me, I should think.
Orders, indeed!--from an agent! I wonder what the last Squire of
Scarhaven would have said to a proposition like that? Mr.
Copplestone--you've punished that bad old man quite sufficiently. Will
you open the gate for me--and we'll go on our way."

The girl spoke with so much decision that Copplestone moved away from
Chatfield, who struggled to his feet, muttering words that sounded very
much like smothered curses.

"I'll have the law on you!" he growled, shaking his fist at Copplestone.
"Before this day's out, I'll have the law!"

"Sooner the better," retorted Copplestone. "Nothing will please me so
much as to tell the local magistrates precisely what you said to your
master's kinswoman. You know where I'm to be found--and there," he
added, throwing a card at the agent's feet, "there you'll find my
permanent address."

"Give me my walking-stick!" demanded Chatfield.

"Not I!" exclaimed Copplestone. "That's mine, my good man, by right of
conquest. You can summon me, or arrest me, if you like, for stealing it."

He opened the wicket-gate for Audrey, and together they passed through,
skirted the walls of the ruins, and went away into the higher portion of
the woods. Once there the girl laughed.

"Now there'll be another row!" she said. "Between master and man
this time."

"I think not!" observed Copplestone, with unusual emphasis. "For the
master is afraid of the man."

"Ah!--but which is master and which is man?" asked Audrey in a low voice.

Copplestone stopped and looked narrowly at her.

"Oh?" he said quietly, "so you've seen that?"

"Does it need much observation?" she replied. "My mother and I have known
for some time that Marston Greyle is entirely under Peter Chatfield's
thumb. He daren't do anything--save by Chatfield's permission."

Copplestone walked on a few yards, ruminating.

"Why!" he asked suddenly.

"How do we know?" retorted Audrey.

"Well, in cases like that," said Copplestone, "it generally means that
one man has a hold on the other. What hold can Chatfield have on your
cousin? I understand Mr. Marston Greyle came straight to his inheritance
from America. So what could Chatfield know of him--to have any hold?"

"Oh, I don't know--and I don't care--much," replied Audrey, as they
passed out of the woods on to the headlands beyond. "Never mind all
that--here's the sea and the open sky--hang Chatfield, and Marston, too!
As we can't see the Keep, let's enjoy ourselves