The Wall Between Part 12

Slowly the girl's latent faculties aroused themselves.

"You hurry up and dress while I go and watch," panted Ellen. "Be quick's you can, or we may miss somethin'."

She went out, closing the door; but in a few moments her niece heard her shrill call:

"They're comin' out with it! What'd I tell you? Two of 'em have got it, carryin' it across the lawn. Ain't you 'most dressed?"

"Yes, I'm coming."

Fastening her belt as she went, Lucy hurried to her aunt's side.

Amid the sparkling, dew-kissed glory of early morning, she could plainly see the three Howes making their way through the wet gra.s.s in the direction of their pasture.

"Bless me! if they don't mean to sink it in the brook!" whispered Ellen.

"Oh, I never can stand this. I've got to foller 'em an' find out what they're doin'."

"You wouldn't!" exclaimed Lucy in dismay.

"Indeed I would," her aunt retorted. "I'd go to any length to see what's in that bag. If they were younger----" she broke off abruptly. "Anyhow, it's somethin' they're ashamed of, I'm certain of that. They couldn't 'a'

murdered anybody, I s'pose. Bad's I hate 'em, I'd hardly think they're that wicked. Still what can it be?"

"I can't imagine."

"Well, I'm goin' to track 'em down, anyhow," Ellen announced. "Ain't you comin'?"

"No."

To spy on the actions of others did not appeal to the younger woman's honest mind.

"You can get breakfast while I'm gone then," Ellen said, catching up her coat, "and if I don't come back pretty soon, you go ahead and eat yours.

I'd a thousand times rather ferret out what those Howes are tryin' to bury than eat. I'd be willin' to starve to do it."

CHAPTER VII

THE UNRAVELING OF THE MYSTERY

LEFT to herself Lucy stood for an instant watching her aunt's resolute figure make its way under the fringe of lilacs that bordered the driveway.

Then she turned her attention to preparing breakfast, and the Howes and their mysterious doings were forgotten.

In the meantime Ellen walked on, skirting the shelter of the hedge until she came into the lee of a clump of elder bushes growing along the margin of the brook at the juncture of the Howe and Webster land. Here she secreted herself and waited.

The brook was quite deep at this point and now, swollen by the snows that had recently melted on the hillsides, purled its path down to the valley in a series of cascades that rippled, foamed, and tinkled merrily.

As she stood concealed beside it, its laughter so outrivaled every other sound that she had difficulty in discerning the Howes' approaching tread, and it was not until the distinct crackle of underbrush reached her ear that she became aware they were approaching. She peered through the bushes.

Yes, there they were, all three of them; and there, firm in their grasp, was the mysterious bag.

It was not large, but apparently it was heavy, and they handled it with extreme care.

"Let's put it down," puffed Mary, who was flushed and heated, "an' look for a good deep place. Ain't you tired, 'Liza?"

"I ain't so tired as hot," Eliza answered. "Warn't it just providential Martin took it into his head to go to the village this mornin'? I can't but think of it."

"It was the luckiest thing I ever knew," a.s.sented Mary. "I don't know what we'd 'a' done with this thing round the house another day. I'd 'a' gone clean out of my mind."

"I still can't understand why we couldn't 'a' left it buried," Eliza fretted.

"I explained why to you last night," Jane answered, speaking for the first time. "There warn't a spot on the place that Martin might not go to diggin' or plowin' up sometime. He might even 'a' dug round the roots of the linden for somethin'. Ain't he always fertilizin' an' irrigatin'? I didn't dare leave the bag there. If he'd 'a' gone stickin' a pick or a shovel into it sudden----"

"I see," interrupted Eliza. "'Twas stupid of me not to understand before.

'Course that wouldn't do. Yes, I guess you were right. There ain't much to do but sink it in the brook. Would you 'a' dreamed there could be anything in the world so hard to get rid of? All I've got to say is I hope neither Martin nor old Miss Webster finds it. What do you s'pose they'd say?"

"I wouldn't want Martin to come on to it unexpected. 'Twould worry me to death." Eliza shuddered.

"But you don't care about old Miss Webster," Jane observed with a laugh.

"I never wished Miss Webster ill, goodness knows that," returned Eliza gravely. "None of us ever did 'cept Martin, an' he's got no business to. I s'pose he'd like nothin' better than to have her run across this thing.

You don't s'pose there's any danger that she will, do you, Jane?"

"Danger of her findin' it?"

"No. I mean danger of her gettin' hurt with it," explained Eliza timidly.

"Mercy, no. How could it harm her if it was wet?"

"I dunno," whimpered Eliza. "I'm so scat of such things."

"Well, it's certainly made us trouble enough!" put in Mary, with a sigh.

"I've felt like a criminal ever since the thing came to light. It's seemed as if we'd never get rid of it."

Jane smiled. "I know it," she said. "Who'd 'a' believed 'twould be so hard. When I think what we've been through tryin' to make way with it, I wonder folks ever are wicked. It's so much trouble. 'Tain't half as easy as it looks. You've got to have your wits about you every second. This affair's taught me that. Ain't I been all over the face of the earth tryin' to find a safe place to hide this pesky bag! First I tried the mountain. Then I was afraid the woodcutters might find it, so I had to cart it home again. Then it come to me to drive down to the river and dump it in. Anybody'd have said that was simple enough. But halfway there, I met Elias Barnes walkin' to the village, an' he asked for a ride. I s'pose he couldn't see why I couldn't take him in; I had an empty seat an' had often done it before, so I had to. But when he started lightin' up his pipe----"

"What did you do, Jane?" cried Mary.

"I guess I nearly screamed," answered Jane, laughing. "He looked some surprised; anyhow, I told him I just remembered somethin' I'd left behind, an' I drew up an' put him down quicker'n chain lightnin'. Then I turned round and drove off lickety-split for home, leaving him stock still in the middle of the road starin' after me."

"You showed good nerve, Jane, I'll say that," Mary declared with open admiration.

"Now if it had been me, I'd 'a' just given the whole thing away. I ain't no good at thinkin' quick."

"Well, we ain't got to think about it any more, thank goodness," Jane exclaimed, rising from the gra.s.s and laying a hand on the bag. "Let's put an end to the whole thing now and go home. Take a holt of the other end, and we'll flop it in."

"Wait!" Eliza protested, seized by a sudden idea.

"Well."