n Heaven behear us! . . . Whose money be this, an'
where dropped from?"

"There piles of it--" panted 'Beida.

"Lashin's of it--" echoed 'Bert.

"An' it all belongs to Mr Nanjivell, that we used to call Nicky-Nan,
an' wonder if we could get a pair o' father's old trousers on to him
with a little tact--an' him all the while as rich as Squire
Tresawna!"

"--Rich as Squire Tresawna an' holy Solomon rolled into one,"
corroborated 'Bert, nodding vigorously. "Pinch it 'tween your
fingers, mother, if you won't believe."

But to her children's consternation Mrs Penhaligon, after a swift
glance at the gold, turned about on Nicky-Nan as he backed
shamefacedly to the doorway, and opened on him the vials of
unintelligible fury.

"What d'ee mean by it?" she demanded. "As if I hadn' suffered enough
in mind a'ready, but you must come pokin' money into my oven and
atween me an' my children! Be you mad, or only wicked? Or is it
witchcraft you'd be layin' on us? . . . Take up your gold, however
you came by it, an' fetch your shadow off my doorstep, or I'll--"
She advanced on poor Nicky-Nan, who backed out to the side gate and
into the lane before her wrath, and found himself of a sudden taken
on both flanks: on the one by Mrs Climoe, who had spied upon his
visit and found her malicious curiosity too much for her; on the
other by gentle old Mr Hambly returning from a stroll along the
cliffs.

"Hullo! Tut--tut--what is this?" exclaimed Mr Hambly.
"A neighbours' quarrel, and between folks I know to be so
respectworthy? . . . Oh, come now--come, good souls!"

"A little nigher than naybours, Minister," put in Mrs Climoe.
"That is if you had eyes an' ears in your head."

Nicky-Nan swung about on her: but she rested a hand on either hip and
was continuing. "'Naybours,' you said, sir? 'Naybours'?
Him accused by public talk for a German spy--"

"Hush, Mrs Climoe! Of all the Commandments, ma'am, the one most in
lack of observance hereabouts, to my observation, is that which
forbids bearing false witness against a neighbour. To a charitable
mind that includes hasty witness."

"There's another, unless I disremember," snapped Mrs Climoe, "that
forbids 'ee to covet your naybour's wife."

While Mr Hambly sought for a gentle reproof for this, Mrs Penhaligon,
pale of face, rested a hand against her gate-post, and said she very
gently but in a white scorn--

"What is this talk of naybours, quarrelin' or comfortin' or
succourin