Colonel Thorndyke's Secret Part 6

"You did not search the house further?" the chairman inquired.

"No, sir; I wanted to get the prisoners down here as fast as I could, seeing that two of them were seriously hurt."

The chairman nodded.

"You will, of course, make a careful search of the whole house, constable."

"Yes, sir; I left one of my men up there with instructions to allow no one to go upstairs until I returned."

"Quite right."

John Thornd.y.k.e was the next witness, and his evidence cleared up what had hitherto been a mystery to the general body of the public, as to how he and the constable happened to be in the house on watch when the highwaymen arrived. The most important part of his evidence was the repet.i.tion of the words young Bastow had used as he mounted the ladder, as they showed that it was arranged between the prisoners that the stolen goods should be hidden in the house. The Squire was only asked one or two questions.

"I suppose, Mr. Thornd.y.k.e, that you had no idea whatever that the younger prisoner would be accompanied by anyone else when he returned home?"

"Not the slightest," the Squire replied. "I was there simply to prevent this unfortunate lad from entering the house, when perhaps he might have used violence towards his father. My intention was to seize him if he did so, and to give him the choice of enlisting, as I had urged him to do, or of being brought before this bench for breaking into his father's house. I felt that anything was better than his continuing in the evil courses on which he seemed bent."

"Thank you, Mr. Thornd.y.k.e. I must compliment you in the name of my brother magistrates, and I may say of the public, for the manner in which you, at considerable risk to yourself, have effected the capture of the two elder prisoners."

After consulting with the others the head constable was recalled.

"Do you know anything about the character of the youngest prisoner?"

"Yes, sir. We have had our eye upon him for some time. He was brought before your honors a week ago charged with being drunk and disorderly in this town, and was fined 5 pounds. He is constantly drinking with some of the worst characters in the place, and is strongly suspected of having been concerned in the fray between the poachers and Sir Charles Harris' gamekeepers. Two of the latter said that they recognized him amongst the poachers, but as they both declined to swear to him we did not arrest him."

John Knapp was then recalled, and testified to Bastow's drinking habits, and that the landlord of the alehouse at Crowswood had been ordered by the Squire not to draw any liquor for him in future on pain of having the renewal of his license refused.

"Have you any more witnesses to call?" the chairman asked the head constable.

"Not at present, your honor. We have sent up to town, and on the next occasion the coachman will be called to testify to the shooting of the guard, and we hope to have some of the pa.s.sengers there to identify the articles stolen from them."

"It will be necessary that the Rev. Mr. Bastow should be here. He need not be called to give evidence unless we think it to be of importance, but he had better be in attendance. The prisoners are remanded until this day week."

An hour later the three prisoners, handcuffed, were driven under an escort of three armed constables to Croydon Jail. When again brought up in court the pa.s.sengers on the coach identified the articles taken from them; the coachman gave evidence of the stopping of the coach, and of the shooting of the guard. The head constable testified that he had searched the Rectory from top to bottom, and found nothing whatever of a suspicious nature. None of the pa.s.sengers were able to testify to the two elder prisoners as the men who had robbed them, as these had been masked, but the height and dress corresponded to those of the prisoners; and the two Bow Street runners then came forward, and gave evidence that the two elder prisoners were well known to them. They had long been suspected of being highwaymen, and had several times been arrested when riding towards London on occasions when a coach had been stopped the night before, but no stolen goods had ever been found upon them, and in no case had the pa.s.sengers been able to swear to their ident.i.ty. One was known among his a.s.sociates as "Galloping Bill," the other as the "Downy One." At the conclusion of the evidence the three prisoners were formally committed for trial, the magistrates having retired in consultation for some time upon the question of whether the charge of receiving stolen goods ought to be made against Arthur Bastow.

