Had Mr. Norcot heard the conversation which he interrupted between John Lee and Grace, it must have amazed him exceedingly and reminded him of his lady\'s youth and inexperience.

Those most concerned knew nothing of the relation that now obtained between Grace and her servant, for that a daughter of his could look upon a groom was an idea beyond the wildest mental flight of Maurice Malherb; but humbler folks found themselves not wholly ignorant of recent developments. Harvey Woodman had hinted to his wife that the girl spent a great deal of her time in riding with miser Lee\'s grandson, and Mary Woodman murmured in secret upon this unquiet theme with Dinah Beer. The question in their minds related to Mrs. Malherb.

"Ought us to tell her?" asked Mary. "Such a good, high-minded lady as her be. An\' Miss Gracie—so promising as a March calf, bless her."

"\'Tis a hard thing. I\'ve nought against the boy for my part either," declared Dinah. "He\'s civil an\' smart, an\' his face would soften a stone. But they\'m both young, an\', loramercy! what Nature teaches boys an\' girls ban\'t wisdom, for sartain! Mr. Norcot will never come it over her, for she hates him. Her told me once, when I catched her crying all alone, poor maiden, that she couldn\'t abide his shadow, an\' when I said as her parents knowed best about it, she talked treason wi\' the fire in her cheeks. \'Love can\'t be made to order,\' her said; an\' when I telled something about her duty, she cut me short an\' axed, \'Do you love your Richard, Dinah?\' \'Ess fay!\' I sez. \'An\' if your faither an\' mother had told you to marry some person else—what then?\' she sez. \'There, Miss, let me get to my work,\' I answered her; but the truth—I couldn\'t tell it: that me an\' Dick runned an\' got married against faither\'s orders, as meant for me to take a cordwainer to Tavistock."

"Shall we tell Kekewich?" suggested Mrs. Woodman. "For all his wickedness he\'d never do an unwitty thing. He\'s terrible wise—not after the event, when us all be—but in time."

"I couldn\'t," declared Dinah. "It do always bring a cloud to my heart when I see his pain-stained face—such a prophet of evil as he be."

"He never promises any good to anybody, so he\'s always right," answered Mrs. Woodman, who was in a pessimistic vein.

"My husband don\'t like him, no more don\'t I," replied the other woman. "Don\'t say nought to him—a baggering old Job\'s comforter. He\'d get John Lee turned off without a character. Us have right an\' reason to trust Miss Grace in such a thing. Only I do wish the proper one would turn up. She never sees a young man but him."

"A terrible pretty chap—Lee, I mean. Have \'e noticed how mincing he gets in\'s speech?"

"Dick an\' your husband was laughing at him for it last night. He picks it up from Miss Grace."

"Which shows they must have a lot to say to one another."

Dinah nodded, and with an uneasy sense of guilt changed the conversation. But the truth was in fact nearer their suspicions than they guessed, and Grace Malherb, by slow degrees, had come to make a close friend and confidant of John Lee. He possessed other charms than beauty, for his mind was simple; his heart was generous; his disposition kindly. Romance and some mystery hovered round him; and Grace, left much to her own devices, found the groom too often in her mind, his voice too often upon her ear.

A critical conversation fell out between them upon the day of Norcot\'s return to Fox Tor Farm. For three months Lee had now served his new master, and attended Grace to all parts of the Moor. Sometimes Mr. Malherb accompanied these expeditions, and generally he superintended Grace\'s hurdle practice, for she was to hunt during the coming season; but the father did not always find himself at leisure to follow this pleasant task, and Lee, whose first duty was to wait upon Miss Malherb, went far afield with her alone.

From indifference Grace woke to pleasure at his delicate and refined nature. She encouraged him to talk, and presently heard as much of his scanty story as he himself knew. The narrative fired her imagination, and lent him a romantic interest to her mind. Gradually she divulged a few of her own secrets, and the less he apparently desired to know, the more she found herself telling him. His courteous reserve even piqued her upon occasion. Once she quarrelled with him, and bade him retire. But her apology upon the following day, brought him quickly to her side.

"\'Twas not indifference, God knows, Miss Grace," he told her. "I held back for fear I might seem too forward in your affairs. Every breath you draw is a thing of account to me. I do know by the very light in your eyes whither your thoughts be tending—up or down. An\' I\'m loth to call Mr. Norcot into your mind; for his name brings a shadow over your face, like a cloud across noon sunshine."

