Whether aroused by the barking of Ghaoth, or having awoke and found Lora absent from the cottage, Mrs. Maclean had risen, lit a candle, and now stood upon the threshold, looking intently at the twain as they approached. Among the islefolk many words are not used. The over-arching majesty of the sky, the surrounding majesty of the sea, the loneliness of these little wind-swept spots of earth isled in remote waters, leave a hush upon the brain, and foster eloquent silences rather than idle words. Mrs. Maclean knew intuitively that something of disaster was in this nocturnal return of Alastair: that he and Lora had met by chance, or through a summons unknown to her: and that now they came--to her, in their youth, so tragically piteous under the shadow of calamity--craving only for that impossible boon of the young in sorrow: peace. When they drew near to her, she turned and placed the candle on the table. Then, facing them, she came forward, led them in by the hand, and closed the door. She saw that Alastair was hatless, and his clothes damp and travel-stained; so with quiet, home-sweet words, she persuaded him to change his things while she laid some food for him to break his long fast with. But though wearily he did the one, he would have nothing of the other save a draught of warm milk. A heavy drowsiness was now upon him. He could scarce uplift the lids from his eyes. His voice, when he spoke at all, was so low that it was barely audible. After a silence, during which he had looked long at the fire, and closed his eyes at the last, with Lora's gaze hungrily set upon him, and the dark, sweet gloom of Mrs. Maclean's, wet with the dew of unshed tears, upon both of the twain, whom she loved so passing well, he murmured huskily and confusedly: "By green pastures ... I will lay me down to sleep.... It calleth, calleth ..." Suddenly Mrs. Maclean arose. Taking Lora's hand, she led her to the fireside and motioned her to kneel beside Alastair. Then, blowing out the candle-flame, she too knelt. Only the fireglow now lit the room, filled with brooding shadows in the corners and with warm dusk where the two women kneeled and the man slept. With arms lifted as if in invocation, the elder woman--her face wan under her grey hair, though touched with an unreal glow from the flaming peats--in a low, crooning voice, repeated the ancient rest-words, the ancient prayer of her people, said at the covering up of the fire against the hours of sleep: "_Smàlaidh mis'n nochd an teine; Mar a smàlas Mac Moire. Gu'm bu slan an tigh's an teine, Gu'm bu slan a' chiudeachd uile. Co bhios air an lar? Peadair agus Pòl, Co bhios air an phaire nochd? Moire mhin-gheal's a Mac. Bial De a labhras, Aingeal geal a dh' innseas-- Ga'r comhnadh's ga'r gleidheadh Gus an tig an solus geal a maireach._"