“Sweetheart,” he whispered, “that little burst o’ sunshine is right. A kiss from your lips is the best thing to chase away the tears. But why are you sad, mochree?”
“I was thinking of the sorrow of old Lir; and how little it matters whether one live fifty years or five hundred, as these old Dedannans did. Then suddenly the thought flashed across me that some day soon we should lose Peterkin: he too will become a wild swan, and it will be we who shall hear the far-off singing of his laughing childhood.”
“Perhaps he will take his childhood with him into manhood, dear. Let him look often into your beautiful eyes, Eilidh, and the little one will learn much without knowing that he is learning. And then, too, to be near you: why, that is to be a child always deep down, and to have sunshine in the heart and mind—for have you forgotten your name, ‘Sunshine’?”
As he spoke, Ian Mor leaned and kissed her. Puzzled at the sudden radiant smile on her face, he looked round. There was Peterkin, sitting squatted on the hearth, with an impish smile in his blue eyes. He had crawled behind the hanging curtain at the door, and unseen and unheard gained the fireside.
With a joyous laugh he sprang to his feet.
“Ah, Ian, you and your rain! Is it not hearing you are? It’s on the window as if the brownies were throwing little wee stones. It was not the rain you were wanting, but only a kiss from Eilidh! Now, Eilidh, tell me true?”
“Tell you true, Blumpits. Why——”
But here Peterkin, overcome by some sudden memory suggested by the pet name which Eilidh sometimes gave him, went dancing round the room, laughing and chuckling by turns, and once and again clapping his hands in elfin glee.
“Eilidh, Eilidh,” he cried, “do tell me again that story of Blumpits and the Bunnywig.”
Ian looked puzzled.