By the road, Scarby village is good three miles from Colletwood, the nearest town and railway station. But there is a short cut over the hills for foot passengers. Over the hills they call it, but between the hills would be more correct, for there is a sort of tableland once you have climbed a short, steep bit up from the town, which extends nearly to Scarby, sloping gradually down to the village.

And on each side of this tableland the hills rise again, north and south, much higher to the north than to the south. So this flat stretch, though at some considerable height, is neither bleak nor exposed, being sheltered on the colder side, and fairly open to the sunshine south and west.

It is a pleasant place, and so it must have been considered in the old days; for a large monastery stood there once, of which the ruins are still to be seen, and of which the memory is still preserved in the name – "Monksholdings".

Pleasant, but a trifle inconvenient, as the only carriage-road makes a great round from Colletwood, winding along the base of the hill on the north side till it reaches the village, then up again by the gradual slope, half a mile or so – a drive in all of three to four miles, whereas, as the bird flies or the pedestrian walks, the distance from the town is barely a quarter of that.

In the old days there was probably no road at all, the hill-path doubtless serving all requirements. Naturally enough, therefore, it came to be looked upon as entirely public property, and people forgot – if, indeed, any one had ever thought of it – that though the monastery was a ruin, the once carefully kept land round about the old dwelling-place of Monksholdings was still private property.

And the sensation was great when suddenly the news reached the neighbourhood that this "unique estate," as the agents called it, was sold – sold by the old Duke of Scarshire, who scarcely remembered that he owned it, to a man who meant to live on it, to build a house which should be a home for several months of the year for himself and his family.

There was considerable growling and grumbling; and this rose to its height when a rumour got about that the hill-path – such part of it, that is to say, as lay within the actual demesne – was to be closed —must be closed, if the site already chosen for the new house was to be retained; for the house would actually stand upon the old foot-track, and there could be no two opinions that this position had been well and wisely selected.

Things grew warlike, boding no agreeable reception for the newcomers – a Mr. Raynald and his family, newcomers to England, it was said, as well as to Scarshire. Every one plunged into questions of right-of-way; the local legalities raised and discussed knotty points; Colletwood and Scarby were aflame. But it all ended, flatly enough, in a compromise!

Mr. Raynald turned out to be one of the most reasonable and courteous of men. He came, saw, and – conquered. The goodwill of his future neighbours was won e'er he knew he had risked its loss. Henceforward congratulations, reciprocated and repeated, on the charming additions to Scarby society were the order of the day, and the détour, skirting the south boundary of the Monksholdings grounds, which the footpath was now inveigled into making, was voted "a great improvement".

And in due time the mansion rose.

"A great improvement" also, to the aspect of the surrounding landscape. It was in perfectly good taste – unpretentious and quietly picturesque. It might have been there always for any jarring protest to the contrary.

And just half-way along the old foot-track, that is to say, between the two stiles which let the traveller to or from Scarby in or out of the Monksholdings demesne, stood Sybil Raynald's grand piano!

The stiles remained as an interesting survival; but they were made use of by no one not bound for the house itself. And beside each was a gate – a good oaken gate, that suited the place, as did everything about it; and beside each gate a quaint miniature dwelling, one of which came to be known as the east, and the other as the west, Monksholdings lodge.

The first time the Raynalds came down to their new home they made but a short stay there. It was already late in the season, and though the preceding summer had been a magnificent one for drying fresh walls and plaster, it would scarcely have done to risk damp or chilly weather in so recently-built a house.

They stayed long enough to confirm the favourable impression the head of the family had already made, and to lead themselves to look forward with pleasure to a less curtailed stay in Scarshire.

The last morning of their visit, Sybil, the eldest daughter, up and about betimes, turned to her father, when she had taken her place beside him at the breakfast-table, with a suspicion of annoyance on her usually cheerful face.

"Papa," she said, "I have seen that old man again, leaning on the stile by the Scarby lodge and looking in – along the drive —so queerly. I don't quite like it. It gave me rather a ghosty feeling; or else he is out of his mind."

Her brother, Mark by name, began to laugh, after the manner of brothers.

