he led me to a cottage on the outskirts of Dolphin Town, and of all in
that village nearest to the sea.

"My friend," said he, "is named Ginver Wyeth, and, though he comes
from these parts, he does not live here, being a school-master on the
mainland. His mother has died lately, and he is come on that account."

Mr. Wyeth received me hospitably, but with a certain pedantry of
speech which somewhat surprised me, seeing that his parents were
common fisherfolk. He readily explained the matter, however, over a
pipe, when Mr. Lovyes had left us. "I owe everything to Mrs. Lovyes,"
he said. "She took me when a boy, taught me something herself, and
sent me thereafter, at her own charges, to a school in Falmouth."

"Mrs. Lovyes!" I exclaimed.

"Yes," he continued, and, bending forward, lowered his voice. "You
went up to Merchant's Point, you say? Then you passed Crudge's
Folly--a house of two storeys with a well in the garden."

"Yes, yes!" I said.

"She lives there," said he.

"Behind those shutters!" I cried.

"For twenty years she has lived in the midst of us, and no one has
seen her during all that time. Not even Robert Lovyes. Aye, she has
lived behind the shutters."