A dead silence fell on the little room. Audrey started and flushed at her mother's eager, pregnant question; Mr. Dennie sat up very erect and took a pinch of snuff from his old-fashioned box. Copplestone pushed his chair away from the table and began to walk about. And Mrs. Greyle continued to look from one face to the other as if demanding a reply to her question. "Mother!" said Audrey in a low voice. "You aren't suggesting--" "Ahem!" interrupted Mr. Dennie. "A moment, my dear. There is nothing, I believe," he continued, waxing a little oracular, "nothing like plain speech. We are all friends--we have a common cause--justice! It may be that justice demands our best endeavours not only as regards our deceased friend, Bassett Oliver, but in the interests of--this young lady. So--" "I wish you wouldn't, Mr. Dennie!" exclaimed Audrey. "I don't like this at all. Please don't!" She turned, almost instinctively, to seek Copplestone's aid in repressing the old man. But Copplestone was standing by the window, staring moodily at the wind-swept quay beyond the garden, and Mr. Dennie waved his snuff-box and went on. "An old man's privilege!" he said. "In your interests, my dear. Allow me." He turned again to Mrs. Greyle. "In plain words, ma'am, you are wondering if the present holder of the estates is really what he claims to be. Plain English, eh?" "I am!" answered Mrs. Greyle with a distinct ring of challenge and defiance. "And now that it comes to the truth, I have wondered that ever since he came here. There!" "Why, mother?" asked Audrey, wonderingly. "Because he doesn't possess a single Greyle characteristic," replied Mrs. Greyle, readily enough, "I ought to know--I married Valentine Greyle, and I knew Stephen John, and I saw plenty of both, and something of their father, too, and a little of Marcus before he emigrated. This man does not possess one single scrap of the Greyle temperament!" Mr. Dennie put away his snuff-box and drumming on the table with his fingers looked out of his eye corners at Copplestone who still stood with his back to the rest, staring out of the window. "And what," said Mr. Dennie, softly, "what--er, does our good friend Mr. Copplestone say?" Copplestone turned swiftly, and gave Audrey a quick glance.