How lovely that vast ocean veiled in violet dusk, save where lit gloriously with moonlight: how full of alluring peace, she thought that wave-whisper all around her.
Surely the music was woven into a song that was dear and familiar in her ears?
She turned her head away from the sea, and looked idly along the sand: though, as she did so, the vague strain ceased.
Then Lora stood, trembling in a great awe, and with a passionate hope in her eyes, in her heart, at the very springs of life.
In the moonshine, she saw a tall figure moving slowly toward her, naked-white, and walking with a proud mien. The erect body, the flashing eyes, the grace and beauty, were those of a king—of a king among men: and as a king the naked figure was crowned, with moonflowers and yellow sea-poppies woven into his gold-sheen hair.
Suddenly he saw her. He stood as though wrought in impassioned stone. The moonshine fell full upon his white skin, upon the beauty of his face, upon the flower-tangle wherewith he had crowned himself.
Then, without a sound, he turned and fled like the wind, and vanished into the gloom that lay beyond the dusk.
And Lora, lifting the child and staggering homeward, knew that she had seen Alastair.
VI
It was not till many weeks later that the way of Alastair's escape from death became known.