SON OF THE WIND
leap, and at its foot a streak no wider than a black ribbon. On the right the hills were near and sharp like an embattlement. Between these higher lands the level lay, filled with the moon. Moving in the thick atmosphere of light Carron felt it like a delicious element more volatile than water, more palpable than air, traveling in gradual ways that floated toward him. It was the floodtide of night, of which she had spoken, when the sky and earth have exchanged hues, the bright for the dark, and both are at the full pulse of life. Within Carron, too, tide stood at flood, the tide of spirit and blood that sweeps the will, and with it, makes a triple strength. The elation of being abroad at this hour, of seeing the bright edges of the earth on every side, feeling no limits to distance that might be traveled or wonders that might be born of such loveliness, were all an outer circle of emotion moving around the woman.
Close beside him, swaying a little in the saddle, poised on wiry waist, she appeared less like herself than some sketch of her caught by the lightning of a master's hand—all blacks and whites, her eyes two velvet splendors, her body outlined with a silver rim. Her lips were a little open as if to taste the sweetness of the wind, and she leaned into it away from him, giving herself to the bodiless caress. Her
284
