"What did you please to want gentleman, when you do get in?" asked the woman, in what the squire thought a very impertinent tone. And he was about to reply, in a manner which would have given the woman an opportunity of keeping up the conversation, and thereby keeping them out of the house for a considerable time longer, when the constable thought it was time for him to begin; for he was a shrewd man in his way, and saw the woman's object. He believed she was keeping them in conversation outside, in order to give the other inmates time to get away or to conceal themselves in the house somewhere; so he said in as commanding a tone as he could,—
"You know me, good woman, don't you?"
"No, I don't," she replied, "and, what's more, I don't want to."
"I'm the head constable of the district I am," said he; "and I claim entrance, in the King's name, under a bench warrant."
"I don't care if you're the tail constable; you shan't come in here," replied the woman, shutting down the window.
"Thank you for nothing," said the constable; for at this moment the door was opened from the inside by Captain Trenow, who had gone round the house to reconnoitre, while the others were still trying to persuade the old woman to let them in; and, finding a window open at the back of the house, he entered that way, and now admitted the whole party. The old woman protested there was no one in the house but herself, and so it turned out; for they searched everywhere—upstairs and down—in the cellars and even out to the extremity of the cavern. There was no one there; so they beat a retreat and went back to the house they had before met at, hoping that by this time Frederick had arrived; but in this they were also disappointed. He was not there, nor had he been seen by anyone; so, after partaking of a hasty refreshment, they turned their horses' heads once more in the direction of the Land's-End, crestfallen and disappointed.
CHAPTER XXXIX. THE UNEXPECTED MEETING AND MYSTERIOUS COMMUNICATION.
While the gentlemen were holding their consulation at Pendrea-house, the ladies of the establishment were variously occupied. Mrs. Pendrea was superintending the cooking of some nice little sweet dish for a poor sick child in the neighbourhood, and the two young ladies were seemingly playing at hide-and-seek with one another, and wandering from room to room, in hopes of hearing something, or of catching a sight of their lovers; while Alrina was left alone to meditate on her sad fate.
She had not been alone long, however, before the door was opened cautiously, and a servant entered, and closing the door after her in a very mysterious way, and, approaching the couch on which Alrina was resting, she put her finger on her lips, as much as to say, "Be silent," and gave Alrina a slip of paper on which was written, or rather scrawled, hastily in pencil—