CHAPTER XVII.
AS the gig rattled down the hill and past the end of Penrose’s road, Tom leaned forward and looked up toward the spot where he had met Isaac Naylor the day before. A knot of people had gathered about the place where the body had been found, collected there by the morbid curiosity that stirs men at such a time; they were talking earnestly together, some sitting on the fence, some leaning against it.
At last they reached the level road that led into Eastcaster, and the nag broke into a trot. The houses were clustered more thickly together around the outskirts of the town. Of course, the news had spread everywhere, and knots of people were gathered here and there talking the matter over. As the gig with the three men in it rattled along the stony street, the talk would be hushed in these groups, and the people would turn and gaze at the constables and their prisoner. Tom had not realized all that he would have to pass through till now; he had not known what it would be to have his neighbors and old acquaintances staring at him with that look of mixed curiosity and horror. He shrunk together in the gig back of the constables, striving to hide himself behind them. Johnson must have known how he felt, for he laid the whip to the horse and drove on as fast as possible.
At last they reached Squire Morrow’s office, at the corner of Market and Andover streets. It was a small, dark two-storied building, with an old-fashioned hipped roof;—it has since been torn down to make way for Prettyman’s new store. A great crowd had gathered around the corner about the squire’s office, and they could see through the windows that the room was packed with the people inside. The gig drew up to the sidewalk and the constable stepped down out of it.
“You’ll have to get down, now, Tom,” whispered Jos Giddings, the deputy, in Tom’s ear. Then Tom stepped out and the deputy followed him. The constable had a great deal of trouble in pushing his way through the people, for they crowded up very closely to get a look at Tom. He walked with his eyes fixed straight ahead of him; he saw nothing but the crown of the constable’s hat, but he knew, as well as though he had looked about him, that a mass of faces were gazing at him with eager and intense curiosity. He also knew that his father and his brothers, John and William, had gotten out of the farm wagon and were following close behind him.
“Stand out of the way there!” said the constable, in a loud voice, as he pushed into the office, and then Tom found himself standing beside a railing that separated the squire’s desk from the mass of people packed into the body of the office. The light came through a little window in the end of the room, so that Tom could see things only duskily after coming in from the dazzling glare of the sunlight outside. Mr. Morrow was sitting at his desk, leaning back in his chair, with a very troubled look in his eyes. He was playing absently with a pen that lay on the table in front of him.
“Won’t the prisoner sit down, constable?” said he; “he looks pretty badly.”
“I don’t care to sit down,” said Tom, “I’d rather stand.” He was resting with his handcuffed hands on the railing in front of him; after a while he collected his courage, and then he looked slowly around him.
A number of people were sitting inside of the railing; the first one that he saw was Patty Penrose, and on her his eyes lingered long and painfully. She was very white, and dark rings encircled her eyes. She sat with her handkerchief in her hand, and she wiped the slow tears from her cheeks with it every now and then. Her father sat beside her, looking very hard and stern. He did not glance at Tom until later in the examination that followed. Just behind Elihu Penrose sat Mr. Moor. He, too, was very pale, and every now and then he wiped his face with a bandana handkerchief. Beside these three were Ephraim Whiteley and his colored man, Mrs. Bond, the landlady of the Crown and Angel, and Dr. Winterapple.