“Oh, it 's you, Captain Nourse,” said Wood, rising to open the netting door, and holding out his hand. “Come to summons me as a witness in something about the bank case, I suppose. Let me introduce Captain Nourse, Mary,” he said, “deputy sheriff. Sit down, Captain, and have some dinner with us.”
“No, I guess I won't set,” said the captain. “I cal'lated not to eat till I got home, in the middle o' the afternoon. No, I 'll set down in eye-shot of the mare, and read the paper while you eat.”
“I hope they don't want me to testify anywhere to-day,” said Wood; “because my boat's half verdigris'd, and I want to finish her this afternoon.”
“No testimony to-day,” said the captain. “Hi! hi! Kitty!” he called to the mare, as she began to meander across the road; and he went out to a tree by the front fence, and sat down on a green bench, beside a work-basket and a half-finished child's dress, and read the country paper which he had taken from the office as he came along.
After dinner Wood went out bareheaded, and leaned on the fence by the captain. His wife stood just inside the door, looking out at them.
The “bank case” was the great sensation of the town, and Wood was one of the main witnesses, for he had been taking the place of the absent cashier when the safe was broken open and rifled to the widespread distress of depositors and stockholders, and the ruin of Hon. Edward Clark, the president. Wood had locked the safe on the afternoon before the eventful night, and had carried home the key with him, and he was to testify to the contents of the safe as he had left it.
“I guess they 're glad they 've got such a witness as John,” said his wife to herself, as she looked at him fondly, “and I guess they think there won't be much doubt about what he says.”
“Well, Captain,” said Wood, jocosely, breaking a spear of grass to bits in his fingers, “I did n't know but you 'd come to arrest me.”
The captain calmly smiled as only a man can smile who has been accosted with the same humorous remark a dozen times a day for twenty years. He folded his paper carefully, put it in his pocket, took off his spectacles and put them in their silver case, took a red silk handkerchief from his hat, wiped his face, and put the handkerchief back. Then he said shortly,—
“That's what I have come for.”