The Gold of Fairnilee | Page 8

"No, I won't; or if I do, I 'll come back, with such a horse, and a sword
with a gold handle. I'm going to the Wishing Well. Come on!"
Jean did not like to say "No," and off they went.
Randal and Jean started without taking anything with them to eat. They
were afraid to go back to the house for food. Randal said they would be
sure to find something somewhere. The Wishing Well was on the top
of a hill between Yarrow and Tweed. So they took off their shoes, and
waded the Tweed at the shallowest part, and then they walked up the
green grassy bank on the other side, till they came to the burn of Peel.
Here they passed the old square tower of Peel, and the shepherd dogs
came out and barked at them. Randal threw a stone at them, and they
ran away with their tails between their legs.
[Illustration: Page 265]
"Don't you think we had better go into Peel, and get some bannocks to
eat on the way, Randal?" said Jean.
But Randal said he was not hungry; and, besides, the people at Peel
would tell the Fairnilee people where they had gone.
"We'll wish for things to eat when we get to the Wishing Well," said
Randal. "All sorts of good things--cold venison pasty, and everything
you like."
So they began climbing the hill, and they followed the Peel burn. It ran
in and out, winding this way and that, and when they did get to the top
of the hill, Jean was very tired and very hungry. And she was very
disappointed. For she expected to see some wonderful new country at

her feet, and there was only a low strip of sunburnt grass and heather,
and then another hill-top! So Jean sat down, and the hot sun blazed on
her, and the flies buzzed about her and tormented her.
"Come on, Jean," said Randal; "it must be over the next hill!"
So poor Jean got up and followed him, but he walked far too fast for
her. When she reached the crest of the next hill, she found a great cairn,
or pile of grey stones; and beneath her lay, far, far below, a deep valley
covered with woods, and a stream running through it that she had never
seen before.
That stream was the Yarrow.
Randal was nowhere in sight, and she did not know where to look for
the Wishing Well. If she had walked straight forward through the trees
she would have come to it; but she was so tired, and so hungry, and so
hot, that she sat down at the foot of the cairn and cried as if her heart
would break.
Then she fell asleep.
When Jean woke, it was as dark as it ever is on a midsummer night in
Scotland.
It was a soft, cloudy night; not a clear night with a silver sky.
Jeanie heard a loud roaring close to her, and the red light of a great fire
was in her sleepy eyes.
In the firelight she saw strange black beasts, with horns, plunging and
leaping and bellowing, and dark figures rushing about the flames. It
was the beasts that made the roaring. They were bounding about close
to the fire, and sometimes in it, and were all mixed in the smoke.
Jeanie was dreadfully frightened, too frightened to scream.
Presently she heard the voices of men shouting on the hill below her.
The shouts and the barking of dogs came nearer and nearer.

Then a dog ran up to her, and licked her face, and jumped about her.
[Illustration: Page 267]
It was her own sheepdog, Yarrow.
He ran back to the men who were following him, and came again with
one of them.
It was old Simon Grieve, very tired, and so much out of breath that he
could scarcely speak.
Jean was very glad to see him, and not frightened any longer.
"Oh, Jeanie, my doo'," said Simon, "where hae ye been? A muckle gliff
ye hae gien us, and a weary spiel up the weary braes."
Jean told him all about it: how she had come with Randal to see the
Wishing Well, and how she had lost him, and fallen asleep.
"And sic a nicht for you bairns to wander on the hill," said Simon. "It's
the nicht o' St. John, when the guid folk hae power. And there's a' the
lads burning the Bel fires, and driving the nowt* through them: nae less
will serve them. Sic a nicht!"
* Nowt, cattle.
This was the cause of the fire Jean saw, and of the noise of the cattle.
On midsummer's night the country people used to light these fires, and
drive the cattle