It was so. As Mrs. Ryle stood there, haughty and self-possessed, they might have deemed it the old Squire over again. "You want to know why my father willed away his estate from Joe's son?" she said. "Ask Chattaway; ask Diana Trevlyn," with a sweep of the hand to both. "Ask them to tell you who kept it from him that a son was born to Joe. _They_ did. The Squire made his will, went to his grave, never knowing that young Rupert was born. Ask them to tell you how it was that, when in accordance with this fact the will was made, my father constituted his second daughter's husband his heir, instead of my husband; mine, his eldest daughter's. Ask them, Rupert." "Heart-burnings? Yes, I can understand," murmured Squire Trevlyn. "Ask _him_--Chattaway--about the two thousand pounds debt to Mr. Ryle," she continued, never flinching from her stern gaze, never raising her voice above its calm tones of low, concentrated indignation. "You have just said that you and Tom Ryle were friends, Rupert. Yes, you were friends; and had you reigned after my father, he, my husband, would not have been hunted to his death." "Maude! What are you saying?" "The truth. Wherever that man Chattaway could lay his oppressive hand, he has laid it. He pursued my husband incessantly during life; it was through that pursuit--indirectly, I admit--that he met his death. The debt of two thousand pounds, money which had been lent to Mr. Ryle, he, my father, cancelled on his death-bed; he made my husband a present of it; he would have handed him the bond then and there, but it was in Chattaway's possession, and he said he would send it to him. It never was sent, Rupert; and the first use Chattaway made of his new power when he came into the Hold, was to threaten to sue my husband upon the bond. The Squire had given my husband his word to renew the lease on the same terms, and _you_ know that his word was never broken. The second thing Chattaway did was to raise the rent. It has been nothing but uphill work with us." "I'll right it now, Maude," he cried, with all the generous impulse of the Trevlyns. "I'll right that, and all else." "We have righted it ourselves," she answered proudly. "By dint of perseverance and hard work, not on my part, but on _his_"--pointing to George--"we have paid it off. Not many days ago, the last instalment of the debt and interest was handed to Chattaway. May it do him good! _I_ should not like to grow rich upon unjust gains." "But where is Rupert?" repeated Squire Trevlyn. "I must see Rupert."