"I think, gentlemen," the chairman said, after a good deal had been urged on both sides of the question, "in this case we can afford to take a merciful view. In the first place, no stolen goods were discovered upon him or in the house. There is strong presumptive evidence of his intention, but intention is not a crime, and even were the evidence stronger than it is, I should be inclined to take a merciful view. There can be no doubt that the young fellow is thoroughly bad, and the bravado he has exhibited throughout the hearing is at once unbecoming and disgraceful; but we must remember that he is not yet eighteen, and that, in the second place, he is the son of a much respected clergyman, who is our neighbor. The matter is serious enough for him as it stands, and he is certain to have a very heavy sentence.

"Mr. Thornd.y.k.e, who takes no part in our deliberations, is most anxious that the prisoner's father should be spared the agony of his son being placed on trial on a capital charge, though I do not think that there would be the smallest chance of his being executed, for the judges would be certain to take his youth into consideration. Had there been prima facie evidence of concealment, we must have done our duty and sent him to trial on that charge; but as there is no such evidence, I think that it will be in all respects better to send him on a charge on which the evidence is as clear as noonday. Moreover, I think that Mr. Thornd.y.k.e's wishes should have some weight with us, seeing that it is entirely due to him that the important capture of these highwaymen, who have long been a scourge to this neighborhood, has been effected."

Mr. Bastow had not been called as a witness. John Thornd.y.k.e had brought him down to Reigate in a closed carriage, and he had waited in the justices' room while the examination went on; but the magistrates agreed that the evidence given was amply sufficient for them to commit upon without given him the pain of appearing. John Thornd.y.k.e had taken him to another room while the magistrates were consulting together, and when he heard the result drove him back again.

"I have fully made up my mind to resign my living, Thornd.y.k.e. I could not stand up and preach to the villagers of their duties when I myself have failed so signally in training my own son; nor visit their houses and presume to lecture them on their shortcomings when my son is a convicted criminal."

"I quite see that, old friend," the Squire said. "And I had no doubt but that you would decide on this course. I will try not to persuade you to change your decision, for I feel that your power of usefulness is at an end as far as the village is concerned. May I ask what you propose to do? I can hardly suppose that your savings have been large."

"Two years ago I had some hundreds laid by, but they have dwindled away to nothing; you can understand how. For a time it was given freely, then reluctantly; then I declared I would give no more, but he took it all the same--he knew well enough that I could never prosecute him for forgery."

"As bad as that, eh?" Thornd.y.k.e said sternly. "Well, we won't talk further of him now; what I propose is that you should take up your abode at the Hall. I am not satisfied with the school where Mark has been for the last two years, and I have been hesitating whether to get a private tutor for him or to send him to one of the public schools. I know that that would be best, but I could not bring myself to do so. I have some troubles of my own that but two or three people know of, and now, that everything is going on smoothly on the estate and in the village, I often feel dull, and the boy's companions.h.i.+p does me much good; and as he knows many lads of his own age in the neighborhood now, I think that he would do just as well at home.

"He will be taking to shooting and hunting before long, and if he is to have a tutor, there is no one I should like to have better than yourself. You know all the people, and we could talk comfortably together of an evening when the house is quiet. Altogether, it will be an excellent arrangement for me. You would have your own room, and if I have company you need not join us unless you like. The house would not seem like itself without you, for you have been a.s.sociated with it as long as I can remember. As to your going out into the world at the age of sixty, it would be little short of madness. There--you need not give me an answer now," he went on, seeing that the Rector was too broken down to speak; "but I am sure that when you think it over you will come to the same conclusion as I do, that it will be the best plan possible for us both."

CHAPTER IV.

The trial of the two highwaymen and Arthur Bastow came off in due course. The evidence given was similar to that offered at Reigate, the only addition being that Mr. Bastow was himself put into the box. The counsel for the prosecution said: "I am sorry to have to call you, Mr.

Bastow. We all feel most deeply for you, and I will ask you only two or three questions. Was your son frequently out at night?"

"He was."

"Did you often hear him return?"

"Yes; I seldom went to sleep until he came back."

