Having thrust his nephew into the cottage, Captain Ogilvy's first
proceeding was to close the outer shutter of the window and fasten it
securely on the inside. Then he locked, bolted, barred, and chained the
outer door, after which he shut the kitchen door, and, in default of any
other mode of securing it, placed against it a heavy table as a
barricade.
Having thus secured the premises in front, he proceeded to fortify the
rear, and, when this was accomplished to his satisfaction, he returned
to the kitchen, sat down opposite the widow, and wiped his shining pate.
"Why, uncle, are we going to stand out a siege that you take so much
pains to lock up?"
Ruby sat down on the floor at his mother's feet as he spoke, and Minnie
sat down on a low stool beside him.
"Maybe we are, lad," replied the captain; "anyhow, it's always well to
be ready--
"`Ready, boys, ready,
We'll fight and we'll conquer again and again.'"
"Come uncle, explain yourself."
"Explain myself, nephy? I can neither explain myself nor anybody else.
D'ye know, Ruby, that you're a burglar?"
"Am I, uncle? Well, I confess that that's news."
"Ay, but it's true though, at least the law in Arbroath says so, and if
it catches you, it'll hang you as sure as a gun."
Here Captain Ogilvy explained to his nephew the nature of the crime that
was committed on the night of his departure, the evidence of his guilt
in the finding part of the plate in the garden, coupled with his sudden
disappearance, and wound up by saying that he regarded him, Ruby, as
being in a "reg'lar fix."
"But surely," said Ruby, whose face became gradually graver as the case
was unfolded to him, "surely it must be easy to prove to the
satisfaction of everyone that I had nothing whatever to do with this
affair?"
"Easy to prove it!" said the captain in an excited tone; "wasn't you
seen, just about the hour of the robbery, going stealthily down the
street, by Big Swankie and Davy Spink, both of whom will swear to it."
"Yes, but _you_ were with me, uncle."
"So I was, and hard enough work I had to convince them that I had
nothin' to do with it myself, but they saw that I couldn't jump a stone
wall eight foot high to save my life, much less break into a house, and
they got no further evidence to convict me, so they let me off; but
it'll go hard with you, nephy, for Major Stewart described the men, and
one o' them was a big strong feller, the description bein' as like you
as two peas, only their faces was blackened, and the lantern threw the
light all one way, so he didn't see them well. Then, the things found
in our garden,--and the villains will haul me up as a witness against
you, for, didn't I find them myself?"
"Very perplexing; what shall I do?" said Ruby.
"Clear out," cried the captain emphatically.
"What! fly like a real criminal, just as I have returned home? Never.
What say _you_, Minnie?"
"Stand your trial, Ruby. They cannot--they dare not--condemn the
innocent."
"And you, mother?"
"I'm sure I don't know what to say," replied Mrs Brand, with a look of
deep anxiety, as she passed her fingers through her son's hair, and
kissed his brow. "I have seen the innocent condemned and the guilty go
free more than once in my life."
"Nevertheless, mother, I will give myself up, and take my chance. To
fly would be to give them reason to believe me guilty."
"Give yourself up!" exclaimed the captain, "you'll do nothing of the
sort. Come, lad, remember I'm an old man, and an uncle. I've got a
plan in my head, which I think will keep you out of harm's way for a
time. You see my old chronometer is but a poor one,--the worse of the
wear, like its master,--and I've never been able to make out the exact
time that we went aboard the _Termagant_ the night you went away. Now,
can you tell me what o'clock it was?"
"I can."
"'Xactly?"
"Yes, exactly, for it happened that I was a little later than I
promised, and the skipper pointed to his watch, as I came up the side,
and jocularly shook his head at me. It was exactly eleven p.m."
"Sure and sartin o' that?" enquired the captain, earnestly.
"Quite, and his watch must have been right, for the town-clock rung the
hour at the same time."
"Is that skipper alive?"
"Yes."
"Would he swear to that?"
"I think he would."
"D'ye know where he is?"
"I do. He's on a voyage to the West Indies, and won't be home for two
months, I believe."
"Humph!" said the captain, with a disappointed look. "However, it can't
be helped; but I see my way _now_ to get you out o' this fix. You know,
I suppose, that they're buildin' a lighthouse on the Bell Rock just now;
well, the workmen go off to it for a month at a time, I believe, if not
longer, and don't come ashore, and it's such a dangerous place, and
troublesome to get to, that nobody almost ever goes out to it from this
place, except those who have to do with it. Now, lad, you'll go down to
the workyard the first thing in the mornin', before daylight, and engage
to go off to work at the Bell Rock. You'll keep all snug and quiet, and
nobody'll be a bit the wiser. You'll be earnin' good wages, and in the
meantime I'll set about gettin' things in trim to put you all square."