"I thought you yawned yesterday, John, when I mentioned him. That is what angered me."

"\'Yawned\'! I\'ve never yawned since I knowed you."

"Since you knew me, John. You are so slow to mend that weak ending of the past tense. \'Tis a part of Devon speech—a thing in their blood—but not in yours."

"I wish I knew all that was in my blood," he answered.

"You will some day. Light will come. Sometimes I think old Lovey stole you, as gipsies steal little children. \'Tis monstrous to suppose that you are kin of hers."

"Not so; her daughter was my dear good mother without a doubt."

"\'Tis strange how a man\'s heart warms to the very name of his mother, though he has never known her," said Grace.

"Mine does, but I can only remember a white face and great frightened eyes that belonged to her. And when I ask my granddam for my father, she laughs—that laugh like tin beating on tin—and tells me to look in the river and I\'ll see him."

"He was a very handsome man then. You\'ve got about the most beautiful ears I ever saw on anybody."

She spoke in a pensive and a critical tone with her eyes lifted to the hills, as though she spoke to them.

"Good Lord, Miss Grace. Have I?"

And so they talked and daily drifted nearer danger. A conversation of moment happened between them concerning Lovey Lee. John ransacked his memory for Grace\'s benefit and told her of early recollections, of his mother\'s funeral, of his arrival with Mrs. Lee at Siward\'s Cross when a child, and of his first labours upon the Moor.

"I had to collect the lichen of which they make dyes," he said; "then I went wool-gathering, and grew very clever at setting briars in the sheep-tracks. Later I learned to plait rexens, or rushes as I should call \'em; then a man taught me how to ride. And as I grew and got sense, my grandmother became a greater wonder and mystery to me. She lived two lives, and of one I knew nothing. Oftentimes I found that she went abroad by night. Lying in my straw near the cattle, with their sweet breath coming to me, I\'d wake and see light in the slits of the boards overhead where Granny slept. Then she would dout the flame—put it out, I mean—and the boards would creak and she\'d come down the ladder and go out into the night. \'Twas moonlight she always chose, and once, when I was a bit of a lad, up home twelve years old, I reckoned I\'d follow after and see what \'twas that took her off so secret when all things slept. But \'twas a poor thought for me. I followed \'pon a summer night in staring moonlight; and half a mile from Fox Tor, under which she went, my foot slipped where I was sneaking along a hundred yards behind her and I fell into a bog. She heard me splash out of it, and afore I could crouch down and hide, her cat\'s eyes had marked me and she turned and catched me, breathless an\' soaking wet to the waist."

"Alack, John! And what did she do?" asked the girl, reining up her horse to hear his answer.

"Well, \'tisn\'t too strong a word to say that she very nearly knocked the life out of me. She changed from a woman into a demon. She screamed like to a horrid vampire, and clapper-clawed me from head to foot. \'You\'d spy, you li\'l devil!\' she said. \'I\'ll larn you to peep \'pon my doings; I\'ll tear your liver out, I\'ll——\' Then under her blows I went off fainty, an\' she scratched me like a cat-a-mountain, an\', no doubt, left me for dead. I was only a little boy, of course, and she was just the same as she is now, only six years stronger. When I come to again she\'d gone; but I thought I\'d waked to die, for there was a dreadful bitter pang in my breast. I crawled back to the cottage somehow, and next day, when she was out of the way, I caught a donkey she had, and got up to Prince Town. The doctor at the prison by good fortune passed me as I came, and I made bold to tell him I was ill, and he had a look at me and said two of my ribs were broken. They kept me at a cottage up there, where Granny was known, and \'twas a round six weeks afore I went back to her. Then first thing she said was that she\'d kill me and salt me down in her snail barrel if ever I spied on her again; so you may be sure I never did."

The story fascinated Grace.

"How you must have suffered! But to think of the secrets that horrid old woman has hidden! It makes my mouth water, John. Father believes that she knows all about the Malherb amphora—the priceless glass vase that vanished, you know—and I believe she knows all about you. These things must be discovered; and \'twill be your task to find them out, John Lee."

"Ah! if I could find my father. But that\'s a search I\'m almost fearful to make. I——"

He ............