Chapter 22. The Murder

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_ CHAPTER XXII. THE MURDER

So successful did the friendship between the two boys turn out to be that next autumn Johnny English was invited to visit the Ordes at Monrovia. He accepted very promptly, and, as the distance was short, brought with him the cart and pony. The country around Monrovia was very interesting to them. Riverland, marshland, swampland, shore and meadow, all offered themselves in the most diversified forms. The sandy roads wound over the hills, down the ravines, along the corduroys and float-bridges. Life was varied. The boys, armed with their Flobert rifle, 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 first and last to see a great deal. In the snipe marshes they knew when the first flight dropped in--and murdered a killdeer as he stood. Out in the sloughs they marked the earnest red-heads from the north--and accomplished two mud-hens, a ruddy duck, and a dozen blackbirds. In the uplands they knew almost to a feather how many partridge each thicket had bred; to a covey where the quail used; and once in a great while, by strategy 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 to the point, they felt the season as it changed. The gradual transformation from the green of summer to the brown and lilac of late autumn, the low swinging of the sun, the mellowing of the days, the broad-hung curtain of sweet smoke-breeze, the hushing of the vital forces of the world in anticipation of winter--all these passed near them and, passing, touched their eyes. They were too busy to notice such things consciously, however. The influence sank deep and became part of the permanent background against which their lives were to be thrown.

At first some doubt was expressed as to the wisdom of that Flobert rifle. To turn two small boys loose with a deadly weapon seemed to Mrs. Orde a rather strong temptation of Providence. Mr. Kincaid spoke for them. In the end it was decided, though with many misgivings and more admonitions.

"Keep the muzzle pointed up; never get excited; never shoot at anything unless you _know_ what it is," was Mr. Kincaid's summing up.

These three precepts were so constantly impressed that to the boys their practice ended by becoming second nature.

"It's not only dangerous to do these things," said Mr. Kincaid, "but it's a sure sign of a greenhorn. A man ought to be deadly ashamed to confess himself such an all-round dub."

Toward the end of the fall, and nearing Thanksgiving, the boys drove Bobby Junior out the old east road. After a time they turned off into a by-way deep with sand. It ended. They hitched the placid Bobby Junior to the top rail of a "snake-fence" climbed it, and headed toward a scrub-oak and popple thicket thrown like a blanket over the long slope of a hill. They walked cautiously, for by experience they had learned that at the very edge, and in the lea of an old burned log, it was possible a fine big cock-partridge might be sunning himself. The popples, shining silvery, were almost bare of leaves, but the scrub oaks clung tenaciously to a crackling umber-brown foliage. It was now near the close of the afternoon. The game bag was empty. Both boys trod on eggs, scrutinizing every inch of the ground before them.

"It's too late for 'em," whispered Bobby in discouragement. "There's not enough sun. They've gone in to feed."

But Johnnie seized his arm.

"There," he breathed, "See him! He's sitting in that little scrub oak--just to the left of the stub."

Bobby peered along his friend's arm. After a moment he made out a mottled spot of brown.

"I see him," said he, cocking his rifle. "It's his breast. I wish I could 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, and pressed the trigger.

Immediately the thicket broke into a tremendous commotion. A scurrying of leaves, a brief exclamation of pain, a brown cap whirling through the air--and both boys turned and ran, ran as hard as they could up the hill until sheer lack of breath brought them to the ground. They stared at each 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 unable to gather their faculties. This was just what so often both had been cautioned against--the shooting without seeing clearly the object of aim. To the shock of a catastrophe they had to add the sinking remorse over 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 time they 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 a mile away, they saw Mr. Kincaid. He was bareheaded. Curly was with him. The man was trying to send the water spaniel into the copse. Curly pretended that he wanted to play, and did not in the least understand what it was all about. He capered joyously around Mr. Kincaid's outstretched arm; he pressed his chest to the earth and uttered short barks; he chased madly around in circles, but he did not enter the copse, which was plainly his master's desire. Finally Mr. Kincaid gave it up and departed over the brow of the next hill.

And while this little by-play was going on two small boys above him felt the warmth of life flowing back into their frozen souls. The blood returned to their lips, their thumping hearts calmed, all the blessed joy and sunshine and freedom of the world flooded in a return tide of blessed 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'm glad!"

"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 of caution.

"It's a good lesson to us," said Bobby by way of reminiscent philosophy often heard before.

