Lady Wellwood among the number—had made love to him. But he knew the difference now.