Great heat, with many thunders, had prevailed. For nine days at the beginning of July the rain poured: or ceased, only to let rainbows come and go upon the gleaming hills. During this time Oona and the blind man at Màm-Gorm were much together. A change had come upon the child. She looked at her foster-father often, with a wistful gaze. Something puzzled her. In the air, some vague trouble moved like a vanishing shadow. Of Nial she saw little. Now and again she heard his signal in the forest, and answered it: sometimes, at dawn or dusk, coming upon him on the hillside, sitting solitary on some isolated boulder, or crouching by a pool, and staring intently into its depths. But he would not come across the airidh. No one knew how he lived. Once or twice Murdo the shepherd gave him to eat: and, every morning and night, Oona put a small crock of porridge and oatcakes, or other food, in a place where the vagrant could have it if he willed--and thrice, at least, she found it empty. On the few moonlit nights she fancied she saw a pale, misty column of thin smoke rise above the pines. Still more was she troubled about Sorcha. Her beautiful sister had grown even lovelier to look upon, but there was a new look in her eyes, a new hush in her voice. She shepherded on the mountain as one in a trance: as one in a dream she moved about the house. At night, in her sleep, she sighed often, and moaned gently: and once, turning and finding Oona by her, she put her arms round the child, and, sleeping still, whispered, "_Ah, heart of my heart, joy of my joy!_" Oona knew that Sorcha and Alan Gilchrist loved each other. She knew, also, that this was why Alan could never come to Màm-Gorm, for her foster-father had laid his ban upon their love. But what did this love mean? What, she pondered vaguely, did this tragic silence, this tragic yet happy silence hide? "I know now," she said one day to Sorcha at the coming home of the kye, "I know now why it is that Alan, when he meets you in the gloaming by the byre or in the hay-shed, or down in the strath by the Mairg Water, calls you 'Dream.'" Sorcha was startled, and the beautiful face flushed at the knowledge that she had been seen at these secret meetings with Alan. Oona's unconsciousness of any cause of embarrassment, however, reassured her. "So you have seen us, Oona my flower? Well, see to it that you say nothing of this to father, or to any one. And, Oona, my bonnie, how do you know he--Alan--calls me 'Dream': and what do you mean by saying you know now what that means?" "I heard him call you so, that moonlight night last week, when you came hand in hand through the wood. He called you Sunshine, Joy, and then Dream--and you said that 'Dream' was best, for it was the name he gave you '_that_ day.' ... Sorcha!" "Yes, birdeen?" "What was '_that_ day'?" The girl turned her face aside, because of the flame in it; but the flush was in the white neck as well, and the child laughed.