"How very oddly you express yourself!" he said. "I should like to experience 'a ghosty feeling'. A ghost is just what this place wants to make it perfect. But it should be the spirit of one of the original monks."

Mr. Raynald turned to his son rather sharply.

"I don't want any nonsense of that kind set about, Mark," he said. "It would frighten the younger children when they come down here. I will ask about the old man. It is quite possible he is half-witted, or something of that sort. I forgot about it when Sybil mentioned it before. But no doubt he is perfectly harmless. Has no one seen him but you, Sybil?"

The girl shook her head.

"None of us," she replied. "And I wasn't exactly frightened. There was something very pathetic about him. He looked at me closely, murmuring some words, and then shook his head. That was all."

But just then her father was called away to give some last directions, and in the bustle of hurry to catch their train the matter passed from the minds of the younger as well as the elder members of the family.

It returned to Sybil's memory, however, when she found herself in their London house again, and called upon by her younger sisters to relate every detail of Monksholdings and its neighbourhood. But mindful of her father's warning, she said nothing to Esther or Annis of the figure at the gate. It was only to Miss March – Ellinor March – the dearly-loved governess, who was more friend than teacher to her three pupils, that she spoke of it, late in the evening, when the younger ones had gone to bed, and her father and mother were busy with Indian letters in Mr. Raynald's study.

The two girls, we may say – for Ellinor was still some years under thirty – were alone in the drawing-room. Ellinor had been playing something tender and faintly weird – it died away under her fingers, and she sat on at the piano in silence.

Sybil spoke suddenly.

"That is so melancholy," she said, "something so long ago about it, like the ghost of a sorrow rather than a sorrow itself. I know – I know what it makes me think of. Listen, Ellinor."

For out of school hours the two threw formality aside. And Sybil told of the sad, wistful old face looking over the stile.

"Now it has come back to me," she said, "I can't forget it."

Ellinor, too, was impressed.

"Yes," she said, "it sounds very pitiful. Who knows what tragedy is bound up in it?" and she sighed.

Sybil understood her. Miss March's own history was a strange one.

"We must find out about it when we go down to Monksholdings next year," she said.

"And perhaps," added Ellinor, "even if he is half-witted, we might do something to comfort the poor man."

Sybil hesitated.

"Then you don't think he can be a ghost?" she said, looking half ashamed of the suggestion.

Miss March smiled – her smile was sad.

"In one sense, no, I should think it highly improbable; in another, yes, there must be the ghost of some great sorrow about the face you describe," she said.

So there was.

This is the story.

At the farther end of Scarby village – the farther end, that is to say, from Monksholdings and the path between the hills – the road drops again somewhat suddenly. Only for a short distance, however; Mayling Farm – "Giles's" as it is colloquially called – which is the first house you come to when you reach level ground again, being by no means low lying.

On the contrary, the west windows command a grand view of the great Scarshire plain beneath, bordered by the faint hazy blue, scarcely to be distinguished from clouds, of the long range of hills concealing the far-off glimmer of the ocean, which otherwise might sometimes be perceptible.

Mayling is a very old place, and the Giles's had been there "always," so to speak – steady-going, unambitious, save as regards their farming and its success; they had been just the make of men to settle on to their ground as if it and they could have no existence apart. A fine race physically as well as morally, though some twenty-five years or so before the Raynalds bought Monksholdings, a run of ill luck, a whole chapter of casualties, had brought them down to but one representative, and he scarcely the typical Farmer Giles of Mayling.

This was Barnett, the youngest of four stalwart sons; the youngest and the only survivor. He was already forty when his father died, earnestly commending to him the "old place," which even at eighty the aged farmer felt himself better fitted to manage than the somewhat delicate, sensitive man whom his brothers had made good-natured fun of in his youth as a "book-worm".

But Barnett was intelligent and sensible, and he rose to the occasion. Circumstances helped him. The year after old Giles's death Barnett for the first time fell in love, wisely and well. His affection was bestowed on a worthy object – Marion Grover, the daughter of a yeoman in the next county – and was fully returned.

