have you ever stood near a bee-hive when something unusual was going on inside? when a swarm was meditated, or you had cut off the communication with a super which you meant to take? just such a buzz and murmur as then arises might have been heard in weston court-yard when the boys poured out from the schools, only increased so much in volume as the human vocal organs are more powerful than the apiarian. and surely not without cause, for the scene which had just been enacted, without any rehearsal, for their benefit was simply astounding.
“fancy tom buller the chief of a gang of poachers!” cried saurin. “by jove, i did not think it was in him, and fairly confess that i have not done him justice. he is a dark horse and no mistake.”
“why, you don’t for a moment suppose that there is anything in it, do you?” asked robarts, who heard him.
“i don’t know, i’m sure,” replied saurin; “perhaps not. awful liars those keeper chaps, no doubt. we shall know all about it in time, i suppose.”
“it would not be bad fun if one got a fair price for the game one took,” said griffiths. “but the risk and difficulty of selling it would be so great that one would be certain to be robbed.”
“what an ass tom bowling was to give himself up; it would have been all right if he had sat still.”
“i don’t know that. he had already been caught breaking out of college, don’t you see, and they would have been certain to put this and that together.”
“who would?”
“old jolliffe.”
“not a bit of it. i twigged his face when buller stood up, and he looked as vexed as possible. he’d never have told.”
“i am not sure of that, and i think buller was right not to risk it.”
“fussy old chap, lord woodruff!”
“not a bad sort altogether, i believe, if you rub him the right way.”
“no more am i; give me everything i want, and never thwart me, and i am the easiest fellow to live with in the world.”
that is a sample of the way the matter was discussed and commented upon. but the most astonished of the whole school, and the only one who could not trust himself to make any remark at all in public, was edwards. for the second time that day he had to watch his opportunity for a private conference with saurin, and when he found it he opened on him eagerly.
“what a chap you are! and so you had a regular fight with keepers, and nearly did for one; and all you said this morning was that the whole thing was a failure and a sell. and even when we talked about gamekeepers catching poachers, and the poachers resisting, you kept it all dark.”
“why, it was a serious thing to talk about, you see,” said saurin.
“well, i think you might have trusted me at all events,” replied edwards somewhat reproachfully.
“trust you! my dear fellow i would trust you with my life,” said saurin. “but i thought it better to keep marriner’s attack on this keeper secret for your sake. there was sure to be a row, and in case of the inquiry coming in this direction, and your being questioned, it would be so much jollier for you to be able to say that you knew nothing about it. whereas, if i had entered into all the details, it would have bothered you. for, to tell the truth, i feared the man was killed; now he is not hurt much, i don’t care.”
“they would not have got anything out of me,” said edwards.
“perhaps not,” replied saurin. “but those lawyers are awful fellows when they get you into the witness-box, and make you say pretty nearly what they like. i had much rather have nothing to tell them myself if i were to be put in such a position, and i thought you would feel the same.”
“you are right, so i do,” said edwards. “what a fellow you are, saurin, you think of everything!”
“it is different, now that they have got hold of that ass, buller; what a joke it all is, isn’t it?”
“yes,” replied edwards, in a tone of hesitation, however, as if he did not quite see the humour of it. “rather rough upon buller, though, don’t you think?”
“not a bit of it; he has got off his flogging.”
“but suppose he comes in for something worse?”
“how should he? they cannot prove that he was in the coppice when he was about three miles in the opposite direction, you know. now, if i were once suspected, they would find out that i constantly went to slam’s, who finds agents to sell the game for all the poachers round, and some of the keepers too, if the truth were known, and that i had been seen in marriner’s company; who is considered to make a regular income out of lord woodruff’s pheasants, and they would have some grounds to go upon. but buller is all right.”
but though he spoke like this to quiet edwards, saurin did not care whether buller got into serious trouble or not. he was a friend of crawley’s, had seconded him in the fight, and given him advice which contributed as much as anything else to saurin’s defeat. if he were expelled and sent to prison it would not break his (saurin’s) heart. the only fear was that if edwards blabbed—and he was so weak that he could not be absolutely trusted—fellows would think it horribly mean to let buller be punished unjustly for what he himself had done. and on this account, and this account only, he hoped that buller would get off.
mr elliot, the magistrate, lived at penredding, the village where mr rabbits had gone to lecture, and thither tom buller was driven in a close fly, the doctor accompanying him. lord woodruff, who had come to weston on horseback, rode over separately. mr elliot was a man of good common sense, though his opinions were not quite so weighty as his person, which declined to rise in one scale when fifteen stone was in the other. he was a just man also, though perhaps he was less dilatory in attending to the wishes of a member of one of the great county families than he might be in the case of a mere nobody. if a rich man and a poor one had a dispute, he considered that the presumption was in favour of the former, but he did not allow this prejudice to influence him one iota in the teeth of direct evidence.
