"You know I would. Why mock me?"

"You would do a great deal in order that this might come to pass."

"What do you want?"

We had come back to the same point again, and again old Peter hesitated.

"You know Restormel?" he said at length.

"Restormel Castle, up by Lostwithiel?" I asked.

"No; Restormel in the parish of St. Miriam, a few miles north from here?"

"Oh, yes, I know."

"What do you know?"

Both old Peter and young Peter spoke in the same breath; both spoke eagerly, too—anxiously in fact.

"What is rumoured by certain gossips," I replied. "I expect there is no truth in it."

"But what have you heard?"

"It is said that the estate belongs to a chit of a maid," I replied; "that the maid's mother died at her birth, and that her father, Godfrey Molesworth, did not long survive her. That he was broken-hearted. That everything was left to a mere baby."

"But what became of the baby?"

"I know not. I have heard that she has never been seen on the place, although her father has been dead wellnigh twenty years. That the rents are paid to Colman Killigrew who lives at Endellion Castle, and who is a godless old savage. Rumour says that he claims to be the maid's guardian. But of this I am ignorant. He lives full fifty miles from here, and I know nothing of him."

[Pg 23]

[Pg 23]

"That is all you have heard?"

"That is all I can remember at present."

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