Chapter III: Part 3

Caddy paced two or three times up and down the room, lamenting his misfortunes, and inwardly vowing never to quit his cottage for a castle again. He was so anxious not to disturb the household, that he neither stamped on the floor, nor groaned audibly; but rather “stepped a-tip-toe,” from the window to the fire-place, and thence to the window again, scarcely breathing as he moved. Finding but little relief from this state of constraint, he threw himself on the old chair that stood on the right-hand side of the bed, and began to recover a little of his usual good humour. He reviewed the circumstances which had happened during the night; and they now presented themselves in so droll a light to Caddy's mind, that he could not help smiling at his mishaps, and proceeded to unbutton his waistcoat All at once, the remembrance of the moving tapestry flashed across him, and his eye was instantly fixed on the figure that had alarmed him, previous to his retiring to rest “Surely,” thought he, “it could not have been imagination, for it moveth, even now, most palpably!--or my visionary organs are singularly impaired;--or these new spectacles lead me into very unpleasant errors. Would that I had never accepted them!” He removed the suspected offenders from his nose, wiped them carefully with the tail of his coat, and was going to put them on again, when a tall, stout-built person, slipped out from behind the arras, and advanced, with hasty steps, toward him, exclaiming, “Soho! friend Caddy Cuddle, you're come at last!”

“What, in the name of all that's good, art thou?” exclaimed Caddy, feeling surprised that he was not more frightened;--“who art thou?”

“Don't you know me, Caddy?” said the intruder, laying his hand on Cuddle's arm; who was very much pleased to feel that his visitor possessed the property of tangibility, and was, therefore, no ghost.--“Don't you know me, Caddy?” repeated the figure, in rather a reproachful tone.

“I dare say I should, sir, if you would permit me to put on my spectacles,--bad as they are,” replied Caddy; “and if you'd step back a yard or two, so as to get, as it were, at the proper focus of my sight:--suppose you take a chair.”

The tall man retreated some paces, and Caddy put on his spectacles:--“Now, sir,” said he, “we shall see:--Where are you?--Oh! I perceive--Why, bless my soul, sir--is it--can it be? Are these glasses really playing me tricks? or have I, in truth, leaped out of the frying-pan into the fire?--You surely can't be my very unfortunate and most respected friend, Caddy Caddy, of Caddy Castle!”

“The same,” replied the tall old man, with a sigh:--“Caddy Caddy, sir, of Caddy Castle.”

“And how the nipperkins did you break loose?” cried Cuddle, rising from the chair, and advancing two or three steps.

“Where now, where now, sir?” said Caddy Caddy, taking a gentle hold of Cuddle's arm:--“Where now, friend Cuddle?”

“Where?--why, to the door, doubtless!--Am I doomed to do nothing but alarm the castle?”

“Alarm the castle!” exclaimed Caddy Caddy; “are you out of your senses? why, they'd lock me up, man, if you did.”

“To be sure they would, and that's precisely what I want them to do.--My dear sir, I beg pardon; I wouldn't give offence I'm sure,--neither to you nor the people of the Castle; but I can't help it.--You must allow me to give the alarm.--I cannot submit to be shut up with a madman.”

“So, then, you join in the slander, do you?” said Caddy Caddy; “Cuddle, you hurt me to the soul!”

“Well, well,--my dear friend,--my respected friend,--I am sorry I said so;--it was but in joke.”

“Cuddle,” replied Caddy, “I was ruined by a joke:--somebody called me a madman, in jest; the rest of the world joined in the cry, though it was a fool who gave tongue; and, at last, they ran me down; proved, to their own satisfaction, that I was out of my wits, for being in a passion with, and turning upon, those who were hunting me. Nothing is more easy than to prove a man mad:--begin, by throwing a slur upon his mental sanity; watch him narrowly; view all he does with a jaundiced eye; rake up a score of facts, which occurred a year apart,--facts that are really frolics, freaks, whims, vagaries, or what you will, of the like nature; place them all together, and the business is done; you make as fine a picture of lunacy as a man would wish to look at. I assure you, Caddy Cuddle, I am no more a lunatic than you are,--take my word for it; so sit down and tune the fiddle.”

“Fiddle! what?--where?--which fiddle?”

“Oh! they allow me my fiddle; I should go crazy in earnest without that I left it behind the arras;--come--”

“Come! come where?”

“Come and fetch it,” said Caddy, dragging Cuddle toward the place from which he had issued.

“Nipperkins, cousin!” cried Cuddle, “go and get it yourself.”

“No, no,” replied the other, with a knowing look; “If I were to do so, you'd slip out, while my back was turned, and raise the Castle. I've had trouble enough to elude their vigilance, during the bustle, to lose my liberty so easily again. By-and-bye, we'll go down stairs together, and break open the cellar;--it's all my own, you know, if right was cock of the walk. I'm for gamocks and junketting, I forewarn you, and we'll have a jolly night of it.” By this time, Caddy had approached the arras, with Cuddle fast in his clutch; he stooped down, and drawing forth an old fiddle and stick, put them into the hands of Cuddle; who, as may readily be imagined, was by no means enamoured of his situation.

“Now,” said Caddy, “in the first place, my friend, play Rowley Waters. I have been trying to recollect the two last bars of it for these three years, but I cannot. Do you remember how beautifully my drunken old butler, Barnaby, used to troul it?”

“Ay, those were merry days, cousin,” said Cuddle; “poor Barnaby! his passion for ale laid him low, at last.”

“And many a time, before.”

