"I hear you are leaving. Will you come up for a minute, that I may wish you well?"

"What is it?" asked Mary Anne.

"Lady Ellis wishes to say farewell to me," he answered. "I will go to her now."

The maid led the way, and showed him up to the small sitting-room. Lady Ellis was leaning back in her easy-chair, but she sat upright when he entered. Even more than before was he struck with the white, hollow, skeleton look of the face, on which death had so unmistakably set his seal; but the disorder had arrived at that stage now when each day made a perceptible change. The black eyes, once glistening so fiercely with their vain passions, lighted up with a faint pleasure.

"I am glad you came up: so glad! I thought you did not intend to see me at all."

He answered that he did not know she was well enough to be seen, speaking cordially. With that dying face and form before him, three-parts of his cherished enmity to the woman died out. Not his dislike of her.

"I would bid you farewell, Mr. Hunter. I would wish you--an' you will permit me--God-speed. The next time we meet, both of us will have entered on a different world from this."

"Thank you," he said, in allusion to the wish, "but are you sure nothing can be done for your recovery?"

"Nothing whatever. And the end cannot be very far off now. Mr. Thornycroft is going back with me to Cheltenham, and I am glad of it. I should like him to see the last of me."

She was looking at the fire as she spoke. He, standing at the opposite side of the mantelpiece, looked at her. What a change from the vain, worldly, selfish woman of the past! Raising her eyes suddenly, she caught his gaze, perhaps divined somewhat of his thoughts.

"You cannot think me to be the same, can you?"

"Scarcely." He glanced at the timepiece. At best the interview was not pleasant to him, neither did he care to prolong it.

"You fear to lose the omnibus?"

"I have lost it. Your clock is slow. I am now about to start on foot to Jutpoint."

"Could they not send you in the dog-cart?"

"Thank you; I prefer to walk. The night is fine, and the road good. And I suppose I must be going."

She stood up as he moved, and held out her hand, her silk gown falling in folds from her shrunken form. He shook hands.

"God bless you; God prosper you here and hereafter!" she said with some emotion.

He hardly knew what to answer. To express a wish for her continued life was so palpable a fallacy, with those signs of decay before him: so he murmured a word of thanks, and gave the thin hand a friendly pressure as he released it.

But she did not release his. "It was not quite all I wished to say," she whispered, looking up to him with her sad eyes, in which stood a world of repentance. "I want to ask your forgiveness."

"My forgiveness?"

"For the past. For your lost wife. But for me she might not have died. My long illness has brought reflection home to me, and--and repentance: as I suppose hopeless illness does to most people: showing me things in their true light; showing me the awful mistakes and sins the best and the worst of us alike commit. Say that you forgive me."

"Lady Ellis," he said, his countenance assuming a solemn aspect as he looked straight at her, "I have far more need of forgiveness myself than any other can have: I saw that at the time; I see it always. My wife was mine; it was my duty to cherish her, and I failed; no one else owed obligation to her. The chief blame lay with me."

"Say you forgive me! I know she has, looking down from heaven."

"I do indeed. I forgive you with my whole heart, and I pray that we may, as you say, meet hereafter--all our mistakes and sins blotted out."

"I pray it always. Cyril knows I do. He was the first to lead me--ah, so kindly and imperceptibly!--to the remembrance that our sins needed blotting out. It was during a six weeks' visit he paid me with his sister. Few in this world are so good and pure and loving as Cyril Thornycroft. Fare you well, Robert Hunter! fare you well for ever."

"For ever on earth," he added. Another pressure of the poor weak hand, a warm, earnest look, a faint thought of the Heaven that might be attained to yet, and Robert Hunter turned away, and woke up to the world again.

His cold coffee stood in the drawing-room when he got back. He sat a short while with the two young ladies, very quiet and absorbed. Cyril was not there. Mary Anne inquired what was the matter with him.

"That poor woman upstairs," he briefly answered; "she seems so near to death, but I think she is prepared for it."

Mary Anne Thornycroft simply looked at him in reply; the manner and look were alike strange. Robert Hunter sipped the cold coffee by spoonfuls, evidently unconscious what it was he was doing.

"But I must be going!" he suddenly cried, starting up. "It would not do to miss the train as I have the omnibus. Good bye, Anna; you will be coming back to Miss Jupps's, I suppose, when school begins?"

The vivid blush went for nothing. She, Mrs. Isaac Thornycroft, a schoolteacher again! "Good-bye, Robert," she softly said. "I wish you safe to Jutpoint, but I should not like your walk. Give my love to the Miss Jupps if you see them, and to Mrs. Macpherson."

Mary Anne went out with him to the door. As they crossed the hall, sounds of talking came from the dining-room, and there was a sudden burst of laughter. Evidently the party were enjoying themselves. He took his remarkable coat from a peg and flung it over his arm.

"You must say good-bye to Cyril for me, Mary Anne."

"I will. But perhaps you will see him outside. Why don't you put your coat on?"

