Kitabı oku: «The Brass Bound Box», sayfa 13
CHAPTER XVIII.
REUBEN SMITH, ACCESSORY
The wheels belonged to Squire Pettijohn's buggy, in which were seated Aunt Eunice and himself. This was a combination which, as Katy related it from the window, greatly astonished Moses. Yet there was nothing surprising in the fact, after all. The gentleman had chanced to be up-mountain, calling at the same house where Miss Maitland was visiting, and had offered to take her home, hearing her say that she was anxious to be there early on the morrow.
She had not enjoyed her ride, yet blamed herself for her aversion to a neighbor who, if not a gentleman, had learned sufficient good manners to conduct himself as nearly such. The worst annoyance he had given her was by continual and roundabout references to what had happened in the forest. The more she evaded his questions the more direct they became, till she was almost forced to tell everything or be imputed a liar.
As they turned into the village street he made a final effort for enlightenment, saying:
"You must know, Miss Maitland," – he did not call her "Eunice" to her face as he had done behind her back to Susanna, – "you must know that in keeping this treasure, or whatever was found in your woods, a secret from others, you are injuring somebody. They say you are conniving at the escape of a tramp, even. A tramp! One of those dangerous creatures which infest our State, but have not before invaded Marsden. I flatter myself that I – that I – have so far prevented their coming, and I am certainly making it my business now to unearth this one who, I am told, lurks principally in your forest. You are a large-hearted, generous lady, Miss Maitland; one who is an honor to her township and whom I am proud to call a neighbor – "
"Indeed? I thank you," said Aunt Eunice, stiffly.
Squire Pettijohn ignored the interruption. He meant to make the most of this unlooked-for chance to satisfy his curiosity and his self-importance, and continued as if she had not spoken:
"But who, I fear, sometimes lets her heart run away with her head. In pitying the individual, namely, the tramp in present question, you should also remember that you are endangering the community."
"Nonsense. But may I ask, in turn, from whom you gained your information that I protected the tramp?"
"Hm-m – Er – Ah! I believe it was Mrs. Turner who said that you said you 'hoped if any poor hungry wretch strayed into this village of plenty he would get enough to eat for once.' That you 'had always regretted we had no really poor people in Marsden, where they could be cared for, and so lessen the number of starving persons elsewhere.' Mrs. Turner made a personal application of the remark, and suggested that if it had been your pies which had been purloined you might feel differently."
Eunice laughed as gaily as a girl, and exclaimed:
"So it has grown to be 'pies,' has it? The last time I heard the matter mentioned it was one possible pie, and Robert, as well as a tramp, had been in the locality where they were set to cool. Besides, it would be an excellent thing if they had all been taken. Mrs. Turner is a nice woman, but she can't make pastry fit to eat, as witness her husband's dyspepsia. Monty says they have pie at the Turners three times a day, and it's a paradise for hungry small visitors who can digest anything. Indeed, I am surprised to learn I gave my neighbor offence on this same pie subject. We talked for some time over it and she fell into my idea that fruit for dessert would suit Mr. Turner far better than pastry, and save her a world of trouble. It would also diminish the number of the children's playmate 'droppers-in' at meal-times. Yes, I am surprised."
They had come within sight of The Maples, and Squire Pettijohn had, with apparent carelessness, let back the top of the buggy so that any who cared might observe him riding with the mistress of that fine old estate and the present centre or heroine of so much mystery. This was an unusual thing to do, for letting carriage-tops back is apt to crack the leather, and "Jim" Pettijohn cracked nothing which could be preserved. Eunice comprehended and smiled quietly in her corner of the seat, talking at length as she had done to stave off any further prying into her affairs.
Even yet she was not to be let free. Said the gentleman, with a preliminary cough:
"I do hope and trust, dear Miss Maitland, that you will forego a mistaken expression of sympathy, should an appeal be made to you, and assist me as a magistrate to nip this evil in the bud. In other words, to send this vagrant to the lockup at the earliest possible moment. As I observed, you owe it to your community to protect it, not endanger it."
Eunice turned her glowing eyes upon him. "And I owe to the Great Father, who has given us this day, to be good to every child of His, however humble. If the tramp comes to my door he shall be fed. If he needs shelter I will shelter him. If he needs clothing I will clothe him. Why, look, man, look!" spreading her hand wide to point out the lovely surroundings: "Should anybody come into all this and go away not the better for it? How do we know what chance has brought this stranger hither? Or what and where his life began? Maybe, in just some such favored country village; and once, at least, he was – somebody's son."