Marion was years younger than her lover, fifteen at least, eminently practical, healthy, and pretty. She brought her husband just exactly what he was most in need of – brightness, energy, and youth. It was an ideal marriage, and everything prospered at Mayling. Four years after the advent of the new Mrs. Giles you would scarcely have recognised the farmer, he seemed another man.

He adored his wife, and could hardly find it in his heart to regret that their child was not a son, even though, failing an heir, the old name must die out; for if there was one creature the husband and wife loved more than each other it was their baby girl.

A month or two after this child's second birthday the singular catastrophe occurred which changed the world to poor Barnett Giles, leaving him but a wreck of his former self, physically and mentally.

Young Mrs. Giles was strong in every way, and from the first she took the line of saving her husband all extra fatigue or annoyance which she could possibly hoist on to her own brave shoulders. There was something quaint and even pathetic in the relations of the couple. For, notwithstanding Marion's being so much Barnett's junior, her attitude towards him had a decided suggestion of the maternal about it, though at times of real emergency his sound judgment and advice never failed her. It was within a week or two of Christmas; the weather was bitingly, raspingly cold. And though as yet no snow had fallen, the weather-wise were predicting it daily.

"I must go over to Colletwood this week," said Mrs. Giles, "and I must take Nelly. Her new coat is waiting to be tried at the dressmaker's, and I must get her some boots and several other things before Christmas. And there is a whole list of other shopping too – all our Christmas presents to see to."

Her husband was looking out of the window, it was still very early in the day.

"I doubt if the snow will hold off much longer," he said.

"And once it begins it may be heavy," his wife replied, "and then I might not be able to go for ever so long, even by the road," – for a deep fall of snow at Scarby was practically a stoppage to all traffic. "I'll tell you what, Barnett, we'll go to-day and make sure of it. I will put other things aside and start before noon. A couple of hours, or three at the most, will do everything, and then Nelly and I will be back long before dark. You'll come to meet us, won't you?"

"Of course I will – if you go. But," and again he glanced at the sky. The morning was, so far, clear and bright, though very cold, but over towards the north there was a suspicious look about the blue-grey clouds. "I don't know," he said, "but that you'd better wait till to-morrow and see if it blows off again."

But Marion shook her head.

"I've a feeling," she said, "that if I don't go to-day, I won't go at all. And I really must. I'll take Betsy to carry the child till we're just above the town, and then send her home, so as not to be tired for coming back. Not that I'm ever tired, as you know," with a smile.

He gave in, only stipulating that at all costs they should start to return by a certain hour, unless the snow should have already begun, in which case Marion was to run no risks, but either to hire a fly to bring her home by the road, or to stay in the town with some of her friends till the weather cleared again.

"And I'll meet you," he added. "Let us set our watches together – I'll start from here so as to be at – let me see – "

"Half-way between the stiles," said Marion. "We can each see the other from one stile to the opposite one, you know, even though it's a good bit of a way. Yes, dear, I'll time it as near as I can to meet half-way between the stiles."

And with these words the last on her lips, she set off, a picture of health and happiness – little Nelly crowing back to "Dada" from over stout Betsy's shoulder.

Betsy was home again within the hour.

But the mother and child – alas and alas! It was the immortal story of "Lucy Gray" in an almost more pathetic shape.

Farmer Giles, as I have said, was a studious, often absent-minded man. There was not much to do at that season and in such weather, and what there was, some amount of supervision on his part was enough for. After his early dinner he got out his books for an hour or two's quiet reading till it should be time to set off to meet his darlings. No fear of his forgetting that time, but till the clock struck, and he saw it was approaching nearly, he never looked out – he was unconscious of the rapid growth of the lurid, steely clouds; he had no idea that the snowflakes were already falling, falling, more and more closely and thickly with each instant that passed.

Then rose the storm spirit and issued his orders – all too quickly obeyed. Before Barnett Giles had left the village street he found himself in what now-a-days would be called a "blizzard". And his pale face grew paler, and his heart beat as if to choke him, when at last he reached the first stile and stood there panting, to regain his breath. It was all he could do to battle on through the fury of the wind, the blinding, whirling snow, which seemed to envelop him as if in sheets. Not for many and many a day will that awful snowstorm be forgotten in Scarshire.

