“I should think any manner of accounting for his disappearance likelier than that one,” said Rees. “And even if that were the true explanation, nothing would induce me to prowl about Lord St. Austell’s property to find out the truth of it.” He said this haughtily, yet he waited when he had finished speaking, to hear Goodhare’s further arguments. But the elder man had apparently decided that to argue against such flinty determination would be waste of breath. He turned away from the young man with a sigh. “Well, Mr. Pennant, it is no use for me to try to persuade you into any course which you do not think strictly honorable, I know. I will, therefore, say no more about this, but only ask you to believe that I would never have breathed a word on the matter to you, if I had not myself believed it to be a suggestion which you might follow up to your own honor and Lord St. Austell’s profit.” “I don’t wish to do anything to his profit,” said Rees passionately. “But, of course, I know you meant well, and--and thank you, and--and good-night.” He gave Goodhare’s hand a grateful squeeze, and then lingered as if expecting a little more argument or a little more persuasion from him. But none came. Goodhare simply wished him good-night, and left him to return home by himself with slow steps and an unusually reflective manner. When he got home he found that his practical brother, Godwin, and his harassed mother, had had time to make a more thorough examination of such of his father’s papers as were within their reach, and that the result, even of this cursory search, was worse than they had feared. Nothing but debts, debts; bills unpaid, liabilities unmet. It was ruin, absolutely ruin, without a hope. Rees had to learn the truth, from their haggard eyes first, and their lips afterwards. Poor, kind-hearted old Captain Pennant had not been of so much account in the world or in his own household but that this discovery of the penniless state in which he had left his family over-shadowed their grief at his death. Rees listened to the recital at first in dumb dismay. Then came a feeling of bitterness, of injury. Lastly, the idea of the gold which might lie hidden among those old ruins within half a mile of his own wrecked home rushed into his brain, not as the chimerical vision it had appeared when Amos first mentioned it to him that evening, but as a vivid, saving truth. So fast had the welcome fancy grown unconsciously in his mind.