Charles Miner Thompson

“ Even though disappointed in political ambition, a man might live there in some content.
After all, he had thirty thousand dollars, and it had been calmly drawing interest through all his tribulations.
Consoled by this reflection, he walked to the rear of his house and began pottering about the chicken yard. Then in the Edwards garden appeared Jim. Solomon gave a slight [222] start, and took a hesitating step or two, as if minded to flee, but restrained by shame. He watched the boy come to the fence, and climb upon it. He said nothing; he could not think of anything to say. ”

“ Jim sat there in his room, looking out into the pleasant sunshine, conscious that the boys were playing "three old cat" in the field not faraway [58] —as rebellious and magnanimous, as hot and angry, as heroic and morally muddled a boy as one could wish to see. And looking at the affair from his point of view, not many people will blame him. It is delightful, of course, to have a pirate chief for father; but what if he makes you walk the plank?
It is amusing to think of Mr. Peaslee and Jim each shut up in his respective room ”

“ But soon this tale of a cat, bird shot, and an unexpected Canadian began to disclose a comic aspect; the plight of poor, respectable Mr. Peaslee, in all the fresh honors of his jurorship, began to show a ludicrous side; their own position as grave men seeing what they thought a serious offense change, as by magic, into a [165] farcical accident, bit by bit revealed its humor.
Sampson, the foreman, glanced at Paige, the state's attorney. The young man's face wore an odd expression. Their eyes met, and Sampson's mouth began to twitch. ”

“ And then Jim was happier still.
Those were reluctant feet which dragged Mr. Peaslee the next morning to the jury-room. The counsel of [202] the night had brought no comfort, and when he came among his fellows their constraint and silence were far from reassuring. Nor, when the sitting had begun, did he like the enigmatic smile with which the well-dressed Paige stood and swung his watch-chain. How he distrusted and feared this smug, self-complacent young man! Yet the state's attorney's first words brought him unexpected comfort. ”

“ Service on the grand jury might lead to his becoming selectman, perhaps justice of the peace, perhaps town representative from Ellmington—who knew what else? He looked down a pleasant vista of increasing office, at the end of which stood the state capitol. He [12] could be senator, perhaps! And he began planning his behavior as juror, the dignified bearing, the well-matured utterances, the shrewd cross-questioning. At the end of his service his neighbors would know him for a man of solid judgment, a "safe" man to be intrusted with weighty affairs.
Mr. Peaslee was fifty-three years old. ”

“ Then, struck by the boldness and openness of his father's return to the house, Jim suddenly felt that he had been foolish; that the cleaning [47] of the gun had not been needed. What man would dare, after such a lesson, to complain against his father!
Mr. Edwards walked straight into Jim's room. Aroused from his nap by the shot, he had leaped to the window and seen the man fall. He had then turned and run downstairs so quickly that he had not seen the fellow half-rise and crawl into the bushes; and, having reached the spot, he was much relieved, if somewhat staggered, to find no body. ”

“ Jim, looking sidewise, recognized Jake Hibbard, and began covertly to study his face. He knew that this flabby-faced, dirty man, with the little screwed-up eyes, and the big screwed-up mouth, stained brown at the corners with tobacco, was Pete Lamoury's lawyer. Familiar for many years to his contemptuous young eyes, Jake now looked sinister and dangerous. What were these men going to do to him?
Amid his fluttering emotions and [92] rushing thoughts one thing only stood fixed and clear: he would not tell on his father. ”

“ The air in the court house was close, and every one felt uncomfortable and depressed.
Mr. Peaslee, having greeted three or four men whom he knew, found himself jammed into a corner behind four or five jurors who were strangers to him, but he was too disheartened to try to scrape acquaintance with them. He felt lonely and helpless.
He looked enviously over to the other end of the corridor, where Fred [134] Farnsworth, Eben Sampson, and Albion Small were standing together. In contrast with the others, these men were laughing. Albion was "consid'able of a joker," Mr. Peaslee reflected gloomily. ”

“ Exactly as boys at the seashore are prone to believe that a pirate is, on the whole, an admirable character, so these border boys, and especially Jim, had come to feel—only with more excuse, because of the generally indulgent view of the community—that smuggling is an occupation in which any one may engage with credit, and which is much more interesting than most. ”

