Betty Gordon at Bramble Farm: or, The Mystery of a Nobody

"Why, Betty!" he protested. "You don't usually act like this. What does ail you – are you sick?"

"It isn't fair!" protested Betty passionately. "Wapley and Lieson worked so hard and Mr. Peabody was mean to 'em! I don't want to save his old chickens for him! I'd much rather the hired men got the money. And I won't be a witness for him and get them into prison!"

Bob looked shocked at this outburst, but Mrs. Bender only continued to soothe the girl, and presently Betty's sobs grew less violent, and by and by ceased.

After supper Mrs. Bender played for them and sang a little, and then, declaring that Betty looked tired to death, took her upstairs to the blue and white guest-room, where, after she had helped her to undress and loaned her one of her own pretty nightgowns, she turned off the lights and sat beside her till she fell asleep. For the first time in months, Betty was encouraged to talk about her mother, and she told this new friend of her great loss, her life with the Arnolds, and about her Uncle Dick. It both rested and refreshed her to give this confidence, and her sleep that night was unbroken and dreamless.

Long after Betty was asleep, Bob and the recorder played checkers, Mrs. Bender sitting near with her sewing. Bob was starved for companionship, and something about the lad, his eager eyes, perhaps, or his evident need of interested guidance, appealed to Recorder Bender.

"You say you were born in the poorhouse?" he asked, between games. "Was your mother born in this township?"

Bob explained, and the Benders were both interested in the mention of the box of papers. Encouraged by friendly auditors, Bob told his meager story, unfolding in its recital a very fair picture of conditions as they existed at Bramble Farm.

Betty lay in dreamless sleep, but Bob, in a room across the hall, tossed and turned restlessly. At half-past ten he heard the recorder go out, and knew he was going to see if the chicken thieves and motor truck driver had been brought in by his men. Bob wondered how it seemed to be arrested, and he fervently resolved never to court the experience. He was asleep before the recorder returned, but woke once during the night. A heavy truck was lumbering through the street, the driver singing in a high sweet tenor voice, probably to keep himself awake, Bob's swift thoughts flew to Wapley and Lieson, and he wondered if they were asleep. How could they sleep in jail?

Breakfast in the Bender household was just as pleasant and cheerful and unhurried as supper had been. Mrs. Bender in a white and green morning frock beamed upon Bob and Betty and urged delicious viands upon them till they begged for mercy. It was, she said, so nice to have "four at the table."

Mr. Bender pushed back his chair at last, glancing at his watch.

"The hearing is set for ten o'clock," he announced quietly. "Mr. Peabody has been notified and should be here any minute. I think we had better walk down to the office. Catherine, if you're ready – "

Mrs. Bender smiled at Betty. She had promised to see her through.

CHAPTER XXIII

IN AMIABLE CONFERENCE

Betty's sole idea of a court had been gained from a scene or two in the once-a-week Pineville motion picture theater, and Bob had even less knowledge. They both thought there might be a crowd, a judge in a black gown, and some noise and excitement.

Instead Recorder Bender unlocked the door of a little one-story building and ushered them into a small room furnished simply with a long table, a few chairs, and a case of law books.

Presently two men came in, nodded to Mrs. Bender, and conferred in whispers with Mr. Bender. There was a scuffling step outside the door and Mr. Peabody entered.

"Huh, there you are!" he greeted Bob. "For all of you, I might have been hunting my horse and wagon all night. Mighty afraid to let any one know where you are."

"Mr. Peabody?" asked the recorder crisply, and suddenly all his quiet friendliness was gone and an able official with a clear, direct gaze and a rather stern chin faced the farmer. "Sit down, please, until we're all ready."

Mr. Peabody subsided into a chair, and the two men went away. They were back in a few moments, and with them they brought Wapley and Lieson and a lad, little more than a boy, who was evidently the truck driver.

"Close the door," directed the recorder. "Now, Mr. Peabody, if you'll just sit here – " he indicated a chair at one side of the table. With a clever shifting of the group he soon had them arranged so that Wapley, Lieson, the truck driver, and the two men who had brought them in were sitting on one side of the table, and Betty, Bob, Mrs. Bender and Mr. Peabody on the other. He himself took a seat between Betty and Mr. Peabody.

"Now you all understand," he said pleasantly, "that this is merely an informal hearing. We want to learn what both sides have to say."

Mr. Peabody gave a short laugh.

