“Humph!” said the disappointed treasure-hunter audibly; “daylight and a stout pole may probe the mystery to the bottom.  I’ll mark this spot.”

“Mark this spot,” said another voice at some distance, repeating his words like an echo.  The rock was certainly within “striking distance,” and it might have been this accident which lent its aid to the delusion.

Gregory could not withstand so apparently supernatural an occurrence.  He took to his heels, driven fairly off the field; nor did he look behind him until safely entrenched before a blazing fire in the kitchen at Waddington Hall.

“Out, ill-favoured hound!” said a serving wench, who was stirring a blubbering mess of porridge for supper.  But Gregory was not in the humour to reply:  he sat with one long lean hand under his chin, the other hung down listlessly to his heels, which were drawn securely under the stool on which he sat.  His thoughts were not on the victuals, though by long use and instinct his eyes were turned in that direction.

“Thee art ever hankering after the brose, thou greedy churl!” continued the wench, wishful to goad him on to some intemperate reply.

But Gregory was still silent.  At this unwonted lack of discourse, Janet, who generally contrived to bring his long tongue into exercise, was not a little astonished.  It needed no great wit, any time, to set him a-grumbling; for neither kind word nor civil speech had he for kith or kin, for man or maid.

Looking steadfastly towards him, she struck her dark broad fists upon her hips, and, in a loud and contemptuous laugh, abruptly startled the cynic from his studies.  He eyed her with a grin of malice and vexation.

“Thou she-ape, I wonder what first ye’arn made for; the plague o’ both man and beast,—­the worst plague that e’er Pharaoh waur punished wi’.  Screech on; I’ll ha’ my think out, spite o’ thy caterwauling.”

“Thou art a precious wonder, Master Crab.  Squirt thy verjuice, when thou art roasting, some other way.  I wonder what man-ape thy mother watch’d i’ the breeding.  She had been special fond o’ children, I bethink me.”

“And what knowest thou o’ my dame’s humours, thou curl-crop vixen?” said Gregory, unwarily drawn forth again from his taciturnity.  “How should her inclinations be subject to thy knowledge?”

“She rear’d thee!” was the reply.

Two other hinds belonging to the household, who were watching the issue of the contest, here joined in a loud clamour at the victory; and Gregory, dogged with baiting, became silent, scowling defiance at his foe.

Waddington Hall was at that period a building of great antiquity.  Crooks, or great heavy arched timbers, ascending from the ground to the roof, formed the principal framework of the edifice, not unlike the inverted hull of some stately ship.  The whole dwelling consisted of a thorough lobby and a hall, with a parlour beyond it, on one side, and the kitchens and offices on the other.  The windows were narrow, scarcely more than a few inches wide, and, in all probability, not originally intended to contain glass.