“ And indeed it would be awkward for a respectable citizen with political aspirations to be accused before a grand jury of which he is a member of assault with a dangerous weapon upon an inoffensive man.
Mr. Peaslee's reflections rose in a strophe of hope and fell in an antistrophe of despair.
[60] "'T ain't likely it hurt him any—just bird shot," said Hope.
"Bird shot's mighty irritatin'—specially to a wrathy fellow," said Despair.
And alternating thus, his thoughts ran on: "Bird shot'll show I didn't have any serious intent; but mebbe a piece of the marble struck him. ”

“ Mr. Peaslee's jaw dropped, his face turned white. But the next moment he gave a great sigh of relief. He saw the man rise and slip into cover of the bushes, and so disappear through the orchard. He had not, then, killed the fellow!
Relieved of that fear, he thought of himself. What would people say were he charged with firing at a man—he, a respectable citizen, a [31] director in the bank, a grand juror? They must not know!
He silently laid the gun back against the window-sill, turned with infinite care, and tiptoed quickly back into the sitting-room, into the hall, into the street. ”

“ But he's one of these obstinate men who will do anything they've made up their minds to do, even if you prove to them that they're wrong, even if it hurts them more than it does any one else. He's just got it into his head that Jimmie ought to confess, and he'd let him go to the gallows before he'd back down."
Nancy spoke with animation, her color rose and her eyes grew bright, and Fred looked and listened admiringly. He was skeptical about Jim, but he was struck with the accuracy of the portrait of Edwards. ”

“ He had a comfortable figure, a clean-shaven, round face, and blue eyes much exaggerated for the spectator by the strong lenses of a pair of great spectacles. These, with his gray hair, gave him a benevolence of aspect which somewhat misrepre [13] sented him. As a matter of fact, although good-humored and not without a still surviving capacity for generous impulse, he was only less "near" than his wife. Childishly vain, he bore himself with an air of self-satisfaction not without its charm for humorous neighbors. ”

“ Keith! Oh, come now!" he heard Hopkins exclaim. "What's the use of raising a rum [169] pus? It wasn't nothing but bird shot. Folks don't go murdering folks with bird shot."
"Don't care if 't was bird shot!" came Abijah's snapping tones. "Don't care if 't was pin-heads; principle's the same."
"It is, it is!" admitted Solomon, in his soul.
"Well," said Hiram, with a common sense in which Mr. Peaslee took comfort, "the practical effect is mighty different. Gentlemen," he added to the jurors, "I can't see that we've got any call to go any further with this. Peaslee was just shooting at a cat. ”

“ Pete Lamoury, a French-Canadian, whom Mr. Edwards had hired as a drover, and abruptly discharged, was spreading stories about his former employer [39] which made Blackbeard, the pirate, seem like a babe by comparison. Pete was not a very credible witness; but still, building upon a suspicion that already existed, he succeeded in adding something to its substantiality.
These stories had come to Jim's ears, and Jim was delighted. The consideration that, were the stories true, his father was a criminal did not occur to him at all. ”

“ Peaslee. "I wonder now if you'd mind taking this along to him," and he offered her the paper parcel. "It's a harmonica, I guess they call it. It's real handsome. It cost consid'able—a pretty consid'able sum. I feel kinder sorry for the leetle feller, and I don't grudge it a mite." And he kept repeating, in a tone which suggested whistling to keep your courage up, "Not a mite, not a mite."
Miss Ware smothered a laugh on hearing what the present was. She must not hurt the feelings of this kind old man! ”

“ Peaslee had tact enough to let her husband have the credit for her business acumen. "I ain't goin' to let on," she said to herself, "that he ain't just as good as the rest of 'em." She had her pride.
As Mr. Peaslee stepped along the straight walk which divided his neat lawn, and opened the neat gate in [16] his neat white fence, he met Sam Barton, the broad-shouldered, good-humored giant who was constable of Ellmington. ”

“ The man's air of cold strength excited in the son fear as well as admiration; his reserve kept his naturally affectionate boy at more than arm's length. Poor Mr. Edwards! Poor Jim! Misunderstanding between them was as sure to occur as the rise of to-morrow's sun.
Pat on Jim's speculations about his father's stirring deeds, the gunshot came echoing through the silent barn. Jim ran to the loft door and looked out. He saw smoke curling up from the window of his [43] "den," and knew that it was his own gun that had been fired. ”

