“Call William Bradbury,” said Mr. Alison, but it was clear he was as much perplexed as the magistrates at the turn of events. “Hanged if I know what You’re about with your hares’ teeth and your Pots and Pans,” I heard him mutter to our attorney.
“Better wait and see,” suggested that gentleman blandly.
Old William Bradbury was the next and only other witness for the prosecution. He had been out of court during the examination of his son. He walked to the witness-box with bent shoulders and feeble and faltering steps, leaning heavily upon his stick. The impression he designed to convey was clearly that of extreme age and debility, badly mauled in the discharge of duty. He told his story, the same tale as that unfolded by his son in his examination-in-chief, in a cringing, fawning voice. The course of his cross-examination I need not follow. It went on the same lines as that of Tom. When Mr. Blackburn asked the momentous question as to the conversation between the witness and his son at Pots and Pans the old gamekeeper gasped for breath. His eye wandered to where Tom sat in the body of the Court.
“Oh! you needn’t look for inspiration to your son,” ripped out Mr. Blackburn. “Let us have the tale in your own way.”
“Aw dunnot know what th’ young fooil’s said,” he babbled, “but what ya’r Tom said aw stick to.”
“I daresay, but that won’t do for me. Where is the brace of hares you and your son had with you when you secreted yourself in the warren to await the coming of the prisoner?”
“Wheer does ya’r Tom say they are?” fenced the witness.
“I rather think, he began to say, you’d eaten them.”
“Then etten ’em we han, yo’ may be sewer.”
“And what about those you’ve produced? Have you examined their teeth?”