“What! was it in time of your sanity? I beg pardon--Do you remember, then, our finding him, flat on his back, by the side of an untapped vat of the stoutest beer that ever Caddy Castle could boast?--Methinks I can see him now, with the gimlet in his hand, with which he had made an aperture in the cask, and sucked the blood of barley-corn, to such an abominable extent--the old beast did--that--”

“Don't asperse him, Cuddle,” said Caddy; “he put a peg in the hole before he died. He was the best of butlers; if he always drank a skinful, he never wasted a noggin. But now for Rowley Waters;--play up, and I'll jig.”

“No, no,” said Cuddle, laying down the instrument; “I'll do no such thing;--I won't, by Jupiter!--that's resolute.”

“Well, then, I'll play, and you shall dance.”

“Don't make me swear,” said Cuddle; “don't, Caddy Caddy!--What! raise a riot again?--You don't know, perhaps, that I have, already, sinned egregiously;--although, I protest, without the least evil intention. Besides, it would produce that very effect which you wish to--Eh! what was I saying?--Well, I don't mind if I _do_ give you _one_ tune.”

“Thank you, kindly, cousin Cuddle,” said Caddy, taking up the fiddle; “but you have raised an objection, which I admit to be of great weight. Oh! cousin Cuddle! Did you want to betray me?--I thank you for the hint:--we should, indeed, alarm my enemies. You overreached yourself, and saved me, cousin.”

“Well, I scorn a lie,” replied Cuddle; “such a thought as you suspect did occur to me; for I protest I am not very comfortable in your company, much as I respect you. Go back to your bed; do, pr'ythee now, be ruled--oblige me, cousin;--for your own sake, go.”

“Oh! what a thing self-interest is!” exclaimed Caddy; “'for your own sake, go,' quoth he, when it is solely for his! Cousin Cuddle, I shall not;--that's a plain answer for you.”

Caddy now placed a chair immediately opposite to that one on which he had found Cuddle sitting, on his entrance; he forced the alarmed little gentleman into his seat; and, in a few moments, resumed the conversation.

“Cuddle,” said he, looking very seriously, “as the world goes, I take you to be an honest man, and my friend. Now, I'll confide something to your ear that will perfectly astonish you. The people about me, don't know a syllable of the matter; I kept it snug from them; if I had not, they would have restricted me to one room, instead of allowing me the liberty and use of three.--Draw your chair close.--About three years' since, I broke loose.”

“So I heard,” said Cuddle, trembling as he remembered what had been related of Caddy's violence on that occasion. The great staircase of the better part of Caddy Castle, was circular, and surmounted by a magnificent dome, which lighted it completely down to the hall; Caddy had thrown himself over the banisters, and must, inevitably, have been dashed to pieces, had it not been for a scaffolding, which some workmen had erected within the circle of the staircase, for the purpose of repairing some part of the masonry, a few days before. Caddy fell among the people on the temporary platform, and was taken up, apparently, lifeless; but, in the course of a couple of months, his bodily health was restored,--his mental malady remaining nearly in its former state.

“You know,” continued Caddy, “of my leap; I gave them the slip, then, cousin, in good earnest I fell a terrific depth, and did the business at once. I recollect the moment of my near approach to the scaffolding, of the erection of which, I was ignorant; but, as it happened, it did not frustrate my intentions.”

“I feel very ailing--very indisposed, indeed,” said Cuddle; “pray, cousin Caddy, permit me to--”

“Nonsense!” exclaimed Caddy; “you are as well as ever you were in your life; I am sure of it; so hear me out:--of course, you heard their account of restoring me to health;--but they know nothing of the matter, cousin Cuddle:--when I seemed to them to revive, I felt that I was _disembodied!_”

“Disembodied!” cried Cuddle, staring wildly at Caddy.

“Ay, disembodied, cousin,” said Caddy; “and my sole with, except for liberty, now is, to obtain a disembodied companion, who--”

Cuddle could hear no more. To describe his thoughts or feelings at this moment, would be a task beyond the power of our feeble pen. We shall attempt, only, to relate his actions.--He threw himself back in the capacious chair which he had hitherto occupied, but by no means filled; brought his knees on a level with, and as near as he possibly could to, his face; and then, suddenly throwing out his legs, with all the energy he possessed, struck Caddy in the breast with his feet so violently, as, in an instant, to turn him and his chair topsy-turvy on the floor. He exhibited a specimen of that agility for which he had been famed in his younger days, as well in this, as in his subsequent proceedings. Skipping over Caddy and the chair, he flew to the door, and made for the staircase at full speed. It is useless to conceal that Cuddle was dreadfully frightened; he heard Caddy striding after him at a fearful rate; and felt satisfied, by the evidence of his ears, that his dreaded pursuer would very speedily overtake him. People in similar situations adopt plans for escaping, which men, sitting calmly over their coffee, would never dream of. Cuddle knew that he should have no chance in a grapple with Caddy: it was ridiculous to hope for help if he cried out; for, before any one could come to his assistance, Caddy would have sufficient time to disembody his spirit; and his pursuer was evidently an over-match for him in speed. Cuddle was desperate: he suddenly determined on attempting to evade his enemy by a bold and dangerous manouvre. He leaped upon the banisters, which were massive and broad enough for a man to stand upon with ease; caught hold of the rope, by which the dinner bell, above the cupola, was rung by the porter, in the hall below; and threw himself upon it,--in a style which would have done honour to a thorough-bred seaman,--at the moment the tops of Caddy's fingers touched his heels. We cannot wait to describe the consternation into which the ringing of the dinner bell, at that time of the night, threw all the inmates of Caddy Castle;--our hero claims our undivided attention; for his position was most perilous--at least, in Cuddle's own opinion.

