sir, if you please," said Edward sternly, as he pulled the little
boat up to the edge of the breakwater. A vision of Mrs. Thomas shot into
Owen's mind. If the boatman did not believe in him, what chance had he
with the housekeeper? He wished he had brought the lawyer down with him,
and then he wished that he was back in the sugar brig.

"Now, sir," said Edward still more sternly, putting down his hesitation
to an impostor's consciousness of guilt.

"Um!" said Owen to the young lady, "I beg your pardon. I don't even know
your name, and I am sure I have no right to ask it, but would you mind
rowing across with me? It would be so kind of you; you might introduce
me to the housekeeper."

Again Beatrice laughed the merry laugh of girlhood; she was too young to
be conscious of any impropriety in the situation, and indeed there was
none. But her sense of humour told her that it was funny, and she became
possessed with a not unnatural curiosity to see the thing out.

"Oh, very well," she said, "I will come."

The boat was pushed off and very soon they reached the stone quay that
bordered the harbour of the Castle, about which a little village of
retainers had grown up. Seeing the boat arrive, some of these people
sauntered out of the cottages, and then, thinking that a visitor had
come, under the guidance of Miss Beatrice, to look at the antiquities
of the Castle, which was the show place of the neighbourhood, sauntered
back again. Then the pair began the zigzag ascent of the rock mountain,
till at last they stood beneath the mighty mass of building, which,
although it was hoary with antiquity, was by no means lacking in the
comforts of modern civilization, the water, for instance, being brought
in pipes laid beneath the sea from a mountain top two miles away on the
mainland.

"Isn't there a view here?" said Beatrice, pointing to the vast stretch
of land and sea. "I think, Mr. Davies, that you have the most beautiful
house in the whole world. Your great-uncle, who died a year ago, spent
more than fifty thousand pounds on repairing and refurbishing it, they
say. He built the big drawing-room there, where the stone is a little
lighter; it is fifty-five feet long. Just think, fifty thousand pounds!"

"It is a large sum," said Owen, in an unimaginative sort of way, while
in his heart he wondered what on earth he should do with this white
elephant of a mediaeval castle, and its drawing room fifty-five feet
long.

"He does