Whether it was an hour or a minute that she slept, she never knew. Slowly and dimly her waking senses crept back to her; but though she heard and saw and understood, she could neither stir nor speak. Two forms were bending over the cradle, forms of little men, venerable and shadowy, with hair like snow, and blanched, pale hands, like her visitor of the afternoon. They did not look at Karen, but consulted together above the sleeping child.
"It is here, brother, and here," said one, laying his finger gently on the baby's head and heart.
"Does it lie too deep for our reaching?" asked the second, anxiously.
"No. The little herb you know of is powerful."
"And the crystal dust you know of is more powerful still."
Then they took out two minute caskets, and Karen saw them open the baby's lips, and each drop in a pinch of some unknown substance.
"He is of ours," whispered one, "more of ours than any of them have been since the first."
"He has the gift of the far sight," said the other, lightly touching the closed eyes, "the divining glance, and the lucky finger."
"I read in him the apprehension of metals," said the second old man, "the sense of hidden treasures, the desire to penetrate."
"We will teach him how the waters run, and what the birds say—yes, and the way in and the way out!"