Having descended, with moderate haste, for a few yards, he felt, by certain jerks of the rope, that Caddy had followed his example, and was pursuing him down the rope,--with such hair-brained velocity too, as he very speedily ascertained, that he was in greater danger than ever. The rope was swung to and fro, by his own exertions and those of his enemy,--bumping him against the banisters with considerable force; but the blows he thus received were beneath his notice; he thought only of escaping. Finding that Caddy gained upon him, he contrived, as the rope swung toward the side of the staircase, to catch hold of one of the stout iron rails of the banister;--secure in his clutch, he quitted the rope with considerable dexterity, and had the satisfaction, while he dangled, of seeing Caddy slide by him. He now began to roar lustily; but his efforts were needless, for almost every living creature in the house was already on the alert; the watch dogs were barking without, and the lap-dogs within; the ladies were shrieking; the gentlemen calling the servants, and the latter wondering, and running here and there, exceedingly active, but not knowing what to do or what was the matter. By degrees, the male portion of the inhabitants of the Castle became concentrated in the hall: lights were procured; and while the ladies and their attendants peeped over the rails of the great staircase, in their night-caps, to watch the proceedings of the party below, Martha, armed with the kitchen poker, volunteered to search every hole and corner in the Castle: but her master forbade her on pain of his displeasure; “For,” said he, “I feel satisfied that it is a disgraceful hoax of some scoundrel in the house, who shall certainly be ducked if ever I discover him.--Is any one absent?”

“All the men servants are here, sir,” said the coachman; “and all the gentlemen, too, I think.”

“No, they are not,” exclaimed Martha, with a ludicrous grin; “where is my sweetheart, can you tell?--I do not see him.”

“Oh! he's fast asleep, good man!” said the Honourable Charles Caddy.

“I wish he were;--I do most sincerely wish he were!” quoth Cuddle, who had released himself, by his own exertions, from his pendent position, and was now hastening down the lowest flight of stairs. “You may stare, my good host,” continued he, “but to sleep in Caddy Castle is perfectly impossible!”

“So I find, to my cost,” replied the Honourable Charles Caddy; “and if I can find out the rascal who--”

“Do not waste time in threats,” said 'Cuddle; “but fly--disperse, in quest of my respected, unhappy friend, poor Caddy Caddy, who has been with me this half hour, and would have disembodied me, if I hadn't given him a kick in the stomach, and put my trust in the bell-rope.”

At the request of his host, Cuddle gave a hurried detail of what had taken place between himself and Caddy Caddy; while those domestics, who had the immediate care of the lunatic, hastened up to his rooms. They returned just as Cuddle had concluded, and stated that Caddy Caddy was undressed, and fast asleep in his bed;--that they found the doors locked, and every thing about the apartments in the precise state in which they had left them. One of the party said, that he slept in the next room to Caddy Caddy, and was quite certain that he should have been, as usual, roused, had the lunatic but merely moved: and as to the old Squire having been at large, the fellow swore that it was impossible.

It was useless for Cuddle to vow and solemnly declare that Caddy Caddy had been with him, in the face of this evidence: the gentlemen shook their heads; the men grumbled; the ladies on the stair-case tittered; and their maids pronounced Mr. Cuddle's conduct to be altogether shocking.

“It is a very distressing case,” said the Honourable Charles Caddy; “and I protest I never was in so awkward a situation before. I feel bound to apologize,” continued he, “to every lady and gentleman in the Castle, for the uproar, which my relation, Mr. Caddy Cuddle, has, doubtless, unintentionally, produced. I am bound to add, in justice to myself, that, upon my honour as a gentleman, I had not the most remote idea that either of my guests was a somnambulist.”

“Is it possible that you can allude to me?” exclaimed Caddy Cuddle. “Is my veracity impeached? Am I to be a martyr to our poor mad relation's freaks?--Or, possibly, you will tell me that I ought to doubt the evidence of my own senses?”

“I never presume,” was the reply, “to dictate to a gentleman on so delicate a point. Perhaps you will allow one of my servants to wait on you during the remainder of the night.”

“I'll do no such thing,” said Caddy Cuddle: “let the horse be saddled directly. I'll go home at once, and endeavour to make my peace with Mrs. Watermark, from whom I expect and merit a very severe lecture, for so cruelly cutting up her feelings as to stay out a whole night nearly. Cousin Caddy, good b'ye; ladies and gentlemen, your servant.”

Caddy Cuddle immediately departed, vowing, _per Jovem_, as he went, never, after that morning, to bestride Anthony Mutch's horse,--to dine at Caddy Castle, or any where else out of his own house,--or to put on a strange pair of spectacles again.

THE BRAINTREES.

It was the boast of old Samuel Gough, who, during a period of thirty-two years, had been landlord of The Chough and Stump,--a little, old-fashioned house, with carved oaken angels supporting the roof of its porch,--that, notwithstanding the largest road-side farm-house in the village had been licensed and beautified; though tiles had been substituted for its old thatch; a blue sign, with yellow letters, fixed over its entrance; and a finger-post erected at the top of the lane, about the middle of which his own tenement stood, directing travellers to The New Inn,--The Chough and Stump still “bore the bell.”

