Edgar had to stop this exposition by asking after the “chapel-folks” to whom she could direct him, and in answer was told of three tradesmen in the neighbourhood who “held by the Methodys,” one of whom had been a deacon in the disused chapel. This was a carpenter, who could not be seen till his dinner-hour, and on whom Edgar had to dance attendance with very indifferent satisfaction; for the deacon’s report was that the chapel had never been, so far as he could remember, licensed for marriages, and that none had taken place within it. This statement, however, was flatly contradicted by the pork-butcher, whose name was the next on his list, and who recollected to have heard that some one had been married there just about the time indicated by Miss Lockwood. Finally, Edgar lighted on an official who had been a local preacher in the days of the chapel, and who was now a Scripture-reader, under the sway of the new Rector, who had evidently turned the church and parish upside-down. This personage had known something of the Lockwoods, and was not disinclined--having ascertained that Edgar was a stranger, and unlikely to betray any of his hankerings after the chapel--to gossip about the little defunct community. Its books and records had, he said, been removed, when it was closed, to some central office of the denomination, where they would, no doubt, be shown on application. This man was very anxious to give a great deal of information quite apart from the matter in hand. He gave Edgar a sketch of the decay of the chapel, in which, I fear, the young man took no interest, though it was curious enough; and he told him about the Lockwoods, and about the eldest daughter, who, he was afraid, had come to no good. “She said as she was married, but nobody believed her. She was always a flighty one,” said the Scripture-reader.