278 THE GOLD OF FAIRNILEE.

 

But at last they had to come back to Fair-
nilee; and a sad place it was, and silent
without the sound of Randal’s voice in the
hall, and the noise of his hunting-horn in the
woods. None of the people wore mourning
for him, though they mourned in their hearts.
For to put on black would look as if they had
given up all hope. Perhaps most of them
thought they would never see him again, but
Jeanie was not one who despaired.

The years that had turned Lady Ker’s hair
white, had made Jean a tall, slim lass—‘“‘ very
bonny,” everyone said; and the country people
called her the Flower of Tweed. The Yarrow
folk had their Flower of Yarrow, and why not
the folk of Tweedside? It was now six years
since Randal had been lost, and Jeanie was
grown a young woman, about seventeen years
old. She had always kept a hope that if
Randal was with the Fairy Queen he would
return perhaps in the seventh year. People
said on the country-side that many a man and
woman had escaped out of Fairyland after
seven years’ Imprisonment there.

Now the sixth year since Randal’s disappear-
ance began very badly, and got worse as it
went on. ‘Just when spring should have been
beginning, in the end of February, there came
the most dreadful snowstorm. It blew and
snowed, and blew again, and the snow was as
fine as the dust on a road in summer. The