"Not yet; I am hot. By-and-by, when the air shall strike cool to me."

They stood just outside the door, in the shade of the walls, and he wound his arms round her for a last embrace. A last? "God bless you, Mary Anne!" he whispered; "the time will come, I trust, when we need not part."

She stood looking after him, the outline of his retreating form being very distinct in the bright night.

The stars were clear and the air was frosty. Mary Anne Thornycroft watched him pass through the gate, and then saw that instead of going straight on, he turned short off to the waste land skirting the side of the plateau.

She wondered. It was the farthest way to the village, and moreover the private way of Mr. Thornycroft. Another moment and she saw him running up the plateau, having crossed the railings.

"Why, what in the world!--he must be dreaming," she mentally concluded. "Perhaps he wants to take a farewell view of the sea. He would see enough of it between here and Jutpoint."

However, Miss Thornycroft found it cold standing there, and went indoors, meeting Sinnett in the hall.

"Sinnett, Mr. Hunter's portmanteau must go by the early omnibus. See that it is sent to the Mermaid in time."

"Very well, miss," replied Sinnett. And it may be here mentioned that she obeyed the order by sending it that night.

Very shortly after Robert Hunter had left the dining-room, Richard and Isaac Thornycroft also withdrew from it, one by one, and unperceived. That is, the guests and the justice were too agreeably engaged with their pipes and drink, their talk and laughter, to pay heed to it. One of the gentlemen from Jutpoint--a magistrate--was relating a story that convulsed the parson with laughter and sent the rest almost into fits. Altogether they were uncommonly jolly, and the lapse of one or two of the party counted for nothing. Mr. Kyne had nearly ceased to care whether his subordinate was on the watch, or off it.

As it happened, he was on it. With the promised visit of his superior before his eyes, Mr. Puffer had not dared to leave his post. He stood close to the bleak edge of the cold plateau, wishing himself anywhere else, and bemoaning the hard fate that had made him a coastguard-man. Unpleasant thoughts of ghosts, and such like visitants, intruded into his thoughts now and then: he entirely disbelieved Mr. Kyne's theory that there were smugglers; and the only cheering ray in his solitude, was the sight of the cheery lights in the Red Court Farm. Tomlett, the fishing-boat master, who had recovered his accident, suddenly hailed him.

"Cold work, my man," said he, sauntering up the plateau.

"It just is that!" was Mr. Puffer's surly answer.

"But it's a bright night: never saw a brighter when there was no moon: so you run no danger of making a false step in the dark and pitching over. There's consolation in that."

"Ugh!" grunted the shivering officer, as if the fact afforded little consolation to him.

"What on earth's the use of your airing yourself here?" went on Tomlett. "You coastguard fellows have got the biggest swallows! As if any smugglers would attempt the coast to-night! My belief is--and I am pretty well used to the place, and have got eyes on all sides of me--that this suspicion of Master Kyne's is all moonshine and empty herring-barrels. I could nearly take my oath of it."

"So could I," said the man.

"Let us go on to the Mermaid, and have a glass," continued Mr. Tomlett, persuasively. "I'll stand it. Johnson and Simms, and a lot more, are there."

"I wish I dare," cried the aggravated Puffer. "But Kyne will be up presently."

"No he won't. He is round old Thornycroft's fire, in a cloud of smoke and drink. There's a dinner-party at the Red Court, and Kyne and the rest are half-seas over."

"Are you sure of this?"

"I'll swear it if you wish me; I have just come from there. I went down to try and get speech of the justice about that boat loss: it comes on at Jutpoint to-morrow, and he is to be on the bench. But it was no go: they are all fixed in that dining-room; and will be there till twelve o'clock to-night, and then they'll reel off to bed with their boots on."

Tomlett was not in the habit of deceiving the men; he showed himself their friend on all occasions; and Mr. Puffer yielded to the seduction. Seeing him comfortably settled at the Mermaid, with what he liked best steaming before him, and some good fellows around, Tomlett withdrew, leaving him to enjoy himself.

From the Mermaid, Tomlett steered his course to the Red Court Farm, tearing over the intervening ground as if he had been flying from a mad bull. He took the liberty of crossing the lawn before the front windows (the shortest way), and went round by the unused path at the far end of the house, which led to the stables and to the young men's apartments. Carefully pushing open the small door in the dead wall, he encountered Richard Thornycroft.

"It is all right, sir," he panted, out of breath with running; "I have got the fellow in. We must lose no time."

"Very well," whispered Richard. "Find Hyde, and come down."

"I suppose he's safe, sir?" said Mr. Tomlett, jerking his head in the supposed direction of the dining-room.

"Couldn't be safer," responded Richard. "He had enough wine before he began at the brandy."

Isaac Thornycroft came up, a lighted lantern under his coat. Scarcely could either of the brothers be recognised for those who had so recently quitted the dining-room; they wore small caps; gaiters were buttoned over their legs; their dinner coats were replaced by coarse ones of fustian.

