XXII
THE MURDER
So successful did the friendship between the two boys turn out to bethat next autumn Johnny English was invited to visit the Ordes atMonrovia. He accepted very promptly, and, as the distance was short,brought with him the cart and pony. The country around Monrovia was veryinteresting to them. Riverland, marshland, swampland, shore and meadow,all offered themselves in the most diversified forms. The sandy roadswound over the hills, down the ravines, along the corduroys andfloat-bridges. Life was varied. The boys, armed with their Flobertrifle, wandered far afield.
They did not get very much, it is true, but they popped away steadily,and did a grand amount of sneaking and looking. And they managed firstand last to see a great deal. In the snipe marshes they knew when thefirst flight dropped in--and murdered a killdeer as he stood. Out in thesloughs they marked the earnest red-heads from the north--andaccomplished two mud-hens, a ruddy duck, and a dozen blackbirds. In theuplands they knew almost to a feather how many partridge each thickethad bred; to a covey where the quail used; and once in a great while, bystrategy on their own side and foolishness on the part of the quarry,they caught one sitting and brought it down. What is quite as much tothe point, they felt the season as it changed. The gradualtransformation from the green of summer to the brown and lilac of lateautumn, the low swinging of the sun, the mellowing of the days, thebroad-hung curtain of sweet smoke-breeze, the hushing of the vitalforces of the world in anticipation of winter--all these passed nearthem and, passing, touched their eyes. They were too busy to notice suchthings consciously, however. The influence sank deep and became part ofthe permanent background against which their lives were to be thrown.
At first some doubt was expressed as to the wisdom of that Flobertrifle. To turn two small boys loose with a deadly weapon seemed to Mrs.Orde a rather strong temptation of Providence. Mr. Kincaid spoke forthem. In the end it was decided, though with many misgivings and moreadmonitions.
"Keep the muzzle pointed up; never get excited; never shoot at anythingunless you _know_ what it is," was Mr. Kincaid's summing up.
These three precepts were so constantly impressed that to the boys theirpractice ended by becoming second nature.
"It's not only dangerous to do these things," said Mr. Kincaid, "butit's a sure sign of a greenhorn. A man ought to be deadly ashamed toconfess himself such an all-round dub."
Toward the end of the fall, and nearing Thanksgiving, the boys droveBobby Junior out the old east road. After a time they turned off into aby-way deep with sand. It ended. They hitched the placid Bobby Junior tothe top rail of a "snake-fence" climbed it, and headed toward ascrub-oak and popple thicket thrown like a blanket over the long slopeof a hill. They walked cautiously, for by experience they had learnedthat at the very edge, and in the lea of an old burned log, it waspossible a fine big cock-partridge might be sunning himself. Thepopples, shining silvery, were almost bare of leaves, but the scrub oaksclung tenaciously to a crackling umber-brown foliage. It was now nearthe close of the afternoon. The game bag was empty. Both boys trod oneggs, scrutinizing every inch of the ground before them.
"It's too late for 'em," whispered Bobby in discouragement. "There's notenough sun. They've gone in to feed."
But Johnnie seized his arm.
"There," he breathed, "See him! He's sitting in that little scruboak--just to the left of the stub."
Bobby peered along his friend's arm. After a moment he made out amottled spot of brown.
"I see him," said he, cocking his rifle. "It's his breast. I wish Icould get at his head."
"He'll be gone in a minute!" warned Johnny.
It was Bobby's turn to shoot. He raised his weapon, aimed carefully, andpressed the trigger.
Immediately the thicket broke into a tremendous commotion. A scurryingof leaves, a brief exclamation of pain, a brown cap whirling through theair--and both boys turned and ran, ran as hard as they could up the hilluntil sheer lack of breath brought them to the ground. They stared ateach other with frightened eyes from faces chalky white.
"We've killed somebody!" gasped Johnny.
They clung to each other trembling with the horror of it, utterly unableto gather their faculties. This was just what so often both had beencautioned against--the shooting without seeing clearly the object ofaim. To the shock of a catastrophe they had to add the sinking remorseover warnings disobeyed.
"What are we going to do?" chattered Johnny at last.
"We got to go down and see----"
"I daresn't" confessed Johnny miserably.
