proceeded to the high road, we shall try to find what earnest quest sent
her out this afternoon, in spite of her old nurse's remonstrances and
the east wind.

Grace Campbell's father and mother died when she was very young, and
since then her home had been with her aunt. For the last few years Miss
Hume had been so infirm that she did not feel able to undertake the
journey to Kirklands, a small property in the north of Scotland, which
she inherited from her father. Her winter home was Edinburgh, and Miss
Hume for some years had only ventured on a short journey to the nearest
watering-place, while her country home stood silent and deserted, with
only the ancient gardener and his wife wandering about through the
darkened rooms and the old garden, with its laden fruit-trees and its
flowers run to seed. But, to Grace's great delight, her aunt had
announced some months before that if she felt strong enough for the
journey, she meant to go to Kirklands early in the spring. It seemed as
if in her fading autumnal time she longed to see the familiar woods and
dells of her childhood's home grow green again with returning life. So
the darkened rooms had been opened to the sun again, and on the day
before our story begins, some of the former inmates had taken possession
of them.

The three years during which Grace had been absent from Kirklands had
proved very eventful to her in many ways. There had been some changes in
her outer life. Walter, her only brother and playmate, had left home to
go to sea. They had only had one passing visit from him since, so
changed in his midshipman's dress, with his broadened shoulders and
bronzed face, and so full of sailor life and talk, that his playmate had
hardly composure of mind to discover till he was gone that the same
loving heart still beat under the blue dress and bright buttons. And