CHAPTER IX.

The Crowd in the Early Morning.

When Richard and Isaac Thornycroft left the dining-room, so unobtrusively as not to draw attention to the fact, they passed through the small door at the further end of the hall. Isaac, the last, silently locked it, thereby cutting off all communication with the busy part of the house. Swiftly ascending to Richard's chamber, they changed their clothes for others which were laid out in readiness. Hyde, his clothes also changed, was in waiting at the foot of the stairs when they came down, and he crossed with Isaac to the coach-house opposite, built, as must be remembered, on a portion of the old ruins. Richard undid the door in the wall looking to the front, and stayed there until joined by the breathless Tomlett--as above seen.

The dog-cart was in its place in the coach-house; the broken old cart and the bundles of straw were in the corner; all just as usual. Tomlett and Hyde removed the cart and the straw from their resting place (whence, by all appearance, they never were removed), and the brothers Thornycroft lifted a trap-door, invisible to the casual observer, that the straw had served to conceal. A flight of steps stood disclosed to view, which Isaac and Richard descended. The steps led to a subterranean passage; a long, long passage running straight under the plateau and terminating in a vault or cavern, its damp sides glistening as the light of the lantern flashed upon it. Traversing this passage to the end, Isaac put the lantern down: then they unwound a chain from its pulley, and a square portion of the rock, loose from the rest, was pulled in and turned aside by means of a pivot: thus affording an ingress for goods, smuggled or otherwise, to come in. No wonder Robert Hunter had thought the rock sounded hollow just there!

Ah, Mr. Kyne had scented the fox pretty keenly. But not the huntsmen who rode him to earth.

It took longer to do all this than it has to relate it. When Richard had helped Isaac to remove the rock, he returned along the passage on his way to the plateau. It was customary for one of the two brothers to stand on the plateau on the watch during these dangerous feats, with his descending signal of warning in case of alarm. Richard took that post to-night. Oh, that it had been Isaac! But it was marvellous how lucky they had hitherto been. Years had gone on, and years, and never a check had come. One great reason for this was that the late supervisor, Mr. Dangerfield--let us only whisper it!--had allowed himself to be bribed. What with that, and what with the horror the preventive men had of the plateau, the daring and profitable game had been carried on with impunity. Richard Thornycroft went on his way, little knowing the awful phantom that was pursuing him.

Midway in the passage he met Hyde and Tomlett, tried and true men, on their way to join Isaac. Mr. Tomlett's accident had occurred during one of these night exploits--hence his wife's terrified consternation at being questioned by Miss Thornycroft. A strange chance had led, some years ago, to Mrs. Tomlett's discovery of what her husband was engaged in at intervals: the woman kept the secret, but never was free from fear.

Isaac Thornycroft, left alone, proceeded with his necessary movements. By help of a long pole, thrust through the hole, he held forth a blazing flambeau, which for two minutes would light up the half-moon beach and the rocks behind it. It was the signal for the boats to put off from that especial vessel that was the object of the worthy supervisor's abhorrence. And so the night's secret work was fairly inaugurated. Isaac Thornycroft held his signal for the approach of the boats, laden with their heavy spoil; Richard was speeding back to assume his watch overhead; and it was just about this time that Mr. Hunter had taken his departure from the Red Court Farm.

It is quite useless to speculate, now, why Robert Hunter went on the plateau. Some power must have impelled him. These things, bearing great events in their train, do not occur by chance. Had he been questioned why, he probably could not have told. The most likely conjecture is, speaking according to human reason, that he intended to stand a few moments on its brow, and sniff the fresh breeze from the sea, so grateful to his heated senses. He had taken more wine than usual; certainly not to anything like intoxication, for he was by habit and principle a sober man. He had dined more freely; the hot room, the talking, all had contributed to heat him; and, following on it, came the interview with Lady Ellis. Whatever the cause, certain it is that, instead of pursuing the straight course of his road, like a sensible man, he turned off it and went on the plateau.

It was a remarkably light night--as already said--clear, still, frosty, very bright. The clouds, passing occasionally over the face of the clear sky, seemed to be moved by an upper current that did not stir the air below. The sea was like silver; no craft to be seen on it save one vessel that was hove-to close in-shore--a dark vessel, lying still and silent. Robert Hunter, at the very edge of the plateau, stood looking on all this: a peaceful scene; the broad expanse of sea stretching out, the half-moon beach lying cold and solitary below.

Suddenly a bright sheet of light shot out from underneath, illumining the half-moon, the rocks, and his own face, as he bent over to look. Was he dreaming?--was his brain treacherous, causing him to see things that were not? There, half-way down the rocks, shone a great flame, a flickering, flaring, blazing flame, as of a torch; and Robert Hunter rubbed his eyes, and slapped his chest, and pinched his arms, to make sure he was not in a dream of wine.

