“Sure, it’s too late to sleep, an’ I’m thinking I would like to hear now that story you were to tell me.” The man gave no answer to that. Each looked at the other with luminous unwinking eyes. “It will not be a fair thing,” said Isla slowly, at last. “It will not be a fair thing: for I am bigger and stronger.” “There is another way, Isla Macleod.” “Ay?” “That you or I go to her, and tell her all, and then at the last say: ‘Come with me, or stay with him.’” “So be it.” So there and then they drew for chance. The gaining of that hazard was with Sheumas Maclean. Without a word Isla turned and went into the house. There he took his _feadan_, and played low to himself, staring into the red heart of the smouldering peats. He neither smiled nor frowned; but only once he smiled, and that was when Sheumas came back, and said _Come_. So the two walked in silence across the dewy grass. There was a loud calling of skuas and terns, and the raucous laughing cry of the great herring-gull, upon the weedy shore of Craigard. The tide bubbled and oozed through the wilderness of wrack. Farther off there were the cackling of hens, the lowing of restless kye, and the bleating of the sheep on the slopes of Melmonach. A shrewd salt air tingled in the nostrils of the two men. At the closed door Sheumas made a sign of silence. Then he unfastened the latch, and entered. “Silis,” he said in a low voice, but clear. “Silis, I’ve come back again. Dry your tears, my lass, and tell me once again--for I’m dying to hear the blessed truth once again--tell me once again if it’s me you love best, or Isla Macleod.” “I have told you, Sheumas.” Without, Isla heard her words and drew closer. “And it is a true thing that you love me best, and that since the choice between him and me has come, you choose me?” “It is a true thing.” A shadow fell across the room. Isla Macleod stood in the doorway. Silis turned the white beautiful face of her, and looked at the man she loved with all her heart and all her soul. He smiled. She was no coward, his Silis, though he called her his fawn. “Is--it--a--true--thing, Silis?” he asked slowly. She looked at Sheumas, then at Isla, then back at her husband. “It might kill Sheumas,” she muttered below her breath, so that neither heard her: “it might kill him,” she repeated. Then, with a swift turn of her eyes, she spoke. “Yes, it is a true thing, Isla. I abide by Sheumas.” That was all. She was conscious of the wave of relief that went into Sheumas’ face. She saw the rising of a dark, strange tide in the eyes of Isla. He stared at her. Perhaps he did not hear? Perhaps he was dreaming still? He was a dreamer, a poet: perhaps he could not understand. It was a little while wherein to kill a man. “My Fawn,” he whispered hoarsely, “my wee Fawn!” But Silis was frozen. The deadly frost in her eyes slew the dream that the brain of the poet dreamed. Then it slew the poet.