Slowly the corpse began to sink again. Down, down it went, leaning forward more and more, till it seemed as though it were standing upright on some unseen ledge of rock. Then, gradually, it revolved further, till once more it hung suspended in the depths, face downward, and with stiff arms adroop beneath. Without further gyration, motionlessly it seemed, the body sank, till it became blurred, obscure, shapeless. Then there was no more of it than a black shadow far down in the brown depths. Oona rose to her full height. She gave a long sigh, one short, choking sob. Her eyes stared unwaveringly at nothing; the nails of her fingers cut the small clenched hands. The raven on the dead branch beyond the pool, that had been croaking monotonously ever since she had first heard it, became suddenly still. Nial rose too. He knew, without word from her, without thought even, what she meant to do. "Oona!" She did not glance round, but he saw her throat quiver. "My birdeen, my birdeen, ah, my bonnie wee fawn! Come back, come back! Sure, it is not him at all! It is the kelpie, Oona, it is the kelpie!" When the words came from her, hushed and strange, he knew that she knew the truth. "I will be going ... now." "Oona! come ..."--then in a flash his arms were about her as she leaped, and with an effort that nearly hurled both into the pool he swung her back to the ledge. There she lay on the grass-covered rock, white and still. Nial bent over her, moaning, trembling, moaning. * * * * * An hour later, Murdo the shepherd, coming down from the mountain, and going by the Linn o' Mairg, so as to reach Inverglas by the west side of the Strath, heard a wild barking of his dogs. Through the heat-haze he stared indifferently, then curiously, at two stooping figures. He approached the pool slowly. The dogs were silent. One had stopped, and was sniffing and staring, the other whined at his feet. Yes, he was right, he muttered; it was Nial ...and Oona! But what did it mean? Both sat silently by the Kelpie's Pool. The wild, fantastic, shrunken figure of Nial was black against the light. He seemed as though rapt, spellbound. The child was naked, her shoulder reddening under the flame of the sun. He could see her strained, streaming eyes. His heart beat quick with a vague fear as he moved toward them. He stopped, when Oona's low, irregular sobbing was audible. Beside him the collies crouched, whining. Nial looked round, rose, and touched Oona. She, too, rose; her sobbing breath ceasing. "Màm-Gorm is dead," said Nial simply; "he is dead--_there_." IX In a brief space, Murdo learned what Nial could tell him. For all his shepherd-eyes, he could discern nothing in the pool but a vague blur of darkness far down.