The tenderness of her compassionate tone but hardened the other's purpose.
"Huh! If he were my own son, even, I would have the law on him to the fullest extremity!" he answered, harshly; and Eunice shivered, remembering, as he seemed to have forgotten, that poor son of his who had gone astray and might be roaming the world then, as was this unknown who had so stirred the lawyer's wrath.
Baffled yet persistent, as he helped her alight at her own threshold, the Squire put one more sudden question:
"But, after all, there was something —something– found in your woods that day, wasn't there?"
It was not even in Eunice's patience to endure thus much. Caught unawares, she burst out, indignantly:
"Yes, there was something found, but it does not concern anybody to know what. Thank you for your courtesy, and – good evening."
The lawyer drove homeward satisfied. She had admitted "the find." He would now proceed to unearth it. Incidentally, he would unearth the tramp, but that was, in his estimation, a secondary matter.
Eunice reëntered her home, glad to be there, but as Susanna saw at first greeting, "all stirred up and upsot." She would not allow herself to talk till she had recovered her composure. She even promptly, though affectionately, dismissed Katharine to her bed, reminding her that the morrow brought school again and she must be awake early.
The little girl was disappointed. She had longed for a long, cosy talk with her guardian over so many, many things. Not least of all concerning the brilliant scheme which had occurred to her and Monty that day on the hay. Nor did it please her any too well to lie and listen to the voices of Eunice and Susanna, murmuring on and on indefinitely, in the sitting-room below. Commonly the housekeeper went early to sleep on Sunday nights, for it was her habit to rise before daybreak and set about her Monday washing. To-night the great clock struck eleven, actually eleven, before this conference broke up; only to be resumed at intervals during the next morning, whenever the pair were alone.
However, Katharine had other matters on hand so absorbing that even the mysteries of tramp and brass bound box sank out of mind. She was off to school a half-hour before time, and strangely enough Montgomery was equally prompt. Together they repaired to the wooden bench under the beech-tree, and while the lad suggested things to be written down, Kate wrote them rapidly on little slips of paper, which suspiciously resembled a leaf from a copy-book.
Other scholars came along and stared, wondering what had sent this usually tardy boy so far in advance of the bell. Little girls tittered. Phrony Walker tossed her braid flippantly over her shoulder, casually displaying a new hair ribbon with which she meant to impress the city girl who wore and needed none. Sophronia's hair did not kink and curl as Katharine's did, but it was "a hunderd times as long and a great deal prettier colored." Kate had said so herself, yet here was she who was so generously admiring, almost covetous, calmly unobservant of braid, ribbon, and all.
Martha and Mary Turner came, swinging their lunch-basket between them, delightfully conscious that in its depths were stored three apple turnovers, one for each of them and one for Kitty Keehoty, who was never allowed to carry pie to school. With a child's fondness for the indigestible, she had once declared that Mrs. Turner's turnovers were "sim-ply de-lic-ious," and they had teased their mother ever since to make one for their new friend. But they stopped short at sight of the light and dark head so close together over something they did not know about, and when Martha drew nearer and informed the dark-haired scribbler that she had "brought it," Kate merely nodded her head and continued scribbling.
Bob and Ned arrived, tackle over shoulder, intent upon playing hookey at afternoon session, and disgusted that Monty was so little excited by their grimacing pantomime, as they demonstrated how they would escape to the woods and invited his company. Then they tried ridicule, calling "girl-boy, girl-boy," as loudly as they dared, with Katharine's scornful glances upon them. Monty grew fiery red and tossed his blond head as if shaking an obnoxious insect from it, but did not cease to scratch it for ideas, which he whispered to his companion as fast as he dug them out.
Even when the teacher came and Kate sprang to her feet to bid him her always courteously ready "Good morning," also dragging Montgomery to his own feet as a reminder of what was correct, that excited, exalted expression left neither young face.
Matters continued thus all through school. Monty was worse than ordinary in the matter of lessons, and that was saying much. Katharine, having had better advantages, stood far in advance of her class, so had no need to study, and kept her slips of paper in her book all the time she sat at her desk. She was not a rapid writer and she certainly had a deal of writing to do. At recess the before-school performance was repeated; and when the truants, Bob and Ned, disappeared in the direction of the "Eddy" after "noonin'," Monty failed to send one regretful glance thither. He was more occupied in watching the face of the clock than anything else, and as soon as dismissal-bell rang, darted from the schoolroom as if propelled by a gun. Just then, too, the first warning notes of Reuben Smith's horn came floating through the trees and down the street, and thereafter all that was seen of the boy was a pair of heels vanishing in air.
