AT MR. CHATFORD’S GATE.
“HOW strange it seems,” said Mrs. Pipkin that morning, “not to have Jack
around! I don’t believe I should have missed any one of you so much.
Somehow I can’t get used to his being away; can you, Mrs. Chatford?”
A tear quivered in Mrs. Chatford’s eye as she replied, “I can’t be
reconciled to his going in the way he did. I feel that we are
responsible for the boy’s future; and if he had died I could hardly have
mourned for him more than I do!”
This conversation took place at the breakfast-table, and it did not seem
to help the appetites of those who heard it. The deacon shoved back his
chair with a dissatisfied look; for it was an uncomfortable subject to
him, firmly as he believed himself justified in withdrawing from Jack
his sympathy and support.
“I’m so glad he got away!” said little Kate; “but I’m afraid they’ll
catch him again!”
“Not much danger of that,” remarked Mr. Pipkin, rising slowly from the
table. “A boy smart enough to do what he done yisterday, can keep clear
of the clutches of the constables if he’s a mind to. I’ll resk Jack! I’d
be willin’ to bet—By hokey!” he exclaimed in astonishment, looking from
the window.
“What is it, Pip?” cried Moses.
“I’ve lost my bet ’fore I made it! Jack!”
“Jack!” repeated several voices at once; and there was a general rush to
the windows. Annie Felton’s face flushed, while Phin’s turned suddenly
pale. “Jack, and Sellick with him!” said the deacon, unpleasantly
surprised. “I hoped—Couldn’t the boy keep out of the way! See what they
want.”
Meanwhile Sellick, with Jack by his side in the buggy in which they
began their ride the day before, had driven up to the gate and turned
about.
“Hullo!” cried Moses, going out to them.
“Hullo back agin,” replied Sellick. “Fine morning. How’s the folks? Good
morning, Mis’ Chatford.”
“I can’t say I’m glad to see you!” exclaimed the good woman from the
door. “Poor boy! how does it happen?”
“Jack took such a shine to me yisterday,” laughed Sellick, “he couldn’t
bear the separation; so he come of his own accord to renew the
acquaintance this morning,—or last evening,—which was it, Jack?”
“O Jack! did you give yourself up?” cried Annie Felton, alarmed to think
he might have been led by her advice to take an unwise step, until the
sight of his beaming countenance reassured her.
“He’s too modest to say so, but that’s jest it,” Sellick answered for
him. “I took him yisterday, and he took me this morning—by surprise.
I’ve hardly got my breath yit. Bright boy, Jack! honest boy! Says he has
done nothing he ought to go to jail for, but if we want to put him in
jail, we can; and I vow I don’t know but what that’s the right view to
take on ’t!”
“O Jack! is this so?” said Mrs. Chatford, hurrying to the side of the
buggy, and seizing both the boy’s hands, while she looked up earnestly
in his face.
“Yes,” replied Jack, smiling frankly, yet with quivering lips and misty
eyes. “After talking with Annie last night,”—casting a glance of
affectionate gratitude at the schoolmistress,—“I concluded I had been
foolish. I didn’t know what I wanted to run away for. If I have done
wrong, why, I’m willing to suffer for it. I know I’ve been wrong in some
things. The idea of finding so much money, and then of having it taken
from me, made me wild; I wasn’t myself; but I guess I’m all right now,
and I hope you’ll forgive me,” he said, winking away a tear or two.
“Bless you, dear boy! what have I to forgive?” said Mrs. Chatford, while
tears ran down her own upturned face.
“After all you had done for me, to think that I could be so cross and
sullen to you and to everybody, because Squire Peternot had wronged me;
and then to have such thoughts,—I can’t tell you what bad thoughts I
have had!” Jack exclaimed, beginning to choke a little. “But they are
gone now, I hope. I’m just going to take what comes, and make the best
of it.”
“That is right! O Jack, I am so glad to hear you talk so! If you can go
to jail in this spirit, it will do you no harm. I shall think more of
you and hope more for you than ever! So will all your friends.—Phineas,
come here, and tell your father to come!”
“Well, Jack! caught, after all, are you?” said Mr. Chatford, walking
slowly towards the gate.
“No, sir, not caught; Mr. Sellick won’t say I’ve been caught,” replied
Jack.
“No, I don’t take no credit to myself,” said Sellick; “Jack’s here of
his own free will, or he wouldn’t be here.” And he told the story of
Jack’s stay in the barn the night before, and his sudden appearance in
the cow-yard that morning.
