‘She told me his name,’ said Brion. ‘It was Matthew Fulk, and he was a sad miser. He has been dead a year and more now; but all during the latter half of his dwelling here she lived with him alone as his servant—only she and none other. This house had been his for twenty years, maybe; and in the first of that time there was a young maid, his niece, that abode with him. But her he murdered, and cast her body down the well in the well-house, and gave out that she had gone off with one of the rebel troopers that marched to the siege of Exeter in the time of the great riots.’
‘And why should she not have?’ The pupils of Clerivault’s eyes stared like a cat’s.
‘Because,’ said Brion, ‘after his death they would cleanse the well of its foulness, seeing the water had rotted there undrawn since the maid was lost; and in its slime were found bones—human bones, Clerivault.’
‘More liker some dog’s or sheep’s,’ said the other scornfully. ‘Why should he murder her?’
‘Because the devil whom he served asked a sacrifice of him.’
Clerivault snorted.
‘Ah, hold your peace! This is the very lunacy of superstition. I knew the man, Sir—was here with him on legal business four, or it may be five years ago, and plumbed his very soul. A gripping, sour-lidded curmudgeon: but murder! He feared the law too much. These be old wives’ tales, and she who utters them a potion-brewing witch. Give her no credit, I entreat you.’
Brion did not answer, pursuing his own train of thought.
‘Clerivault,’ said he in a little, ‘it must be long since my Uncle dwelt here.’
‘How?’ asked the other.