Shaken, he left the glen and walked back up the dirt and gravel lane to the blacktop, and from there back to the village. That night he pondered what he had seen, hunched over his dinner in an alehouse close to his lodgings, nursing a pint of Welsh beer and trying to make sense of it all. There was no way the fisherman could have disappeared so swiftly, so utterly. There was no place for him to go. But if he hadn’t disappeared, then he wasn’t there in the first place, and Ross wasn’t prepared to deal with that.
For several days he refused to return to the glen, even though he wanted to. He thought about going at night, as the fisherman had urged, but he was afraid. Something was waiting for him, he believed. What if it was something he was not prepared to face?
Finally, three days later, he went back during the day. It was gray and overcast, the clouds threatening more of the rain that had already fallen intermittently since dawn. Again, the parking lot was deserted as he made his way off the blacktop and down the ratted lane. Cows looked at him from the pasture on his left, placid, disinterested, and remote. He tightened his rain slicker against the damp and chill, passed through the opening in the fence, and started down the trail. He was thinking that it was a mistake to do this. He was thinking that it was something he would come to regret.
He continued on anyway, stubbornly committed. Almost immediately he saw the fisherman. It was the same man; there was no mistaking him. He wore his broad-brimmed hat and greatcoat and was fishing with the same pole and line. He sat somewhat farther away from the falls than he had the previous day, as if thinking to find better fishing farther downstream. Ross walked carefully across the rocks to reach him, keeping close watch as he approached, making sure that what he was seeing was real.
The fisherman looked up. “Here you are again. Good day to you. Have you done as I suggested? Have you come at night?”
Ross stopped a dozen yards away from him. The man was sitting on a flat rock on the opposite bank, and there was no place close at hand to cross over. “No, not yet.”
“Well, you should, you know. I can see in your eyes that you want to. The fairies mean something to you, something beyond what they might mean to an average man. Can you feel that about yourself?”
Ross nodded, surprised to find that he could. “I just…” He stopped, not knowing where to go. “I find it hard…”
“To believe,” the other finished softly.
“Yes.”
“But you believe in God, don’t you?”
Ross felt a drop of rain nick the tip of his nose. “I don’t know. I guess so.”
The man adjusted the pole and line slightly. “Hard to believe in fairies if you don’t believe in God. Do you see?”
Ross didn’t, but he shook his head yes. Overhead, the clouds were darkening, closing in, screening out the light. “Who are you?” he asked impulsively.
The man didn’t move. “Owain. And you?”
“John Ross. I’m, uh, traveling about, seeing a little of the world. I was in graduate studies for a number of years, English and Ancient Civilizations, but I, uh … I needed…”
“To come here,” the man said quickly. “To come to the Fairy Glen. To see if the fairies were real. That was what you needed. Still need, for that matter. So will you come, then? As I suggested? Come at night and see them for yourself?”
Ross stared at him, groping for an answer. “Yes,” he said finally, the word spoken before he could think better of it.
The man nodded. “Come in two nights, when the moon is new. Then’s the best time for catching them at play; there’s only the starlight to reveal them and they are less wary.” His face lifted slightly, just enough so that Ross could catch a glimpse of his rough, square features. “It will be a clear night for viewing. A clear night for seeing truths and making choices.” ‘