They put Bobby Junior into the barn, cleaned the Flobert, changed their hunting clothes, and answered with alacrity the summons to the dining room. After they were well started with the meal, Mr. Orde came in and sat down. He nodded abstractedly, and had little to say. The boys were too far down in remorse to care to bring up any of the subjects near their 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 could not cheer them up. As soon as the meal was over Mr. Orde dismissed the boys.

"Run along now," said he briefly; "I want to talk."

They climbed the stairs to Bobby's room, and sat down glumly on the floor. Reaction was strong, and they had both fallen into aimless doldrums of spirit. Suddenly Bobby sat up straight at attention.

The Orde house was provided with old-fashioned hot-air registers. When the registers happened all to be open, they constituted most excellent speaking-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. "But I'm bothered a lot. A dreadful thing happened to-day. You know that popple 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 of it."

"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 was 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 several competent witnesses coming out from that thicket, and as far as anybody has been able to find out he is the only human being who was out there to-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 knows it. That's the trouble. Pritchard, as usual, has off and on done an awful lot of talking."

"You don't for a moment believe----"

"Certainly not. Arthur Kincaid never would harm a fly in anger. And I rely absolutely on his word."

"You've seen him?"

"Of course. He acknowledges he was out at Pritchard's, but denies all knowledge of the affair. That's the trouble. He offers no explanation of the facts, and the facts are--queer."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, this; the men who saw Kincaid coming out of the thicket say he was bareheaded. When Pritchard's body was found, Kincaid's cap was discovered about fifty feet distant."

"What does he say to that?"

"His story is so ridiculous that I wouldn't blame anybody who did not know Kincaid for not believing it. He says he was playing with his dog Curly, when Curly grabbed the cap and made off with it. The dog came back 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 a quarter-mile of the scene of the murder."

"That might be so."

"Of course it's so, if Arthur Kincaid says it is," insisted Orde, "but what do you think of this? The cap had a 22-calibre bullet hole through the 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'd plead self-defence any jury in Michigan would acquit him without leaving the box. But when we asked him how that bullet hole got in that cap, he simply 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 best friend. If you ever say anything about this afternoon----"

"Let go!" cried Johnny struggling. "You hurt! You needn't get mad about it. He's my friend, too. I ain't going to say anything." Bobby released his arm. "He must have done it, though," concluded Johnny.

"Of course he did it. I'd have done it. Pritchard was an old beast. You ought 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. "It was 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 air of secrecy and an irresponsibility of action very irritating to everybody. They forgot errands, they did absent-minded, destructive things, they were much given to long consultations behind the woodshed. When they were permitted to visit Mr. Kincaid at the jail, they tried mysteriously to convey assurance of absolute secrecy, but succeeded only in appearing stupid, frivolous and unsympathetic. Nevertheless their concern was very real. Bobby in especial brooded over the affair to the exclusion of all other interests. The Flobert rifle was laid away, the printing press gathered dust. Over and over he visualized the scene, until he could shut his eyes and reproduce its every detail--the hillside with its scattered, half-burned old logs, the popple thicket shining white, the scrub oaks with red rustling leaves, the patch of brown that looked exactly like a partridge; and then the whirl of the cap in the air as the bullet struck, and the horrible sinking feeling before he turned to flee. A dozen small things he had not noticed consciously at the time, now stood out clear. He remembered that the supposed partridge had stood out against the sky; that the ground broke gently up just beyond the black log. "Mr. Kincaid must have been standing on a stump," he thought. He recalled now his own exact position, and figured the course of the bullet. "It must have gone in just at the tip top," he figured. "That's the only way it could have done without hurting his head. Otherwise, it would have scalped him." Over and over he turned the facts until gradually he evolved an exact picture of what had occurred--here was the victim, here the murderer. Inquiry disclosed the spot where Pritchard's body had been found. It was up-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 it was before."

"No," argued Bobby. "Because then when I shot the cap off, if Pritchard had been alive, we'd have heard from him."

"Maybe Mr. Kincaid killed him to keep him from chasing us," suggested Johnny.

Bobby considered this romantic suggestion but shook his head.

"No," said he, "there wasn't time for Mr. Kincaid to kill him and then walk down to the other end of the thicket. He must have run when I shot."

"Do you think they'll convict Mr. Kincaid?"

"Papa says he doesn't think so," said Bobby. "He says nobody can prove Mr. Kincaid was at the place."

"We could."

"We're going to shut up!" said Bobby sharply. _

Read next: Chapter 23. The Trial

Read previous: Chapter 21. Winter

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