Betsy began to sob.

"I told you you had better leave the room," went on the squire in a low tone.

Pickering endeavored to raise himself in the bed, but sank back with a groan. The unfortunate girl forgot her own troubles at the sound, and rushed to arrange the pillow beneath his head.

"It comes to this, then," he said huskily; "you want to arrest, on a charge of attempting to murder me, a woman whom I intend to marry long before she can be brought to trial!"

Betsy broke down now in real earnest. Beckett-Smythe and the superintendent gazed at Pickering with blank incredulity. This development was wholly unlooked for. They both thought the man was light-headed. He smiled dryly.

"Yes, I mean it," he continued, placing his hand on the brown hair of the girl, whose face was buried in the bedclothes. "I--I didn't sleep much last night, and I commenced to see things in a different light to that which presented itself before. I treated Betsy shamefully--not in a monied sense, but in every other way. She's not one of the general run of girls. I promised to marry her once, and now I'm going to keep my promise. That's all."

He was desperately in earnest. Of that there could be no manner of doubt. The superintendent stroked his chin reflectively, and the magistrate could only murmur:

"Gad, that changes the venue, as the lawyers say."

One thought dominated the minds of both men; Pickering was behaving foolishly. He was a wealthy man, owner of a freehold farm of hundreds of acres; he might aspire to marry a woman of some position in the county and end his days in all the glory of J. P.-dom and County Aldermanship.

Yet, here he was deliberately throwing himself away on a dairymaid who, not many hours since, had striven to kill him during a burst of jealous fury. The thing was absurd. Probably when he recovered he would see this for himself; but for the time it was best to humor him and give official sanction to his version of the overnight quarrel.

"Don't keep us in suspense, squire," cried the wounded man, angered by his friend's silence. "What are you going to do?"

"Nothing, George; nothing, I think. I only hope your accident with the pitchfork will not have serious results--in any shape."

The policeman nodded a farewell. As they quitted the room they heard Pickering say faintly:

"Now, Betsy, my dear, no more crying. I can't stand it. d.a.m.n it all, one doesn't get engaged to be married and yelp over it!"

On the landing they saw Kitty, a white shadow, anxious, but afraid to speak.

"Cheer up," said Beckett-Smythe pleasantly. "This affair looks like ending in smoke."

Gaining courage from the magistrate's affability, the girl said brokenly:

"Mr. Pickering and--my--sister--are quite friendly. You saw that for yourself, sir."

"Gad, yes. They're going to be--well--er--I was going to say we have quite decided that an accident took place and there is no call for police interference--so long as Mr. Pickering shows progress toward recovery, you understand. There, there! You women always begin to cry, whether pleased or vexed. Bless my heart, let's get away, Mr.

Superintendent."

CHAPTER VIII

SHOWING HOW MARTIN'S HORIZON WIDENS

The sufferings of the young are strenuous as their joys. When Martin pa.s.sed into the heart of the bustling fair its glamour had vanished. The notes of the organ were harsh, the gay canvas of the booths tawdry, the cleanly village itself awry. The policeman's surprise at his lack of knowledge on the subject of his parentage was disastrously convincing.

The man treated the statement as indisputable. There was no question of hearsay; it was just so, a recognized fact, known to all the grown-up people in Elmsdale.

Tommy Beadlam, he of the white head, ran after him to ask why the "bobby" brought him to the "Black Lion," but Martin averted eyes laden with misery, and motioned his little friend away.

Tommy, who had seen the fight, and knew of the squire's presence this morning, drew his own conclusions.

"Martin's goin' to be locked up," he told a knot of awe-stricken youngsters, and they thrilled with sympathy, for their champion's victory over the "young swell frae t' Hall" was highly popular.

The front door of the White House stood hospitably open. Already a goodly number of visitors had gathered, and every man and woman talked of nothing but the dramatic events of the previous night. When Martin arrived, fresh from a private conversation with the squire and the chief of police, they were on the tip-toe of expectancy. Perhaps he might add to the store of gossip. Even Mrs. Bolland felt a certain pride that the boy should be the center of interest in this _cause clbre_.

