"Alastair ... this is Lora, who has sought you far, and now has found you."
"Lora? Lora is dead! She is a beautiful spirit, and sleeps in that pool under the rowan. She walked with me last night in the moonshine. She has a beautiful child that is our child. It is now a song, singing in the sunshine. I heard it at dawn, when I was listening to the stars calling one to another. It is a song of joy about the doorway of Pharais. I saw the golden doors open a brief while ago—the doors of Pharais. Our little child danced in the glory as a mote in a sunbeam. But Lora is dead."
"Hush! Lora is not dead, but liveth. Lora is here. See, her tears run for you—her bosom heaves for you—her arms reach for you!"
Slowly the dreamer advanced. He would not come quite close at first, but there was a wonderful new light in his eyes.
"Alastair! Alastair! It is I, Lora! Come to me! Come to me!"
"If, indeed ... if, indeed, you are Lora ... Lora, my joy ... where is our child whose soul I heard singing in the sunshine over against Tigh-na-Pharais?"
Without a word, and swiftly, Lora took her poor blind blossom from Mary, and held the child toward him.
"It is God's gift to us, Alastair," she added at last, seeing that he came no nearer, and looked at the child wonderingly.
He advanced slowly, till his breath fell upon Lora's hands, and made her heart strain with its passion. Stopping, he stretched forth his right hand and gently touched the sleeping face. A sun-ray fell upon it. Then a smile grew upon the little parted lips, as the spirit of a flower might grow and bloom bodiless in dreamland.
Alastair smiled. With soft, caressing hand, he smoothed the child's face and little, uplifted arm. Then he took it gently from its mother, kissed it, handed it to Mary.