"But I see many difficulties ahead," objected Ruby.
"Of course ye do," retorted the captain. "Did ye ever hear or see
anything on this earth that hadn't rocks ahead o' some sort? It's our
business to steer past 'em, lad, not to 'bout ship and steer away. But
state yer difficulties."
"Well, in the first place, I'm not a stonemason or a carpenter, and I
suppose masons and carpenters are the men most wanted there."
"Not at all, blacksmiths are wanted there," said the captain, "and I
know that you were trained to that work as a boy."
"True, I can do somewhat with the hammer, but mayhap they won't engage
me."
"But they _will_ engage you, lad, for they are hard up for an assistant
blacksmith just now, and I happen to be hand-and-glove with some o' the
chief men of the yard, who'll be happy to take anyone recommended by
me."
"Well, uncle, but suppose I do go off to the rock, what chance have you
of making things appear better than they are at present?"
"I'll explain that, lad. In the first place, Major Stewart is a
gentleman, out-and-out, and will listen to the truth. He swears that
the robbery took place at one o'clock in the mornin', for he looked at
his watch and at the clock of the house, and heard it ring in the town,
just as the thieves cleared off over the wall. Now, if I can get your
old skipper to take a run here on his return from the West Indies, he'll
swear that you was sailin' out to the North Sea _before twelve_, and
that'll prove that you _couldn't_ have had nothin' to do with it, d'ye
see?"
"It sounds well," said Ruby dubiously, "but do you think the lawyers
will see things in the light you do?"
"Hang the lawyers! d'ye think they will shut their eyes to _the truth_?"
"Perhaps they may, in which case they will hang _me_, and so prevent my
taking your advice to hang _them_," said Ruby.
"Well, well, but you agree to my plan?" asked the captain.
"Shall I agree, Minnie? it will separate me from you again for some
time."
"Yet it is necessary," answered Minnie, sadly; "yes, I think you should
agree to go."
"Very well, then, that's settled," said Ruby, "and now let us drop the
subject, because I have other things to speak of; and if I must start
before daylight my time with you will be short--"
"Come here a bit, nephy, I want to have a private word with 'ee in my
cabin," said the captain, interrupting him, and going into his own room.
Ruby rose and followed.
"You haven't any--"
The captain stopped, stroked his bald head, and looked perplexed.
"Well, uncle?"
"Well, nephy, you haven't--in short, have ye got any money about you,
lad?"
"Money? yes, a _little_; but why do you ask?"
"Well, the fact is, that your poor mother is hard up just now," said the
captain earnestly, "an' I've given her the last penny I have o' my own;
but she's quite--"
Ruby interrupted his uncle at this point with a boisterous laugh. At
the same time he flung open the door and dragged the old man with gentle
violence back to the kitchen.
"Come here, uncle."
"But, avast! nephy, I haven't told ye all yet."
"Oh! don't bother me with such trifles just now," cried Ruby, thrusting
his uncle into a chair and resuming his own seat at his mother's side;
"we'll speak of that at some other time; meanwhile let me talk to
mother."
"Minnie, dear," he continued, "who keeps the cash here; you or mother?"
"Well, we keep it between us," said Minnie, smiling; "your mother keeps
it in her drawer and gives me the key when I want any, and I keep an
account of it."
"Ah! well, mother, I have a favour to ask of you before I go."
"Well, _Ruby_?"
"It is that you will take care of my cash for me. I have got a goodish
lot of it, and find it rather heavy to carry in my pockets--so, hold
your apron steady and I'll give it to you."
Saying this he began to empty handful after handful of coppers into the
old woman's apron; then, remarking that "that was all the browns", he
began to place handful after handful of shillings and sixpences on the
top of the pile until the copper was hid by silver.
The old lady, as usual when surprised, became speechless; the captain
smiled and Minnie laughed, but when Ruby put his hand into another
pocket and began to draw forth golden sovereigns, and pour them into his
mother's lap, the captain became supremely amazed, the old woman
laughed, and,--so strangely contradictory and unaccountable is human
nature,--Minnie began to cry.
Poor girl! the tax upon her strength had been heavier than anyone knew,
heavier than she could bear, and the sorrow of knowing, as she had come
to know, that it was all in vain, and that her utmost efforts had failed
to "keep the wolf from the door", had almost broken her down. Little
wonder, then, that the sight of sudden and ample relief upset her
altogether.
But her tears, being tears of joy, were soon and easily dried--all the
more easily that it was Ruby who undertook to dry them.
Mrs Brand sat up late that night, for there was much to tell and much
to hear. After she had retired to rest the other three continued to
hold converse together until grey dawn began to appear through the
chinks in the window-shutters. Then the two men rose and went out,
while Minnie laid her pretty little head on the pillow beside Mrs
Brand, and sought, and found, repose.