“Never but once,” said Sam; “that was when I hooked a big package of loaf-sugar out of father’s store, and had to keep finding new places to hide it in until it was eaten up.”
“I suppose that mystery helped keep you up?” suggested Canning.
“Well, you see——Oh, look! there comes father; I suppose he’s wondering why I don’t bring his letters. Good-bye;” and Sam got away from that very provoking question as fast as possible.
As for the other boys, they simply sat on the sidewalk opposite old Mrs. Bartle’s, and worshipped the house from which their hero had not been successfully coaxed to come out. In spite of Paul’s caution to Benny, and the promises that were made in return, the deputy had talked so enthusiastically about Paul to all the men he met, that the story sped about town that Paul had done as much toward recapturing the prisoner as the officer had. This story might have been spoiled had Benny acted according to the spirit of his promise, but the little fellow had been so elated by the looks that people gave him, as he marched with Paul and the counterfeiter through the street, that he could not bear to deliberately rob himself of his fame, as of course he would do as soon as Paul’s story had been told. So Benny refused to be seen; he went to bed very early, and before breakfast he had hidden himself in the unused attic of his mother’s cottage, where he nursed his glory until he felt that he was simply starving for something to eat.
And all this while his fictitious valor was nowhere in the eyes of the populace, for Mr. Morton himself had gone out immediately after breakfast, and had himself given Paul’s version of the affair to every one, besides giving Benny a fair share of the credit for the tender-heartedness displayed by the two boys toward the captive, so that when Benny finally entered the world again he found he had lost some hours of praise to which he was honestly entitled. As for Paul, the teacher begged every one to say nothing at all to him about it. The boy was somewhat peculiar, he said; the affair had made a very painful impression upon him, and any one who really admired him could best prove it by treating him just as before, and not reminding him in any way of Laketon’s most famous day.
Mr. Morton had not yet decided whether to open his school again, and the boys, although they would have been sorry to have him go away from Laketon, hoped he would not decide before court opened, for now that the counterfeiter had been mixed up in some way with two of their own number, the boys with one accord determined that they would have to attend the trial; indeed, it seemed to some of them that the trial could not go on without them, for did they not know the two boys who had helped bring the prisoner back from the woods? They thought they did.
When the day for the trial came, and the sheriff opened the court-room, the doors of which had been kept locked because of the immense crowd that threatened to fill the house in advance of the hour for the session, he was surprised to find seventeen boys in the front seats of the gallery. On questioning them, he learned that most of them had entered through a window before sunrise, and that two had slept in the gallery all night. He was about to remove the entire party, but the boys begged so hard to be allowed to remain, and they reminded him so earnestly that they all were particular friends of Paul, that the sheriff, who once had been a boy himself, relented, and let them remain.
It was about six in the afternoon, according to the boys, but only a quarter before ten by the court-house clock, when the front doors were opened and the crowd poured in. Within the next five minutes any boy in that front gallery row could have sold his seat for a dollar, but not a boy flinched from what he considered a public duty, although every one knew just what to do with a dollar if he could get it. Soon the lawyers flocked in by the judge’s door, and grouped themselves about the table inside the rail, and at five minutes before ten his honor the judge entered and took his seat. Then the sheriff allowed Mr. Morton and Paul to enter by the judge’s door, because they were unable to get through the crowd in front. At sight of Paul the whole front row of the gallery burst into a storm of hand-clapping.
THE SHERIFF ENFORCES ORDER.