"What do you mean, sir?" exclaimed his young hostess, looking at him for the first time with something like surprise, if not alarm. "How do you know she was like that? She has been dead for," and she counted rapidly on her fingers--"for one hundred and seventy years!"
"Miss Alderly," Reginald replied, "will you believe me if I tell you that I think I shall be able to throw some light upon your family history when I have heard it? I have something to tell you as well as to listen to."
"Then," said the girl, "your presence here is not due to accident. You have come purposely to this island in connection with the hidden wealth it is supposed to contain."
"Yes!" he said, "yes, I could not tell you an untruth. I have come purposely here to find out about that wealth. Believe me, my presence bodes no harm to you or yours, no deprivation of what belongs rightly to you."
"Oh!" she said, "how happy that will make father. But will you not tell me----"
"With your permission," he replied, "I will not tell you anything until you have told me your story. Then I will keep nothing back from you--I will, indeed, help you to recover that which has been sought for so long----"
"You know where it is?"
"I think so. I discovered the secret in England, and I came out here to dig----"
"But," she again interrupted, "if you discovered the secret, then this treasure is yours, not ours."
"No," he said hastily, "no; it would have been mine had I not found that there were people in existence who are more righteously entitled to it. Now I shall find it, if I can, for you. Pray continue your tale. When that is concluded I will begin mine."