"Well, well. That is all right," responded the fisherman, his look brightening. "If he sees Mrs. Culpepper first, she'll tell him what to do."
A sudden light broke upon Smeaton's mind. "Pray was it Mrs. Culpepper," he said, "who directed you to come to my rescue?"
The old man laughed.
"You are quite under a mistake, sir," he said. "None of us came to your rescue. We know nothing about it. Ask any man in the place, and he'll tell you the same. There has not been one of them a couple of hundred yards from the place to-night."
A sly smile contradicted his words, and Smeaton, comprehending the truth, answered laughingly:
"Nevertheless, Master Grayling, there is a great streak of scot, or some black stuff, all the way down your cheek."
"The devil there is!" cried the man, starting up, and walking with the candle to a little looking-glass that hung against the wall. "Here, mother, give us a tuft of oakum." And, having got what he demanded, he rubbed his weather-beaten cheek hard, and then threw the oakum into the fire.
"It is a rule here, sir," he said, "never to speak of anything that we do beyond the cross-road; and it is a good rule too; so neither you nor any one else will get anything out of us, ask what questions you will. Sir John is a keen hand, and he tried it more than once at first; but he could make nothing of it, for we all know that a man's greatest enemy is his own tongue. You could not make that little child there blab, I'll be bound. But I dare say you know that Mrs. Culpepper has a brother and two nephews living over at Keanton; good solid men they are, who know how to held their tongues too, and that is all I shall say upon the subject. So now, sir, if you like to have a glass of Geneva and some broiled fish, we'll have our supper."
Smeaton explained that he had supped already, and the old man, lighting a fresh candle, conducted him up the stairs to his bed-room. When they were in it and the door shut, he put down the light and said: "You won't be very comfortable here, sir, but you'll be very safe, and I'll tell you how to manage. But, mind you, I'm going to put myself a bit in your power; so you must keep my secret as well as I'll keep yours. That window there looks up the hill; but nobody can come down that way, and from it you can see all the way up the path by what they call the blind man's well. Then look here. Underneath that bed, three of the planks lift up, altogether. They play upon a pivot; so you have nothing to do but put your knife under, and lift them as I do now. There, you see, is the top of a ladder, going down into our storehouse, as we call it, though old mother Grayling will call it my hiding-hole. If you get notice that anybody is coming, you have nothing to do but to go down there, shut the trap after you, and push in the bolt. Light enough enters through the chinks for you to see in the day-time; but don't take a candle in, and mind you don't tumble over the bales and other things."
"Is it cut in the rock?" asked Smeaton.