Hearing this he began to question my aunt and me. He learned from our replies that at the time I got the deed from my father none but my parent had any clear idea of what this old family compact meant, but that now we were in possession of such facts as enabled us to understand it. I then went on to make plain that my aunt was full of the matter, and eager, but that I had no inclination at any time to enter on a long and doubtful litigation in another country. To myself I confessed that I desired no immediate settlement until I saw what Arthur meant to be at. It was one more hold on a scamp still able to do me mischief. If it was clearly his father’s estate and not ours, he should soon or late be relieved of any possible doubt this deed might still make as to questions of title. When Mr. Wilson turned to my aunt he found a more warlike witness. She delighted in the prospect of a legal contest. “When a child,” she said, “I used to hear of my father’s having consented to make over or give away to his brother William an embarrassed estate, and that the crown officers were in some way consenting parties to the agreement, my father engaging himself to go to America when let out of jail. “There is no doubt,” she went on, “that Wyncote was under this arrangement legally transferred by my father to his next brother. Our Welsh cousins must have this conveyance. It seems, from the deed you have examined, that privately a retransfer was made, so as, after all, to leave my father possessed of his ancestral estate. If ever he chose to reclaim it he was free to do so. The affair seems to have become more or less known to the squires in that part of Merionethshire. William was, we presume, unwilling to take an unfair advantage of his brother’s misfortune, and hence the arrangement thus made between them.” “You state the case admirably,” said the lawyer. “And what else is there?” “But little. Letters of affection and esteem came and went at long intervals. I recollect hearing bits of them, but cannot say if the estate matter were ever mentioned. After William’s death the correspondence may or may not have ceased. His brother Owen came into the property without interference, and, dying, left a young son, Owen, who is still alive. His son Arthur, Captain Wynne, is to be here today. There are personal matters involved, into which there is no need to go. The Welsh branch is no doubt desirous in some way to clear the matter; but having held the estate for a century, they are, we may presume, not very eager to give it up. In justice to Owen Wynne, I may say that it is probable that because of a long minority he only began, as I think, a few years ago to have any doubt as to his title. I may add,” my aunt went on, “that Captain Wynne came and went during the war, and that only of late has this deed turned up.” “And your brother is quite unfit to help us?” said Wilson. “Yes; and unwilling if he were able.” “I see, madam, I see; a difficult business.”