he time when I took Mr. Penryn to
Pennington, it was rumoured that Naomi had overcome her objection to
Nick Tresidder, and that, owing to her father's wishes, she had
consented to be his wife.

There seemed nothing that I could do, yet I would not go away; nay, I
could not. I was chained to St. Eve; and although I knew I was in danger
from Captain Jack and his gang, I heeded not. Tamsin Truscott, I
discovered, was slowly recovering, and it was to her, I suspect, that I
owed my safety.

I tried many times to gain an audience with Naomi's father, and in this
also I was unsuccessful. He refused to hold any intercourse with me, and
this embittered me all the more, because, even if he regarded me as the
merest stranger, I had tried to be a friend to him and his. I tried to
excuse him, and thus gain hope by saying that he was busily engaged in
the affairs of his estate; but all the same my heart was very weary and
sad in those days, especially as every one seemed to shun me. No one
would befriend me; no one gave me a kind or helpful word.

At that time all hopes of getting back Pennington died out of my heart.
Up to now I had comforted myself with the idea that I should at some
time obtain the means to fulfil the conditions of my grandfather's will.
Pennington was a valuable estate, and ignorant as I was, there seemed no
way of getting the money; for be it known, in those days money was
scarce in the country, none of the families for many miles around had
more than they needed, and even had I many friends among the so-called
wealthy, and had they been willing to advance the necessary money, I
doubt whether they could have done so. But I had no friends. Richard
Tresidder had poisoned the minds of all against me, so that the
possibility of my raising many thousands of pounds was out of the
question.

And what almost maddened me was the thought that John Penryn should have
so willingly played into the hands of my enemies, that he should so
easily have been deceived by those who were using him only as a means to
their own safety and aggrandisement.

Then one day a light came into my sky in the shape of a message from
Naomi's father, asking me to meet him in the copse above Granfer
Fraddam's cave. At first I suspected treachery, but I determined to go.
If any one had wanted to do me bodily harm plenty of chances had been
offered since I returned from my perilous adventure to the Scilly Isles.
Indeed, I did not much care what