"You have been punished often, Mark Ferrar, for going off on these expeditions?" cried one of the jury.
"I used to be, sir. Father has leathered me for it at home, and Clerk Jones at school. I can"t do without going out a bit. I wish I was a sailor."
"Oh, indeed! Well--is there one of your companions that you can suspect of having harmed this poor little boy--accidentally or otherwise?"
"No, sir. It is being said that he was pushed over in ill-feeling, or else by accident; but it don"t seem likely."
"Did you push him over yourself?"
"Me!" returned Ferrar, in surprise. "Me push him over!"
"As far as we can learn yet, no one was with him there but you."
"I"d have saved him from it, sir, if I had been there, instead of harming him. When he sent me away he was all right, and not sitting anigh the edge. If it was me that had done it, sir, he"d not have asked for me to go up to him in his room--and shook hands--and said I should see him in heaven."
Mark Ferrar broke down at the remembrance, and sobbed like a child. I don"t think one single person present thought it was he, especially the coroner and jury. But the question was--which of the other boys could it have been?
Several of them were called before the coroner. One and all declared they had done no harm to the deceased--had not been near him to do it--would not have done it if they had been--did not know he had been sitting in the place talked of--did not (most of them) know where the spot was now. In short, they denied it utterly.
Mr. Jones stepped forward then. He told the coroner and jury that he had done his best to come to the bottom of the affair, but could not find out anything. He did not believe one of his boys had been in it; they were mischievous enough, as he well knew, and sometimes deceitful enough; but they all seemed to be, and he honestly believed _were_, innocent of this.
The room was cleared while the jury deliberated. Their verdict was to the effect that Kingsley Sanker had died from falling over a portion of one of the Malvern hills; but whether the fall was caused by accident, or not, there was not sufficient evidence to show.
It was late when it was over. Growing dusk. In turning out of the inn pa.s.sage to the street, I remember the great buzz around, and the people pushing one"s elbows; and I can"t remember much more. If one Frog was there, it seemed to me that there were hundreds.
I stayed at Captain Sanker"s again that night. We all went up to bed after supper and prayers--which the captain read. He said he could not divest himself of the idea that it was a pure accident--for who would be likely to harm a helpless lad?--and that what Dance heard must have been some pa.s.sing dispute connected with other people.
"Come along, Johnny: this one candle"ll do for us both," cried Dan, taking up a bed candlestick and waiting for me to follow him.
I kept close to him as we went by the room--_the_ room, you know--for Dan was worse than any of them for pa.s.sing it. He and King had been much together. King followed him in age; they had always slept together and gone to school together; the rest were older or younger--and naturally Dan felt it most.
"I shan"t be a minute, Johnny, and then you can take the candle," said he, when we got to the top. "Come in."
Before I had well turned round, after getting in, I declare Dan had rushed all his things off in a heap and leaped into bed. Poor King used not to be so quick, and Dan always made him put the light out.
"Good-night, Dan."
"Good-night, Johnny. I hope I shall get to sleep."
He put his head under the bedclothes as I went away with the candle. I was not long getting into bed either. The stars were bright in the sky.
Before there was time to get to sleep, Dan came bursting in, shivering as on the past night, and asking to be let get into the bed. I did not mind his being in the bed--liked it rather, for company--but I did think it a great stupid pity that he should be giving way to these superst.i.tious fears as though he were a girl.
"Look here, Dan: I should be above it. One of the smallest of those Frogs couldn"t show out more silly than this."
"He"s in my bed again, Johnny. Lying down. I can"t sleep there another night."
"You know that he is below in his coffin--with the room-door locked."
"I don"t care--he"s there in the bed. You had no sooner gone with the light than King crept in and lay down beside me. He used to have a way of putting his left arm over me outside the clothes, and he put it so to-night."
"Dan!"
"I tell you he did. n.o.body would believe it, but he did. I felt it like a weight. It was heavy, just as dead arms are. Johnny, if this goes on, I shall die. Have you heard what mamma says?"
"No. What?"
"She says _she_ saw King last night. She couldn"t sleep; and by-and-by, happening to look out of bed, she saw him standing there. He was looking very solemn, and did not speak. She turned to awake papa, in spite of the way he goes on ridiculing such things, but when she looked next King had gone. I wish he was buried, Johnny; I shouldn"t think he could come back into the house then. Should you?"
"He"s not in it now--in that sense. It"s all imagination."
"Is it! I should like you to have been in my bed, instead of me; you"d have seen whether it was imagination or not. Do you suppose his heavy arm across me was fancy?"
"Well, he does not come in here. Let us go to sleep. Good-night, Dan."
Dan lay still for a good bit, and I was nearly asleep when he awoke me sobbing. His face was turned the other way.
"I wish you"d kill me, Johnny."
"Kill you!"
"I don"t care to live any longer without King. It is so lonely. There"s n.o.body now. Fred"s getting to be almost a man, and Toby"s a little duffer. King was best. I"ve many a time snubbed him and boxed him, and I always put upon him; and--and now he"s gone. I wish I had fallen down instead of him."
"You"ll get over it, Dan."
"Perhaps. But it"s such a thing to get over. And the time goes so slowly. I wish it was this time next year!"
"Do you know what some of the doctors say?"
"What do they say?" returned Dan, putting the tip of his nose out of bed.
"Dr. Teal told Captain Sanker of it; I was by and heard him. They think that poor King would not have lived above another year, or so: that there was no chance of his living to grow up. So you might have lost him soon in any case, Dan."
"But he"d have been here till then; he wouldn"t have died through falling down Malvern Hill. Oh, and to think that I was rough with him often!--and didn"t try to help him when he wanted it! and laughed at his poetry! Johnny, I wish you"d kill me! I wish it had been me to fall over instead of him!"
There was not one of them that felt it as keenly as Dan did: but the chances were that he would forget King the soonest. Dan was of that impetuous warm nature that"s all fire at first; and all forgetfulness when the fire goes out.
I went home the next day to Crabb Cot. Mr. Coney came into Worcester to attend the corn-market, and offered to drive me back in his gig. So I took my leave of the Sankers, and my last look at poor King in his coffin. He was to be buried on Monday in St. Peter"s churchyard.
The next news we had from Worcester was that Mark Ferrar had gone to sea. His people had wanted him to take up some trade at home; but Mark said he was not going to stay there to be told every day of his life that he killed King Sanker. For some of the Frogs had taken up the notion that it must have been he--why else, they asked, did the coroner and the rest of "em want to see his green handkercher shook out? So his father, who was just as much hurt at the aspersions as Mark, allowed him to have his way and go to sea; in spite of Sally crying her eyes out, and foretelling that he would come home drowned. Mark was sent to London to some friend, who undertook to make the necessary arrangements; he was bound apprentice to the sea, and shipped off in a trading vessel sailing for Spain.
It was Michaelmas when we next went in to Worcester (save for a day at the festival), driving in from d.y.k.e Manor: the Squire, Mrs. Todhetley, and I. You have heard the expedition mentioned before, for it was the one when we hired the dairymaid, Grizzel, at St. John"s mop. That business over, we went down to Captain Sanker"s and found them at home.
They were all getting pretty well over the death now, except Dan. Dan"s grief and nervousness were as bad as ever. Worse, even. Captain and Mrs.
Sanker enlarged upon it.