The Calico Cat | Page 7

want to know about it."
"Me!" cried Jim, in complete bewilderment. "I--I haven't shot any man, father! You know I haven't."
Mr. Edwards, never a man of nice observation, and now bewildered with anger and headache, took his son's genuine astonishment for mere pretense and subterfuge. Were not the facts plain?
"I don't want any nonsense about this," he said incisively. "I heard your gun. I saw the man fall. No one else but you could possibly have fired it. It's useless to lie, and I won't stand it. Tell me at once what happened."
"I didn't shoot him, father. You know I didn't!" reiterated Jim, more and more dumfounded. "I don't know how it happened, honest Injun--I don't, father!"
Mr. Edwards's mouth shut tight. He swept the room with his eyes until they rested upon the gun in the rack over the mantelpiece.
He stepped forward, took it down, and examined it. Holding it in his hands, he gazed about the floor. A rag which the ashes in the fireplace had not wholly covered caught his attention.
"You cleaned the gun and put it away," he said grimly. "Then you tried to hide the rag with which you cleaned it," and he touched the bit of cloth sticking from the ashes contemptuously with his foot. "What do you expect me to think from that?"
Jim was silent. The boy was unlike his father in many ways, but they were alike in this: they both were proud. Each would meet an unjust accusation in silence. And Jim was beginning to show another of his father's characteristics. A still anger was beginning to burn in him against this man who accused him of a deed which he himself had done, and he felt rising within him a stubborn will to endure, not to surrender. If his father was going to act like that, why, let him--
"Where is your shot-pouch?" asked Mr. Edwards.
Jim motioned toward the drawer.
"Is your powder-flask there, too?"
"Yes."
Mr. Edwards was silent After all, he was a just man. He was trying, as well as his headache would let him, to see things straight.
"It's plain what happened," he said at last. "You had an accident and got frightened. You cleaned your gun, you hid the rags, you put away your ammunition, you got your books and pretended to study. You're afraid to tell the truth now."
Jim's face flushed hotly, but he kept silent. Such assurance, such cruelty, he had never imagined. If this was what smugglers were like--if this was a sample of their tricks--
"I'll give you one more chance to tell the truth," said Mr. Edwards. "Did you do it?"
"No, I didn't!" said Jim, and his jaw snapped close like his father's.
"Very well," said Mr. Edwards. "I'll leave you until you change your mind. You will stay here. Sarah will bring you bread and milk at supper-time. If you're willing to talk to me then, you may tell her that you'd like to see me."
He turned to go, then paused.
"It's a serious matter; and all the facts are against you. It would go hard with you in court. It will go harder if you stick to your stubborn and foolish lie. One thing more: if you don't choose to tell the truth, you will have to reckon with the law as well as with me."
Mr. Edwards, upon this, shut the door and departed. His was a stern figure, but the hurt within was very sore. This, then, he reflected bitterly, was the kind of boy he had. He suffered deeply at the discovery, which for him was unquestionable.
Jim felt outraged. He had done his loyal best to save his father from the consequences of his rash act, and now, with incredible ingenuity and cool injustice, his father was using his son's acts of helpfulness to make it appear that he had done the deed. Without a scruple, his father had made him a scapegoat.
Jim told himself that he would gladly have taken the blame had his father, as chief of the band, demanded the sacrifice of this, his devoted follower. Nay, more, he would have endured the ordeal without a murmur had his father, deeming it unsafe to enter into formal explanations, only hinted to him that this was a farce which they two must play together. If his father had only winked at him! Surely he might have done that with safety! But not to be admitted to the secret,--not to be allowed to play the heroic part,--to be used as an ignoble tool by a father who neither loved him nor knew his courage,--that was too much! He would not betray his father--no, a thousand times, no! But the day would come--
The afternoon dragged on. Jim sat there in his room, looking out into the pleasant sunshine, conscious that the boys were playing "three old