"Why, what in the world ails Monty? And say, Katy, didn't you like your turnover?" asked Martha Turner, drawing near to her heroine and showing that she felt somewhat aggrieved.
"Oh, Monty's all right. He – Don't you worry. You'll all know sometime. And didn't I eat it?"
"Yes. You ate it fast enough, but you didn't say whether you liked it or not. I think ma, she – "
"Oh, you dear thing! Of course I liked it; and please make my regards to your mother and tell her that I thank her very much. It was the nicest turnover I ever had, and – and it was the first one."
To an older mind this might not have been so convincing an argument, but it satisfied Martha. She considered that Katharine Maitland had the "perfectly sweetest manner of any girl in the world," and was daily trying to improve her own by the pattern set. "Make my regards." She had never heard that phrase before, but it impressed her as very stately and "Miss Eunicey," so put it away in her memory for future use. She was further delighted by Katharine's begging her and Mary to walk home with her, as far as they went her way, for she had something to talk over with them.
But when she revealed this "something" it proved not so much after all. She merely inquired exactly how many boys and girls there were in their school and out of it. "I want to get the name of every single child that isn't more than sixteen years old. As much younger as you please, but older than that would be grown-ups. At least, they would be in Baltimore."
That settled it. Whatever was done "in Baltimore" seemed to these young provincials as the acme of correctness; little knowing that to a wider world even "Baltimore" was also provincial.
But it was easy enough to "count noses," as Mary phrased it, and the list of names Katharine had already prepared swelled considerably. She wrote as she walked, the cover of her book her desk, and with such haste that the writing was almost illegible. However, a trifle of that sort could be overcome.
"No, Mattie, I know it isn't very plain, but I guess I'll make it out. Let's hurry. Reuben Smith's blowing his go-away horn, and I want to see – Oh, yes! There he is! The stage-driver keeps blowing every little while, yet he keeps talking, too, so I know it's all right! Oh, just fancy! It's going to be perfectly, perfectly splendid! Oh, you dear, dear things!"
Katharine's playmates were accustomed to being caught up and hugged whenever anything pleased her more than common, and she was usually as free in explaining her delight as in expressing it physically. But she explained nothing now. She merely squeezed their hands, and stared at Mr. Smith still arguing with Montgomery, till suddenly looking around she saw their puzzled faces.
"Never mind me, girls. I can't tell yet, not just yet, because it's a beautiful secret. But you'll all know right soon. You're going to be in it, too; we're all going to be in it! Oh, the happy old man! Oh, the fun! Oh, the queer crazy decorations! I believe I'm just too happy to live! But the stage is going and I must run to Monty. Good-by. Be sure to be at school to-morrow. Then you'll know."
Reuben Smith mounted to his high seat, blew a farewell blast on his ancient horn, and drove away out of the village, while Montgomery fairly tumbled over himself in his haste to meet Katharine, who greeted him with the question:
"Well, will he do it?"
"Y-y-y-ye-es!" gasped the breathless lad, and sat down on the edge of the path to recover.
For once careless of dust, Kate dropped down beside him and counted questions off upon her fingers so fast that Monty could only nod his head in acquiescence. Then she drew a small chain purse from her blouse pocket, where it had been carefully pinned ever since she left home in the morning. From this she took a pile of new one-dollar bills – ten in all – and laid them one by one on Montgomery's outstretched palms. It was the largest amount of money Kate had ever owned, it was almost the largest the boy had ever seen. A feeling like awe stole upon him and he whispered, – without a stutter, – "S'pose he should lose it!"
"That's a good boy. Monty, you're improving so fast, you'll beat the time I set for you to conquer in. Have you said your piece to-day? And, of course he won't lose it. Men don't lose things. Except Uncle Moses his 'specs' and the deacon his two-pronged fork, that's never in the hay-mow when he wants it there. Stage-drivers don't lose, anyway, and I'm glad it's you, not I, who have to deal with him. He doesn't like me much. I was saucy when I came. I don't think I am quite, not quite so saucy spoken as I was when I came. Do you, Monty?"