He stood staring at it, his eyes and mouth open; stared at it until, by some mysterious process, it steadily lowered itself, and disappeared inside the rocks. Light--not of the torch--flashed upon him.

"The smugglers!" he burst forth: and the clear night air carried the words over the sea. "The smugglers are abroad to-night! That must be their signal for the booty to approach. Then there is an opening in the rocks! I'll hasten and give word to Kyne."

Flying back straight towards the Red Court, he had leaped the railings when he encountered Richard Thornycroft, who seemed to be flying along with equal speed towards the plateau. Hunter seized his arm.

"Richard Thornycroft! Mr. Richard! the smugglers are at work! I have dropped upon them. Their signal has been hoisted beyond the rocks underneath."

"What?" roared Richard.

"It is true as that we are breathing here," continued Hunter. "I went on the plateau, and I saw their light--a flaming torch as big as your head. They are preparing to run the goods. It struck me there must be an opening there. I am going to fetch Kyne. Mr. Thornycroft, if he will come out, may be convinced now."

He would have resumed his way with the last words, but Richard caught him. The slight form of Robert Hunter was whirled round in his powerful grasp.

"Do you see this?" he hoarsely raved, his face wearing an awfully livid expression, born of anger, in the starlight. "It is well loaded."

Robert Hunter did see it. It was the bright end of a pistol barrel, pointed close to his head. He recoiled, as far as he could, but the grasp was tight upon him.

"What, in Heaven's name, do you mean?"

"You talk of Heaven, you treacherous cur!" panted Richard. "Down upon your knees--down, I say! You shall talk of it to some purpose."

By his superior strength, he forced the younger and slighter man to his knees on the waste ground as he would a child. The fur coat fell from Robert Hunter's arm, and lay beside him, a white heap streaked with black, in the starlight.

"Now, then! Swear, by all your hopes of Heaven, that what you have detected shall never pass your lips; shall be as if you had not seen it."

"I swear," answered Robert Hunter. "I believe I guess how it is. I will be silent; I swear it."

"Now and hereafter?"

"Now and hereafter."

"Get up, then, and go your way. But, another word, first of all," interrupted Richard, as if a thought struck him. "This must be kept secret from my sister."

"I swear that it shall be, for me."

Holding Robert Hunter still in his fierce grasp, he dictated to him yet another oath, as if not satisfied with the last one. In cooler moments neither of them might have acted as they were doing: Richard had been less imperative, the other less blindly yielding. Robert Hunter was no coward, but circumstances and Richard's fury momentarily over-mastered him.

He swore a solemn oath--Richard dictating it--not to hold further communication with Mary Anne at present, either by word or letter; not to do it until Richard should of his own will voluntarily give permission for it. He swore not again to put foot within the Red Court Farm; he swore not to write to any one of its inmates, failing this permission. The determination not to be pestered with letters perhaps caused Richard to insist on this. Any way, the oaths were taken, and were to hold force for six months.

"Now, then, go your way," said Richard. "Your path for departure lies there," and he pointed to the open highway leading from the entrance gates of the Red Court. "But first hear me swear an oath that I shall surely keep: If you do not go straight away; if you linger on this spot unnecessarily by so much as a few minutes; if you, having once started, return to it again I will put this bullet through your body. Cyril! See him off; he was turning traitor."

Cyril Thornycroft had come strolling towards them, somewhat at a distance yet; he did not catch the sense of his brother's concluding words, but he saw that some explosion of anger had occurred. Picking up the coat, Hunter put it on as he walked to join Cyril; while Richard, as if under the pressure of some urgent errand, flew off across the lawn and flower-beds towards the coach-house ruins and the secret passage leading from it.

"What is all this? What does Richard mean?" inquired Cyril as they commenced their walk along the high road. "He said something about a traitor."

"I was not a traitor; your brother lies. Would I turn traitor to a house whose hospitality I have been accepting? I saw, accidentally, a light exhibited from the Half-moon rocks, and I guessed what it meant. I guess more now than I will repeat, but the secret shall be safe with me."

"Safe now, and after your departure?"

"Safe always. I have sworn it."

"I am sorry this should have happened," said Cyril, after a pause.

"And so am I," returned Robert Hunter. "Circumstances, not my own will, led to it. It is a pity I missed the omnibus."

"Yes," said Cyril, speaking abstractedly, as if his thoughts were far away. "But if you step out well you may be at Jutpoint by half-past ten."

"Scarcely so," thought Robert Hunter. Cyril, perhaps, did not know the hour now.

"What! Have you missed the omnibus, sir?"

The question came from a woman who met them, Captain Copp's servant Sarah. She was coming along without her bonnet in the frosty night.

"Yes, I have; and must walk it for my pains," answered Mr. Hunter.

"Are you going to the Red Court, Sarah?" asked Cyril.

"I am, sir; I'm going there to fetch Miss Chester," returned Sarah in her hardest tone. "And a fine tantrum master's in over it, roaring out that I ought to have come a good hour ago. Why didn't they tell me, then?"

