ran to look up at Kate's window. His heart bounded when he saw a white
figure looking out into the stormy dark.

"Kate! Kate!" he cried, in a loud whisper, "come out--do come out. It's
so splendid!"

She started and drew back. Presently she reappeared, and opening the
window, said,

"Alec! do come in."

"No, no. You come out, Kate. You don't know what it's like. You have
only to get into bed again."

Kate hesitated. But in a moment more she withdrew. Alec saw she meant
to come, and flew round to the door. In a few minutes she glided
silently out, and fronted the black sky. The same moment another flash,
in which her spirit seemed to her to be universal, flung the darkness
aside. She could have counted the houses of Glamerton. The hills rose
up within her very soul. The Glamour shone in silver. The harvest
gleamed in green. The larch-forest hung like a cloud on the horizon.
Then the blank dark folded again its scared wings over the world; and
the trees rustled their leaves with one wavy sweep, and were still. And
again the rain came down in a tumult--warm, genial summer rain, full of
the life of lightning. Alec stood staring through the dull dark, as if
he would see Kate by the force of his will alone. The tempest in the
heavens had awaked a like tempest in his bosom: would the bosom beside
his receive his lightning and calm his pent-up storm by giving it space
to rave? His hand took hers beseechingly. Another flash came, and he
saw her face. The whole glory of the night gloomed and flashed and
flowed in that face. But alas! its response was to the stormy heaven
alone, not to the stormy human soul. As the earth answers the heaven
with lightning of her own, so Kate, herself a woman-storm, responded to
the elemental cry.

Her shawl had fallen back, and he saw a white arm uplifted, bare to the
shoulder, gleaming through the night, and an eye flashing through the
flood that filled it. He could not mistake her passion. He knew that it
was not for him; that she was a harp played upon by the elements; yet,
passioned still more with her passion, he cried aloud,

"Oh, Kate! if you do not love me I shall die."

Kate started, and sought to take her hand from his, but she could not.

"Let me go, Alec," she said, pleadingly.

His fingers relaxed, and she sped into the house like a bird, leaving
him standing in the night.

There was no more lightning. The rain fell heavy and persistent. The
wind rose. And when the dawn