wish he could have known."


What does it matter if this seems a strange story? To some it will mean
something; to some it will mean nothing. To those it has a meaning for
it will open wide windows into the light and lift heavy loads. That
would be quite enough, even if the rest thought it only the weird fancy
of a queer girl who had lived alone and given rein to her silliest
imaginings. I wanted to tell it, howsoever poorly and ineffectively
it was done. Since I KNEW I have dropped the load of ages--the black
burden. Out on the hillside my feet did not even feel the grass, and yet
I was standing, not floating. I had no wings or crown. I was only Ysobel
out on the hillside, free!


This is the way it all ended.

For three weeks that were like heaven we three lived together at
Muircarrie. We saw every beauty and shared every joy of sun and dew and
love and tender understanding.

After one lovely day we had spent on the moor in a quiet dream of joy
almost strange in its perfectness, we came back to the castle; and,
because the sunset was of such unearthly radiance and changing wonder
we sat on the terrace until the last soft touch of gold had died out and
left the pure, still, clear, long summer twilight.

When Mrs. MacNairn and I went in to dress for dinner, Hector lingered a
little behind us because the silent beauty held him.