“Richard Cockle,” he would often say, “being twenty years butler to old 'Squire Borfield, ha' made friends among the gentlefolks. The petty sessions is held in his best parlour, now and then; he hath a' got a pair of post-horses, and tidy tits they be, I must say; his house is made post-office; and excise-office, to the tail o' that--for this and the five nearest parishes; he pays for a wine license, and hath two or three gentlevolks, may be, once a month, for an hour or two; but not much oftener, as there be few do travel our cross-country road; and he do call one room in his house a tap:--but for all that, and his powdered head to boot, gi' me The Chough and Stump still.” Gough's boast was not altogether without warranty: his comfortable, old-fashioned kitchen, with its bacon-rack, broad hearth, dingy walls, and rude mantel-slab, enriched with strange hieroglyphical scratches, in which his neighbours traced, or affected to trace, the names of their grandfathers, was endeared to the inhabitants of the village;--there were old feelings, and pleasant associations connected with it Sam Gough was a jolly host, who regaled himself, among his guests, from morning till night; habitual drinking, for along time, having rendered him, as Abel Harris, the schoolmaster of the village, said, “invulnerable to intoxication he not only could, but often did, sing a good old song, and tell a good old story;--never repeating either the one or the other on the same day; for he was orderly in his entertainment, and had his Monday's songs and his Tuesday's songs, as well as his morning stories and his evening jokes: he never sponged upon a customer but paid his share of the reckoning to his wife, who officiated as mistress, while he appeared to be only a constant guest. His ale was generally clear as amber, sweet as milk, and strong as brandy.” In the tap of The New Inn, which was the name of the rival house, the company generally consisted of the postilion and ostler of the establishment, a few out-door servants from some of the neighbouring gentlemen's houses, and three or four of the gayest, youthful, village bucks: but the elderly and middle-aged men,--“the substantial,” as Abel Harris called them, usually congregated, to smoke their evening pipes, round the oak in front of The Chough and Stump, when the weather would permit, or in the kitchen settle, before a blazing fire of logs and turf, when the rustics sat up three or four hours after sunset Schoolmaster Abel, although he was one of the pair of parish constables, patronized The Chough and Stump, and grumbled mightily at being obliged to pay five shillings for a dinner, once a year, at the New Inn, with the churchwardens, and other official persons of the parish; which dinner had been instituted solely for the benefit of Richard Cockle, and much against the inclination of several of those, who were almost compelled, on account of their connexion with his wealthy supporters, to attend it. It was at The Chough and Stump that all the village news was to be heard; and if one of its customers were not found at his post, on the settle, at the usual hour, old Gough concluded, that he was either bad, busy, or gone to the rival tap, to glean gossip about the great families, from the servants, in order to retail it, the next night, to the grateful crew at The Chough and Stump.

One winter's evening, although it was neither a Saturday, a holiday, nor a fast day, the settle was not only completely occupied, but several occasional visitors to the old kitchen were closely packed along a narrow bench that ran across the back wall. Many of the poorer inhabitants of the place were lurking about the porch, and several women, with their check aprons thrown over their red and almost frost-bitten elbows, stood peeping in at the window, and eagerly listening to an old dame, who had placed her ear to a little corner from which the glass had been broken, and occasionally repeated what she heard passing within.

“I do pity the mother o' the lad, troth do I,” said a woman about twenty-five years of age; “her hath a got but one zon--no more have I--and truth to speak, I do pity her.”

“And well thou may'st, Tabby Mudford,” said the old dame; “for constable Abel hath just a' told thy husband, that the boy's taken off in a cart, wi' 'Squire Stapleton's coachman a one side o' un, and constable Tucker o' t'other, hand-cuffed, and leg-fast, to the county gaol.”

“Poor Meg Braintree! poor soul!” cried several of the women, on hearing this, and one or two of them actually began to sob aloud.

“Poor Meg Braintree, forsooth!” exclaimed a little sharpnosed female, with a high-cauled cap, and leathern stomacher;--“I don't zay no zuch ztuff--not I,” added she, in a shrill, disagreeable voice; “it hath a' come home to her now; and I said it would, two-and-twenty years agone come Candlemas, when she scoffed and vlouted poor Phil Govier, and took up wi' Zaul Braintree, a'ter she'd a' most a' promised, as I have heard tell, to marry Phil. In my mind, he loved her better, worse luck vor un, poor vellow, than ever this Zaul Braintree did, and took on zo for two or dree year a'ter, that there was some that thought he'd never ha' got over 't.”

“Vor shame, Aunt Dally,” said Tabby Mudford; “Meg Braintree never done you wrong.”

“I don't know that,” replied Dolly.

“It be true, I ha' heard mother zay, you cocked your cap at Zaul, yourself; as you did to many more, though you never could trap any body to have'ee, aunt; but I never could believe it.”

“The vellow did, once upon a time, look up to me,” said Dolly, lifting her chin, and curling her thin and slightly-bearded lip; “but I scorned'un. I wouldn't ha' had un if his skin were stuffed wi' gold.”

“And yet you do blame Meg vor scorning Phil Govier! Vor my part,--I were a child, to be zure,--but by what I do recollect of'em, I'd rather ha' had Zaul, wi'out a zhoe to's, voot, than Philip Govier, if every hair on the head o' un were strung wi' pearls.”

“Don't talk to me, Tab,” cried her now incensed aunt, flouncing off; “it don't become thee. I do zay it ha' come home to her;--her zon be zent to the county gaol, vor murdering the man whose heart she a'most broke more than twenty year agone:--get over that if you can. It ha' came home to her, and I'll bide by it;--wi' her blue clocked ztockings, and putting up her chit of a daughter to smirk wi' the young 'squire!--I ha'n't a' got patience wi' zuch pride.”

The supervisor, who was going his rounds, and intended to sleep that night at The Chough and Stump, now rode up, on his sturdy little grey cob; and before he could alight, some of the loiterers about the porch had, in part, acquainted him with the cause of their being assembled round the inn-door. The old man, however, as he said, could make “neither head nor tail” of what he heard; and hastened, as well as his infirmities would allow, into the kitchen. The landlord rose on his appearance, and conducted the spare and paralytic old man, to the post of honour, in the settle, between his own seat and that of the exciseman,--a cunning-looking, thick-set, fat, or, to use an expressive West Country adjective, podgy, little man, between forty and fifty; with a round, sallow, bloated face, begemmed here and there with groups of pimply excrescences, resembling the warts that are occasionally seen on the cheek that is turned to the sun of a wounded pumpkin. One of the exciseman's eyes glared at his beholder, dull and void of expression, while the other was almost concealed beneath its lids;--a circumstance occasioned by an inveterate habit of winking, all his life, at every tenth word, with the latter; which operation he was totally unable to perform with the former.

