“I I,” said L'Estrange, smiling, “remarked nothing! there is not a less observant fellow breathing.”
“If it were not for those words about the parish registry, George,” said the other, in a grave tone, “I 'd carry a light heart about all this; I'd take my father's version of this fellow, whoever he is, and believe him to be an impostor; but I don't like the notion of foul play, and it does mean foul play.”
L'Estrange was silent, and for some minutes neither spoke.
“When my father,” said Augustus—and there was a tone of bitterness now in his voice—“when my father drew that comparison between himself and his sons, he may have been flattering his superior intellect at the expense of some other quality.”
Another and a longer pause succeeded.
At last L'Estrange spoke:—
“I have been running over in my head all that could bear upon this matter, and now I remember a couple of weeks ago that Longworth, who came with a French friend of his to pass an evening at the cottage, led me to talk of the parish church and its history; he asked me if it had not been burnt by the rebels in '98, and seemed surprised when I said it was only the vestry-room and the books that had been destroyed. 'Was not that strange?' asked he; 'did the insurgents usually interest themselves about parochial records?' I felt a something like a sneer in the question, and made him no reply.”
“And who was the Frenchman?”
“A certain Count Pracontal, whom Longworth met in Upper Egypt. By the way, he was the man Jack led over the high bank, where the poor fellow's leg was broken.”
“I remember; he, of course, has no part in the story we are now discussing. Longworth may possibly know something. Are you intimate with him?”