Saying good night to the woman, who wished Mr. Hunter a pleasant journey, they continued their way, striking into the village; a silent village to-night. In the windows of the Mermaid above, lights were no doubt gleaming, but they were not near enough to that hospitable hostelry to see. Everybody else seemed abed and asleep, as was generally the case at Coastdown by nine o'clock on a Sunday night.

Cyril had fallen into thought. Should he offer Hunter any apology or excuse for these practices of his house, so inopportunely discovered, and which had always been so distasteful to him? Better not, perhaps. What excusing plea could he justly offer? And besides, he knew not how far the discovery went, or what Richard had said. A feeling of resentment against Robert Hunter rose up in his heart, in his anxiety to ward off ill from his father and brothers, in his jealous care for the fair fame of the Red Court Farm. Good though he was, striving ever to follow in his Master's footsteps of love and peace, Cyril Thornycroft was but human, with a human heart disposed by its original nature to passion and sin.

"Let me advise you, at any rate for the present, not to hold communication with our house or its inmates," he said, gently breaking the silence. "In this I include my sister."

"I have promised all that. Your brother was not satisfied with exacting a simple promise; he made me swear it. I was to have written to Mary Anne on my arrival in town. Will you explain to her the reason why I do not?"

"I thought you and my sister did not correspond," interrupted Cyril.

"Neither do we. It was only to notify my safe arrival."

"I will explain sufficient to satisfy her. I suppose I must not ask you to give her up?"

"My intention is to win her if I can," avowed Robert Hunter. "She would share my fortunes tomorrow, but for the fear that my position would not be acceptable to Mr. Thornycroft."

"I see; it is decided. Well, in your own interest, I would advise you to break off all present relations with our house. What has occurred to-night will not tend to increase Richard's favour to you, and his opinion very greatly sways my father. Your visit here, taking it on the whole, has not been pleasant, or productive of pleasant results. Give us time to forget it and you for the present. Give Richard time to forget the name and sojourn of Robert Hunter."

"You say you suggest this in my own interest?"

"I do indeed," answered Cyril, his good, calm face turning on the speaker with a kindly light. "In yours and my sister's jointly. She will be true to you, I make no doubt; and things may come about after a short while. If you have decided to take each other, if your best affections are involved, why should I seek to part you? But I know what Richard is; you must give him time to get over this."

"True," answered Robert Hunter, his heart responding to the evident kindness. "At any rate, there can be no question of my holding communication with the Red Court Farm for six months, even by letter. It was a rash oath, no doubt; I was not quite myself when I took it; but I have undertaken not to write to any one of you until Richard shall give me leave. At the end of the six months I suppose I shall hear from him; if not, I shall consider myself at liberty to write--or to come."

"You will surely hear from him if he has implied that you shall. Richard never breaks a promise. And now that I have seen you thus far on your way, I'll wish you well, and turn back again."

"They had reached the end of the village, and he grasped Robert Hunter's hand with a warm and friendly pressure. The other was loth to part with him so soon.

"You may as well go with me as far as the Wherry."

Robert Hunter spoke not of a boat or of any landing for one, but of a lone and dismantled public-house, standing about a couple of hundred yards farther. Its sign swung on it still, and rattled in the wind. Cyril acquiesced, and they went down into the bit of lonely road leading to it.

We must go back for a moment to Richard Thornycroft. He gained the ruins, and lifted the trap-door with, as it seemed, almost superhuman strength, for it took of right two to do it. Completely upset by what had occurred, Richard was like a man half mad. He went thundering down the steps to the subterranean passage, his errand being to give' warning to Isaac, and assist in hoisting two lights, which those on board the vessel would understand as the signal not to advance. He had reached the cavern at the end, when his alarm began to subside, to give place to reason; and his steps came to a sudden standstill.

"Why stop the boats?" he demanded of himself. "If Hunter has cleared himself off--of which there can be no doubt--where is the danger?"

Where, indeed? He thought--Richard Thornycroft did think--that Hunter was not one to play false after undertaking to be true. So, after a little more deliberation, somewhat further of counsel with himself, he resolved to let things go on, and turned back again without warning Isaac.

* * * * * *

What mattered it that the contraband cargo was safely run? What reeked the guilty parties concerned in it of the miserable deed of evil it involved, while the valuable and double valuable booty got stowed away in silence and safety? One was lying outside the Half-moon, while they housed it, with his battered face turned up to the sky--one whose departed soul had been worth all the cargoes in the world. The body was bruised, and crushed, and murdered--the body of Robert Hunter!

How did it come there?

Coastdown woke lazily up from its slumbers with the dawn--not very early in January--and only got roused into life and activity by the startling piece of news that a shocking murder had been committed in the night. Hastening down to its alleged scene, the Half-moon beach, as many as heard it, shopkeepers, fishermen, and inhabitants generally, they found it to be too true. The poor man lay in the extreme corner of the strip of beach, right against the rocks, and was recognised for the late guest at the Red Court Farm, Robert Hunter.

