"I don't know about that," mused the squire, who was apparently trying to reconcile the facts to his theory, rather than the theory to the facts.

John, the hired man, lived about three miles from the squire's house.

His father was very sick; and he had been home every evening for a week, returning between ten and eleven. On the night preceding the fire, he had seen a boy prowling round the barn, who ran away at his approach. The next day, he found a pile of withered gra.s.s, dry sticks, and other combustibles heaped against a loose board in the side of the barn. He had informed the squire of the facts, but the worthy justice did not consider them of much moment.

Probably Ben had intended to burn the barn then, but had been prevented from executing his purpose by the approach of the hired man.

"This must be the boy," added the squire.

"He had on a sack coat, and was bigger than this boy," replied John.

"Harry has no sack coat," put in Mr. Nason, eagerly catching at his evidence.

"It is easy to be mistaken in the night. Search him, and see if there are any matches about him."

Undoubtedly this was a very brilliant suggestion of the squire's muddy intellect--as though every man who carried matches was necessarily an incendiary. But no matches were found upon Harry; and, according to the intelligent justice's perception of the nature of evidence, the suspected party should have been acquitted.

No matches were found on Harry; but in his jacket pocket, carefully enclosed in a piece of brown paper, were found the four quarters of a dollar given to him by Mr. Nason.

"Where did you get those?" asked the squire, sternly.

"They were given to me," replied Harry.

Mr. Nason averted his eyes, and was very uneasy. The fact of having given this money to Harry went to show that he had been privy to his escape; and his kind act seemed to threaten him with ruin.

"Who gave them to you?"

Harry made no reply.

"Answer me," thundered the squire.

"I shall not tell," replied Harry.

"You shall not?"

"No, sir."

The squire was nonplussed. The boy was as firm as a hero; and no threats could induce him to betray his kind friend, whose position he fully comprehended.

"We will see," roared the squire.

Several persons who had been present during the examination, and who were satisfied that Harry was innocent of the crime charged upon him, interfered to save him from the consequences of the squire's wrath.

Mr. Nason, finding that his young friend was likely to suffer for his magnanimity, explained the matter--thus turning the squire's anger from the boy to himself.

"So you helped the boy run away--did you?" said the overseer.

"He did not; he told me that money would keep me from starving."

"Did he?"

Those present understood the allusion, and the squire did not press the matter any further. In the course of the examination, Ben Smart had often been alluded to, and the crime was fastened upon him. Harry told his story, which, confirmed by the evidence of the hired man, was fully credited by all except the squire, who had conceived a violent antipathy to the boy.

The examination was informal; the squire did not hold it as a justice of the peace, but only as a citizen, or, at most, as an overseer of the poor. However, it proved that, as the burning of the barn had been planned before any difficulty had occurred between the squire and Harry, he had no motive for doing the deed.

The squire was not satisfied; but the worst he could do was to commit Harry to the care of Jacob Wire, which was immediately done.

"I am sorry for you, Harry," whispered Mr. Nason.

"Never mind; I shall _try again_," he replied, as he jumped into the wagon with his persecutor.

CHAPTER VII

IN WHICH HARRY FINDS HIMSELF IN A TIGHT PLACE AND EXECUTES A COUNTER MOVEMENT

"Jacob, here is the boy," said Squire Walker, as he stopped his horse in front of an old, decayed house.

Jacob Wire was at work in his garden, by the side of the house; and when the squire spoke, he straightened his back, regarding Harry with a look of mingled curiosity and distrust. He evidently did not like his appearance. He looked as though he would eat too much; and to a man as mean as Jacob, this was the sum total of all enormities.

Besides, the little pauper had earned a bad reputation within the preceding twenty-four hours, and his new master glanced uneasily at his barn, and then at the boy, as though he deemed it unsafe to have such a desperate character about his premises.

"He is a hard boy, Jacob, and will need a little taming. They fed him too high at the poorhouse," continued the squire.

"That spoils boys," replied Jacob, solemnly.

"So it does."

"So, this is the boy that burnt your barn?"

"Well, I don't know. I rather think it was the Smart boy. Perhaps he knew about it, though;" and the squire proceeded to give his brother-in-law the particulars of the informal examination; for Jacob Wire, who could hardly afford to lie still on Sundays, much less other days, had not been up to the village to hear the news.

"You must be pretty sharp with him," said the overseer, in conclusion.

"Keep your eye on him all the time, for we may want him again, as soon as they can catch the other boy."

Jacob promised to do the best he could with Harry, who, during the interview, had maintained a sullen silence; and the squire departed, a.s.sured that he had done his whole duty to the public and to the little pauper.

"Well, boy, it is about sundown now, and I guess we will go in and get some supper before we do any more. But let me tell you beforehand, you must walk pretty straight here, or you will fare hard."

Harry vouchsafed no reply to this speech, and followed Jacob into the house. His first meal at his new place confirmed all he had heard about the penuriousness of his master. There was very little to eat on the table, but Mrs. Wire gave him the poorest there was--a hard crust of brown bread, a cold potato, and a dish of warm water with a very little mola.s.ses and milk in it, which he was expected to imagine was tea.

Harry felt no disposition to eat. He was too sad and depressed, and probably if the very best had been set before him he would have been equally indifferent.

He ate very little, and Jacob felt more kindly towards him than before this proof of the smallness of his appet.i.te. He had been compelled to get rid of his last boy, because he was a little ogre, and it seemed as though he would eat him out of house and home.

After supper Harry a.s.sisted Jacob about the barn, and it was nearly eight o'clock before they finished.