It was almost dark by this time; but he saw the look of horror and dismay which flashed across her face when she saw who her visitor was. Her glance passed quickly to the keg on the step below, but only for a moment. Then, without appearing to notice that very suspicious article, she addressed Tregenna, not discourteously, but with decided coldness. “What is your pleasure, sir? Are you come to see my father? He is not yet returned.” “I am not come to see your father, madam, but another person who is harboring beneath this roof; the smuggler who is taking refuge here from the consequences of his ill deeds.” She was taken by surprise, and the look which crossed her candid face betrayed her. “’Tis in vain for you to deny it, madam,” pursued Tregenna, boldly, “for I have proof of what I say.” There was a short pause, and then Joan said steadily— “I do not deny it.” Certain as he had felt of the truth of his surmise, Tregenna felt that his breath was taken away for a moment by this cool confession. He was shocked, grieved, through all the triumph he felt at having, as he thought, at last run his prey to earth. “You deny not, madam,” he went on, in an altered voice, “that you have beneath your roof a thief, and if not a murderer, at least an associate and accomplice of murderers?” “A murderer! No, I will not believe that,” cried Joan, warmly. “Well a smuggler, if that name please you better, though in truth there’s mighty little difference between them. I am come, then, madam, to see this smuggler, and to endeavor to find out whether he is the man that cruelly stabbed to death a poor coastguardsman but a couple or so of hours ago.” “It was not he,” said Joan, hastily. “He hath been here since last night.” “Ah! then he was engaged in the fight with us last night; and ’twas he, doubtless, whom I shot in the leg as he got away.” “And is not the wound, think you, sir, a sufficient injury to have inflicted on him, that you must relentlessly track him down for fresh punishment?” “Madam, ’tis no matter of personal feeling; ’tis in the king’s name, and on the king’s behalf, I charge you to give him up to justice.” “Then, in the name of justice and of humanity, I refuse!” said Joan, passionately, as she threw her handsome head back, and fixed upon him a look of proud defiance. “The man who takes shelter in my father’s house, should be safe there, were he the greatest criminal on earth; and how much more when he comes bleeding from a wound inflicted by the men who should be our protectors!” Exasperated as Tregenna was by the difficulties which she put in his way, he could not help admiring her spirit. He answered more mildly than he would have done had her defiant speech been uttered by another mouth— “Nay, madam, you will not suffer us to protect you from the wrong-doers and their works; you side with them, against us and the law!” “Who is that talks of the law?” cried a cheery voice from the narrow hall behind Joan.