 | CHAPTER XXIII.
A CROSS-EXAMINATION. The story of Kennett |  |
23. CHAPTER XXIII.
A CROSS-EXAMINATION.
The story of Gilbert Potter's robbery and marvellous
escape from death ran rapidly through the neighborhood,
and coming, as it did, upon the heels of his former adventure,
created a great excitement. He became almost a
hero in the minds of the people. It was not their habit to
allow any man to quite assume so lofty a character as that,
but they granted to Gilbert fully as much interest as, in
their estimation, any human being ought properly to receive.
Dr. Deane was eagerly questioned, wherever he
went; and if his garments could have exhaled the odors of
his feelings, his questioners would have smelled aloes and
asafœtida instead of sweet-marjoram and bergamot. But
— in justice to him be it said — he told and retold the
story very correctly; the tide of sympathy ran so high and
strong, that he did not venture to stem it on grounds which
could not be publicly explained.
The supposed disgrace of Gilbert's birth seemed to be
quite forgotten for the time; and there was no young man
of spirit in the four townships who was not willing to serve
under his command. More volunteers offered, in fact, than
could be profitably employed. Sandy Flash was not the
game to be unearthed by a loud, numerous, sweeping hunt;
traps, pitfalls, secret and unwearied following of his many
trails were what was needed. So much time had elapsed
that the beginning must be a conjectural beating of the
bushes, and to this end several small companies were organized,
and the country between the Octorara and the
Delaware very effectually scoured.
When the various parties reunited, after several days,
neither of them brought any positive intelligence, but all
the greater store of guesses and rumors. Three or four
suspicious individuals had been followed and made to give
an account of themselves; certain hiding-places, especially
the rocky lairs along the Brandywine and the North Valley-Hill,
were carefully examined, and some traces of occupation,
though none very recent, were discovered. Such evidence
as there was seemed to indicate that part of the
eastern branch of the Brandywine, between the forks of
the stream and the great Chester Valley, as being the probable
retreat of the highwayman, and a second expedition
was at once organized. The Sheriff, with a posse of men
from the lower part of the country, undertook to watch the
avenues of escape towards the river.
This new attempt was not more successful, so far as its
main object was concerned, but it actually stumbled upon
Sandy Flash's trail, and only failed by giving tongue too
soon and following too impetuously. Gilbert and his men
had a tantalizing impression (which later intelligence proved
to have been correct) that the robber was somewhere near
them, — buried in the depths of the very wood they were
approaching, dodging behind the next barn as it came into
view, or hidden under dead leaves in some rain-washed gulley.
Had they but known, one gloomy afternoon in late
December, that they were riding under the cedar-tree in
whose close, cloudy foliage he was coiled, just above their
heads! Had they but guessed who the deaf old woman
was, with her face muffled from the cold, and six cuts of
blue yarn in her basket! But detection had not then become
a science, and they were far from suspecting the extent
of Sandy Flash's devices and disguises.
Many of the volunteers finally grew tired of the fruitless
chase, and returned home; others could only spare a few
days from their winter labors; but Gilbert Potter, with
three or four faithful and courageous young fellows, — one
the search, and not until the end of December did he confess
himself baffled. By this time all traces of the highwayman
were again lost; he seemed to have disappeared
from the country.
“I believe Pratt 's right,” said Mark, as the two issued
from the Marlborough woods, on their return to Kennett
Square. “Chester County is too hot to hold him.”
“Perhaps so,” Gilbert answered, with a gloomy face.
He was more keenly disappointed at the failure than he
would then confess, even to Mark. The outrage committed
upon him was still unavenged, and thus his loss, to his
proud, sensitive nature, carried a certain shame with it.
Moreover, the loss itself must speedily be replaced. He
had half flattered himself with the hope of capturing not
only Sandy Flash, but his plunder; it was hard to forget
that, for a day or two, he had been independent, — hard to
stoop again to be a borrower and a debtor!
“What are the county authorities good for?” Mark exclaimed.
“Between you and me, the Sheriff's a reg'lar
puddin'-head. I wish you was in his place.”
“If Sandy is safe in Jersey, or down on the Eastern
Shore, that would do no good. It is n't enough that he
leaves us alone, from this time on; he has a heavy backscore
to settle.”
“Come to think on it, Gilbert,” Mark continued, “is n't
it rather queer that you and him should be thrown together
in such ways? There was Barton's fox-chase last spring;
then your shootin' at other, at the Square; and then the
robbery on the road. It seems to me as if he picked you
out to follow you, and yet I don't know why.”
Gilbert started. Mark's words reawakened the dark,
incredible suspicion which Martha Deane had removed.
Again he declared to himself that he would not entertain
the thought, but he could not reject the evidence that
there was something more than accident in all these encounters.
for the last meeting, it must be Alfred Barton. The
latter, therefore, owed him an explanation, and he would
demand it.
