o shouted.

"Where did he come from?" said the lieutenant. "Anybody see him put
off?"

"No, sir! No, sir!" came from all directions; and the lieutenant raised
his glass to sweep the coast.

"What do you want?" cried the man at the side as the boat came on, and
the lieutenant bade the man ask.

"Want?" shouted the lad, a sturdy-looking fellow with keen grey eyes and
fair close curly hair all about his sunburned forehead. "I've come
after our cow!"

CHAPTER THREE.

"How do, Sir Risdon?"

The speaker was a curious-looking man of fifty, rough, sunburned, and
evidently as keen as a well-worn knife. He was dressed like a farmer
who had taken to fishing or like a fisherman who had taken to farming,
and his nautical appearance seemed strange to a man who was leading a
very meditative grey horse attached to a heavy cart, made more weighty
by the greatcoat of caked mud the vehicle wore.

He had been leading the horse along what was called in Freestone a road,
though its only pretensions to being a road was that it led from
Shackle's farm to the fields which bordered the cliff, and consisted of
two deep channels made by the farm tumbril wheels, and a shallow track
formed by horses' hoofs, the said channels being more often full of
water than of mud, and boasting the quality of never even in the hottest
weather being dry.

The person Blenheim Shackle--farmer and fisher, in his canvas sailor's
breeches, big boots, striped shirt, and red tassel cap--had accosted,
was a tall, thin, aristocratic-looking gentleman, in a broad-skirted,
shabby brown velvet coat, who was daintily picking his way, cane in
hand, over the soft turf of the field, evidently deep in thought, but
sufficiently awake to what was around to make him stoop from time to
time to pick up a glistening white-topped mushroom, and transfer it to
one of his pockets with a satisfied smile.

"Ah, Master Shackle," he said, starting slightly on being addressed.
"Well, thank you. A lovely morning, indeed."

"Ay, the morning's right enough, Sir Risdon. Picking a few mushrooms,
sir?"

"I--er--yes, Master Shackle. I have picked a few," said the tall thin
gentleman, colouring slightly. "I--beg your pardon, Master Shackle, for
doing so. I ought to have asked your leave."

"Bah! Not a bit," said the fisher-farmer, with a chuckle. "You're
welcome, squire."

"I thank you, Master Shackle--I thank you warmly. You see her ladyship
is very fond of the taste