“Did the accident? What d’ye mean?”
Amos Honeywell got up from his seat, and jerked his thumb toward the pit-bottom. “This here one,” he said. “Yer gran’father.”
“D’ you mean he killed him?”
“Dun’t much matter what ye call it now the chap’s dead, but I wouldn’t put it killed—not meanin’.” Amos Honeywell came slouching along the pit-edge, talking as he came. “See, he was a Coopersale chap an’ new here, an’ knowed few. Well, he sees this here’s a likely spot for a rabbit or so, an’ he puts up a few pegs an’ a wire or two, just arter dark: you know. In the middle of it he sees a strange oad chap comin’ with a lantern, searchin’—searchin’ what for? Why for wires, he thinks, o’ coase. He hides in some brambles, but t’oad chap gets nigher an’ nigher an’ presen’ly Stiles he sees he’s about caught. So he ups on a sudden an’ knocks the oad chap over, an’ grabs the wires an’ then he bolts. Oad chap goes over into pit of a lump, an’ he falls awk’ard an’—an’ well—there y’are!”
“And how long ha’ you known this?”
“Knowed it? Knowed it all time, same as others.”
“An’ never said a word of it, nor told the police?”
“Why no,” Amos answered, with honest indignation. “Wudn’t hev us get the poer chap in trouble, wud ye?”
And this was the mystery: nothing of wonder at all, nothing but a casual crossing of ways: just a chance from the hatful, like all the rest of it. And Amos—well, he was right, too, by such lights as he could see.
. . . . . .