"You think it funny, of course; but the truth is----" And Sam looked apprehensively towards the door. "We shall not be overheard here, shall we?" "There's no one in the house but myself, except the cook. Mother's gone out to see a neighbour." "Oh, well, I'm glad I've caught you on the quiet, as it were. I wouldn't have the matter talked about for the world." William began to feel uncomfortable, and to wonder what his kinsman had been up to. "I hope you have not been getting into any foolish matrimonial entanglement?" he questioned seriously. Sam laughed heartily and good-humouredly. "No, no; things are not quite so bad as that," he said. "The fact is, I would like to get into a matrimonial entanglement, as you call it, but not into a foolish one." Then he stopped suddenly, and began to fidget again in his chair. "Then you are not engaged yet?" "Well, not quite." And Sam laughed again. William waited for him to continue, but Sam appeared to start off on an entirely new tack. "I don't think I've been in St. Goram parish since the sale at Hillside Farm. You remember it?" "Very well!" "How bad luck seems to dog the steps of some people. I felt tremendously sorry for David Penlogan. He was a good man, by all accounts." "There was no more saintly man in the three parishes." "The mischief is, saints are generally so unpractical. They tell me the son is of different fibre." "He's as upright as his father, but with a difference." "A cruel thing to send him to gaol on suspicion, and keep him there so long." "It was a wicked thing to do, but it hasn't spoilt him. He's the most popular man in St. Ivel to-day." "I remember him at the sale--a handsome, high-spirited fellow; but his sister interested me most. I thought her smile the sweetest I had ever seen." "She's as sweet as her smile, and a good deal more so," William said, with warmth. "In fact, she has no equal hereabouts." "I hear you are on friendly terms with them." "Well, yes," William said slowly. "Not that I would presume to call myself their equal, for they are in reality very superior people. There's no man in St. Goram, and I include the landed folk, so well educated or so widely read as Ralph Penlogan." "And his sister?" "She's a lady, every inch of her," William said warmly; "and what is more, they'll make their way in the world. He's ability, and of no ordinary kind. The rich folk may crush him for a moment, but he'll come into his own in the long-run." "Are they the proud sort?" "Proud? Well, it all depends on what you mean by the word. Dignity they have, self-respect, independence; but pride of the common or garden sort they haven't a bit." "I thought I could not be mistaken," Sam said, after a pause; "and to tell you the honest truth, I've never been able to think of any other girl since I saw Miss Penlogan at the sale." William started and grew very pale. "I don't think I quite understand," he said, after a long pause.