"But it's useless speculating," he mused. "I can't do anything—and here
I am, with nothing to do!"
He had pleaded an engagement, but he had none, of course. There was a shelf of old books in the room, but he did not care to read. And presently, hands in pockets, he lounged out into the hall and saw Mrs. Wooler standing at the door of the little parlour into which she had shown him and Stafford earlier in the day.
"There's nobody in here, sir," she said, invitingly; "if you'd like to smoke your pipe here—"
"Thank you—I will," answered Copplestone. "I got rid of that old fellow," he observed confidentially when he had followed the landlady within, and had dropped into a chair near her own. "I think he had come—fishing."
"That's his usual occupation," said Mrs. Wooler, with a meaning smile. "I told you he was called Peeping Peter. He's the sort of man who will have his nose in everybody's affairs. But," she added, with a shake of the head which seemed to mean a good deal more than the smile, "he doesn't often come here. This is almost the only house in Scarhaven that doesn't belong to the Greyle estate. This house, and the land round it, have belonged to the Wooler family as long as the rest of the place has belonged to the Greyles. And many a Greyle has wanted to buy it, and every Wooler has refused to sell it—and always will!"
"That's very interesting," said Copplestone. "Does the present Greyle want to buy?"
The landlady picked up a piece of sewing and sat down in a chair which seemed to be purposely placed so that she could keep an eye on the adjacent bar-parlour on one side and the hall on the other.
"I don't know much about what the present Squire would like," she said. "Nobody does. He's a newcomer, and nobody knows anything about him. You saw him this afternoon?"
"I met a young lady on the sands who turned out to be his cousin, and he came up while I was talking to her," replied Copplestone. "Yes, I saw him. I'm afraid Mr. Stafford, who came in here with me, you know, offended him," he continued, and gave Mrs. Wooler an account of what had happened. "Is he rather—touchy?" he concluded.
"I don't know that he is," she said. "No one sees much of him. You see he's a stranger: although he's a Greyle, he's not a Scarhaven man. Of course, I know all his family history—I'm Scarhaven born and bred. In my time there have been three generations of Greyles. The first one I knew was this Squire's grandfather, old Mr. Stephen Greyle: he died when I was a girl in my 'teens. He had three sons and no daughters. The three sons were all different in their tastes and ideas; the eldest, Stephen John, who came into the estates on his father's death, was a real home bird—he never left Scarhaven for more than a day or two at a time all his life. And he never married—he was a real old bachelor, almost a woman-hater. The next one, Marcus, went out to America and settled there—he was the father of this present Squire, Mr. Marston Greyle. Then there was the third son, Valentine—he went to live in London. And years after he came back here, very poor, and settled down in a little house near Scarhaven Church with his wife and daughter—that was the daughter you met this afternoon, Miss Audrey. I don't know why, and nobody else knows, either, but the last Squire, Stephen John, never had anything to do with Valentine and his family; what's more, when Valentine died and left the widow and daughter very poorly off, Stephen John did nothing for them. But he himself died very soon after Valentine, and then of course, as Marcus had already died in America, everything came to this Mr. Marston. And, as I said, he's a stranger to Scarhaven folk and Scarhaven ways. Indeed, you might say to England and English ways, for I understand he'd never been in England until he came to take up the family property."