"Do you suppose he's dead?"
"They'll probably put us in jail."
"Come on," said Bobby at last.
They arose, very giddy and uncertain on their feet. For the first timethey forced themselves to look at the copse lying below them.
"Oh!" breathed Johnny, "Look!"
Below them on the farther edge of the copse, and over a quarter of amile away, they saw Mr. Kincaid. He was bareheaded. Curly was with him.The man was trying to send the water spaniel into the copse. Curlypretended that he wanted to play, and did not in the least understandwhat it was all about. He capered joyously around Mr. Kincaid'soutstretched arm; he pressed his chest to the earth and uttered shortbarks; he chased madly around in circles, but he did not enter thecopse, which was plainly his master's desire. Finally Mr. Kincaid gaveit up and departed over the brow of the next hill.
And while this little by-play was going on two small boys above him feltthe warmth of life flowing back into their frozen souls. The bloodreturned to their lips, their thumping hearts calmed, all the blessedjoy and sunshine and freedom of the world flooded in a return tide ofblessed relief.
"Gee," said Johnny, "I'm never going hunting again! Never any more!Never!"
"You bet I'm going to be careful after this," said Bobby. "My, but I'mglad!"
"I wonder why he didn't pick up his cap?" wondered Johnny.
"Perhaps he had it in his hand."
The boys drove home ringing the changes on a thousand new resolutions ofcaution.
"It's a good lesson to us," said Bobby by way of reminiscent philosophyoften heard before.
They put Bobby Junior into the barn, cleaned the Flobert, changed theirhunting clothes, and answered with alacrity the summons to the diningroom. After they were well started with the meal, Mr. Orde came in andsat down. He nodded abstractedly, and had little to say. The boys weretoo far down in remorse to care to bring up any of the subjects neartheir hearts. Finally Mrs. Orde remarked this general depression.
"I must say you're a cheerful lot of men folks," said she. "What is it?Business?" She smiled at the boys in raillery at the idea. But she couldnot cheer them up. As soon as the meal was over Mr. Orde dismissed theboys.
"Run along now," said he briefly; "I want to talk."
They climbed the stairs to Bobby's room, and sat down glumly on thefloor. Reaction was strong, and they had both fallen into aimlessdoldrums of spirit. Suddenly Bobby sat up straight at attention.
The Orde house was provided with old-fashioned hot-air registers. Whenthe registers happened all to be open, they constituted most excellentspeaking-tubes. Thus, without intention of deliberate eavesdropping,Bobby and his friend became aware of the following conversation.
"What's the matter, Jack? Anything wrong at the office or on the River?"
Mr. Orde sighed deeply.
"Oh, no. Everything's snug as a bug in a rug, sweetheart," said he. "ButI'm bothered a lot. A dreadful thing happened to-day. You know thatpopple thicket out at Pritchard's place?"
Both boys froze into horrified attention.
"Yes."
"Well, just before dusk Pritchard was found dead near the east end ofit."
"Why, how did that happen?" cried Mrs. Ode.
The boys stole a look at each other.
"He had been murdered."
"Murdered!" cried Mrs. Orde sharply.
"Oh!" moaned Bobby in a smothered voice.
"Yes. He wa
s found with a knife wound in his throat."
"How terrible!" said Mrs. Orde.
"But that isn't what worries me. Pritchard is no irreparable loss."
"Jack!" cried Mrs. Orde.
"He isn't," insisted Orde stoutly. "But Kincaid was seen by severalcompetent witnesses coming out from that thicket, and as far as anybodyhas been able to find out he is the only human being who was out thereto-day. They have him under arrest."
"I never heard of anything so ridiculous!" cried Mrs. Orde indignantly.
"There has been bad blood between them," said Orde; "and everybody knowsit. That's the trouble. Pritchard, as usual, has off and on done anawful lot of talking."
"You don't for a moment believe----"
"Certainly not. Arthur Kincaid never would harm a fly in anger. And Irely absolutely on his word."
"You've seen him?"
"Of course. He acknowledges he was out at Pritchard's, but denies allknowledge of the affair. That's the trouble. He offers no explanation ofthe facts, and the facts are--queer."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, this; the men who saw Kincaid coming out of the thicket say hewas bareheaded. When Pritchard's body was found, Kincaid's cap wasdiscovered about fifty feet distant."
