gigantic gray horse, which reared high with fright. But for its size I
could have testified before a magistrate, that I had not only seen that
horse in the stable as my pony was being saddled, but had stroked and
kissed him on the nose. I conceived at once that his apparent size was an
illusion caused by the suddenness and keenness of the light, and that my
uncle had come home before I had well reached the moor, and had ridden
out after me. With a wild cry of delight, I turned at once to leave the
road and join him. But the thunder that moment burst with a terrific
bellow, and swallowed my cry. The same instant, however, came through it
from the other side the voice of my uncle only a few yards away.

"Stay, little one," he shouted; "stay where you are. I will be with you
in a moment."

I obeyed, as ever and always without a thought I obeyed the slightest
word of my uncle: Zoe and I stood as if never yet parted from chaos and
the dark, for Zoe too loved his voice. The wind rose suddenly from a lull
to a great roar, emptying a huge cloudful of rain upon us, so that I
heard no sound of my uncle's approach; but presently out of the dark an
arm was around me, and my head was lying on my uncle's bosom. Then the
dark and the rain seemed the natural elements for love and confidence.

"But, uncle," I murmured, full of wonder which had had no time to take
shape, "how is it?"

He answered in a whisper that seemed to dread the ear of the wind, lest
it should hear him--

"You saw, did you?"