“Here hath been a sad to-do, sir,” said Gough, addressing the supervisor, as soon as the latter was comfortably seated; “a sad to-do, indeed.”

“Ah! so I hear, Gough,--so I hear;--but what is it?--No affray with the excise, I hope.”

“No--fear of--that, sir,” replied the exciseman, winking, and puffing the smoke from his lips thrice as he spoke; “we've no enemies here.--I'll tell you all--about it--sir, when--I have wetted--my lips.” He now raised the jug to his mouth, but before he had finished his draught, little Tailor Mudford, who sat by his side, taking advantage of the moment, placed his right elbow on his knee, and still keeping his pipe between his teeth, leaned forward, and bore away the glory of the announcement from the exciseman, by stating, that Philip Govier, 'Squire Stapleton's gamekeeper, had been killed; and young Robert Braintree committed for trial, as the perpetrator of the crime.

“Robert Braintree! Robert Braintree!” calmly repeated the old man; “Preserve us from evil! Haven't I seen him?”

“To be sure you have, sir,” replied Gough; “a tall, straight-limbed chap, between eighteen and twenty, and as fine a young fellow as ever stood in shoe-leather. I shouldn't ha' thought it of him.”

“I should,” said the exciseman; “a down-looking--”

“Ah! I be zorry vor the lad,” said Mudford, again interrupting the exciseman, in the brief interval occupied by a puff and a wink; “nobody could zay harm o' un, except that his vather made un go out a poaching wi' un, and so vorth: but a zung in the choir o' Zindays; and' though he never were asked so to do, often joined in, wi' the rest o' th' neighbours, to reap a little varmer's bit o' wheat, or mow a tradesman's whoats he ha' done zo by me, many's the time, wi'out any thing but thanks, and a bit o' dinner and a drop o' drink, which he never wanted at home. He'd ha' been the last I should ha' zuzpected.”

“But the evidence,” said constable and schoolmaster Abel, “the circumstantial evidence, doth leave no doubt, either in the mind of me, or the magistrate, of his guilt.”

“You be d--d, Yeabel!” cried a bluff old fellow in a corner; “Who be you, I should like to know?--Marry come up, then! times be come to a vine pass, I trow, when a pig-vaced bit of a constable, two yards long, and as thin as a hurdle, do zet hi'zelf up cheek-by-jowl wi' the 'squire!--Who cares vor thy opinion, dost think?”

“Farmer Salter,” responded Abel, with affected humility; “I am educating your son and heir:--you are a freeholder, and ha' got a vote for the county--”

“I know that well enough, stupid! and zo had my vather avore me, and so shall my zon a'ter me.--Poor buoay! you ha' often licked un, Yeabel:--may be you be right--may be you bean't; but this I do know, tho' I ha'n't a told un zo, that I do vind, upon casting things over, whenzoever I do gie you a bit ov a clumzy wipe here, at The Chough and Stump, over night Jack's zure and zartin to get breeched in your school-room the next day: now that be odd, yean't it, Gough?”

“Farmer Salter,” pursued Abel, as Gough nodded in acquiescence, and Salter chuckled at what he had said; “I repeat, you are a freeholder:--you've a slip of land between the two 'squires' estates, upon which you and your forefathers ha' grazed a cow, raised a crop of wheat, hay and potatoes, to last'ee for the year; and built a small edifice for yourselves, and a sty for your pigs: you do wear a looped hat at all times, and, on Sundays, a blue coat, wi' a red collar and cuffs, and crown pieces of the reign of King Jacobus, for buttons; a flowered and flapped waistcoat; leather breeches, wi' seven-shilling pieces and silver buckles at the knees; and half a pack o' cards figured wi' colours in each o' your stockings: you do strut up to church, just as a 'squire would, and your father did,--whose finery you ha' saved for such service,--half a century ago:--but you know nothing either of law or good breeding for all that, fanner Salter.”

The freeholder was about to bristle up indignantly when Abel concluded, but Zachary Tickel, the hereditary herbalist, or, as he denominated himself, apothecary of the village, whose nick-name was “Bitter-Aloes,”--and there were few of his neighbours who were not as well known by some equally appropriate baptismal of the laity,--took him by the collar, and endeavoured to tranquillize, while he forcibly held him on his seat:--meantime, the supervisor inquired what had induced the constable to suspect Robert Braintree of the murder.

“Why, zir,” said Mudford, cutting in, as a coachman would express it, before Abel and the exciseman, (each of whom intended to reply,) while the asthmatic constable was cleansing his throat by two or three hems, and the exciseman was puffing out a magazine of smoke, which, at that moment, he had drawn into his mouth, to be retailed and divided into a dozen or twenty whiffs;--“the vact, zir, is this,” said Mudford; “the body were vound, dead and stiff, this morning, in the copse, t'other zide o' the hill;--there was a nail or more of znow on the ground, and vootsteps ov a dog and a man were traced vrom the body to Braintree's cottage:--the dog's vootsteps were, likely enough, the vootsteps ov Ponto, a dog belonging to the Braintrees; a zort ov a crossbred pointer, az ztrong as a bull, and wi' more zense in his tail-end, as the zaying is, than many men ha' got in their whole bodies, head and all.”

“The shoe-marks, permit me to observe,” said Abel, “were decidedly made by the shoes of Bob Braintree:--I've sworn to't, because I compared'em; and I apprehended him wi' those identical shoes on his feet.”