"What does he say to that?"
"His story is so ridiculous that I wouldn't blame anybody who did notknow Kincaid for not believing it. He says he was playing with his dogCurly, when Curly grabbed the cap and made off with it. The dog cameback without the cap, and Kincaid could not find it. That's all he says,except that he was not in the thicket at all, and certainly not within aquarter-mile of the scene of the murder."
"That might be so."
"Of course it's so, if Arthur Kincaid says it is," insisted Orde, "butwhat do you think of this? The cap had a 22-calibre bullet hole throughthe crown; and Pritchard was armed with a 22-calibre rifle."
"What does Mr. Kincaid say to it?"
"That's just the trouble," cried Orde in despairing tones. "If he'dplead self-defence any jury in Michigan would acquit him without leavingthe box. But when we asked him how that bullet hole got in that cap, hesimply says that he doesn't know; it wasn't there when he lost the cap!Could anything be more absurd!"
Bobby reached out and softly closed the register.
He turned to grip Johnny fiercely by the arm. His eyes blazed.
"Mr. Kincaid is my friend," he hissed. "Understand that? He's my bestfriend. If you ever say anything about this afternoon----"
"Let go!" cried Johnny struggling. "You hurt! You needn't get mad aboutit. He's my friend, too. I ain't going to say anything." Bobby releasedhis arm. "He must have done it, though," concluded Johnny.
"Of course he did it. I'd have done it. Pritchard was an old beast. Youought to have been along with me when he ordered us off his land."
"Mr. Kincaid says he was never up at that end."
"There's his cap, with the hole I shot in it," Bobby pointed out. "Itwas right where Pritchard was when I shot at it."
Johnny nodded.
"If we let that get out, they'll have us in as witnesses."
"We mustn't," said Johnny.
Following this policy the boys for the next month carried about an airof secrecy and an irresponsibility of action very irritating toeverybody. They forgot errands, they did absent-minded, destructivethings, they were much given to long consultations behind the woodshed.When they were permitted to visit Mr. Kincaid at the jail, they triedmysteriously to convey assurance of absolute secrecy, but succeededonly in appearing stupid, frivolous and unsympathetic. Neverthelesstheir concern was very real. Bobby in especial brooded over the affairto the exclusion of all other interests. The Flobert rifle was laidaway, the printing press gathered dust. Over and over he visualized thescene, until he could shut his eyes and reproduce its every detail--thehillside with its scattered, half-burned old logs, the popple thicketshining white, the scrub oaks with red rustling leaves, the patch ofbrown that looked exactly like a partridge; and then the whirl of thecap in the air as the bullet struck, and the horrible sinking feelingbefore he turned to flee. A dozen small things he had not noticedconsciously at the time, now stood out clear. He remembered that thesupposed partridge had stood out against the sky; that the ground brokegently up just beyond the black log. "Mr. Kincaid must have beenstanding on a stump," he thought. He recalled now his own exactposition, and figured the course of the bullet. "It must have gone injust at the tip top," he figured. "That's the only way it could havedone without hurting his head. Otherwise, it would have scalped him."Over and over he turned the facts until gradually he evolved an exactpicture of what had occurred--here was the victim, here the murderer.Inquiry disclosed the spot where Pritchard's body had been found. It wasup-hill from the spot Bobby had shot the cap--and about ten feet away."He must just have done it," he said with a shudder.
"Why?" demanded Johnny to whom he confided these reasonings. "Maybe itwas before."
"No," argued Bobby. "Because then when I shot the cap off, if Pritchardhad been alive, we'd have heard from him."
"Maybe Mr. Kincaid killed him to keep him from chasing us," suggestedJohnny.
Bobby considered this romantic suggestion but shook his head.
"No," said he, "there wasn't time for Mr. Kincaid to kill him and thenwalk down to the other end of the thicket. He must have run when Ishot."
"Do you think they'll convict Mr. Kincaid?"
"Papa says he doesn't think so," said Bobby. "He says nobody can proveMr. Kincaid was at the place."
"We could."
"We're going to shut up!" said Bobby sharply.