When they reached the top of the “big hill” north of
the Fairthorn farm-house, whence they looked eastward
down the sloping corn-field which had been the scene of
the husking-frolic, Mark turned to Gilbert with an honest
blush all over his face, and said, —
“I don't see why you should n't know it, Gilbert. I 'm
sure Sally would n't care; you 're almost like a brother to
her.”
“What?” Gilbert asked, yet with a quick suspicion of
the coming intelligence.
“Oh, I guess you know well enough, old fellow. I asked
her that night, and it 's all right between us. What do
you say to it, now?”
“Mark, I 'm glad of it; I wish you joy, with all my
heart!” Gilbert stretched out his hand, and as he turned
and looked squarely into Mark's half-bashful yet wholly
happy face, he remembered Martha's words, at their last
interview.
“You are like a brother to me, Mark,” he said, “and
you shall have my secret. What would you say if I had
done the same thing?”
“No?” Mark exclaimed; “who?”
“Guess!”
“Not — not Martha?”
Gilbert smiled.
“By the Lord! It 's the best day's work you 've ever
done! Gi' me y'r hand ag'in; we 'll stand by each other
faster than ever, now!”
When they stopped at Fairthorn's, the significant pressure
of Gilbert's hand brought a blush into Sally's cheek;
but when Mark met Martha with his tell-tale face, she answered
with a proud and tender smile.
Gilbert's first business, after his return, was to have a
consultation with Miss Betsy Lavender, who alone knew of
the suspicions attaching to Alfred Barton. The spinster
had, in the mean time, made the matter the subject of profound
and somewhat painful cogitation. She had ransacked
her richly stored memory of persons and events,
until her brain was like a drawer of tumbled clothes; had
spent hours in laborious mental research, becoming so absorbed
that she sometimes gave crooked answers when
spoken to, and was haunted with a terrible dread of having
thought aloud; and had questioned the oldest gossips
right and left, coming as near the hidden subject as she
dared. When they met, she communicated the result to
Gilbert in this wise:
“'T a'n't agreeable for a body to allow they 're flummuxed,
but if I a'n't, this time, I 'm mighty near onto it.
It 's like lookin' for a set o' buttons that 'll match, in a box
full o' tail-ends o' things. This'n 'd do, and that'n 'd do;
but you can't put this'n and that'n together; and here 's
got to be square work, everything fittin' tight and hangin'
plumb, or it 'll be throwed back onto your hands, and all to
be done over ag'in. I dunno when I 've done so much
head-work and to no purpose, follerin' here and guessin'
there, and nosin' into everything that 's past and gone; and
so my opinion is, whether you like it or not, but never
mind, all the same, I can't do no more than give it, that
we 'd better drop what 's past and gone, and look a little
more into these present times!”
“Well, Betsy,” said Gilbert, with a stern, determined
face, “this is what I shall do. I am satisfied that Barton
is connected, in some way, with Sandy Flash. What it is,
or whether the knowledge will help us, I can't guess; but
I shall force Barton to tell me!”
“To tell me. That might do, as far as it goes,” she remarked,
after a moment's reflection. “It won't be easy;
you 'll have to threaten as well as coax, but I guess you
you here, two bein' better than one, if one is but a sheep's-head.”
“I don't see, Betsy, that I need to call on you.”
“This way, Gilbert. It 's a strong p'int o' law, I 've
heerd tell, not that I know much o' law, Goodness knows,
nor ever want to, but never mind, it 's a strong p'int when
there 's two witnesses to a thing, — one to clinch what the
t'other drives in; and you must have a show o' law to work
on Alf. Barton, or I 'm much mistaken!”
Gilbert reflected a moment. “It can do no harm,” he
then said; “can you go with me, now?”
“Now 's the time! If we only git the light of a fardencandle
out o' him, it 'll do me a mortal heap o' good; for
with all this rakin' and scrapin' for nothin', I 'm like a heart
pantin' after the water-brooks, though a mouth would be
more like it, to my thinkin', when a body 's so awful dry
as that comes to!”
The two thereupon took the foot-path down through the
frozen fields and the dreary timber of the creek-side, to
the Barton farm-house. As they approached the barn, they
saw Alfred Barton sitting on a pile of straw and watching
Giles, who was threshing wheat. He seemed a little surprised
at their appearance; but as Gilbert and he had not
met since their interview in the corn-field before the former's
departure for Chester, he had no special cause for
embarrassment.
“Come into the house,” he said, leading the way.
“No,” Gilbert answered, “I came here to speak with you
privately. Will you walk down the lane?”
“No objection, of course,” said Barton, looking from
Gilbert to Miss Lavender, with a mixture of curiosity and
uneasiness. “Good news, I hope; got hold of Sandy's
tracks, at last?”