“Now, d'ye hear, volks?--d'ye hear?” exclaimed farmer Salter; “how Yeabel do belabour us wi' vine dixonary words? 'Apprehended,' and 'identical,' quotha!--Why, I should be azhamed to talk zo-vashion. 'Those identical zhoes!' zays he;--'those!'--Bless us, how vine we be!--'Those,' vorsooth!--Why doan't the vool zay 'they there zhoes,' like a man?”

Abel cast a glance of contempt on the freeholder, but did not condescend to reply. A brief silence ensued, which was broken by the herbalist; who observed, after throwing himself back in the settle, “Bad bird, bad egg--that's all I've to zay. I bean't so compassionate, and all that, as zome volk. How hath Zaul Braintree ha' got his living vor eighteen year past, but by zmuggilin and poaching, and, may be, worse, vor what I know? Why wen he discharged by 'Zquire Ztapleton, but vor doing what he shon not do? Didn't poor Phil Govier, that's lying dead, when he wen under Zaul, detect and prove to the 'zquire, that instead o' Zaul' s doing his duty, as game-keeper, he were killing hares upon the zly, and zending'em to market? And when Phil got Zaul's place, have they ever met without looking at one another like a couple o' dogs that was longing vor a vight, and yet stood off, as though they were aveard to pitch into one another? What d'ye think Braintree hath instilled into Bob, but hatred and malice against Govier?”

“You may talk and talk, old Bitter-Aloes,” said Salter; “but vor my part, though the'zquire believed Govier's story, and turned away Zaul, in a way enough to nettle a parson, I didn't think it quite as it should be. I ha' zeen things o' Phil, what I won't tell ov, now he's gone, as I didn't while he were alive; but if I had to choose, vor all Phil's quiet tongue and humble looks,--which were all zlyness, in my mind,--gi'e me Zaul, I zay.”

“Well,” quoth Gough, “I say nothing--why should I? But Bob was a good boy; and though he'd noose a hare, or decoy a vlock o' wild ducks, or stalk a covey, I don't think he'd any harm in him. He'd do what Zaul bid him, to be zure, but I don't think Zaul would ever tell him to commit murder; and if I must speak my mind--I don't agree wi' Abel Harris.”

“Abel--I must say,”--muttered the exciseman, “the constable, I mean;--he--he's no conjuror.”

“I can't make out,” growled Salter, “how he came to be made constable, zeeing az he's the most uncapable man in the parish. I ha' zeed un run, as if'twere vor his life, when he thought nobody were nigh, vrom my gander!--Poor Jack! thoult zuffer, may be, vor this to-morrow;--but I can't help speaking the truth. Yeabel, doan't thee baste un, or dang me if I doan't drash thee!”

“There is one thing,” remarked a spare, but hale-looking man, who sat next the herbalist, “one thing, or, may be, a thing or two, I'll make bold to observe, which is, namely, this:--though Zaul Braintree were never over and above vriendly to I--that be nothing--the man's a man--and I do zay, the'zquire were a bit too hard upon Zaul, to turn un off wi out more nor an hour's notice, and not gi'e un a good character:--and what vor, I wonder?--Because this here Phil Govier, a demure, down-looking twoad, zaid a' poached a bit! A'ter this, what were Zaul to do? Wi'out a character, he couldn't get a zarvice, and a poor man bean't to starve: zo a' poached, and that in downright earnest;--and it ztrikes I, no blame to un neither.”

“Oh! fie! fie!” exclaimed the supervisor; “you should not preach so, friend; the practice of poaching is highly illegal.”

“Highly illegal,--indeed,--John,--that is,--James Cobb,” said the exciseman, in his usual manner; “we must not hear--this sort of a--thing; must we,--constable?”

“Why, it bean't treason, master exciseman, be it?” asked a tall old fellow, who stood at the end of the settle.

“Do you hear--that?” said the exciseman, turning to his superior; “do you hear that?--and he an earth-stopper,--and gets his bread by--the game laws.”

The supervisor looked aside toward the bottom of the narrow table, and while the ensuing conversation went on, took a deliberate view of the earth-stopper's person, apparel, and accoutrements. He was a squalid-looking figure, with half a week's growth of grey beard on his chin and cheeks; the edge of a red woollen night-cap, which he wore under a weather-beaten dog's-hair hat, was strained across his pale, wrinkled brow; his legs were thin, puny, and bent outward in such a manner, that they seemed to have been moulded on the carcase of a horse.

“Well,” quoth the earth-stopper, in reply to the exciseman's observation, shouldering his pick-axe and shovel, and lighting the candle in his lanthorn, as he spoke; “I zuppose a man may move his tongue, if a' be a yearth-stopper,--or else what be the use o't to un?--I were one o' the virst to lay hands on young Braintree, and always ha' ztood vorward on zuch like 'casions; but what o' that? I'd help to take up thee, or thy betters by the zide o' thee there, if thee wert zuzpected and accused; but vor all that, I'd speak up my own mind, and zay, I thought thee wert innocent, iv zo be as I did think thee zo--mind me:--and now you ha' put me up, I'll go vurther, and ask 'ee, what business had Phil Govier a' got in the copse that time o' night?”

“Ay, that's true,” observed the landlord; “for it be well known the 'squire's strict orders was, that the keepers shouldn't go out o' nights. 'Let the poachers have a little o' their own way,' I have a heard un say;--'I'd rather lose a few head o' game, than ha' blood shed upon the manor; and meetings by night, betwixt poachers and keepers, often do end worse than either one or t'other a' looked for.'”

