THE HOLE IN THE WALL.

As soon as Dock Vincent and Mat Mogmore had left the house, Mr.

Fairfield procured a case-knife,--for he was not the owner of so useful an implement as a screw-driver,--and, with trembling anxiety, removed the board that covered the hole in the wall. Thrusting his hand down into the aperture, a cold chill swept through his frame when he failed to touch the bags in which the gold was contained. With convulsive energy, he felt in every part of the cavity; but the money had surely taken to itself wings and flown away.

Had all the human beings upon the earth been suddenly destroyed before his eyes, the effect upon the miser could not have been more deplorable. He loved his money; he did not love his fellow-beings. His heart almost ceased to beat beneath the shock, his lip quivered, and the tears started in his eyes. His brain began to reel before the blow; he uttered a prolonged howl, and rushed out into the kitchen rather from impulse than because he desired or expected human sympathy.

Bessie Watson was terrified by the fearful aspect of Mr. Fairfield when he entered the room, and for weeks the awful expression upon his face haunted her like the vision of a midnight ghost. Levi was startled, and Mrs. Fairfield, accustomed as she was to the ways of her husband, was deeply moved by his singular conduct. When he was ailing, he was subject to fainting fits; but he had never appeared so badly as on the present occasion.

The miser trusted no person, had no confidence in any one, not even in his wife. He had not told her that he had four thousand dollars in gold in the house, for he feared that she might be tempted to rob him of his treasure. Mrs. Fairfield, therefore, did not comprehend his despairing utterances when he announced the loss of his money.

Levi and his aunt conveyed the senseless form to the front room, and after working over him nearly half an hour, he came out of the fit, but only to suffer the most intense agonies at the loss of his money.

"What on airth is the matter with you, Nathan?" asked his wife, when, after another examination of the hole in the wall, he appeared in the kitchen again.

Bessie had gone home; but Levi remained, to render any a.s.sistance in his power in putting the house to rights.

"O!" groaned the miser, heavily, as he paced the room with furious strides.

"Can't you tell what ails you?" continued Mrs. Fairfield.

"It's all gone," gasped he, with a prolonged sigh.

"What is it? What's all gone? Why don't you tell a body what has happened?"

"My money is all gone! Somebody has stolen it--robbed me, ruined me!"

"Who on airth stole it?"

"I donno," replied Mr. Fairfield, glancing at Levi.

"How much was stole?"

"Four thousand dollars," sighed the miser.

"For ma.s.sy sake!" exclaimed Mrs. Fairfield; and it was a question whether she would not faint, for such a sum of money was beyond her comprehension.

"Where was it, uncle Nathan?" asked Levi, who pitied the sufferings of the old man.

The miser looked at his nephew. People always suspect those whom they hate. If any wicked deed is done, they charge it upon those they love the least, regardless of circ.u.mstances.

"Levi Fairfield, you stole my money!" continued the old man, fiercely.

"Nonsense, Nathan!" interposed Mrs. Fairfield. "Levi didn't do nothin'

of the sort."

"Didn't you tell me he went up in the attic before the fire? Didn't you tell me you gave him a piece of candle?" demanded Mr. Fairfield, earnestly; and doubtless he felt that Levi was guilty, for his impulsive charge was made on the strength of a course of reasoning he had followed out.

"What if I did tell you so? Levi didn't steal no four thousand dollars.

There's no sense nor reason in sayin' so," added aunt Susan.

"I say he did steal it. I know he did now," persisted the miser. "He set the house afire, and then took the money. That boy hates me, and he's bad enough to do anything, if he is go'n' to jine the church."

"Levi has money enough," argued Mrs. Fairfield. "Why should he steal your money?"

"Cause he hates me."

"Uncle Nathan, I don't hate you, and I didn't steal your money," said Levi, who had calmly listened to the debate between his uncle and aunt.

"Yes, you did; you set the house afire, so's to git a chance to git the money. It's all plain enough to me," continued the old man, striding up and down the room more rapidly than before.

"I suppose it will be useless for me to say anything," added Levi, more in pity than in anger. "I am willing to do anything I can to help you find the money, if it is lost, or catch the thief, if it was stolen."

"'Tain't no use for you to talk no more, Levi Fairfield," said the old man, stopping in front of him. "You know all about it, and you took the money. If you're a mind to give it all back to me, I won't say a word to n.o.body about it."

"I did not take it, and I know nothing about it. I was not aware that you had so much money in the house," replied Levi.

"What did you want of the candle, then, if you didn't steal the money?"

"I wanted it to grease the saw-mill, and the candle lies on a rock by the brook now."

"Didn't you set the house afire when you went up in the garret?"

"I did not. I had no light, and not even a match in my pocket."

"Who did steal it, then, if you didn't?"

"I don't know. Where did you keep the money?"

The old man led the way to his chamber, and pointed out the hole.

"That's a bad place to keep money," said Levi.

"'Tain't no use to keep money in the bank now; they're all failin', and folks is failin'; and a man that's got a little money is wus off than them that hain't got none."

Levi asked a great many questions about the money, and the hole, which uncle Nathan, hoping to find his money, answered. There was no evidence to fasten the crime upon any one. The facts that appeared were, that the money, in four bags, had been deposited in the cavity; that an hour before the fire, the miser had a.s.sured himself the gold was safe; that, after the fire, the board had been found in its place as before, but the gold was gone. A dozen of the neighbors, at least, had been into the room, and Dock Vincent and Mat Mogmore had been the last to leave.

Mr. Fairfield was sure that neither Dock nor Mat knew he had any money in the house. There was no good reason for supposing they, any more than any other of the neighbors, had taken the gold.

After a long and careful examination of the premises, and a patient inquiry into all the circ.u.mstances, nothing could be brought forward to implicate any person in the robbery. Levi was not willing to believe yet that the gold had been stolen. He went down cellar, and surveyed the timbers under the hole, hoping that the bags had dropped through; but he could not find them. He could not determine whether or not there was any connection between the fire and the robbery; but Mr. Fairfield insisted that some one--he did not say Levi now--intended to burn the house, so as to cover up the crime, or at least afford an opportunity to commit the theft.

"How could any one set the fire in the roof?" asked Levi.

"They might have gone up there, as you did," replied the old man, rather malignantly.

"Let us go up and see how the fire took," added Levi. "Aunt Susan had a big fire in the oven."

"It couldn't ketch afire up there if she did," replied uncle Nathan, as he followed his nephew up the ladder.

Some of the boards and shingles had been burned through, but the rafters were only charred. Levi went up to the chimney and examined the woodwork near it. The house was a very old one, and had been built upon until its present proportions had been reached. The chimney, where the fire had taken, was in the most ancient part, and the bricks were laid in clay. Levi found that three or four of them, on one of the inside corners, had dropped out. This was the defect which the owner had repaired.