The prophecy that it was "a fule's errand" rang unpleasantly in Grace's
ear, as she crossed the park and climbed the rustic stiles which led to
the high road. It was true she knew that during the last three years
there had been many a "clearance" at Kirklands, for she remembered
having overheard Mr. Graham congratulating her aunt on the larger
returns owing to these improvements. But surely, she thought, there
might still be found some little cottages like those to which she heard
her mamma was so fond of going when she was a girl. Walter and she used
certainly, she remembered, often to see children with bare, dust-stained
feet on the road, when they happened to go beyond the grounds on a
fishing expedition, or down with their aunt through her lands; but her
brother had been an all-sufficient playmate, and Grace's interest in the
peasant children did not extend beyond a glance of curiosity. But now
how gladly would she gather a little company of them to tell them that
old sweet story, which had come to her own heart with such new strange
sweetness, during these winter days, though she had heard it ever since
she could remember. Grace hurried eagerly along the high road, looking
at every turn for traces of any lowly wayside dwellings. There used to
be a little clump of cottages here, she thought, as she stopped at a
bend of the road where there were traces of recent demolitions, and a
great field of green corn was evidently going to reclaim the waste
place, and presently swallow it up.
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