The Unbidden Guest

“Heigh-ho! I wish I were a boy, then I would run away from The Crags and see the beautiful world that lies hidden beyond these tall mountains!”

It was the voice of a pretty young girl, poised on tiptoe on the very verge of a lofty cliff, gazing down eagerly at the scene far below, the silvery Greenbrier River, the gleaming line of serpentine railway, and the winding road that curved around the jagged cliffs up to the heights where stood The Crags, a picturesque old stone mansion.

Here several generations of the aristocratic Willoughbys had lived and died, and the present owner and incumbent was Miss Cyrilla Willoughby, a spinster of sixty years, with literary tastes, who spent her time preparing for publication the memoirs of her distinguished race.

Oh, a mere nobody! A sort of protégée of Miss Willoughby.

It was quite seventeen years ago that the lady’s cousin, a stern, domineering soldier, had stalked into her library one day, saying abruptly:

“Cyrilla, there are some impudent, thieving gipsies camped in your south meadow, and I have taken the liberty of driving them off. I gave orders for them to be gone bag and baggage before dark.”

“But was that necessary, Eustis? They have camped on my lands several times before, and never did any harm that I know of, and they amused the young people of the neighborhood telling their fortunes,” remonstrated the spinster mildly.