But his glum face created alarm in her motherly breast.

"Why, Martin," she cried, "what's gone wrong? Ye look as if ye'd seen a ghost wi' two heds!"

The all-absorbing topic to Martin just then was his own history and not the half-comprehended tragedy of the rural lovers. If his mother's friends knew that which was hidden from him, why should he compel his tongue to wag falsely? Somehow, the air seemed thick with deception just now, but his heart would have burst had he attempted to restrain the words that welled forth.

"Mother," he said, and his lips quivered at the remembrance that the affectionate t.i.tle was itself a lie, "Mr. Benson told the squire I was not your boy--that father and you adopted me thirteen years ago."

Mrs. Bolland's face glowed with quick indignation. No one spoke.

Martin's impetuous repudiation of his name was the last thing they looked for.

"It is true, I suppose," he went on despairingly. "If I am not your son, then whose son am I?"

Martha lifted her eyes to the ceiling.

"Well, of all the deceitful scoundrels!" she gasped. "Te think of me fillin' his blue coat wi' meat an' beer last neet, an' all t' return he maks is te worry this poor lad's brains wi' that owd tale!"

"Oh, he's sly, is Benson," chimed in stout Mrs. Summersgill. "A fortnight sen last Tuesday I caught him i' my dairy wi' one o' t'

maids, lappin' up cream like a great tomcat."

A laugh went round. None paid heed to Martin's agony. A dullness fell on his soul. Even the woman he called mother was angered more by the constable's blurting out of a household secret than by the destruction of an ideal. Such, in confused riot, was the thought that chilled him.

But he was mistaken. Martha Bolland's denunciations of the policeman only covered the pain, sharp as the cut of a knife, caused by the boy's cry of mingled pa.s.sion and sorrow. She was merely biding her time. When chance served, she called him into the larder, the nearest quiet place in the house, and closed the door.

"Martin, my lad," she said, while big tears shone in her honest eyes, "ye are dear to me as my own. I trust I may be spared to be m.u.t.h.e.r te ye until ye're a man. John an' me meant no unkindness te ye in not tellin'

ye we found ye i' Lunnun streets, a poor, deserted little mite, wi'

nather feyther nor m.u.t.h.e.r, an' none te own ye. What matter was it that ye should know sooner? Hev we not done well by ye? When ye come to think over 't, ye're angered about nowt. Kiss me, honey, an' if anyone says owt cross te ye, tell 'em ye hev both a feyther an' a m.u.t.h.e.r, which is more'n some of 'em can say."

This display of feeling applied balm to Martin's wounds. Certainly Mrs.

Bolland's was the common sense view to take of the situation. He forbore to question her further just then, and hugged her contentedly. The very smell of her lavender-scented clothes was grateful, and this embrace seemed to restore her to him.

His brightened countenance, the vanishing of that unwonted expression of resentful humiliation, was even more comforting to Martha herself.

"Here," she said, thrusting a small paper package into his hand, "I mayn't hev anuther chance. Ye'll find two pun ten i' that paper. Gie it te Mrs. Saumarez an' tell her I'll be rale pleased if there's no more talk about t' money. An' mebbe, later i' t' day, I'll find a shillin' fer yersen. But, fer goodness' sake, come an' tell t' folk all that t'

squire said te ye. They're fair crazed te hear ye."

"Mother, dear!" he cried eagerly, "I was so--so mixed up at first that I forgot to tell you. Mr. Beckett-Smythe gave me half a crown."

"Ye doan't say! Well, I can't abide half a tale. Let's hae t' lot i' t'

front kitchen."

It was noon, and dinner-time, before Martin could satisfy the cackling dames as to all within his cognizance concerning Betsy Thwaites's escapade. Be it noted, they unanimously condemned Fred, the groom; commiserated with Betsy, and extolled George Pickering as a true gentleman.