“One of them.”
“Ah, you don't say so! Where?”
“Here!”
Gilbert stopped and faced Barton. They were below
the barn, and out of Giles's hearing.
“Barton,” he resumed, “you know what interest I have
in the arrest of that man, and you won't deny my right to
demand of you an account of your dealings with him.
When did you first make his acquaintance?”
“I 've told you that, already; the matter has been fully
talked over between us,” Barton answered, in a petulant
tone.
“It has not been fully talked over. I require to know,
first of all, precisely when, and under what circumstances,
you and Sandy Flash came together. There is more to
come, so let us begin at the beginning.”
“Damme, Gilbert, you were there, and saw as much as I
did. How could I know who the cursed black-whiskered
fellow was?”
“But you found it out,” Gilbert persisted, “and the
manner of your finding it out must be explained.”
Barton assumed a bold, insolent manner. “I don't see
as that follows,” he said. “It has nothing in the world to
do with his robbery of you; and as for Sandy Flash, I wish
to the Lord you 'd get hold of him, yourself, instead
of trying to make me accountable for his comings and
goings!”
“He 's tryin' to fly off the handle,” Miss Lavender remarked.
“I 'd drop that part o' the business a bit, if I
was you, and come to the t'other proof.”
“What the devil have you to do here?” asked Barton.
“Miss Betsy is here because I asked her,” Gilbert said.
“Because all that passes between us may have to be repeated
in a court of justice, and two witnesses are better
than one!”
He took advantage of the shock which these words produced
upon Barton, and repeated to him the highwayman's
declarations, with the inference they might bear if not satisfactorily
“and said nothing to any living soul of your request that
I should carry money for you to Chester. Sandy Flash's
information, therefore, must have come, either directly or
indirectly, from you.”
Barton had listened with open mouth and amazed eyes.
“Why, the man is a devil!” he cried. “I, neither,
never said a word of the matter to any living soul!”
“Did you really send any money?” Gilbert asked.
“That I did! I got it of Joel Ferris, and it happened
he was bound for Chester, the very next day, on his own
business; and so, instead of turning it over to me, he just
paid it there, according to my directions. You 'll understand,
this is between ourselves?”
He darted a sharp, suspicious glance at Miss Betsy Lavender,
who gravely nodded her head.
“The difficulty is not yet explained,” said Gilbert, “and
perhaps you 'll now not deny my right to know something
more of your first acquaintance with Sandy Flash?”
“Have it then!” Barton exclaimed, desperately — “and
much good may it do you! I thought his name was Fortune,
as much as you did, till nine o'clock that night, when
he put a pistol to my breast in the woods! If you think
I 'm colloguing with him, why did he rob me under threat
of murder, — money, watch, and everything?”
“Ah-ha!” said Miss Lavender, “and so that 's the way
your watch has been gittin' mended all this while? Mainspring
broke, as I 've heerd say; well, I don't wonder!
Gilbert, I guess this much is true. Alf. Barton 'd never
live so long without that watch, and that half-peck o' seals,
if he could help it!”
“This, too, may as well be kept to ourselves,” Barton
suggested. “It is n't agreeable to a man to have it known
that he 's been so taken in as I was, and that 's just the
reason why I kept it to myself; and, of course, I should n't
like it to get around.”
Gilbert could do no less than accept this part of the
story, and it rendered his later surmises untenable. But
the solution which he sought was as far off as ever.
“Barton,” he said, after a long pause, “will you do your
best to help me in finding out how Sandy Flash got the
knowledge?”
“Only show me a way! The best would be to catch
him and get it from his own mouth.”
He looked so earnest, so eager, and — as far as the traces
of cunning in his face would permit — so honest, that Gilbert
yielded to a sudden impulse, and said, —
“I believe you, Barton. I 've done you wrong in my
thoughts, — not willingly, for I don't want to think badly
of you or any one else, — but because circumstances seemed
to drive me to it. It would have been better if you had
told me of your robbery at the start.”
“You 're right there, Gilbert! I believe I was an outspoken
fellow enough, when I was young, and all the better
for it, but the old man 's driven me into a curst way of
keeping dark about everything, and so I go on heaping up
trouble for myself.”
“Trouble for myself. Alf. Barton,” said Miss Lavender,
“that 's the truest word you 've said this many a day.
Murder will out, you know, and so will robbery, and so
will — other things. More o' your doin's is known, not
that they 're agreeabler, but on the contràry, quite the
reverse, and as full need to be explained, though it don't
seem to matter much, yet it may, who can tell? And now
look here, Gilbert; my crow is to be picked, and you 've
seen the color of it, but never mind, all the same, since
Martha's told the Doctor, it can't make much difference to
you. And this is all between ourselves, you understand?”
