“Who be there?” said the voice of the farmer.
“Is that you, Mr. Trumbull? It is I—Mr. Gilmore. I want to get round to the front of the parson’s house.”
“Zurely, zurely,” said the farmer, coming forward and opening the gate. “Be there anything wrong about, Squire?”
“I don’t know. I think there is. Speak softly. I fancy there are men lying in the churchyard.”
“I be a-thinking so, too, Squire. Bone’m was a growling just now like the old ’un.” Bone’m was the name of the bulldog as to which Gilmore had been solicitous as he looked over the gate. “What is’t t’ey’re up to? Not bugglary?”
“Our friend’s apricots, perhaps. But I’ll just move round to the front. Do you and Bone’m keep a lookout here.”
“Never fear, Squire; never fear. Me and Bone’m together is a’most too much for ’em, bugglars and all.” Then he led Mr. Gilmore through the farmyard, and out on to the road, Bone’m growling a low growl as he passed away.
The Squire hurried along the high road, past the church, and in at the Vicarage front gate. Knowing the place well, he could have made his way round into the garden; but he thought it better to go to the front door. There was no light to be seen from the windows; but almost all the rooms of the house looked out into the garden at the back. He knocked sharply, and in a minute or two the door was opened by the parson in person.
“Frank,” said the Squire.
“Halloo! is that you? What’s up now?”
“Men who ought to be in bed. I came across two men hanging about your gate in the churchyard, and I’m not sure there wasn’t a third.”
“They’re up to nothing. They often sit and smoke there.”
“These fellows were up to something. The man I saw plainest was a stranger, and just the sort of man who won’t do your parishioners any good to be among them. The other was Sam Brattle.”
“Whew‑w‑w,” said the parson.
“He has gone utterly to the dogs,” said the Squire.
“He’s on the road, Harry; but nobody has gone while he’s still going. I had some words with him in his father’s presence last week, and he followed me afterwards, and told me he’d see it out with me. I wouldn’t tell you, because I didn’t want to set you more against them.”
“I wish they were out of the place—the whole lot of them.”
“I don’t know that they’d do better elsewhere than here. I suppose Mr. Sam is going to keep his word with me.”
“Only for the look of that other fellow, I shouldn’t think they meant anything serious,” said Gilmore.
“I don’t suppose they do, but I’ll be on the lookout.”
“Shall I stay with you, Frank?”
“Oh, no; I’ve a life-preserver, and I’ll take a round of the gardens. You come with me, and you can pass home that way. The chances are they’ll mizzle away to bed, as they’ve seen you, and heard Bone’m—and probably heard too every word you said to Trumbull.”
He then got his hat and the short, thick stick of which he had spoken, and turning the key of the door, put it in his pocket. Then the two friends went round by the kitchen garden, and so through to the orchard, and down to the churchyard gate. Hitherto they had seen nothing, and heard nothing, and Fenwick was sure that the men had made their way through the churchyard to the village.
“But they may come back,” said Gilmore.
“I’ll be about if they do,” said the parson.
“What is one against three? You had better let me stay.”
Fenwick laughed at this, saying that it would be quite as rational to propose that they should keep watch every night.
“But, hark!” said the Squire, with a mind evidently perturbed.
“Don’t you be alarmed about us,” said the parson.
“If anything should happen to Mary Lowther!”
“That, no doubt, is matter of anxiety, to which may, perhaps, be added some trifle of additional feeling on the score of Janet and the children. But I’ll do my best. If the women knew that you and I were patrolling the place, they’d be frightened out of their wits.”
Then Gilmore, who never liked that there should be a laugh against himself, took his leave and walked home across the fields. Fenwick passed up through the garden, and, when he was near the terrace which ran along the garden front of the house, he thought that he heard a voice. He stood under the shade of a wall dark with ivy, and distinctly heard whispering on the other side of it. As far as he could tell there were the voices of more than two men. He wished now that he had kept Gilmore with him—not that he was personally afraid of the trespassers, for his courage was of that steady settled kind which enables the possessor to remember that men who are doing deeds of darkness are ever afraid of those whom they are injuring; but had there been an ally with him his prospect of catching one or more of the ruffians would have been greatly increased. Standing where he was he would probably be able to interrupt them, should they attempt to enter the house; but in the meantime they might be stripping his fruit from the wall. They were certainly, at present, in the kitchen garden, and he was not minded to leave them there at such work as they might have in hand. Having paused to think of this, he crept along under the