"I don't see what the other side can have to say!" he exclaimed contemptuously. "They've been caught red-handed, stealing my chickens."

The recorder ignored this, and turned to Lieson.

"You've worked for farmers about here in other seasons," he said. "And, from all I can hear, your record was all right. What made you put yourself in line for a workhouse term?"

Lieson cleared his throat, glancing at Wapley.

"It can't be proved we was stealing," he argued sullenly. "Them chickens was going to be sold on commission."

"Taking 'em off at ten o'clock at night to save 'em from sunburn, wasn't you?" demanded Mr. Peabody sarcastically. "You never was a quick thinker, Lieson."

"Now, Lieson," struck in Mr. Bender patiently, "that's no sort of use. Miss Gordon here overheard your plans. We know those chickens came from the Peabody farm, and that you and Wapley had a bargain with Tubbs to sell them in Petria. What I want to hear is your excuse. It's been my experience that every one who takes what doesn't belong to him has an excuse, good or bad. What's yours?"

At the mention of Betty's name, Lieson and Wapley had shot her a quick look. She made a little gesture of helplessness, infinitely appealing.

"I'm so sorry," the expressive brown eyes told them, "I just have to tell what I heard, if I'm asked, but I wouldn't willingly do you harm."

Lieson threw back his head and struck the table a sounding blow.

"I'll tell you why we took those blamed chickens!" he cried. "You can believe it or not, but we were going to sell 'em in Petria, and all over and above twenty-five dollars they brought, Peabody would have got back. He owes us that amount. Ask him."

"It's a lie!" shouted Peabody, rising, his face crimson. "A lie, I tell you! A lie cooked up by a sneaking, crooked, chicken-thief to save himself!"

Lieson and Wapley were on their feet, and Betty saw the glint of something shiny in Peabody's hand.

"Sit down, and keep quiet!" said the recorder levelly. "That will be about all the shouting, please, this morning. And, Mr. Peabody, I'll trouble you for that automatic!"

The men dropped into their chairs, and Peabody pushed his pistol across the table. The recorder opened a drawer and dropped the evil little thing into it.

"Can you prove that wages are owed you by Mr. Peabody?" he asked, as if nothing had happened.

Wapley, who had been silent all along, pulled a dirty scrap of paper from his pocket.

"There's when we came to Bramble Farm and when we left, and the money we've had," he said harshly. "And when we left, it was 'cause he wouldn't give us what was coming to us – not just a dollar or two of it to spend in Glenside, Miss Betty can tell you that."

"Yes," said Betty eagerly. "That was what they quarreled about."

The recorder, who had been studying the bit of paper, asked a question without raising his eyes.

"What's this thirty-four cents subtracted from this two dollars for – June twenty-fourth, it seems to be?"

"Oh, that was when we had the machinist who came to fix the binder stay to supper," explained Wapley simply. "Lieson and me paid Peabody for butter on the table that night, 'cause Edgeworth's mighty particular about what he gets to eat. He'd come ten miles to fix the machine, and we wanted him to have a good meal."

Mr. Peabody turned a vivid scarlet. He did not relish these disclosures of his domestic economy.

"What in tarnation has that got to do with stealing my chickens?" he demanded testily, "Ain't you going to commit these varmints?"

The truck driver, who had been studying Mr. Peabody with disconcerting steadiness, suddenly announced the result of his scrutiny, apparently not in the last in awe of the jail sentence shadow under which he stood.

"Well, you poor, little, mean-livered, low-down, pesky, slithering snake-in-the-grass," he said slowly and distinctly, addressing himself to Mr. Peabody with unflattering directness, "now I know where I've seen your homely mug before. You're the skunk that scattered ground glass on that stretch of road between the crossroads and Miller's Pond, and then laughed when I ruined four of my good tires. I knew I'd seen you somewhere, but I couldn't place you.

"Why, do you know, Mr. Bender," he turned excitedly to the recorder, "that low-down coward wouldn't put ground glass on his own road – might get him into trouble with the authorities. No, he goes and scatters the stuff on some other farmer's highway, and when I lodge a complaint against the man whose name was on the mail box and face him in Glenside, he isn't the man I saw laughing at all! I made a complete fool of myself. I suppose this guy had a grudge against some neighbor and took that way of paying it out; and getting some motorist in Dutch, too. These rubes hates automobiles, anyway."