It was at the appointed trysting place they found him – "half-way between the stiles". But not till late that evening, when Betsy, more alarmed by his absence than by her mistress's not returning, at last struggled out through the deep-lying snow to alarm the nearest neighbours.

"The missis and Miss Nell will have stayed the night in the town," she said. "But I misdoubt me if the master will ever have got so far, though he may have been tempted on when he did not meet them."

By this time the fury of the storm had spent itself, and they found poor Giles after a not very protracted search, and brought him home – dead, they thought at first.

No, he was not dead, but it was less than half life that he returned to. For his first inquiry late the next day, when glimmering consciousness had begun to revive – "Marion, the baby?" – seemed by some subtle instinct to answer itself truthfully, in spite of the kindly endeavour to deceive him for the time.

"Dead!" he murmured. "I knew it. Half-way between the stiles," and he turned his face to the wall.

They almost wished he had died too – the rough but kind-hearted country-folk who were his neighbours. But he lived. He never asked and never knew the details of the tragedy, which, indeed, was never fully known by any one.

All that came to light was that the dead body of Marion Giles was brought by some semi-gipsy wanderers to the workhouse of a town several miles south of Colletwood, early on the morning after the blizzard. They had found it, they said, at some little distance from the road along which they were journeying, so that she must have lost her way long before approaching the Monksholdings confines, not improbably, indeed, in attempting to retrace her steps to the town which she had so imprudently quitted. But of the child the tramps said nothing, and after making the above deposition, they were allowed to go on their way, which they expressed themselves as anxious to do; for reasons of their own, no doubt; possibly the same reasons which had prevented their returning to Colletwood with the young woman's corpse, as would have seemed more natural.

And afterwards no very special inquiry was made about the baby. The father was incapable of it, and in those days people accepted things more carelessly, perhaps. It was taken for granted that "Little Nell" had fallen down some cliff, no doubt, and lay buried there, with the snow for her shroud, like a strayed lambkin. Her tiny bones might yet be found, years hence, maybe, by a shepherd in search of some bleating wanderer, or – no more might ever be known of the infant's fate!

Barnett Giles rose from his bed, after many weeks, with all the look of a very old man. At first it was thought that his mind was quite gone; but it did not prove to be so. After a time, with the help of an excellent foreman, or bailiff, he showed himself able to manage his farm with a strange, mechanical kind of intelligence. It seemed as if the sense of duty outlived the loss of other perceptions, though these, too, cleared by degrees to a considerable extent, and material things, curious as it may appear, prospered with him.

But he rarely spoke unless obliged to do so; and whenever he felt himself at leisure, and knew that his work was not calling for him, he seemed to relapse into the half-dreamy state which was his more real life. Then he would pass through the village and slowly climb the slope to the stile, where he would stand for hours together, patiently gazing before him, while he murmured the old refrain: "'Half-way between the stiles,' she said. I shall meet them there, 'half-way between the stiles'."

Fortunately, perhaps, it was not often he attempted to climb over; he contented himself with standing and gazing. Fortunately so, for otherwise the changes at Monksholdings would have probably terribly shocked his abnormally sensitive brain. But he did not seem to notice them, nor the new route of the old right-of-way agreed to by the compromise. He was content with his post – standing, leaning on the stile, and gazing before him.

His, of course, was the worn, wistful face which had half frightened, half appealed to Sybil Raynald.

But she forgot about it again, or other things put it temporarily aside, so that when the Raynalds came down to Monksholdings again the following Easter it did not at once occur to her to remind her father of the inquiry he had promised to make.

Miss March was not with her pupils and their parents at first. She had gone to spend a holiday week with the friends who had brought her up and seen to her education – good, benevolent people, if not specially sympathetic, but to whom she felt herself bound by ties of sincerest gratitude, though her five years with the Raynald family had given her more of the feeling of a "home" than she had ever had before.

And her arrival at Monksholdings was the occasion of much rejoicing. There was everything to show her, and every one, from Mark down to little Robin, wanted to be her guide. It was not till the morning of the next day that Sybil managed to get her to herself for a tête-à-tête stroll.