"O-o-oh, not n-n-nigh!" he easily replied, never having thought at all about it. He was still entranced with the possession, even temporary, of such vast wealth as he was now bestowing in an old and hitherto useless purse. The crisp new bills. How fat they made it! How utterly and entirely delightful was this girl from the outside world who had such wonderful ideas and the ability to carry them out!
Then the purse was put away in the innermost of all his many inner pockets, and around his blouse, beneath his jacket, Monty fastened a leather strap. Buckling this so tight he could hardly breathe, and fastening the coat over all, he slapped his chest admiringly, and valiantly declared:
"A-a-anybody get that a-a-away from me'll have to k-k-kill me f-f-first!"
Katy jumped up. "Let's go ask Aunt Eunice about the pumpkins!"
In an instant they were off down the street, and some, looking out of window as they raced past, remarked:
"There they go again, Sturtevant and Maitland, each generation as close friends as the other. But chummy as they've been ever since Johnny's girl came to Marsden, there's something more than common on the carpet now."
There certainly was. They burst in upon Miss Maitland's solitude, forgetful to tap at door as they both knew they should, and simultaneously besought the startled lady:
"Please, Aunt Eunice, may we have all the pumpkins in the south corn-field?"
At least, that was what Katharine said. Monty's request was proffered stammeringly but not less earnestly, and he said "punkins" with no attempt at correctness of speech.
"Children! What a pair of noisy creatures you are! Where have you come from? You are late if just from school. And, Montgomery, does your grandmother know that you are here?"
"N-n-no, Aunt E-E-E-Eunice. Nev' mind her. She w-w-won't care. C-c-c-can we?"
"I – don't think I quite understand. Did you ask me for a pumpkin? Please repeat."
"'A pumpkin' – that's one; no, indeed!" said Katy, scornfully. "We want the whole field full of them. We sha'n't hurt them any, Monty says, and he knows 'bout country things better than I do." Here she bestowed such an approving smile upon her comrade that he flushed and smiled beatifically. There were so few, so very few, things in which he could really excel this superior city creature, yet she was so generous as to perceive them even before he did himself.
Just then Susanna came in greatly flurried, and, catching Eunice's arm, tried to draw her hastily out of the room. Miss Maitland herself had swiftly caught her housemate's perturbation. Indeed, she had already been perturbed when the children intruded upon her, and had, apparently, now forgotten them.
Katharine saw their opportunity slipping from them, and opportunity was something that girl never wasted for want of readiness to seize it. Running after the departing lady, she clasped her skirt and stayed her long enough to put her question once more:
"May we, aunty? Oh, please, before you go, say – yes!"
"Yes. Why, of course, yes, yes," returned the lady, all unheeding unto what she had given her consent.
But she was to learn. Ah, yes! She was to learn in good time.
CHAPTER XIX.
WHAT THE MOON SAW IN THE CORN-FIELD
October had now nearly gone, and there was a chill in the air which would, under ordinary circumstances, have made both Eunice and Susanna pause before setting off into the woods at that hour in the afternoon. Certainly they would not have gone without wraps and shawls galore, but neither paused now. As swiftly, almost as secretly, as two guilty schoolgirls would have started upon some surreptitious adventure, they left the house by the back door and passed through the back garden. From thence they struck into the path to the woodland and hurried forward. Between strides the widow managed to interject a few explanatory sentences.
"I got the wash off the line." Pause. "An' I got oneasy." Another pause. Resuming: "I felt druv to go out there, alone even, an' see. What you said about starvin' him worked on me, dreadful. I took a basket o' victuals. Bad as he is – Oh, my suz!"
"Walk slower, Susanna. We shall be overdone if we keep this pace. What then?" asked Miss Maitland.
"Well, I went. I run 'most all the way. I got there – an' he wasn't. He wasn't at all!"
"Do you mean that he had left the cottage?"
"My suz! I should think he has. He's left, an' my log-cabin quilt's left, an' my best feather tick, an' pillows, an' a pair blankets – that kitchen-bedroom bedstead's stripped as clean as 'twas the day it was born – I mean, sot up. Now – what do you think of that?"
