nd his victims for ever."

The old man was speaking slowly now, with a steady yet despairing
ferocity that was terrible to hear. His sunken eyes gleamed in their
sockets, and his hands, that were tightly clinched over the handle of
his axe, trembled with the emotion that had him in its clutches.

"I was sent upon a mission by my master. I was absent from my home some
seven days. When I came back my boy was gone. I had left him in the care
of the keeper of the hounds. He was an honest man, and told me all the
tale. Perchance you know that Sir Hugh Vavasour is what men call a
spendthrift. His estates will not supply him with the money he needs. He
is always in debt, he is always in difficulties. From that it comes that
he cares little what manner of men are his comrades or friends, provided
only that they can supply his needs when his own means fail. This is
why, when all men else hate and loathe the very name of Sanghurst, he
calls himself their friend. He knows that the old man has the secret by
which all things may be turned into gold, and therefore he welcomes his
son to Woodcrych. And men say that Mistress Joan is to be given in
marriage to his son one day, because he will take her without dowry; for
she is the fairest creature in the world, and he has vowed that she
shall wed him and none else."

The brothers were intensely interested by this tale, but were growing a
little confused by all the names introduced, and they wanted the story
of the woodman's son complete.

"Then was it the old man who took your boy, or was it his son? Are they
not both called Peter?"

"Ay, they have both the same name -- the same name and the same nature:
evil, cruel, remorseless. I know not how nor where the old man first set
eyes upon my boy; but he must have seen him, and have coveted possession
of him for his devilish practices; for upon the week that I was absent
from home, he left the solitude of his house, and came with the master
himself to the house where the boy was. And then Sir Hugh explained to
honest Stephen, who had charge of him, that Master Peter Sanghurst had
offered the lad a place in his service, where he would learn many things
that would stand him in good stead all the days of his life. It sounded
fair in all faith. But Stephen stoutly refused to let the boy go till I
returned; whereupon Sir Hugh struck him a blow across the face with his
heavy whip, and young Peter Sanghurst, leaping to the ground, seized the