The Project Gutenberg EBook of Geordie's Tryst, by Mrs. Milne Rae

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Title: Geordie's Tryst
A Tale of Scottish Life

Author: Mrs. Milne Rae

Release Date: June 28, 2004 [EBook #12765]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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GEORDIE'S TRYST.

A TALE OF SCOTTISH LIFE.

[Attributed to Mrs. Milne Rae]

[Illustration: GEORDIE'S HERDING ENDED.]

GEORDIE'S TRYST.

CHAPTER I.

GRACE CAMPBELL.

[Illustration]

It was a chilly Scotch spring day. The afternoon sun glistened with
fitful, feeble rays on the windows of the old house of Kirklands, and
unpleasant little gusts of east wind came eddying round its ancient
gables, and sweeping along its broad walks and shrubberies, sending a
chill to the hearts of all the young green things that were struggling
into life.

On the time-worn steps of the grey mansion there stood a girl, cloaked
and bonneted for a walk, notwithstanding the uninviting weather.

"It's a fule's errand, I assure ye, Miss Grace, and on such an
afternoon, too. I've been askin' at old Adam the gardener, and he says
there isna one o' the kind left worth mindin' in all the valley o'
Kirklands. So do not go wanderin' on such an errand in this bitter wind,
missy."

The speaker was an old woman, standing in the doorway, glancing with an
expression of kindly anxiety towards the girl, who leant on one of the
carved griffins of the old stone railing.

Grace had been looking at the speaker with troubled eyes as she listened
to her remonstrance, and now she said, meditatively, "Does old Adam
really say so, Margery?" Then with a quick gesture she turned to go down
the steps, adding cheerily, "Well, there's no harm in trying, and as for
the wind, that doesn't matter a bit. It's what Walter would call a nice
breezy day. I'm really going, nursie. Shut the door, and keep your old
self warm. I shall be home again by the time aunt has finished her
afternoon's sleep." And Grace turned quickly away, not in the direction
of the sheltered elm avenue, but across the park, by the path which