CHAPTER II
VERDICT
Spring had conquered the river valleys and was climbing to hilltop again. Those old pack-horse tracks, where bygone generations of beast and man have gradually beaten the ways down and down, until they run lower than the fields and the woods about them—those deep, heat-holding Devonshire lanes were dowered with green once more and lush with young leaves and fronds. At their feet opened wood sanicle and dewy moschatel; crowning them the bluebells wove their purple and scattered their fragrance; beside rill and water-trough golden saxifrages shone, and the wood strawberry was in blossom with the violet.
Amelia, after noon on the day that followed Adam Winter's return from London, put on her sunbonnet and taking a man's walking-stick, which she had always used since her illness, crossed Shipley Bridge, passed over the green space beyond and presently reached the home of Mr. Marydrew. She knocked and he came to the door.
"Morning, Billy," she said. "I thought you'd like to know how it went. Adam got back last night and just catched a train after the verdict was given. T 'others come home to-day—so he believes."
"I needn't ax you for the verdict. I see it in your face," he answered. "But come in and tell me, what you've heard."
She sat by his kitchen fire presently and tapped the ground with her stick to drive home the points. He listened without comment.
"'Tis a triumph for the Chosen Few against the ways of darkness," declared Amelia, "and it went very much indeed as you said it would; and we won't talk about him, nor yet the proper wreck and ruin he's made of himself, because we shan't agree about that. But this is what happened. He said what his beastly thoughts made him believe was the truth; and his wife and my nephew told what was the real truth; and then his great weapon against them broke his own head. He gave out certain words, that he swore he'd heard Margery and Adam use in Adam's own bedroom by night. He'd heard Margery say, 'Quick, quick—there's a dear'; and he'd heard Adam say, 'Come, then—come.' And Margery had laughed."
Mr. Marydrew nodded.
"That was his tower of strength; but I always warned him he might have heard wrong, and that if they denied it there was only his word against theirs."