just after the fly had left weston some snow flakes began to fall. “ah!” thought tom, “it may snow as hard as it pleases now. i have had a good turn at any rate. i was not able to do the outside edge when the frost set in, and now i can cut an eight. i wish, though, i could keep my balance in the second curl of those threes. i must practise going backwards, and stick to that next time i have a chance.”
dr jolliffe, who saw that he was absorbed in reflection, thought that he was dwelling upon the serious nature of the position in which he found himself, and would have been amused if he could have read the real subject of his meditations. but he could not do that, so he read the proof-sheets of his new treatise on the digamma. the snow fell thicker, and by the time they reached penredding the country was covered with a white sheet.
mr elliot, who had been warned of their coming, was ready to receive them, and lord woodruff came forward with an inspector of rural police, and told his story, which was written down by a clerk and read over. then the whole party set out on their travels again and drove to the cottage of the wounded gamekeeper, where they were received by a young woman, who had been crying her eyes red, and to the folds of whose dress two little children clung, hiding their faces therein, but stealing shy glances now and then at the quality, and the awful representative of the law, who had come to visit them.
“the doctor has told us that it would do your husband no harm to say before me what he has already told lord woodruff,” said mr elliot to her. “i was rejoiced to hear that he is doing so well. it was a most shameful, brutal, and cowardly attack, and we are most anxious that the offender should be brought to justice.”
“yes, sir,” said the woman. “doctor thinks it may quiet him like to have his dispositions took, and then he may go to sleep.”
“exactly. will you be so kind as to tell him that we are here?”
she pushed the children into an inner room, ran up-stairs, and presently reappeared, asking them to walk up. bradley was in bed, propped with pillows. a handkerchief was tied round his head, and his face was pale from loss of blood. either from that cause, or on account of the shock to the nervous system, he was also very weak.
“how do you feel now, bradley?” asked lord woodruff gently, going to the bed-head.
“rayther queer as yet, my lord,” was the reply.
“no doubt. but you have a good hard head, and there is nothing serious the matter, the doctor says. but it may be some days before it will be prudent for you to go out, so, as we want to get on the traces of the fellow who struck you at once, mr elliot has kindly come over to take your deposition here, instead of waiting till you were fit to go to penredding.”
when tom buller saw the woman and children, and then afterwards their strong bread-earner reduced to such a condition, he indeed felt heartily glad that there was no truth in the accusation against him. to have had any part in bringing about such a scene of family distress would have been too much for him.
the wounded man told his story clearly enough, and then tom buller was told to stand in the light where he could see him clearly.
“noa,” said the wounded man, “i could not say who it wor. there was a bright moon, but the boy was in the shadow, and i got no clear look at his face; but he wor one of the weston young gentlemen, i am sartin of that. a bit bigger than him, i should say, but i couldn’t say for sure. he wor a strong un, i know that.”
when all this was written down, back they went to penredding again, slower now, for the snow was getting deep, and assembled once more in mr elliot’s study, where buller was warned against criminating himself, and then allowed to speak. he had been out that night, but in a contrary direction, skating; no one had seen him, and he had no witnesses.
“there is hardly any case,” said mr elliot. “the boy owns that he was out the night of the assault, and the gamekeeper swears he was struggling with a boy, whom he thinks was rather bigger. but there are no marks of any struggle having taken place upon the lad. there may be reason for suspicion, but nothing more.”
“exactly; and i do not ask for a committal, but only for a remand, to give the police an opportunity of collecting further evidence,” said lord woodruff.
“and i do not oppose the remand,” said dr jolliffe. “i am perfectly convinced of the boy’s complete innocence; but in his interest i should like the matter to be gone into further, now the accusation has once been made.”
“very good; this day week, then. and i will take your bail for his appearance, dr jolliffe.”
and it being so arranged, everybody went home through the snow; and the police took up a wrong scent altogether, that, namely, of the gang that had been taking game in another part of the preserves earlier in the night, and to which it was somewhat naturally supposed the other two belonged. and one of them was traced, and a reward, together with impunity, was offered to him if he would turn queen’s evidence, and say who had struck down the keeper. but the man, of course, could tell nothing about it.
as for tom buller, he went back to his lessons as usual, and was a hero. it was something novel to have a fellow out of prison on bail at weston, and the boys racked their brains for some evidence in his favour. his flogging was put off sine die, for the doctor felt it unjust to deal with his case scholastically while the question of his punishment by the laws of the country was still pending. the only boy who thought of anything practical was smith, “old algebra,” as they called him. he went up privately to mr rabbits one day and said, “i beg your pardon, sir, but might i speak to you for a moment?”
“certainly, smith,” said mr rabbits; “what is it?”
“when you saw buller getting in at the window by the light of your magnesium wire, did you notice his skates?”
