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A MILE southward from the headland
which we have described, lay the fishing
village of Oldport, an assemblage of
huts, many of them consisting of the overturned hulls of wrecked vessels, in which
lurked rather than lived openly a wild and lawless
class of men, half fishermen, half smugglers,
popularly known throughout the region as “The
Wolves.”

In front of a building of somewhat greater
pretensions hung a rude sign depicting a cat
with a bell around her neck. This was the inn
of the Cat and Bell, and on the day after the
scenes just described, a rickety old road-wagon,
answering in place of a stage-coach, deposited
at the inn the disguised French officer who had
entered the vehicle at a town some miles distant.

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Announcing himself as Mr. Delamere, tourist
and amateur tront-fisherman, he dined; stated
that he expected to remain some days; and
taking from the oil-cloth case a jointed fishing-rod,
fitted it together, and strolled through the
village.

From the huts of the “Wolves,” curious and
threatening eyes were bent upon him, shining
under shaggy masses of hair. The wild animals
seemed to scent a popinjay in the well-clad
amateur of their own trade.

But Earle did not see the scornful glances,
or hear the threatening murmurs. He proceeded
toward a body of wood, from which
rose in the distance a great mansion of dark-colored
stone; gained the wood, through which
a stream ran, and rapidly following a path,
muttered, —

“This leads to Westbrooke Hall — which is
my object, since the worthy Viscount Cecil is
not in the vicinity. I must reconnoitre. This is
the path, I think —”

Suddenly he stopped. He had come upon a
group of gypsies; an old crone in a red cloak
bending over a blaze, two rougish-looking girls,
and a young man, black-eyed, black-haired,
lithe of figure, reclining at the moment between

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the girls, and picking his white teeth with a
straw. He was a handsome young vagabond,
and his ragged clothes did not conceal a graceful
and vigorous figure.

No sooner had Earle made his appearance,
than one of the girls rose and hastened to him.

“Shall I tell your fortune, handsome
stranger?” she said.

Earle looked intently at the girl, shook his
head, and replied in a strange tongue which
seemed to produce an electric effect on the
group. The girls started, the old crone turned
her head, and the young man, rising to his feet,
exclaimed,—

“How! You speak the Rommanye Rye!
You are a brother?”

Earle replied in the same language, and the
young man looked at him with astonishment.

“You speak the pure unmixed Rommanye
Rye! Where did you learn it, brother, and
who are you?”

“I learned it in Portugal, brother,” responded
Earle, “and am one of the tribe by adoption.
Who I am, beyond that, is not important.”

The gypsy came up close to him.

“Yes, it is important,” he whispered.

“Why?”

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“Because, if you are really a brother of the
Rommanye Rye,—and you needs must be, since
you speak our tongue,—I have something on
hand in which you can help me, and yourself
too.”

“What is it? and how will it benefit me?”

“There will be ten thousand guineas to
divide.”

Earle looked sidewise at his companion.

“A robbery?” he said, coolly.

The gypsy looked much shocked.

“Nothing of the sort, brother: the affair is a
strange one; but no robbery.”

Earle found his curiosity much excited by this
preamble, and said,—

“Well, tell me about it. I may be able to
assist you.”

The gypsy looked toward his companions, and
whispered,

“Not here or now.”

“When and where, then?”

“Do you see that spot yonder, where the
road skirts the dark pool, under the big rock,
covered with trailing vines, hanging down in
the water?”

“Yes.”

“Meet me there at midnight to-night. I

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swear, on the faith of the Rommanye Rye, that
no harm shall come to you!”

Earle laughed.

“I am not afraid,” he said, “and I know that
oath is sacred. I only demur to the time and
place. I am at Oldport, and that is miles distant.
Midnight is the hour to sleep; why not
earlier and in a less secluded spot?”

“Because what I tell you must be told to you
alone; and that spot is the place to tell it.”

“Why?”

“You will discover.”

Earle looked keenly at his interlocutor. He
was evidently in earnest.

“You want my help?” said Earle.

“I must have help. None of the brothers of
the Rommanye Rye are at hand. You are a
stranger, but a brother. I will trust you.
What do you say?”

“I say I will be yonder, near the pool, at
midnight,” was the reply.

And they returned to the group who had
been eyeing them with ill-dissembled curiosity.

“This is a brother,” he said to the gypsy
girls. “There is no mistake about it.”

The black-eyed houries showed their

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appreciation of the visitor, thereupon, by coming up
to him, locking their arms, browned by the
sun, around his neck, and kissing him with
ardor.

The sailor laughed, and did not decline the
ruddy lips. He then made a confidential gesture
to the young gypsy, declined the offered
supper, and went on, intent, it seemed, on
making the circuit of the Westbrooke Park,
until he reached the gateway.

This he soon found,—a huge arch, with
carved stone abutments,—and, dragging open
the ponderous affair, he entered the grounds.

They had been splendid, but were now returning
to wilerdness. Hares ran across the road
in front of the pedestrian, a deer disappeared
in a tangled thicket, and no human being was
seen, to indicate that the spot was inhabited.

All at once, Earle came in sight of a great
building of age-embrowned stone, apparently
dug from the neighboring quarries, with lofty
gables, ivy-covered, and long rows of windows,
close-shut, and giving no indication that the
house was occupied by the living, whatever antics
the dead might cut up, at midnight, in its
suites of deserted chambers. The great front
door was as closely secured, and a huge knocker

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in bronze scowled fiercely through cobwebs.
In the circle in front of the portico, whose tesselated
floor was giving way, was a stone urn,
slowly crumbling.

Westbrooke Hall was not a cheerful spectacle.

Earle was looking at it, leaning, as he did so,
against a tree, when a rough voice near him
said, in a threatening tone,—

“Well, what is your business here?”

p517-031

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