But as Dick stood on the threshold and his eyes became accustomed to the dimness within, this comforting reflection gave way to surprise and apprehension. Half-way down the passage Penwarden’s hat lay on the floor. Near it was a bundle of bulrushes which he had brought back from a voyage in his sea-going days; it usually stood against the wall beneath a portrait of Rodney. Beyond, the glass of a case enclosing a stuffed John-Dory was broken to splinters, which glinted from the stone floor. The passage presented a strange contrast to its usual neat and tidy appearance. "Joe!" Dick called. His voice reverberated; there was no other sound. He entered the passage and opened the door of the kitchen. It was empty; nothing was in disorder; a kettle stood on the hob; on the table lay a mug, a knife, and a plate holding a few crumbs of bread, witnesses to the old man’s supper. Dick turned about, crossed the passage, and halted for a moment at the bedroom door, seized by the shaking thought that Joe had been taken ill in the night—was perhaps dead. He called, rapped, and, with quivering nerves, entered. The blind was down, so that he could scarcely see; but there was the bed, empty, the bedclothes disturbed. He pulled up the blind. The cold light of the winter sky flooded the room, and he saw things that filled him with alarm. A chair was overturned; fragments of a pipe and a tinder-box lay beside the bed; a thin hair rug was creased into the shape of billows; on one of the white deals was a dark red stain. The appearance of both room and passage pointed to a struggle. The stain was the fresh mark of blood. What had become of the old man? Dick felt the answer to his unspoken question. Excisemen had many enemies; sometimes they lost their lives, not merely in open fight with the smugglers, but by insidious attack. Mr. Mildmay had told of ambushes, midnight assaults, torture, brutal murders. Such incidents were almost unknown in the west country; the fair fame of Cornishmen had not been sullied as that of the men of Kent and Sussex had been. But what more likely than that the bitter ill-feeling rife in the village, which had lately vented itself against the inmates of the Towers, should now have sought a new victim in Penwarden? If the smugglers were prepared to go such lengths against the Trevanions, towards whom their hereditary loyalty had for generations been akin to the Scottish clansman’s devotion to his chief, they would scarcely be disposed to spare a humble old seaman, to whom they attributed the heavy losses they had recently suffered. These thoughts ran through Dick’s mind in a moment. That Penwarden had suffered violent handling he could not doubt. He must at once report the disappearance. He hurried from the room, closing the door, and in the passage met Gammer Oliver, as she was called, the old woman who came daily from the village. "Oh, Maister Trevanion!" she exclaimed, "you did give me a turn."