CHAPTER XXXVII

ONE OF THE DEACON’S BLUNDERS.

FARMER CHATFORD hurried home, and, entering the house, found the three women seated in a circle, holding a solemn consultation.

Mrs. Chatford had just been saying, “I’m glad you didn’t urge him, Annie. He don’t often make up his mind in this way, but when he does it’s no use arguing with him. I had said everything I could, before, to induce him to be Jack’s bail; and when I mentioned the subject again—”

The deacon inferred, with reason, from the sudden manner in which this conversation ceased as he came in, and the scowl Mrs. Pipkin gave him, that his own conduct had been the topic of remark.

“Peternot is hard as a rock!” he said; then added quickly, addressing Mrs. Pipkin, “Call the boys, or your husband; tell ’em to harness up old Maje and put him in the buggy, while I change my clothes. I’ve thought of a little business in the city to-day.”

Mrs. Chatford and Annie exchanged glances; and the former whispered, “I knew he couldn’t be satisfied to let Jack go off so!” Then, following him to the bedroom, “I’m glad you are going! I want you to see the doctor, and tell him about Jack. _He_ will do what he can for him, I’m sure!”

“I guess there’s no danger but what Jack will have everything done for him he deserves,” was the ambiguous reply.

“Couldn’t you have any influence at all with the squire?” said Mrs. Chatford, handing him his second-best suit of clothes.

“No more than the wind that blows! Strange,” added the good deacon, “how a man can be so set in his way, and refuse to let any considerations of reason or humanity have weight with him!”

“Yes, it is, very strange,” remarked Mrs. Chatford, quietly.

“O papa!” cried Kate, running into the room, “what is it about bailing Jack? Would that keep him out of jail? and could you do it?”

“Hush, child!” said her father. “Bailing him might keep him out of jail a little while; but what will that amount to? He will have his trial all the same, when the court sits. The evidence is clear against him. He did break into Peternot’s house; and if he didn’t steal the money, he stole the bag it was in; that’s the way the squire argues. I’d bail him if that would get him clear of the scrape, but it won’t.”

Just then Mose came in haste into the house, with the astonishing announcement that two of the “Huswick tribe” wanted to see his father.

“Cub and Hank?” cried Mr. Chatford from the bedroom.

“No; Hod and Hick.” Hick (short for Hezekiah), aged twelve, was the sixth of this interesting family of boys. “They’ve got something; I shouldn’t wonder—”

“Bring ’em in!” said the deacon, “and be quick! What can the scamps be after!”

He came out, buttoning his suspenders, just as Hod and Hick marched in through the kitchen, one behind the other, bearing a short pole on their shoulders, with a curious burden hanging from it, about midway between them. It was a common meal-bag, having a compact but evidently heavy freight at the bottom, while the loose top was twisted over the pole and made fast by a cord.

“What’s that?” demanded the deacon. “The money that’s made all this trouble!”

“Ya-a-s!” said Hod, grinning and snuffing, and rolling his head from side to side, producing no small amount of friction between his left ear and the pole. “Boys say they don’t want it. Belongs to Jack.”

The deacon, far from suspecting that the rogues had the day before tried to dispose of some of the coin, and found it after all to be worthless, marvelled at this show of honesty in a quarter where it was so little to be looked for, and exclaimed, “I declare! I can’t understand! What did they take this trouble for?”

“’C-o-o-z!” said Hod, rolling his head again, snuffing, and drawing his smeared sleeve across his nose,—actions which Hick, at his end of the pole, did not fail to imitate; for it was characteristic of these young specimens of the Huswick species, that, reckless as they appeared in their native wilds, they were pretty sure to be overcome by a grotesque bashfulness when brought within the doors of civilized beings.

“’Cause what?” demanded the deacon.

“C-o-o-z!” Hod rolled his eyes from him to Annie and Mrs. Chatford, and used his other sleeve. “Squire’s got out warrants for ’em. Take ’em to jail. They don’t want noth’n’ to do with the money; want you to make him promise he won’t have ’em took up; then he may have the money, for all them. They found it in the woods, where Jack hid it.”

“I believe that’s a lie!” said the deacon. “But no matter. I’ll make as good terms for ’em as I can. Is it all here?”

“Ya-a-s; every dollar on ’t, so they say. Slip her off, Hick!” and the two treasure-bearers lowered their burden to the floor.

The deacon hastily untied the bag, looked into it, and then as hastily tied it up again.

“Good aft’noon!” said Hod. “Aft’noon!” said Hick. And they sidled towards the door, hesitating, grinning, and smearing their sleeves.

“You can get some peaches as you go through the orchard,” the deacon called after them, as they disappeared. “Open the big chest there, mother! We’ll lock up this stuff, till Peternot can be made to hear to reason. Is the horse ready?”

Kate caught her father as he was going out. “I want to send Jack something!” she cried. “I couldn’t think of anything when he was here. But there’s that half-dollar!”

“What half-dollar?”

“My half-dollar. Don’t you know? you borrowed it of me the other day, when you wanted one to ring with Jack’s on the doorstep.”

“But I gave it back to you.”

“No, you didn’t. You put it in your pocket. You had on your old gray pants, and you haven’t worn ’em since.”

The deacon went back to the bedroom, took down the said garments from a hook, and explored the pockets.

“You’re right, my girl. Here it is now. Send it to Jack if you like. What!” looking with astonishment at the coin as he was about to give it to her.

“That ain’t my half-dollar!” the child exclaimed. “That—that’s Jack’s!”

“Massy on me! Mother, see here! How under the sun—” stammered the bewildered deacon.

“If that don’t beat all!” said Mrs. Chatford. “Feel in your other pockets.”

The deacon felt, but no other half-dollar could be found.

“Must be—I do declare!” he said, fumbling and staring. “This piece has the very scratches on it! I see! I see!”

“How is it? You said you gave this half-dollar to the goldsmith!” exclaimed Mrs. Chatford. “I don’t understand!”

“My plaguy absence of mind!” said the deacon, scratching his head with one hand while he held the coin in the palm of the other. “I must have put both half-dollars in my pocket, not thinking what I was about. Then—it was dark, you know—I gave the wrong one to the goldsmith! gave him Kate’s instead of Jack’s!”

“Then you came home and told Jack his half-dollar was a good one! O deacon! it’s you that have caused him all this trouble! He never would have quarrelled with the squire, he never would have broken into his house as he did, but for your strange mistake!”

“’Twas a plaguy blunder! Counterfeit, counterfeit, I’ll stake my life!” said the deacon, examining the coin in the bag. “Say nothing to anybody; but—See here, Moses! put it under the buggy-seat, and fling a blanket over it.”

“Now, deacon!” pleaded his wife, “do use a little more, I won’t say deception, but wisdom, more than you do sometimes! Don’t tell the squire at once all you know, for that will be just like you.”

“Think I haven’t any gumption?” cried the deacon.

“No, but you’re so honest, you never can use any sort of art or concealment, you know that! That’s very well in all ordinary business transactions; I wouldn’t have you cheat a body, for any consideration. But your blunder has got Jack into this scrape; and now don’t explain to the squire till you’ve got Jack out of it again.”

“As if I required to be told by a woman that a little shrewdness may be necessary sometimes in dealing with the world!” said the deacon. And, climbing into the buggy with unusual alacrity, he whipped away at an extraordinary rate of speed.