"Then it's time the men made a search, my boy," said Sir Edward; "we must have a robber about. There is the whole explanation of the old women's tales. Well, they will have to bestir themselves, and catch the thief." It was on that same morning that the news reached Cliff Castle, where similar stories had floated about witches and warlocks having taken possession of the shivering hills, where the slatey rocks were always falling, and forming what the country people called screes, which, at a distance, when wet and shiny, looked in the sunshine like cascades descending from on high. "If it comes to any of our sheep being taken, we shall have to take to a hunt, Ralph," Sir Morton had said. "The people like to have a witch or two to curdle their blood, but I'm not going to find them in sheep." It was a glorious morning, and the lad went into the courtyard with his sister to have a look at her new fad, as Nick Garth called it, that is to say, the well-plastered pool with its surrounding of rock-work, in which various plants were beginning to flourish and reflect themselves in the crystal water with which the little pond was filled. "Capital!" cried Ralph; "but you ought to have a few fish in it. They'd look well." "That is just what I wanted you to say, sir," cried Minnie, clapping her hands; "and if you hadn't been such a solemn, serious brother, you would have taken your rod and line, and caught me a few." "Well, I will," said the lad eagerly; "and some for a fry as well. The little ones will be best for you, and I'll take a tin can for them, as well as a creel." An hour later, with a plentiful supply of caddis, caterpillars, and other tempting bait, and rod in hand, Ralph descended to the side of the stream. He was not long in following suit with old Master Rayburn as to his hose; and then stepping into the water, he began to wade upstream, where it was shallow, going on to the bank where it grew deep. But the day was too bright and the water too clear for his task. The fish saw him, and darted away, and when his keen eyes followed them to their lair, they refused to be tempted out by any bait he threw. "Just my luck when I come fishing," muttered Ralph, as he waded slowly on, picking his way among the stones. "There's always something wrong; either it's too hot, or it's too cold, or there's too much water, or there isn't enough, or the wind's somewhere in the wrong quarter, or I haven't got the right bait; and so sure as I was to meet old Master Rayburn, picking flowers on the bank, he'd say: `Ah, you should have come yesterday, or last week, and then you'd have caught a fish at every throw.' "Stupid work, fishing," he said, half-aloud, when he had waded as far as he could without getting wet, for the water had suddenly deepened and curved round out of sight, all calm and still beneath the boughs shading it on either side. "Seems very easy, though, when you watch old Rayburn. He always knows where to throw."