"What is it, dear Nial?"
"Ssh! Hush! Come here: look! ... look!" he whispered.
Gently she stole beside him, leaned over the ledge, and stared down into the pool. A mere breath of the breeze ruffled the surface, and all she could see was a dark mass with a dusky white splatch, looming shadowily through the amber water, and strangely distorted by the silver shimmer caused by the wind-eddy, which came and went round the circuit of the pool like a baffled bird.
"What is it? Who is it? What is it, Nial?"
"Hush, do not speak so loud! It is my soul."
"Your soul, Nial?"
"Ay, true. Sure it is my soul. All night I was in the woods, and I heard a tap-tapping going ever before me, and at dawn it led me down by the Mairg, and then the spirit flew away before me, and the annir-choille was just like a woodpecker! And when it flew up by the Linn, I...."
"Whisper louder, Nial! I can't hear."
"When it flew up by the Linn, I saw it change into a curlew, and it wheeled over the Linn and called cian-cian-cianalas, and then I was afraid, though the annir-choille that was like a woodpecker had made hope to me of finding my soul."
"Who is the annir-choille, Nial?"