Ellinor had some things to tell her quondam pupil. Mrs. Bellairs, her self-appointed guardian, was growing old and somewhat feeble.

"I fear she is not likely to live many years," said Miss March, "and she thinks so herself. She has a curious longing, which I never saw in her before, to find out my history – to know if there is no one really belonging to me to whom she can give me back, as it were, before she dies. She gave me the little parcel containing the clothes I had on when she rescued me from being sent to a workhouse. They are carefully washed and mended, and though I was a poor, dirty little object when I was found, they do not look really as if I had been a beggar child," with a little smile.

"You a beggar child!" exclaimed Sybil indignantly. "Of course not. Perhaps, on the contrary, you were somebody very grand."

"No, no," said Ellinor sensibly. "In that case I should have been advertised for and inquired after. No, I have never thought that, and I should not wish it. I should be more than thankful to know I came of good, honest people, however simple; to have some one of my very own."

"I forget the actual details," said Sybil, "though you have often told me about it. You were found – no, not literally in the workhouse, was it?"

"They were going to take me there," said Miss March. "It was at a village near Bath where Mr. and Mrs. Bellairs were then living, and one day, after a party of gipsies had been encamping on the common, a cottager's wife heard something crying in the night, and found me in her little garden. She was too poor to keep me herself, and felt certain I was a child the gipsies had stolen and then wanted to get rid of. I was fair-haired and blue-eyed, not like them. She was a friend or relation of some of Mrs. Bellairs's servants, and so the story got round to my kind old friend. And you know the rest – how they first thought of bringing me up in quite a humble way, and then finding me – well, intelligent and naturally rather refined, I suppose, I got a really good education, and my good luck did not desert me, dear, when I came to be your governess."

Sybil smiled.

"And can you remember nothing?"

Ellinor hesitated.

"Queer, dreamy fragments come back to me sometimes," she said. "I have a feeling of having seen hills long, long ago. It is strange," she went on, for by this time they had left the private grounds and were strolling along the hill-path in the direction of the town, "it is strange that since I came here I seem to have got hold of a tiny bit of these old memories, if they are such. It must be the hills," and she stood still and gazed round her with a deep breath of satisfaction, "I could only have been between two and three when I was found," she went on. "The only words I said were 'Dada' and 'Nennie' – it sounded like 'Nelly'. That was why Mrs. Bellairs called me 'Ellinor,' and 'March,' because it was in that month she took me to her house."

Sybil walked on in silence for a moment or two.

"It is such a romantic story," she said at last. "I am never tired of thinking about it."

They entered Monksholdings again from the east entrance, Ellinor glanced at the stile.

"By-the-bye," she said, "this is one of the two old stiles, I suppose. Have you ever seen your ghost again, Sybil? Have you found out anything about him?"

Sybil looked round her half nervously.

"It is the other stile he haunts," she said. "I rather avoid it, at least, I mean to do so now. It is curious you speak of it, for till yesterday I had not seen him again, and had almost forgotten about it. But yesterday afternoon, just before you came, there he was – exactly the same, staring in. I meant to speak to papa about it, but with the pleasure and bustle of your arrival, I forgot it. Remind me about it. I am afraid he is out of his mind."

"Poor old man!" said Ellinor. "I wish we could do something to comfort him. I feel as if everybody must be happy here. It is such a charming, exhilarating place. Dear me, how windy it is! The path is all strewn with the white petals of the cherry blossom."

"They have degenerated into wild cherry trees," said Sybil. "Long ago papa says these must have been good fruit trees of many kinds, and this is a great cherry country, you know."

The wind dropped that afternoon, but only temporarily. It rose again so much during the night that by the next morning the grounds looked, to use little Annis's expression, "quite untidy".

"And down in the village, or just beyond it," said Mark, who had been for an early stroll, "at one place it really looks as if it had been snowing. The road skirts that old farmhouse; you know it, father? I forget the name – there's a grand cherry orchard there."

