CHAPTER I
The Lonely Steading in the Dale
Barbara Lynn looked up the dale.
Thundergay glimmered through the green twilight with his hoary head under the Pole star, and his feet in the wan waters of a tarn. His breath was the North wind.
Barbara put up the shutters and turned to an old woman, who was propped against the pillows of a four-post bed. It stood in the full light of a turf fire, and looked like a ship with its sails furled.
"I'll bid you good-night and good rest, great-granny," said the girl.
The old woman was watching her with keen eyes—eyes so bright that they glittered under her shaggy brows.
"Do you ever waken o' nights?" she asked.
Barbara laughed and shook her head.
"Nay, I sleep from dark to dawn. But I'd hear you, great-granny, if you called. I've ears like a mountain hare."