Not by his face; for that was disfigured beyond possibility of recognition; but by the clothes, hair, and appearance generally. He had been shot in the face, and, in falling from the heights above, the jagged edges of the rocks had also disfigured that poor face until not a trace of its humanity remained.

The tide was low; it present the passage to the beach was passable, and stragglers were flocking up. The frosty air was crisp, the sea sparkled in the early morning sun. Amidst others came Justice Thornycroft, upright, portly, a smile on his handsome face. He did not believe the report; as was evident by his greeting words.

"What's all this hullabaloo about a murder?" began he, as he shelved round the narrow ledge and put his foot upon the beach. "How d'ye do, Kyne?--How d'ye do, Copp--How d'ye do, all? When Martha brought up my shaving-water just now, she burst into my room, her hair and mouth all awry with a story of a man having been murdered in the night at the Half-moon. Some poor drowned fellow, I suppose, cast on the banks by the tide. What brings him so high up?"

"I wish it was drowning, and nothing worse, for that's not such an uncivilized death, if it's your fate to meet it," returned Captain Copp, who was brisk this morning after his headache, and had stumped down on the first alarm. "It's a horrible land murder; nothing less; and upon a friend of yours, justice."

"A friend of mine!" was the somewhat incredulous remark of Mr. Thornycroft. "Why, good Heaven!" he added, in an accent of horror, as the crowd parted and he caught sight of the body, "it is my late guest, Robert Hunter!"

"It is indeed," murmured the crowd; and the justice stood gazing at it with horror as he took in the different points of recognition. The face was gone--that is the best term for one so utterly unrecognisable--but the appearance and dress were not to be mistaken.

"He's buttoned close up in his fur coat, sir," one of the crowd remarked.

Just so. He was buttoned up in his remarkable fur coat--as the village wrongly called it, for the coat was of white cloth, as we know, and its facings only of fur. It had stains on it now, neither white nor black, and one of its sleeves was torn, no doubt by the rocks. The hat was nowhere to be found: it never was found: but the natural supposition was, that in the fall it had rolled down to the lower beach, and been carried away by the tide.

Mr. Thornycroft stooped, and touched one of the cold hands, stooped to hide the tears which filled his eyes, very unusual visitors to the eyes of the justice.

"Poor, poor fellow! how could it have happened? How could he have come here?"

"He must have been shot on the heights, and the shot hurled him over, there's no doubt of that," said Captain Copp. "Must have been standing at the edge of the plateau."

"But what should bring him on the plateau at night?" cried Tomlett, who made one of the spectators.

"What indeed!" returned the captain. "I don't know. A bare, bleak place even in daylight, with as good as no expanse of sea-view."

"I cannot understand this," said Justice Thornycroft, lifting his face with a puzzled expression on it. "Young Hunter took leave of us last night, and left for London. He missed the omnibus to Jutpoint and set off to walk. One of my sons saw him part of the way. What brought him back on the plateau?"

"Yes, he contrived to lose the omnibus," interrupted Supervisor Kyne; who, however, what with the wine and the brandy he had consumed, had a very confused and imperfect recollection of the events of the previous evening, but did not choose to let people know that, and chose to put in his testimony. "Mr. Hunter shook hands with me in the dining-room at the Red Court, and I wished him a pleasant journey. That must have been--what time, Mr. Justice?"

"Getting on for nine. And one of my boys saw him go."

"It's odd what could have spirited him back again," exclaimed Captain Copp. "Which of them steered him off?"

"I forget which," returned the justice. "I heard Isaac say that one of them did. To tell you the truth, captain, I sat late in the dining-room last night, and my head's none of the clearest this morning. How do you find yours, Kyne?"

"Oh, mine's all right, sir," answered the supervisor hastily. "A man in office is obliged to be cautious in what he takes."

"Ah, there's no coming over you," cried the justice, with a side wink to Captain Copp.

"There's Mr. Isaac hisself, a coming round the point now," exclaimed one of the fishermen.

The crowd turned and saw him. Isaac Thornycroft was approaching with a rapid step.

"They say Hunter is murdered!" he called out. "It cannot be."

"He is lying here, stiff and cold, Isaac, with a bullet in his head," was the sad reply of the justice. "Shot down from the heights above."

Isaac stooped in silence. His fair complexion and fine colour, heightened by the morning air, were something bright to look upon. But, as he gazed at that sadly disfigured form, yesterday so animate with life and health, a paleness as of the grave overspread his face; a shudder, which shook him from head to foot, passed through his frame.

"What brought him here--or on the plateau?" he asked. Almost the same words his father had used.

"What indeed!" repeated Mr. Thornycroft. "Did you tell me you saw him off, Isaac? Or was it Richard?"

