Rose and Ruth thrilled with the excitement of it all. “I don’t care if they do set us down on the moor, Rose,” Ruth whispered. “It won’t be any wilder than the prairie, and we were never frightened there. But I wish we had our horses, and that Lorna could come with us.”
Rose nodded. “Isn’t she lovely? And if only we do find John——”
Lorna came running with a folded paper in her hand. “Here it is, just a greeting. Hide it, and hasten, for they will suspect something unless we go at once to Sir Ensor.”
So down the slope they raced, and reached the green bottom of the valley in no time at all. A lovely picture they made, the three sweet maids, flushed with their running, their eyes ashine with excitement. An elderly, tall, thin man watched them as they came toward him, and smiled, though his face did not look like one much given to smiling.
The girls saw him suddenly, and their gay chatter died. But he waved a friendly hand.
“Nay, fear nothing, children,” he called. And as they drew nearer, still somewhat fearfully, he asked them how they had got into the Doone valley.
“Our fairy brought us,” answered Rose. “I don’t know just how. You shut your eyes, and take her by the hand—and there you are.”
“How is this, Lorna?” asked the old man, and straight and active he looked for all his years, “Know you ought of a fairy?”
“Some fairy has found out how lonely I am here with no little maid for a playmate, and found a way to bring these friends hither,” Lorna said. “Oh, Sir Ensor, you will not have them harmed,” and with the words she began to cry and sob.
“Hush, Lorna. No one shall hurt them. But they must go from here at once. Two of my boys are saddling now, and will take them out on the moor and leave them within walking distance of some of the good Exmoor folk.” Sir Ensor sneered a trifle over the end of his sentence. “I doubt that any of them would care to see my stout youths at too close range,” he concluded. Then, turning to Rose and Ruth, “You must have your eyes bound,” he said, sternly. “And do not come hither again, with or without this talk of fairies.”