What Might Have Been Expected

by Frank R. Stockton

"George Mason!" said she, "you can stay here as long as you like, and you can have part of whatever I've got in the house to eat, but I'll never sit down to the table with you till you've mended that wire and nailed it to another pole."

"All right," answered George Mason. "Then I'll eat alone."

When Mr. Martin and the mica-mine people and the Akeville people and Harry and Kate and all the boys and everybody black and white heard what had happened, there was great excitement. It was generally agreed that something must be done with George Mason. He had no more right to cut down that pole because he had once lived on the place, than he had to go and cut down any of the neighbors' beanpoles.

So the sheriff and some deputy sheriffs, (Tony Kirk among them), and a constable and a number of volunteer constables, went off after George Mason, to bring him to justice.

It was more than a week before they found him, and it is probable that they would not have captured him at all, had he not persisted in staying in the neighborhood, so as to be on hand with his axe, in case the line should be repaired.

"It's all along of my tellin' him that that line was got up by them Loudon children," said Cousin Maria. "He hates Mr. Loudon worse than pisen, because he was the man that found out all his tricks."

Mason was taken to the court-house and locked up in the jail. Almost all the people of the county, and some people belonging to adjoining counties, made up their minds to be at the court-house when his trial should take place.

On the second night of his imprisonment, George Mason forced open a window of his cell and went away. And what was more, he staid away. He had no desire to be at the court-house when his trial took place.

No one felt more profound satisfaction when George Mason left the country, and the telegraph line was once more in working order, than Harry and Kate.

They had an idea that if George Mason, should persist in cutting the telegraph line, the Mica Company would give it up, and that they might be called upon to refund the money on which Aunt Matilda depended for support. They had been told that they need not trouble themselves about this, as the Mica Company had taken all risks; but still they were delighted when they heard that George Mason had cleared out, and that there was every reason to suppose that he would not come back.