"'Mayling Farm,' you must mean," said Mr. Raynald. "Farmer Giles's. Oh, by the way, that reminds me, Sybil," but a glance round the table made him stop short. They were at breakfast. He scarcely felt inclined to relate the tragic story before the younger children, "they might look frightened or run away if they came across the poor fellow," he reflected. "I will tell Sybil about it afterwards."

Easter holidays were not yet over, though the governess had returned, so regular routine was set aside, and the whole of the young party, Ellinor included, spent that morning in a scramble among the hills.

The children seemed untirable, and set off again somewhere or other in the afternoon. Sybil was busy with her mother, writing letters and orders to be despatched to London, so that towards four o'clock or so, when Miss March, having finished her own correspondence, entered the drawing-room, she found it deserted.

Sybil had promised to practise some duets with her, and while waiting on the chance of her coming, Ellinor seated herself at the piano and began to play – nothing very important – just snatches of old airs which she wove into a kind of half-dreamy harmony, one melting into another as they occurred to her.

All at once a shadow fell on the keys, and then she remembered having heard the door softly open a moment or two before – so softly, that she had not looked round, imagining it to be the wind, which, though fallen now, still lingered about.

Now her ideas took another shape.

"It is Sybil, no doubt," she thought with a smile. "She is going to make me jump," and she waited, half expecting to feel Sybil's hands suddenly clasped over her eyes from behind.

But this was not to be the mode of attack, apparently, though she heard what sounded like stealthy footsteps.

"You need not try to startle me, Sybbie," she exclaimed laughingly, without turning or ceasing to play, "I hear you."

It was no laughing voice which replied.

On the contrary, a sigh, almost a groan, close to her made her look up sharply – a trifle indignant perhaps at the joke being carried so far – and she saw, a pace or two from her only, the figure of an old man – a white-haired, somewhat bent form, a worn face with wistful blue eyes – gazing at her.

She had scarcely time to feel frightened, for almost instantaneously Sybil's "ghost" recurred to her memory.

"He has found his way in, then," she thought, not without a slight and natural tremor, which, however, disappeared as she gazed, so pathetically gentle was the whole aspect of the intruder.

But – his face changed curiously – the sight of hers, now fully in his view, seemed strangely to affect him. With a gesture of utter bewilderment he raised his hand to his forehead as if to brush something away – the cloud still resting on his brain – then a smile broke over the old face, a wonderful smile.

"Marion," he said, "at last? I – I thought I was dreaming. I heard you playing in my dream. It is the right place though, 'Half-way between the stiles,' you said. I have waited so long and come so often, and now it is snowing again. Just a little, dear, nothing to hurt. Marion, my darling, why don't you speak? Is it all a dream – this fine room, the music and all? Are you a dream?"

He closed his eyes as if he were fainting. Inexpressibly touched, all Ellinor's womanly nature went out to him. She started forward, half leading, half lifting him to a seat close at hand.

"I – I am not Marion," she said, and afterwards she wondered what had inspired the words, "but I am" – not "Ellinor," something made her change the name as he spoke – "I am Nelly."

He opened his eyes again.

"Little Nell," he said, "has she sent you down to me from heaven? My little Nell!"

And then he fell back unconscious – this time he had fainted.

She thought he was dead, but it was not so – her cries for help soon brought her friends, Mr. Raynald first of all. He did not seem startled, he soothed Ellinor at once.

"It is poor old Giles," he said. "I know all about him, he has found his way in at last."

"But – but – ," stammered the girl, "there is something else, Mr. Raynald. I – I seem to remember something."

She looked nearly as white as their poor visitor, and as Mr. Raynald glanced at her, a curious expression flitted across his own face.

Could it be so? He knew all her story.

"Wait a little, my dear," he said. "We must attend to poor Giles first."

They were very kind and tender to the old man, but he seemed to be barely conscious, even after restoratives had brought him out of the actual fainting fit. Then Mrs. Raynald proposed that his servants – his housekeeper if he had one – should be sent for.

And when faithful Betsy, stout as of old, though less nimble, made her appearance, her irrepressible emotion at the sight of Ellinor, pale and trembling though the young governess was, gave form and substance to Mr. Raynald's suspicions.