“ Peaslee's place. There was nothing else but the stew, of course, but it lent a gala air to the whole kitchen.
"Why, Sarepty, Sarepty!" he said to his wife.
"You goin' to be arrested?" asked [227] Mrs. Peaslee, sharply. She wanted no sentiment over her unwonted generosity; but, truth to tell, when she had seen Solomon depart that morning, and realized that he might be going to arrest, possibly to trial, perhaps to conviction and to jail, she had felt a sudden fright, a sudden sympathy for her husband, and she had bought half a pint of oysters for a stew—in spite of expense. ”

“ Mr. Peaslee was outraged. What kind of a father was this! He half started forward to offer to be one of the two sureties which the law required, but—no, he dare not. The second surety might prove to be any sort of worthless fellow. But Jim in jail! He had not for a moment dreamed of that. He was very indignant with Mr. Edwards.
[98] Meanwhile, Jake Hibbard was studying Mr. Edwards's face with puzzled attention. He had supposed that the lumber dealer, whom he knew to be well-to-do, would have paid anything, signed any bond, to protect his boy from jail. ”

“ Peaslee," [80] said the judge, in his precise, lawyer-like utterance, "that you are to be on the grand jury. We need men like you there."
"Thank ye, judge, thank ye," said Mr. Peaslee, overcome. And he walked on home, quite convinced that a person of his importance in the community should not be sacrificed to the comfort of any small boy.
"And I've done right by the little feller, I've done right," he assured himself, feeling the knife.
As he turned into his own yard, he cast an anxious eye over to the Edwards house. There sat Jim, [81] elbows on knees, chin on hands, staring into space. ”

“ He waved his hand deprecatingly. "I can't imagine what that Edwards boy used in his gun."
Mr. Peaslee knew: the marble! He trembled. Still, he knew Jake's reputation. A shrewd thought visited his troubled mind.
"What doctor's seein' him?" he asked.
"Doctor!" exclaimed Hibbard, irritated. "Doctor! You know these French Canadians. They're worse scared of a doctor than of the evil one himself. Pete's usin' some old [123] woman's stuff on his wounds,—bear's grease, rattlesnake oil, catnip tea,—what do I know? I can't make him see a doctor." ”

“ I thought mebbe he'd be interested."
"Goin' to brag, are ye?" was his wife's remorseless comment. "Much good it'll do ye, talkin' to that hatchet-face. He ain't so pious as he looks, if all stories are true." [11]
But Mr. Peaslee was already outside the door. She raised her voice shrilly. "You be back, now; them chickens has got to be fed!"
Mr. Peaslee sought a more sympathetic audience. Being drawn for the grand jury had greatly flattered his vanity, for it encouraged a secret ambition which he had long held to get into public life. ”

“ I suggest that a true bill be found at once, and that we proceed to more important matters. I want to remind you that we have a great deal of work before us."
"Well, gentlemen," said Sampson, "I guess we're pretty much of a mind about this. If no one has any objections, I guess we'll call it a vote." He looked round.
[154] "As we're all agreed—" he began.
"Just a moment, Sampson!" suddenly exclaimed Farnsworth. It had just then flashed over him that Mr. Peaslee, the kind Mr. Peaslee, who gave Jim knives and harmonicas, was next-door neighbor to the Edwardses. ”

“ But, Jim, you can see yourself that if you don't tell what you know, everybody'll think that you shot and meant to hurt Lamoury, and then it might go pretty hard with you. Now come, tell me what happened."
[112] "You'd better tell, Jimmie," said Mrs. Calkins, straightening up from her wash-tub. "You won't find any better friends than Mr. Farnsworth and Miss Ware." ”

“ Edwards, Jim, the housekeeper? Where had his own wife been? There were windows from which she might have seen him returning, some from which she might even have seen him fire the fatal shot. But pshaw, there now! Probably no one had seen him at all, not even his wife, not even his victim! Probably no one would ever find out.
[62] "Must have been some worthless feller, stealin' apples, mebbe, who won't dare make a fuss. 'T ain't likely I'll ever hear anythin' of it. 'T ain't no use sayin' anythin' till suthin' happens. What folks don't know don't hurt 'em none." ”