Part 11 (2/2)

”I've been asleep,” he cried. ”How could I!” He ate some snow; then he began to move on automatically, as it were, the dog running in front and barking. The dog would have led him home. ”No, no, Kooran,” he said; ”the river, doggie, the river.”

Kenneth tried to run now. His teeth were chattering with the cold, but his face was hot and flushed.

His nerves had become strangely affected. He started fifty times at imaginary spectres. Some one was walking on in front of him--some shadowy being. He ran a little; it eluded him. Then he stopped; he was sure he saw a head peering at him over a piece of rock. He called aloud, ”Archie! Archie!”

His voice sounds strange to his own ears. He runs towards the rock.

There is no one behind it. No one. Nothing.

He feels fear creeping over his heart. He never felt fear before.

But still he wanders on, muttering to himself, ”I'll soon be back. Poor old Nancy! Poor old Nancy!”

All at once--so it seems--he finds himself at the banks of a stream. He is bewildered now, completely. He presses his cold hand against that burning brow of his.

What is this river or stream? Where is he going? Did he cross this stream before? He must cross it now, but where is the ford? How deep and dark and sullen it looks.

He seats himself on the icy bank to think or try to think.

He is burning, yet he s.h.i.+vers.

Stories of water-kelpies keep crowding through his mind, and the words and weird music of a song he has heard,--

”Kelpie dwells in a wondrous hall Beneath the s.h.i.+mmering stream; His song is the song of the waterfall, And his light its rainbow gleam.

The rowans stoop, And the long ferns droop Their feathery heads in the spray.”

And now he jumps to his feet. He has recollected himself, he was going for the doctor for poor Nancy, and this is the stream he was looking for. He must seek the ford. He cannot have far to go now. Once over the river, and a run will take him to Dugald's cottage.

But stay; what cares he for the ford? He will plunge into the deepest pool, and swim across. He is hot; he is burning; it will cool him.

He walks on a little way, and still the kelpie song runs in his brain.

The trees seem singing it; the wind keeps singing it; the driving clouds nod to its music.

”Where the foam flakes are falling, Falling, falling, falling, Falling for ever and ay--”

Ha! here is a deep dark pool at last. Why, yonder is the kelpie himself beckoning to him, and the maiden.

”When forest depths were dim, For love of her long golden hair--”

The poor dog divines his intention. He rushes betwixt him and the cold black water, uttering a cry that is almost human in its plaintive pathos.

Too late. He laughs wildly, and plunges in. Then there is a strange sense of fulness in his head. Sparks crackle across his eyes.

”Falling, falling, falling, Foam flakes are--”

He remembers no more.

But the brave dog has pulled him to the brink, and sits by his side, lifting his chin up towards the sky, and howling most pitifully.

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