"I think – Oh, what a miserable business it all is! I am so worried I cannot sleep. Right and wrong, right and wrong, like the pendulum of the clock the two sides of the matter swing in my mind till I'm half-distracted. I hardly know what I am doing or saying, I am so anxious to do the best for everybody, yet what is best? I have a fear that those children asked me something absurd a few minutes ago, and I said 'yes' to them without comprehending. I think they said 'a field of pumpkins.' What could they want with a field —a field– of pumpkins?"
"Didn't want 'em, of course. Some their silliness. Don't worry. What's punkins, anyhow, compared with that log-cabin quilt?"
"Little, to be sure. And I hope it isn't really lost. Are you certain that the poor wretch is he you said?"
"As sure as I draw my breath," averred Susanna, solemnly.
"Then Squire Pettijohn must never know," said Eunice, with equal solemnity.
After that they hurried silently onward again, reckless of the fact that they had left a bedridden man alone in the house, for although the deacon was still about his evening chores, such kept him wholly outside. As for Katharine, she might or might not be on hand if Moses summoned her. Evidently she and her boy-chum had some fine scheme on hand and were away to put it in train, since they had both been more than commonly excited and eager.
Never mind. There are times in life when its commonplace affairs must yield to the extraordinary. These two quiet householders had come to such a time on that late October day.
They had walked almost as far as Susanna's cottage when Eunice paused, and held her companion also back, as she pointed through the darkening wood to a wild-looking creature prowling among the trees. He was evidently looking for something. His search so earnest and troubled that the caution he had heretofore displayed had deserted him. Stooping, poking among the leaves and bracken, rising, moving toward another tree, stooping again – repeating endlessly this same proceeding, the watchers soon tired of simply observing him.
"Stay here, Susanna. You were right. It is he. I will go and speak to him."
"Alone? Oh, Eunice, don't! Let the old quilt go! I wish I hadn't told ye. Besides, who'd ever want to sleep under it after he'd touched it?"
But though she caught at her mistress's hand to prevent such foolhardiness, Susanna could not stop her. She was walking swiftly toward the searcher and almost noiselessly, and had come up to him before he was aware. When she was close at his side, so close that her firm fingers rested on his ragged shoulder, he discovered her and started away. But she held him quiet, more by her will than her grasp, while, looking steadily into his eyes, she spoke his name, gently, kindly, as one who welcomes a long absent friend:
"Nathan! Why, Nathan! How glad I am to see you!"
The tramp no longer struggled to free himself, but as if spellbound by her gaze returned it in silence. Gradually there stole over his haggard features the light of recognition, and, instead of remembering later events, his mind reverted to his boyhood.
"Be you Miss Eunice? But – I hain't got my lesson."
Again he would have slunk away expecting a reprimand; yet none came. Quite to the contrary, Miss Maitland's own face brightened and she laughed, answering:
"Never mind the lesson, laddie. We're not little boy and young woman to-day, Sunday scholar and Sunday teacher. We're just two old friends well met, with other things to learn besides printed lessons. What have you lost? Can I help you find it?"
"A box. His'n. I fetched it safe so fur – an' now – now – I can't see it nowhere. Planck'll frown an' make me feel mean. I promised – "
There a pitiful stupidity took the place of the intelligent recognition he had momentarily displayed, and he resumed that fruitless search under the trees.
"Wait, Nathan. Maybe I know. Maybe I can help you. The box was an old, old box. It was of mahogany, heavy, bound with brass, with neither key nor keyhole, and only those who had been shown how could open it. Is that the one, Nathan?"
"Yes, yes! It's all safe inside. He put it there – just when – just – "
With a sudden outburst of grief he began to weep. The great tears ran down his dirty cheeks and streaked them. His breath came in great blubbering sobs which he made no effort to check.
Eunice Maitland also went back in spirit many years and saw before her now, not the repellent vagrant, but a forlorn child who must be comforted. Without shrinking she clasped his vile hand in her dainty one and turned him back toward Susanna's cottage. That good soul had now drawn near and was herself crying bitterly. Why – she could hardly have explained. Surely, not from any affection for Nathan Pettijohn, returned rascal, nor from any sentimental memory of bygone years, such as her mistress's; but just naturally, in sympathy with two other tear-wet faces. She found the tears a relief. Indeed, they all appeared to do so, and began to retrace the way to the woodland cottage with swifter steps. The two women, because they were feeling the cold and now realizing what a foolish thing they had done in coming out unprotected from it. The vagrant, because it was his nature to follow rather than lead. Arrived there, they found the door wide open and the furnishing sadly disordered. Evidently, Nathan had rummaged the place thoroughly.
