“Why, Will Laud, the smuggler. Don’t you know him, Robin?”
“Yes; but I never knew that he was dead.”
“Oh, yes, he’s dead enough. I saw a fellow who told me he helped to bury him in the sands at the foot of the cliff.”
“Then the foul fiend has brought him back to life again, for I have seen him many times; and I spoke to him this very night, and he to me. Not only so, I know him well; and I wish all the fiends had him before he had given that brave lad his death-blow.”
“What! Will Laud? you do not mean to say Will Laud was on the shore to-night?”
“Ask Margaret Catchpole: she can tell you as much as I.”
Margaret returned just as this was said; and Will Simpson, perhaps as much in spite (for Margaret had upon some occasion of his rudeness given him such a specimen of her dexterity with a frying-pan, as left a memorial on his head not easily to be forgotten or forgiven) as for inquisitiveness, put this question—
“I say, Peggy, who met you upon the shore to-night, eh?”
“What’s that to you? A better man than you.”
“Perhaps a better Will, too; eh, Peggy? One who will have his will of you, too, before you die, and tame you, my dear.”