The last words were addressed to Barton, with a comical,
unconscious imitation of his own manner. He guessed
something of what was coming, though not the whole of it,
and again became visibly uneasy; but he stammered out, —
“Yes; oh, yes! of course.”
Gilbert could form a tolerably correct idea of the shape
and size of Miss Lavender's crow. He did not feel sure
that this was the proper time to have it picked, or even that
it should be picked at all; but he imagined that Miss Lavender
had either consulted Martha Deane, or that she had
wise reasons of her own for speaking. He therefore remained
silent.
“First and foremost,” she resumed, “I 'll tell you, Alf.
Barton, what we know o' your doin's, and then it 's for you
to judge whether we 'll know any more. Well, you 've
been tryin' to git Martha Deane for a wife, without wantin'
her in your heart, but rather the contràry, though it seems
queer enough when a body comes to think of it, but never
mind; and your father 's druv you to it; and you were of
a cold shiver for fear she 'd take you, and yet you want to
let on it a'n't settled betwixt and between you — oh, you
need n't chaw your lips and look yaller about the jaws, it 's
the Lord's truth; and now answer me this, what do you
mean? and maybe you 'll say what right have I got to ask,
but never mind, all the same, if I have n't, Gilbert Potter
has, for it 's him that Martha Deane has promised to take
for a husband!”
It was a day of surprises for Barton. In his astonishment
at the last announcement, he took refuge from the
horror of Miss Lavender's first revelations. One thing
was settled, — all the fruits of his painful and laborious
plotting were scattered to the winds. Denial was of no
use, but neither could an honest explanation, even if he
should force himself to give it, be of any possible service.
“Gilbert,” he asked, “is this true? — about you, I mean.”
“Martha Deane and I are engaged, and were already at
the time when you addressed her,” Gilbert answered.
“Good heavens! I had n't the slightest suspicion of it.
Well — I don't begrude you your luck, and of course I 'll
draw back, and never say another word, now or ever.”
“You would n't ha' been comfortable with Martha Deane,
anyhow,” Miss Lavender grimly remarked. “'T is n't
good to hitch a colt-horse and an old spavined critter in
one team. But that 's neither here nor there; you ha' n't
told us why you made up to her for a purpose, and kep' on
pretendin' she did n't know her own mind.”
“I 've promised Gilbert that I won't interfere, and that 's
enough,” said Barton, doggedly.
Miss Lavender was foiled for a moment, but she presently
returned to the attack. “I dunno as it 's enough,
after what 's gone before,” she said. “Could n't you go a
step furder, and lend Gilbert a helpin' hand, whenever and
whatever?”
“Betsy!” Gilbert exclaimed.
“Let me alone, lad! I don't speak in Gilbert's name,
nor yet in Martha's; only out o' my own mind. I don't
ask you to do anything, but I want to know how it stands
with your willin'ness.”
“I 've offered, more than once, to do him a good turn,
if I could; but I guess my help would n't be welcome,”
Barton answered. The sting of the suspicion rankled in
his mind, and Gilbert's evident aversion sorely wounded
his vanity.
“Would n't be welcome. Then I 'll only say this;
maybe I 've got it in my power, and 't is n't sayin' much,
for the mouse gnawed the mashes o' the lion's net, to help
you to what you 're after, bein' as it is n't Martha, and
can't be her money. S'pose I did it o' my own accord,
leavin' you to feel beholden to me, or not, after all 's said
and done?”
But Alfred Barton was proof against even this assault.
He was too dejected to enter, at once, into a new plot, the
issue of which would probably be as fruitless as the others.
He had already accepted a sufficiency of shame, for one
day. This last confession, if made, would place his character
in a still grosser and meaner light; while, if withheld,
partial justification of his course. He had been surprised
into damaging admissions; but here he would take a firm
stand.
“You 're right so far, Betsy,” he said, “that I had a
reason — a good reason, it seemed to me, but I may be
mistaken — for what I did. It concerns no one under
Heaven but my own self; and though I don't doubt your
willingness to do me a good turn, it would make no difference
— you could n't help one bit. I 've given the thing
up, and so let it be!”
There was nothing more to be said, and the two cross-examiners
took their departure. As they descended to
the creek, Miss Lavender remarked, as if to herself, —
“No use — it can't be screwed out of him! So there 's
one cur'osity the less; not that I 'm glad of it, for not
knowin' worries more than knowin', whatsoever and whosoever.
And I dunno as I think any the wuss of him for
shuttin' his teeth so tight onto it.”
Alfred Barton waited until the two had disappeared behind
the timber in the bottom. Then he slowly followed,
stealing across the fields and around the stables, to the
back-door of the Unicorn bar-room. It was noticed that,
although he drank a good deal that afternoon, his ill-humor
was not, as usual, diminished thereby.
| CHAPTER XXIII.
A CROSS-EXAMINATION. The story of Kennett | |