“bless me!” cried mr rabbits; “now you mention it, i think—nay, i am sure i did. they were hanging round his neck. to be sure; why, that tends to corroborate his assertion that he went skating.”
“will it not be enough to clear him, sir?”
“well, not quite, i fear. you see, they may say that he might have started to go skating, and met with this poacher, and gone off with him out of curiosity. but still it is worth something, and i shall make a point of appearing before the magistrate and giving evidence on the point. it was a very good idea of yours—very.”
when the snow ceased, the boys took brooms with them to the gravel-pits and cleared a space, which grew larger every time they went to skate on it, some of the hangers-on of the school helping forward the work for what coppers and sixpences they could pick up. but they were lazy, loafing dogs, and the boys did most of it for themselves. buller did not go to the ice any more, however; though not expressly forbidden, he thought the doctor would not like it; it would look as if he did not take his position seriously enough. it was for the sake of skating that he had broken out at night and got into this scrape, and so now he would deny himself.
the week passed, and buller again went over with dr jolliffe to mr elliot’s house at penredding, mr rabbits this time accompanying him. the frost still held, and the boys went skating.
i have said that there was no recognised system of fagging at weston; yet, when a fellow in the head-master’s class told a boy in the lowest form to do anything, why, it so happened that he generally did it. so, when crawley observed:
“there’s a beautiful bit of smooth ice under here. i say, you two, penryhn and simmonds, suppose you take those brooms and clear a bit of it.”
penryhn and simmonds acted on the suggestion. after clearing some twenty square yards of beautiful black ice, simmonds turned up something hard, which he picked up and invoked jupiter.
“what is it?” asked penryhn.
“findings, keepings,” responded simmonds.
“let’s look,” said penryhn. “why, that is buller’s knife!”
“ah, ah! how do you know that?”
“why, it has a punch in it; he lent it me to punch a hole in my strap when we got home from skating one day. it has his name engraved upon it somewhere; there it is, look, on that plate—‘t. buller’.”
“like my luck!” sighed simmonds; “i never found anything yet but what it belonged to some other fellow.”
“what was that you said, penryhn, about buller lending you his knife?” asked crawley, who was cutting threes on the new bit of ice. “what day was it?”
“the day before the snow; yesterday week, that was.”
“what time?”
“in the evening, just before supper, when i was cleaning up my skates for next day. by jove! i see what you are driving at. buller has not been any day since, so he must have dropped it when he came that night.”
“of course. now, you and simmonds run back to school, find cookson, who is senior master now the doctor’s out, ask leave to go over to penredding, and cut there as hard as you can split.”
the pair were off before he could finish his sentence.
the party assembled in mr elliot’s library was the same as on the week previously, with the addition of a detective, who had detected nothing, and mr rabbits, who now testified that he saw skates hanging round buller’s neck when he was getting in at the window. the question was concerning a further remand, for the magistrate firmly refused to commit the boy for trial on the evidence before them. “i grant that it is suspicious; he was out late at night when he had no business to be, and that same night a weston boy was, almost to a certainty, seized by bradley in the coppice. but if one boy could get out another might, and now it is proved that this one had his skates with him at the time. no jury would convict on such evidence.” he did not even like granting a remand, but neither did he like to stand out too strongly against the wishes of lord woodruff.
at this juncture voices were heard outside, and presently a constable opened the door and said that two young gentlemen from weston had something to say.
“found the real culprit, perhaps,” muttered lord woodruff.
“bring them in,” said the magistrate, and simmonds and penryhn entered, hot, excited, and still panting for breath.
“please, sir, we have leave from mr cookson, and i have found tom bowling—i mean buller’s knife,” said the former, addressing dr jolliffe, who waved his hand towards mr elliot in silence, and frowned.
“wait a bit, my lad, do not be flurried,” said the magistrate; “stand there. let him be sworn,” he added to the clerk. and simmonds took his first legitimate oath.
then he told the simple story which we know. and when he had done penryhn kissed the book in his turn and completed the chain of evidence. it was really quite sufficiently clear, that unless yet another boy had got out, and gone skating on the gravel-pits that night, taking buller’s knife with him and losing it, that he himself had been there as he said; and therefore that he was not in the coppice, two miles on the other side of weston. lord woodruff himself was convinced, and buller was at once discharged, everybody shaking hands with him.
“and, buller,” said dr jolliffe as they left the house, “as i hope that the anxiety you have been subjected to by your own unlawful action will prove sufficient punishment, i shall not take any further notice of your breaking out that night. let it be a lesson to you, that you cannot engage in what is unlawful without assuming something which is common to all criminals, and running the risk of being mixed up with them.” which was a beautifully mild preachee to take the place of floggee.
tom bowling received quite an ovation next day, and did not know what to do with his popularity. he was ready enough to skate now, but a thaw came, and there was no other chance afforded that term.