"It was Cyril. I did not see him at all after he wished us good-bye on leaving the dining-room. But Richard, when he joined me later in the evening, said he had been--had been," repeated Isaac, having rather hesitated at these words, "saying a parting word to Hunter, and that Cyril was walking part of the way with him."

Throwing a pocket handkerchief lightly over the disfigured face, Isaac Thornycroft turned from it towards the sea. The justice spoke.

"I wonder where Cyril left him?"

To wonder it was only natural, but Mr. Thornycroft's remembrances of the matter, as to what he had heard, were altogether hazy. Shut up so long in the dining-room with his guests--for they had not parted until past midnight--doing his part as host at the pipes and grog, though not very extensively, for it was rare indeed that Mr. Thornycroft took too much, he was in a tired, sleepy state when Isaac had come to him after their departure to say that the work was done, the cargo safely in. Isaac had added that he understood from Richard there had been some trouble with Hunter; who had seen the torch-light exhibited on the Half-moon beach, and Richard had been obliged to swear him to secrecy, and had sent Cyril to see him safe away. Of all this, the justice retained an indistinct remembrance.

"Yes," he said slowly, "I recollect now; it was Cyril that you said, Isaac. We must go and find Cyril, and ascertain where he parted with Hunter."

"Why!" suddenly exclaimed a young fisherman of the name of East, "I saw them both together last night; the gentleman and Mr. Cyril. I'd been down at my old mother's and was coming out to go home, when they passed, a walking in the middle of the road. I'd never have noticed 'em, may be, but for the fur coat, for they'd got some way ahead. I see them stop and stand together like, and shake hands as if they was about to part; and then they went on again."

"Both of them went on again?" questioned Isaac. "Yes, sir, both. They went on into the hollow, and I came away."

This young man's mother lived in a solitary hut at the end of the village: in fact, just where Cyril had proposed to leave Hunter, and East must have come out at the same moment.

"We'll go at once and see what Cyril says," resumed the justice, moving away. "Hunter must have come back with him."

"What is to be done with Mr. Hunter, sir?" questioned Tomlett, who had some sort of authority in the place. It did seem like a mockery to call that poor mass of death lying there "Mr. Hunter."

He must be taken to the Mermaid, was the reply of Justice Thornycroft, as he left the beach with his son and three or four friends. "You had better come up and see Pettipher: he'll know what's right to be done. Don't be all the morning about it, Tomlett, or you will have the tide over the path."

Anything for more excitement in a moment like the present! Tomlett, following closely on the steps of Justice Thornycroft, went away with a fleet foot on his errand to the Mermaid, and the whole lot of hearers went racing after him: leaving Captain Copp, who could not race, and Mr. Supervisor Kyne to keep guard over the dead. Her Majesty's officer might have gone with the rest, but that he was in a brown study.

"There's more in this than meets the eye, captain," he began, rousing himself "If this has not been the work of smugglers, my name's not John Kyne."

"Smugglers be shivered!" returned Captain Copp, who it was pretty well suspected in the village obtained his spirits and tobacco without any trouble to her majesty's revenue: as did others. "There are no smugglers here, Mr. Officer. And if there were, what should they want with murdering Robert Hunter?"

"I have been on the work and watch for weeks, captain, and I know there is smuggling carried on; and to a deuced pretty extent."

"We are rich enough to buy our own brandy and pay duty on it, Mr. Supervisor," wrathfully retorted the offended captain.

"Oh, psha! I am not looking after the paltry dabs of brandy they bring ashore," returned the customs' officer. "One may as well try to wash a blackamoor white as to stop that. I look after booty of more consequence. There are cargoes of dry goods run here; foreign lace at a guinea a yard."

"My eye!" ejaculated Captain Copp in amazement, who was willing enough to hear the suspicions, now he found they did not point to anything likely to affect his comfort. "Where do they run them to?"

"They run them here, as I believe; here on the Half-moon; and I suspect they must have a hiding-place somewhere in these rocks."

To describe the intense wonder depicted on the face of the ex-merchant captain would be impossible. It ended in a laugh of incredulity, anything but flattering to his hearer.

"I could swear it," persisted the supervisor. "There! Only a few days ago, I was telling my suspicions to this poor fellow"--glancing over his shoulder--"and he offered to help me ferret out the matter. He came down with me here, examined the rocks, sounded them (he was an engineer, as perhaps you know), and appointed a further hunt for the next day. I never saw a man more interested, or more eager to pounce on the offenders. But before the next day arrived I happened to meet him, and he said he must apologize for not keeping his promise, but he preferred not to interfere further. When I pressed him for his reason he only hemmed and ha-ed, and said that, being a stranger, the neighbourhood might deem his doing so an impertinence. Which of course was sheer rubbish."

Captain Copp, rather slow at taking in ideas, began considering what his own opinion was. The supervisor went on, his tone impressive.

"Now, captain, it is my firm belief that this sudden change and Mr. Hunter's constrained manner, were caused by his having received some private hint from the smugglers themselves not to aid me in my search; and that it is nobody but they who have put it out of his power to do so."

