"'Yes, miss,' says I.
"'Well, I hope you are going to find Reuben Whitney innocent,' says she.
"'I don't know nothing about it,' says I. 'Folks seem to think as he did it.'
"Then she went at me, and told me that she was sure you was innocent; and the squire he was sure, and he would be moighty put out if you was found guilty. So I told her natural that, the squire's being a good landlord, I wouldn't disoblige him on no account; and she might look upon it as good as settled that you should be found innocent. So she tells me not to say a word to anyone, and I ain't, not even to the ould woman; but in course, I don't consider as she meant you."
Reuben could not help laughing as he learned that he had been acquitted, not from any belief in his innocence on the part of the jury, but by the intervention on his behalf of the girl who had, before, fought his battles. Shaking hands with Jacob, he went on to the schoolmaster's.
As he was sitting there chatting with Mr. and Mrs. Shrewsbury, he saw Kate Ellison come out of her father's gate along the road with her basket, as usual. Catching up his hat, he ran out and stood bareheaded, awaiting her.
"Ah, Reuben!" she said, with a smile and a nod, "I am glad to see you before you go; for Mr. Shrewsbury told me, yesterday, you were going to leave Lewes and emigrate. I am glad,"—and she hesitated a little—"very glad that they found you innocent. I was quite sure you would not do such a thing."
"I am glad I came over today, Miss Ellison," Reuben said quietly. "Very glad that I have met you; for I have just learned, from Jacob Priestley, that it is to you I am indebted that I am not, in the present moment, a prisoner in jail, under sentence of transportation."
The girl flushed up hotly.
"Jacob Priestley is very wrong to have spoken about it. I told him he was never to mention it."