My tale is told. The adventure of the caravan has ended. Little more remains to be said.

Monk of Monkshurst was not brought to trial for his iniquities, but he was sorely enough punished by the loss of his ill-gotten estates. Before the claim of the foundling was fully proved he left England, never to return. Whether he is alive or dead I cannot tell.

William Jones, too, escaped legal punishment. A severer retribution came upon him in the seizure and dispersal of the hoards in the great cave. So sorely did he take his loss to heart that he crept to his bed and had an attack of brain fever. When he reappeared on the scene of his old plunderings his intellect was weakened, and he showed curious evidences of imbecility. But the ruling passion remained strong within him. I saw him only last summer, rambling on the sea-shore, talking incoherently to himself, and watching the sea in search of wreckage, as of old.

And Matt?

Well, her title to Monkshurst and the property was fully proved. For a long time she did not realize her good fortune, but gradually the pleasant truth dawned upon her in a sunrise of nice dresses, jewellery, and plenty of money. Chancery stepped in like a severe foster-parent, and sent her to school. There she remained for several years; but Charles Brinkley, who had first taken in hand the vindication of her claims, and who never ceased to be interested in her, saw her from time to time, and took particular note of her improvement in her grammar and the gentle art of speech.

“Matt,” he said, when they met last Christmas in London, and when he saw before him, instead of a towsy girl, as bright and buxom a young lady as ever wore purple raiment and fine linen, “Matt, you are ‘growed up’ at last!”

Matt blushed and hung her head, with a touch of her old manner.

“Yes, I am grown up, as you say. I wonder what William Jones would think if he saw me now?”

“And if he noticed those pretty boots, Matt, and heard you play the piano and prattle a little in French. Upon my word, it’s a transformation! You always were a nice girl, though.”

“Do you really think so?” asked Matt, shyly. “Did you always think so?”

“Certainly.”

“Even when I told you I liked you so much, and you told me ‘it wouldn’t do?”

It was Brinkley’s turn to blush now. It was clear that Matt, despite other changes, still retained her indomitable frankness.

“Even then,” he replied, laughing. “But I say, you were a precocious youngster. You proposed to me, you know!”

“I know I did,” said Matt, “and it wasn’t leap year then”—she added still more slyly—“But it’s leap year now!”

Their eyes met. Both blushed more and more.

“Matt, don’t! It won’t do, you know! Yes, I say so still. You’re a rich woman, and I’m only a poor devil of a painter. You must marry some great swell.”

But Matt replied—

“I shall never marry any one but you!”

“You won’t? Do you mean it?”

“Of course I do.”

He caught her in his arms.

“My darling Matt—yes, I shall call you by that dear name to the end of the chapter. You love me, then? I can’t believe it!”

“I have loved you,” she answered, laughing, “ever since I first came—‘to be took!’”

And she rested her head on his shoulder, just as she had done in the old days, when she was an unsophisticated child of Nature.

“So there’s to be a wedding, after all,” he said, kissing her. “Matt, I’ve an idea!”

“Yes?”

“When we marry, suppose we arrange to spend the honeymoon in—a CARAVAN!”

THE END.