The Widow Sprigg had long since dried her unaccountable tears, and was freshly indignant at the state of affairs. So soon as they were within doors she turned upon the intruder, and demanded:
"What did you mean by such doin's as these, Nate Pettijohn? Ain't you ashamed to destroy folkses prope'ty this way? Where's my log-cabin quilt? My pillows? All my things?"
The man paid no heed to her, but fixed a hungry gaze upon the basket she had brought earlier in the afternoon, and Eunice interposed:
"Wait, Susanna. Let us feed him first, and hear his story afterward."
With that she opened the basket and set fresh food before him, while, with that thoughtfulness which was so constantly belying her sharp tongue, the cottage mistress went to the well and brought in a fresh pail of water. Though not as ravenous as he had been that afternoon by the riverside, he even now devoured, rather than ate, the sandwiches and cakes, swallowing them noisily and so rapidly that what the housekeeper had supposed would be sufficient to last any one for at least twenty-four hours disappeared in less than as many minutes.
"Well, my suz! If that don't beat the Dutch! I shouldn't think, if I hadn't knowed better, 'at you'd seen a mouthful o' victuals sence you scooted out o' Marsden a dozen years ago! An' as for manners – why, our pigs is better behaved. Water? Drink your fill, an' then, Nate Pettijohn, you walk right straight out to that wash-dish in the lean-to an' scrub yourself well. Of all the dirty creatur's – Why, what?"
The vagrant had been seized by a violent fit of coughing, so fierce that it threatened hemorrhage; and Susanna's wrath died.
"Consumption!" she whispered to Eunice, and shivered. It was of consumption "Spriggs, he" had died.
The paroxysm passed and left its victim exhausted. With a longing for rest, he tottered out of the kitchen into the lean-to, but not to wash as its owner had suggested. He went directly to the now uncovered manhole of the cistern and slowly descended a short ladder which protruded from it and had always hitherto hung upon the wall. The women watched him in astonishment, then Susanna hastily procured a candle, and, lighting it, held it above the opening.
As she had herself once said, the cistern was as dry as possible, and was in reality like a low-ceilinged little room, with the manhole for sky-light. Into this place the vagrant had tossed the missing bedding, and with his habit of hiding had bestowed himself upon it. In all probability, he had rarely occupied so snug and comfortable, though peculiar, a bedchamber.
"My – s-u-z!" gasped the widow, and sat down on a wash-bench to recover from her amazement.
Miss Maitland said nothing, yet an expression of great satisfaction settled upon her countenance, and, motioning her friend back into the kitchen, explained its cause.
"Nathan himself has decided what should best be done with him. He is perfectly safe and comfortable in that cistern. It is warm and sufficiently aired. He will not be apt to build a fire, as you feared, especially if we see to it that he has enough to eat. Nobody will think of looking for him in such a place, even though, as he declared he should, his father organizes a search for him. Unhappy father, if he does, and – poor, unhappy son. He looks very ill, and he certainly is no more intelligent than when he went away. But he is evidently faithful to Verplanck Sturtevant, as he always was. It is he that has brought back and for safe-keeping, presumably, hidden the brass bound box that Katharine found, and that has led to so many wild rumors. Do you not think we would better leave him undisturbed for the present, until I can secure better clothing for him? Also, can decide that awful question – whether or not to tell Elinor the stolen box is found. It will be like deliberately trying to break her heart over again if I give it to her and it is empty. Yet, it is not mine, and it rests on my conscience like an actual weight. Do advise me, Susanna."
From which it appears that the widow's curiosity had already been satisfied concerning the fabulous "find" in the Maitland forest, and she readily assented to her companion's idea.
"No, Eunice, we couldn't do better. Let him be. Poor wretch, he won't trouble nobody long, by the sound o' that cough. An' if Squire Pettijohn is mean enough an' onfeelin' enough to treat him like he vowed he would ary tramp, 'even his own son,' I guess we can let the Lord 'tend to him. He wouldn't know another day's peace, not if he's human; 'cause once that mis'able creatur', no matter what he is now, was a baby – a baby in arms. But – my suz, Eunice! I've just figured it out! How can the Squire 'rest anybody? He ain't no constable. Nobody ain't a constable here in Marsden. Ain't been none sence Isaac Brewster died, an' nobody would take his place. 'Less I'm one, myself, as Moses said."
