d not be tempted to come and visit
him at Basset Cottage.

"Oh, Wenna," said he carelessly to her next morning, "Mrs. Trelyon told
me she had asked you to go up there to-morrow evening."

"Yes," Wenna said, looking rather uncomfortable. Then she added quickly,
"Would it displease you if I did not go? I ought to be at a children's
party at Mr. Trewhella's."

This was precisely what Mr. Roscorla wanted; but he said, "You must not
be shy, Wenna. However, please yourself: you need have no fear of vexing
me. But I must go, for the Weekeses are old friends of mine."

"They stayed at the inn two or three days in May last," said Wenna
innocently. "They came here by chance, and found Mrs. Trelyon from
home."

Mr. Roscorla seemed startled. "Oh!" said he. "Did they--did they--ask
for me?"

"Yes, I believe they did," Wenna said.

"Then you told them," said Mr. Roscorla with a pleasant smile--"you told
them, of course, why you were the best person in the world to give them
information about me?"

"Oh dear, no!" said Wenna, blushing hotly: "they spoke to Jennifer."

Mr. Roscorla felt himself rebuked. It was George Rosewarne's express
wish that his daughters should not be approached by strangers visiting
the inn as if they were officially connected with the place: Mr.
Roscorla should have remembered that inquiries would be made of a
servant.

But, as it happened, Sir Percy and his wife had really made the
acquaintance of both Wenna and Mabyn on their chance visit to
Eglosilyan; and it was of these two girls they were speaking when Mr.
Roscorla was announced in Mrs. Trelyon's drawing-room the following
evening. The thin, wiry, white-moustached old man, who had wonderfully
bright eyes and a great vivacity of spirits for a veteran of
seventy-four, was standing in front of the fire, and declaring to
everybody that two such well-accomplished, smart, talkative and
lady-like young women he had never met with in his life: "What did you
say the name was, my dear Mrs. Trelyon? Rosewarne, eh?--Rosewarne? A
good old Cornish name--as good as yours, Roscorla. So they're called
Rosewarne? Gad! if her ladyship wants to appoint a successor, I'm
willing to let her choice fall on one of those two girls."

Her ladyship, a dark and silent old woman of eighty, did not like, in
the first place, to be called her ladyship, and did not relish, either,
having her death talked of as a joke.

"Roscorla, now--Roscorla, there's a good chance for you