“I think _you_’ll be satisfied with him now,” added Mrs. Chatford; “for
he has come of his own accord to make acknowledgments, and to ask our
forgiveness.”
“I’m heartily glad to hear it!” said the deacon, astonished and
gratified. “As I said before, his falsehood about Phineas, and his
standing out so about it, seemed to me worse than anything else. I
rejoice if he has owned up.”
“I’m ready to own everything that I’ve done wrong; but that is
different. I wasn’t going to say anything about it; but if Mrs. Chatford
meant that, when she said I had come to make acknowledgments, why, she
is mistaken. I spoke nothing but the truth about Phineas, and you’ll
know it some day, and then, maybe, you’ll be sorry for having accused me
of lying!” Jack struggled hard to control his feelings, but now, having
said this, he began to cry.
“Phineas! I told Phineas to come here,” said Mrs. Chatford, “and now
where has he gone?”
“I saw him sneaking off to the barn,” said Mr. Pipkin. “He don’t seem to
hanker arter a meetin’ with Jack, dono why!”
Mrs. Chatford was agitated; and the deacon appeared strangely disturbed.
“It hurt me worse than anything,” Jack resumed, wiping his eyes with his
sleeve, “to have you think I would try to get out of a scrape by
flinging the blame on to anybody else, and then lying about it. And
that’s the hardest part for me to get over. But it’s natural you should
think so. I don’t blame you. I can wait for you to find out the truth;
you will some time. I’ve no ill-will against Phin, either; but I don’t
want to see him or have anything to do with him. So don’t call him. I
know just what he would say.”
“Well, well!” said the deacon, walking up and down the path in great
trouble of mind. “No doubt, no doubt! You _may_ be honest. It’s a
strange misunderstanding! I hope it _will_ be explained some day.” But
it was plain to see that the good man’s prejudice against the boy was
far from being overcome.
Meanwhile Moses went to the barn to find Phineas.
“What are ye sneaking off here for?” he cried. “Why don’t you go and see
Jack, and own up to your lie about him? It’s your best way now.”
“Hain’t told any lie!” muttered Phineas. “Come out here to watch Lion,
fear he’d get away.”
“You sha’n’t have that excuse any longer!” exclaimed the indignant
Moses. “It’s too bad to keep the poor brute chained in this way!” And,
pushing his brother scornfully aside, he loosed the dog. “Bellow, will
you? great baby!—Clear, Lion!”
Lion “cleared”; and in ten seconds, darting past Mr. Chatford, and
almost knocking Mr. Pipkin over as he encountered that gentleman
standing by the gate, he leaped up on the buggy-wheel, whining, and
wagging his tail, and struggling to reach his young master.
Jack reached down, and patted the large, noble head, received the
caresses of the eager, affectionate tongue, and dropped a tear upon the
canine nose.
“Tell Phin he needn’t keep him chained; I sha’n’t steal him,” he said.
“Fine fellow!” said Sellick; “good dog! If you come and work for me,”—in
a low tone to Jack,—“bring your dog with you; I’ll keep him.”
“Peternot ought to hear to reason!” exclaimed the deacon. “Jack, why
don’t you give up the money?”
“I don’t care for the money; I’d as soon give it up as not,” Jack
replied, very truly. “But I don’t know where it is.” He checked a
natural impulse to go on and repeat Aunt Patsy’s story. Jack was shrewd,
and he did not believe that a revelation of what he knew of the spurious
character of the coin would have the least effect in softening the
squire’s mind towards him. On the contrary, some advantage might yet be
gained by keeping the secret.
“I suppose the Huswick boys have got it,” said Mr. Chatford. “The squire
had a warrant out yesterday for Cub and Hank; that’s a fact, ain’t it,
Sellick?”
“I’ll say this much,” replied the constable,—“arter Jack give us the
slip, we did make a call on our neighbor Huswick, and found Cub and Hank
had cut stick. I never told anybody I had a warrant. You may infer what
you please.”
“Does Peternot know Jack has given himself up?”
“I see the hired man as we drove by; he said the squire was tending
prayers. Good old man, the squire; has prayers in his family morning and
evening. I told the man to tell him; so he knows by this time. He’ll be
waiting to see his young friend. And now, if you’ll hand out that little
trunk you told me you had ready for him yesterday, we’ll be moving on.”
Mrs. Chatford talked earnestly with her husband aside.
“I don’t know what to do or think!” said the deacon. “I’ll see the
squire again. He _must_ hear to reason!” And he walked hurriedly away
towards Peternot’s house.
------------------------------------------------------------------------