“Of course I do.”
It was quite a shock to me to find any one knew anything about my ruin, and it was some time before I ventured to ask—
“Would you tell it to me?”
Instead of saying “Yes,” the coastguardsman laid down his telescope, pulled a plug of tobacco out of his pocket, and, cutting off a small quid, put it into his mouth, looked up at the sail, shifted himself once or twice in his seat, and then, looking to see if I was ready, began—
“It’s not such a wonderful yarn after all, sir. You see, something like two hundred and fifty years ago, when our Civil Wars were going on—you’ve heard of them, I suppose?—yonder castle belonged to a stout Charles the First’s man called Fulke. He owned a good bit about this coast, I’m told, and the folk at the New Manor are sort of descendants. But direct descendants they can’t be, for Fulke only had one daughter, sir, and she never married. If it hadn’t been for those cruel wars she would have been married, though, for she was betrothed to a neighbour, young Morgan, who lived beyond that hill there, and mightily they loved one another too! Fulke, whose lands joined on Morgan’s, was pleased enough to have the two families united, and united they would have been to this day but for the Civil Wars. I’m no great hand at dates, sir, but it was somewheres about 1642 that things began to get unpleasant.
“One day, not long before the wedding was to be, Fulke and his daughter went over to Morgan Hall; and while the young folk spent the day love-making in the garden the two old folk sat and discussed the affairs of the nation in the house. And it’s safe to say the two out of doors agreed far better than the two indoors. For Morgan went with the Parliament, and told Fulke the King had no right to try and arrest the five members, and that the Parliament had done a fine thing in protecting them, and that if he’d been there he’d have called out against the King as loud as any of them. At that Fulke—who was a hot-headed man at best of times, and who went mad to hear any one say a word against the King—got up in a rage, and, taking his hat, stalked out into the garden, and taking his daughter by the arm marched away from Morgan Hall with never a word.
“It was a sad business. The young folks begged and the old Morgan sent a letter; but no, Fulke wouldn’t listen to one of them, and forbade his daughter to leave the castle.
“Whether the lovers saw one another after that I don’t know, but almost directly after the war blazed out and the whole country went mad. Morgan and his son had to leave these parts, and took arms under the Parliament, while Fulke brought guns and powder into his castle, and hoisted the flag of King Charles.
“The young lady had a busy time of it sheltering and entertaining the Royalists who came this way. But she had no heart in it—not that she didn’t love the King, sir. Yet she loved young Morgan more.
“So things went on for four or live years. The King, as you know, sir, got the worst of it, and was driven to his wits’ end. Most of his friends had fallen, and some had deserted. But so far no one had given Fulke much trouble. Either they had never heard of him, or saw there was not much to fear from him. So the Royal flag waved over the castle day and night, and the young lady did what her father bid her, and never went abroad or heard a word of young Morgan.