"Whew!" whistled the staggered captain. "I could make more of a sinking ship than of what you say. Who are the smugglers? How did they find out he was going to interfere--unless he or you sent 'em word?"

"I don't know how they found it out. The affair is a mystery from beginning to end. Nobody was present at the conversation except Miss Thornycroft. And she cannot be suspected of holding communication with smugglers."

"This young fellow was a sweetheart of hers--eh?" cried the shrewd captain.

"I don't know anything about that. They seemed intimate. I could almost swear Old Nick has to do with this smuggling business," added the supervisor, earnestly. "A fortnight ago there was a dinner at the Red Court--you were there, by-the-way."

"A jolly spread the old justice gave us! Prime drink and cigars," chimed in the salt tar.

"Well--I was there: and one can't be in two places at once. That very evening they managed to run their cargo; ran it on, as I suspect, to this identical spot, sir," cried the disconcerted officer, warming with his grievance. "Vexed enough I was, and never once have I been off the watch since. Every night have I took up my station on that cursed damp plateau overhead, my stomach stretched on the ground, to keep myself dark, and just half an eye cocked out over the cliff--and all to no purpose. Last night, Sunday, I went in again to dine with the hospitable justice, and I'll be--I'll be shivered, sir, as you sometimes say, if they did not take advantage of it, and run another cargo!"

Never, since the memorable time of his encounter with the pirates which resulted in the disabling him for life, had Captain Copp been so struck--dumb, as it were. Nothing was left of him but amazement.

"Bless and save my wooden leg!" he exclaimed, when his tongue was found--"it is unbelievable. How do you know it?"

"I know it, and that's enough," replied Mr. Kyne, too much annoyed to stand upon politeness, or to explain that his boasted knowledge was assumed; not proved. "But, here's the devil of the thing," he continued--"how did the smugglers know I was off the watch those two particular nights? If it got wind the first night that I should be engaged at the Red Court--though I don't believe it did, for I can keep my own counsel, and did then--it could not have got wind the second. Five minutes before I went there last night, I had no notion whatever of going. Mr. Isaac looked into my rooms just before six, and would walk me off with him. I had had my chop at one o'clock, and was going to think about tea. Now how could the wretches have known last night that I was not on duty?"

"It's no good appealing to me, how," returned the captain. "I never was 'cute at breaking up marvels. Once, in the Pacific, there was a great big thing haunted the ship, bigger than the biggest sea-serpent, and--"

"Depend upon it we have traitors in the camp," unceremoniously interrupted the supervisor; for he knew by experience that when once Captain Copp was fairly launched upon that old marvel of the Pacific ocean, there was no stopping him. "Traitors round about us, at our very elbows and hearths, if we only knew in which direction to look for them."

"Well, I am not one," said the captain, "so you need not look after me. A pretty figure my wooden standard would cut, running smuggled goods! Why didn't you tell all this to Justice Thornycroft? He's the proper person. He's a magistrate."

"I know he is. But if I introduce a word about smugglers he throws cold water on it directly, and ridicules all I say. Once he quite rose up against me, all his bristles on end, in defence of the poor fishermen. Upon that, I hinted that I was not alluding to poor fishermen, but to people and transactions of far greater importance. It stirred up his anger beyond everything; he was barely civil, and turned away telling me to find the people and catch 'em, if I could find 'em; but not to apply to him."

"Well, that's reasonable," said Captain Copp. "Why don't you find 'em?"

"Because I can't find 'em," deplored the miserable officer. "There's the aggravation. I don't know in what quarter to look for them. The thing is like magic; it's altogether shrouded in mystery. I don't choose to speak of it publicly, or I might defeat the chance of discovery; the only time I did speak of it, was to Mr. Hunter, and got sympathy and aid offered and returned to me. You see what has come of that."

It was only too evident what he thought had come of it. And perhaps he was not far wrong. But for that recent morning's unlucky conversation between him and Robert Hunter, no dead man might have been lying on the Half-moon beach, with Isaac Thornycroft's handkerchief covering his face.

"Yes, that's the difficulty--where to look for them," resumed the mortified supervisor. "I cannot suspect any of the superior people in the neighbourhood. It's true I do not know much of those Connaughts. But they don't seem like smugglers either."

"The Connaughts!" roared out the captain, taking up their cause as a personal offence. "Why don't you say it's me? Why don't you say it's yourself? The Connaughts! Who next, Mr. Supervisor? Why, old Connaught is bedridden half his time, and the son has got his eyes strained on books all day, learning to be a parson."

"That's true," grumbled the officer, in his miserable incertitude. "All I know is, I can't fathom the affair, worry over it as I will."

"Here comes the plank," interrupted the captain. "I shan't stop to see that moved: so good morning to you, sir."

He stumped off, mortally offended; and met Tomlett and the landlord of the Mermaid inn, with the long queue of curious idlers behind them.