"Had you any reason to suppose that others returned with him?"

"I never saw any others."

"But you might have heard them without seeing them. Please tell us if you ever heard voices."

"Yes, I have heard men's voices," the clergyman said reluctantly, in a low voice.

"One more question, and I have done. Have you on some occasions heard the sound of horses' hoofs in your yard at about the time that your son came in?"

Mr. Bastow said in a low voice: "I have."

"Had you any suspicion whatever of the character of your son's visitors?"

"None whatever. I supposed that those with him were companions with whom he had been spending the evening."

Mr. Bastow had to be a.s.sisted from the witness box, so overcome was he with the ordeal. He had not glanced at his son while giving his evidence. The latter and his two fellow prisoners maintained throughout the trial their expression of indifference. The two highwaymen nodded to acquaintances they saw in the body of the court, smiled at various points in the evidence, and so conducted themselves that there were murmured exclamations of approval of their gameness on the part of the lower cla.s.s of the public. The jury, without a moment's hesitation, found them all guilty of the offenses with which they were charged.

Bastow was first sentenced.

"Young man," the judge said, "young as you are, there can be no doubt whatever in the minds of anyone who has heard the evidence that you have been an a.s.sociate with these men who have been found guilty of highway robbery accompanied by murder. I consider that a merciful view was taken of your case by the magistrates who committed you for trial, for the evidence of your heartbroken father, on whose gray hairs your conduct has brought trouble and disgrace, leaves no doubt that you have for some time been in league with highwaymen, although not actually partic.i.p.ating in their crime. The words overheard by Mr. Thornd.y.k.e show that you were prepared to hide their booty for them, and it is well for you that you were captured before this was done, and that no proceeds of other robberies were found in the house. The evidence of the Bow Street officers show that it had for some time been suspected that these men had an accomplice somewhere in the neighborhood of Reigate, for although arrested several times under circ.u.mstances forming a strong a.s.sumption of their guilt, nothing was ever found upon them. There can now be little, doubt who their accomplice was. Had you been an older man I should have sentenced you to transportation for life, but in consideration of your youth, I shall take the milder course of sentencing you to fifteen years' transportation."

The capital sentence was then pa.s.sed in much fewer words upon the two highwaymen. As they were leaving the dock Bastow turned, and in a clear voice said to John Thornd.y.k.e, who had been accommodated with a seat in the well of the court:

"I have to thank you, Thornd.y.k.e, for this. I will pay off my debt some day, you make take your oath."

"A sad case, Mr. Thornd.y.k.e--a sad case," the judge, who had greatly complimented the Squire on his conduct, said to him as he was disrobing afterwards. "I don't know that in all my experience I ever saw such a hardened young villain. With highwaymen it is a point of honor to a.s.sume a gayety of demeanor on such occasions; but to see a boy of eighteen, never before convicted, exhibiting such coolness and effrontery is quite beyond my experience. I suppose his record is altogether bad?"

"Altogether," the Squire said. "His father has, during the last two years, been quite broken by it; he owned to me that he was in bodily fear of the lad, who had on several occasions a.s.saulted him, had robbed him of his savings by means of forgery, and was so hopelessly bad that he himself thought with me that the only possible hope for him was to get him to enlist. I myself recommended the East India Company's service, thinking that he would have less opportunity for crime out there, and that there would be a strong chance that either fever or a bullet would carry him off, for I own that I have not the slightest hope of reformation in such a character."

"I would have given him transportation for life if I had known all this," the judge said. "However, it is not likely that he will ever come back again--very few of them do; the hulks are not the most healthy places in the world, and they have a pretty rough way with men who give them trouble, as this young fellow is likely to do."

Mr. Bastow, as soon as he had given his evidence, had taken a hackney coach to the inn where he and the Squire had put up on their arrival in town the evening before, and here, on his return, John Thornd.y.k.e found him. He was lying on his bed in a state of prostration.