"Nothing wrong," I replied; "but Mr Gray knows. You had better ask Mr Gray." "Don't worry her, Ursula," said Captain Valentine. "Miss Lindley has a perfect right to employ her time as she pleases. You remember, Miss Lindley, the last time I had the pleasure of meeting you, how we established a sort of cousinship. I believe we are undoubtedly cousins. May I therefore have the pleasure of introducing to you another relative--my brother Tom?" Mr Tom Valentine now came forward. He was a little shorter than his brother, broader set, with a good-humoured and kind face. (Forgive me, Tom, if at that moment I saw nothing more in your face.) He shook hands with me kindly, said a word or two about being glad to meet a relative, and then began to examine the curious room for himself with much interest. "But what are you doing here?" said the irrepressible Lady Ursula; "and oh! Rupert, do look at these keys. Fancy our methodical Rose arranging these keys in bunches, and labelling them. Oh! what a model of neatness you are, Rose! What a housewife you would make!" "Don't worry her, Ursula," said Captain Valentine again. Then he added, turning to me: "The fact is, my brother Tom and I are very much interested in this old house. Tom is my eldest brother, Miss Lindley. He is a great traveller--a sort of lion in his way. You must get him at some propitious moment to tell you all about his many adventures. He has met the savages face to face. He has been through the heart of darkest Africa. He has fought with wild beasts. Oh, yes! Tom, you need not blush." "Who would suppose you could blush, Tom?" said his future sister-in-law, patting him familiarly on his shoulder. "I should imagine that swarthy skin of yours too dark to show a blush." "I hate making myself out a hero," said Tom Valentine in his gruff voice. "Do stop chaffing, Rupert, and let us tell Miss Lindley why we have come here." "Curiosity," said Captain Valentine; "curiosity has brought us. I told Tom last night about Cousin Geoffrey Rutherford's death, and about the curious will he had made. Tom and I spent many happy months in this old house; long, long, long ago, Miss Lindley. I told Tom last night the story of your ruby ring. Altogether I excited his curiosity to an enormous extent; and he said he himself would like to have a search for the missing document. May I ask you a blunt question, Miss Lindley? Are you looking for it now?" I hesitated for a moment. I felt my face turning white; then raising my eyes, I said, steadily, "I am." As I uttered these words I encountered the direct and full gaze of my new cousin, the bearded and bronzed traveller, Tom Valentine. If ever there were honest eyes in the world they dwelt in Tom's rather plain face. They looked straight into mine as I uttered these words, and I read approval in their glance. "Yes, I am looking for the will," I said, encouraged by the glance Tom had given me.