“It's true az I be here zitting,” said Mudford; “that the gamekeeper,--I mean Phil Govier, of course,--had a' got a hare in one pocket, and a cock pheasant in t'other;--I zeed'em myself.”

“Come, come;--no ill o' the dead, pr'ythee, now,” quoth the herbalist.

“No ill o' the dead!” cried the man who sat next to him; “I do zay yea, iv it be truth; and moorauver, in my mind, it be better to zay vorty _lies_, even, of them that be gone, than to tell one that may do harm to them that be living. Them wer'n't the virst Phil pocketed, by night or by day, vor his own profit, as I do think.'T'ant clear to I, that a' didn't play voul wi' Zaul, long ago;--I wouldn't lie down upon my back and zwear that a' didn't kill the game what he 'cuzed Zaul o' poaching, and zo got Braintree out of his place, and popped into't hi'zelf.”

“This is going too far, landlord,” said the supervisor.

“Do 'ee think so, sir?” asked Gough, with a knowing look, accompanied by a shake of the head, which finished in an acquiescent nod to the man who sat next the herbalist.

Mudford asked the constable if Saul had seen his son after the committal of the latter. Abel replied, that an interview had been permitted by the magistrate, just previously to Robert's removal; “which interview,” added he, “took place in the presence of myself and colleague.”

“And what did 'em zay?” eagerly inquired three or four of the persons present.

The constable replied, that it would be highly improper for him to divulge all that took place, even if he were capable of so doing; but there was much that he did not hear, and more that he had forgotten. One part of the brief dialogue he perfectly well remembered:--after having whispered for a short time, the youth said aloud, “But I be innocent, vather; you be zure I be.”--“Well, well!” replied Braintree, in a low, but nevertheless, audible tone; “zuppose things should go against thee, wou'lt thee die like a man, Bob?”--“I doan't know, vather,--I be but a boy! I'll try, iv it do come to that; I hope it won't, though; vor I be aveard I can't bear it--I can't, truly, vather.”

“Zo, thee dost call thyself a buoy, dost?” said Saul; “a vellow here within a head as high as I be, and gone eighteen these zix weeks!”

“You always tells me I be but a boy.”

“Well, and zo I do--thee'rt _my_ boy; but a boy to nobody else. But I zay, Bob, woul't thee mind now, and speak up to the lord judge just what I told thee?”

“Yeas, doan't be aveard.”

“Ah! but woul't tell't cool and zober-vashion, Bob?”

“Never you vear,” replied Robert;--“bless'ee, I shall tell't out to un, just as iv I were telling out zixpenn'orth o' ha'pence.”

“And Bob--” But here Braintree's voice subsided into a whisper again, and Abel heard no more of that part of the conversation.

The parties in The Chough and Stump kitchen now ceased the regular sort of discussion which had hitherto been supported, and talked in couples. The earth-stopper and Abel Harris, by their looks and gestures, seemed to be maintaining a warm debate; the herbalist crossed over and took a place next the supervisor, which tailor Mudford relinquished in his favour, and sat down by the side of farmer Salter. So many persons speaking together, had not, for some time, been heard in The Chough and Stump; but though his customers made a great noise, as Gough observed to the exciseman, they drank but little. This was, indeed, the case; for the interest created by the subject of their discourse, made them almost forget their cups. Each of the speakers grew louder in his tone, in order to make himself heard and understood, amid the “hubbub,” by his listening neighbour; and thus the general noise was increased to such a degree, that the exciseman had already taken up his empty mug to strike the table, and call “order,” when, in an instant, every tongue was motionless, and every eye turned toward the door. A man, on the autumnal side of the prime of life, exceeding the middle stature, with rather handsome features, had just entered. He was dressed in a round, grey, frock coat, a deer-skin waistcoat, corduroy smallclothes, and jean gaiters. His frame was athletic, but by no means clumsy; he looked calmly about him, or, perhaps, rather affected to do so; for, as the herbalist afterwards remarked, his lips appeared as if they had just been blanched with boiling water. A very large, stout-built, liver-coloured dog, stood before him, wagging his tail, and looking up in his master's face, as the latter remained, for a moment, motionless, and with his eyes seeking for a vacant place on the settle. Every seat had its tenant, and no one moved for the newly-arrived guest, or spoke either to him or to any other person present.

“Why, volks! you do all zeem dazed ov a zudden!” said the man, ironically; and then immediately assuming an angry expression of countenance, he turned to the landlady, who had just entered the kitchen, and, in a sharp, surly tone, called for “a pint o' drink.”

“I ha' been trying to squeeze room for thee, Zaul,” said the landlord, addressing his new guest; “but I can't.”

“Don't trouble thyself, Gough,” said farmer Salter, from the opposite side of the settle; “I be vor home, and Braintree can take my corner in a minute.”

“Thankye, master Zalter,” replied Saul; “but Abel Harris ha' just stepped out, and, may be, won't come back; zo I'll zit down in his place; and iv a' do return, 1 can but gie't up to un again; and by that time, you can vinish your pipe wi' comfort” So saying, Braintree took possession of a nook in the settle, which Abel had quitted, in consequence of the landlady having beckoned him out, while Gough was speaking to Saul. Two or three of the guests attempted to strike out new subjects for conversation, but their efforts were ineffectual; and when Dame Gough came in, with Saul's ale, she found her customers, who had lately been so clamorous, silent as statues. Braintree lifted the cup to his lips, but immediately placed it on the table again, without swallowing a spoonful.

“Why, what's the matter, Zaul?” said Gough; “have a mad dog bit'ee, that you do gasp and heave at the liquor so?”

“There were a bit o' hop got in my mouth,” replied Saul; “and your yeale bean't zo good to-night, I think, as'twere;--han't it got a strawberry smack?”

