inquire directly into the cause.

"By-the-by, Morton, you are a Shetlander, if I recollect rightly," he
exclaimed. "I have been lately among your people, and a kind-hearted,
hospitable race they are. Among other places I visited was Lunnasting
Castle, where I made the acquaintance of Sir Marcus Wardhill and his
daughter, a handsome person, though no longer young. He is a hale old
man, but somewhat eccentric, and rather morose, I suspect; has a bee in
his bonnet--that is the case with many of his family. There is a cousin
who lives there; not quite as old as Sir Marcus--a very odd fellow;
indeed, I should say decidedly mad. You may probably know something of
them?"

Ronald told him that he had been brought up in the castle.

"A relative of the family?" said the captain.

"I can scarcely be called so," said Morton humbly. "A distant one only,
on my mother's side. My father was about to take command of a
merchantman when he was pressed into the navy. He has remained in the
service ever since. He is now but a boatswain, but he is a man of whom
any son may be proud."

Ronald then told the captain all he knew of his father's early history,
and of the discovery of the two men who had carried him off.

"I understand the whole affair," exclaimed Lord Claymore, warmly. "With
all my heart I'll help you to clear it up. You will have plenty of
employment for your prize-money: the lawyers will take good care of
that; but never mind, we'll have enough for their maws, and to spare.
Sharks must be fed as well as other fish, you know. As to that Sir
Marcus Wardhill, I like him not. I should have little compunction about
sending him on his travels; but I was interested in his daughter, a
stately lady, still bearing the marks of great beauty; the Lady Hilda,
they call her."

"Yes, I used, as a boy, to think her very lovely," said Ronald, warmly.

"I may say she is so still," returned his captain. "But do you know,
Morton, there is something very strange about her; she talked to me in
the oddest way; inquired if I understood astrology, and would favour her
by working out her horoscope, and would inform her when the lost one
would return."

"She has been sorely tried," observed Ronald. "Her father and Lawrence
Brindister are but sorry companions for one so gifted; and the death of
her husband and loss of her child were blows she has never recovered."

Lord Claymore had not heard the circumstances of the case, and s