The Voyage of the Hoppergrass Part 13

The men who were holding Ed Mason had been seized with the idea of searching him. So they made Ed turn out his pockets in the hope of finding some stolen goods. They examined the jack-knife, cork- stopper with three fish-hooks in it, and lead sinker which they found, and argued whether this was plunder from the house or not.

Then they started to search the rest of us, and we all had to empty our pockets. Not until they came to the pound-cake, in Jimmy Toppan's pocket, did they find anything of consequence, and as he admitted that he had taken that from the house, they felt that they had made a real discovery. They handed it over to the pitchfork man.

"Here, Eb," said Gregory the Gauger, "yer want to keep this--it's everdence."

At this moment one of the policemen put his head out the window, and Eb promptly dropped the cake, and grabbed the policeman by the shoulder, remarking: "I thought there was another one on ye!"

Then he tried to drag the policeman out of the window by force.

The policeman planted his feet firmly, and, as he weighed about three hundred pounds, he successfully resisted all efforts to drag him.

"What in thunder you tryin' to do?" he asked in a high, squeaky voice.

"TRYIN' TO DO? I'll show ye,--resistin' a officer! Here, Justin, give us a hand here, won't ye?"

In the meantime the policeman was blowing a whistle to summon his mate. Eb stooped down again, and he and the policeman looked in each other's faces,--their noses only half an inch apart. Eb had seen the bra.s.s b.u.t.tons.

"Be you a officer?"

"You'll find out whether I am or not!" said the furious policeman, standing up and blowing his whistle again.

"Then watcher doin' here?"

"I'm here mindin' my own business,--I was sent here to look after this house--orders of the Chief. Who in thunder are you?"

"This here's the Kunsterble," said Gregory the Gauger, nodding his head toward Eb, "an' we've ketched the burglars. Here they be!"

The policeman blinked at us, and once more blew his whistle. At last the other policeman came, looking about half awake. He was the one who had been snoring so loud.

"What's all this ruction about?" he asked in a very cross tone.

The big policeman said something to him in a low voice, and they both stepped out on the veranda. The first thing that the sleepy policeman started to do was to cuff all of us boys. But Mr.

Daddles spoke up sharply, threatening to get him into trouble for it, and even Eb protected us.

"No call to do that, Mister," he said, "we'll see to gettin' these young fellers put where they belong for tonight. Tomorrer we'll hold Court, an' find out what's what."

Everyone began to talk at once. It came out that the policemen had been sent there from the town on the mainland, at the request of Mr. Littlefield, who owned the house. He had gone away the day before, and as there had been two burglaries in Bailey's Harbor, or its vicinity, he did not like to leave his place unprotected.

Eb and Gregory the Gauger wished to enter the house, "an' go over it to see if it's all right." The policemen refused to allow them to enter,--probably because they did not wish it to be seen how they had been keeping watch.

This made Eb very angry. He seemed to feel that the dignity of his office, "Kunsterble of this here island," was not getting its proper respect. But I think that the uniforms and bra.s.s b.u.t.tons of the policemen rather frightened him. The only sign of his high station was a badge, pinned to his suspenders. The two policemen ended the discussion by going inside the house once more,--"to make up their lost sleep" suggested Mr. Daddles. They retired within and shut the window.

Then Eb and the rest of them started to march us back to the village. The news of our capture had spread and there must have been twenty or thirty men and boys waiting for us at the front gate. Some of them had lanterns, and two or three had shot-guns or rifles.

"We left Bailey's Harbor very modestly," Mr. Daddles remarked, "but our return is certainly impressive."

"You better keep your mouth shut, young feller," said one of the men, "committin' burglary aint no joke."

"That's right, that's right," said Gregory the Gauger, who was flitting about from one to the other of us, "an' whatever may be said against yer, may be used in yer favor, too,--better remember that."

The constable was still more indignant because the crowd nocked around us.

"Clear outer here! Clear outer here!" he shouted two or three times. But they only laughed at him. Then we set out over the dusty road. First came Eb, with two other men leading Mr. Daddles, then Jimmy and Ed Mason, each securely held, while I was at the end of the procession, gripped by the arm and collar by a tall man, who never uttered a word. At our heels and doing their best to step on MY heels whenever they could, came a mob of boys and men.

When we got back to the Harbor, it had quite changed its appearance. From being a dark and deserted place it was now rather lively. There were lights in most of the houses and people waiting in the street.

On our way out of the village, an hour or two before, we had noticed a tent at the edge of the inlet, just above Gregory's hut.

The people in the tent had turned out now,--they were three young men, who seemed to have been camping there. They had hung a lighted j.a.panese lantern over the door of the tent, and one of the campers was playing on a banjo.

The constable halted the whole procession, and ordered one of his a.s.sistants to put the banjo-player under arrest.

"I won't have it!" he shouted, "he's disturbin' the peace!"

Everyone laughed at this,--there was so much noise in the street that the banjo could hardly be heard. But a man went across the road, took the player by the arm, and told him that he must come along. The banjo-player seemed to be perfectly dumb-founded; his friends gathered round, argued, threatened, and finally laughed, and tried to treat the whole thing as a joke. Eb was stubborn, and the man joined our parade, with his banjo under his arm.

The police-station and jail were both in a new building half way up the hill. Into this we were hurried, and the doors were shut.

"Keep 'em all out!" shouted the constable, "keep 'em all out, except members of the possy!"

The "possy" seemed to consist of Eb himself, the men who were guarding us,--five or six of them--and Gregory the Gauger. I never found out just what office he held, but he was clearly the most important man of the lot,--except Eb. The constable leaned his pitchfork against the wall, lighted one or two lamps, sat down behind a desk and put on a pair of spectacles. Then he jerked his head, as if to beckon, toward the banjo-player.

"Name?" said he, picking up a pen.

"My name is Warren Sprague," said the man.

"Occupation?"

"I suppose you would call me a student."

"Don't yer know that yer was disturbin' the peace--"

"Contrary to statoot," put in Gregory the Gauger.

"Shut up, Mose!" said the constable.

"I thought that the peace was pretty well disturbed already," said the banjo-player,-"there was so much noise in the street that it woke us all up. I couldn't sleep,--none of us could sleep, and I didn't see any harm in playing a tune. Whose peace could I disturb?"

"Looky here, young feller, it won't do yer any good to get flip!"

"I'm not going to get flip."

"Don't yer know that it's agin the law to play on a moosical instrument after eleven P. M.?"

"No, sir, I didn't know it. Are you going to have me executed for it? Because if you are, I hope that you'll let me consult a spiritual adviser, first."

"You're too fresh, young feller. I might have let yer off--"

"With a reppermand," put in Gregory.

"Mose, you shut your head!" said the constable.

Then he turned again to the prisoner.