“No, no, Zaul; your mouth be out o' taste wi' trouble,--that be it;--there's no fault in the ale. You do want comfort in a closer compass; and if you'll ha'a drop o' Hollands, my wife will give'ee some and welcome. Though I don't sell spirits, I can't help Dame Gough's keeping a bottle in her bureau;--it stops her tooth-ache.”

“You be cruel good, master Gough,” replied Saul; “and I do thank'ee vor't; but I don't like to drink in a public-house, wi'out paying my penny for a landlord's penn'orth.”

“Oh! that be folly,” said Gough; “but come; gi'e me your pint o' drink, and I'll treat you wi' a glass o' Hollands.--Dame, bring in a thimble-full.”

Dame Gough bustled out, and soon returned with a small old-fashioned tea-cup, full of the liquor. Saul took the cup, and so far forgot his manners, as to swallow the spirits it contained, without a word, or even a nod, to Gough, or any of his guests. A dead silence succeeded.

“Sharpish weather vor the young wheats,” at length observed Salter.

“Main and sharp!” was the reply of the herbalist; and another pause took place.

“I ha'n't a' zeed Jacob Wall lately;” was the next observation made: it came from the lips of tailor Mudford, but no one honoured it with a reply.

Braintree now began to feel that he was in an unpleasant situation; and guessing on what subject the minds of those about him were brooding, he observed, with a sigh, “A bad job this, o' mine, neighbours!”

“Bad, indeed, Braintree!” replied Gough; “but I hope your son may get over it!”

“Hope, did'ee zay, landlord? why, d'ye think there be any vear on't, then?”

“Excuse me, friend,” observed the supervisor; “I am a stranger to you; but, in my opinion, that is,--speaking candidly,--I'm sorry to say--remember I've no ill-will toward your son--nor, understand me, do I wish to bear on a bruised reed; but its folly to buoy a man up with false hopes;--the case is, if what I've heard be true, most decisive against the young man.”

“And what have'ee heard, old gentleman?--what have'ee heard, zir?”

“That, Saul,”--said the exciseman, “that, it is--needless to repeat;--but the shoe-marks,--Saul--”

“Well, and what o' them?” interrupted Braintree; “mightn't my zon ha' gone that way avore Govier were killed? or mightn't he ha' vound un dead, and come whoam straight, intending to tell the news az zoon az he axed I how a' should act?”

“True, Zaul, true,” replied Salter, who had not yet departed; “it do zeem ztrange that no vootsteps were vound in the snow 'proaching towards the zpot.”

“I can easily account for that, I think,” said the supervisor, with a smile of self-complacency: “the snow--”

“But hark to this,” cried Saul, again interrupting the old man; “hark to this:--how be we to know, that they what zaid they vound the body wer'n't the criminals, eh?”

“Lord bless us and zave us, Zaul!” exclaimed the little tailor, starting up; “Bless us, Zaul! why, 'twere I, good now, what raised the hue and cry. I were coming vrom varmer Butt's, vive mile off, where I a' been dree days at work, making a coat; I'd a' started avore 'twere day, zo as to get to work about Jack Blake's new suit, what he's a going to be married in o' Zinday;--and zharp doings it will be to vinish it as'tis:--zo I took the path through the copse, because it zaves a mile, you do know; and anan, my little dog, rin into the hazels and back again in a minute, barking as iv he'd a' zeen a ghost I were a bit vrightened, you may judge, vor I'd a' got my zilver watch, and half-a-crown, (my dree days' wages,) wi' ten shillings bezides, what the varmer had paid me vor a pig he bought o' me last Zinday vort-night, when he comed over to church. Well, and anan, my little dog, rin into the copse again, and come back growling worse nor avore. Thirdly and lastly, I patted the back o' un, and away he rin again, and when he overtook me,--d'ye mind?--by the light'o the moon, I zeed there were blood upon the nose o' un!--Wi' that, I and the dog rin vit to break our necks,'till we got whoam. Zo then I raised the hue and cry, and Phil's body were vound:--but I had no more hand in the death o' un than you, Zaul. I can handle a reap-hook, or a needle, wi' one here and there, but I never vired a gun off in my life--wish I may die if I did!”

“Well, well, Mudford,” said Braintree, advancing toward the tailor; “I didn't know 'twere thee; gi'e us thy hand;--there--we be vriends, bean't us?”

“I do hope zo, Zaul Braintree,” replied the still terrified tailor; “but you shouldn't--”

“There, do'ee hold your tongue and zit down,” interrupted Saul: “I were wrong; but,--d'ye mind?--Bob be my zon; and if counzel can zave un, he sha'n't lack; vor I'll zell my zhirt to zee un righted.”

Braintree had scarcely reached his seat again, when constable Abel, pale, almost breathless looking very important, and bearing his staff of office in his hand, strode into the kitchen, and immediately laid hands on Saul. “Braintree, thou'rt my prisoner,” said he; “aid and assist, if need be--every body--but especially you,--earth-stopper,--in the King's name.”

Saul was paralysed; he stared vacantly at Abel, and before he could recover his self-possession, the dexterous constable had handcuffed, and almost completed the task of tying his right wrist to the left arm of the earth-stopper.

“Thy prisoner, Yeabel!” at length uttered Braintree; “thou bee'st joking, zure!--Dowl ha' me if I can make out--”

“You'll make it out well enough by-and-by, Saul,” interrupted Abel, as he pursued his task of knitting the earth-stopper fast to Saul; “I ha' been sent for by the 'squire, and I've got his warrant. Master Cockle, of The New Inn, churchwarden of the present year, ha' been making inquiries; and things ha come out, Saul, that do look black against thee.”

“What be'em, Yeabel?--What be'em, pr'ythee?”