She pushed the children into an inner room, ran up-stairs, and presently reappeared, asking them to walk up. Bradley was in bed, propped with pillows. A handkerchief was tied round his head, and his face was pale from loss of blood. Either from that cause, or on account of the shock to the nervous system, he was also very weak.
“How do you feel now, Bradley?” asked Lord Woodruff gently, going to the bed-head.
“Rayther queer as yet, my lord,” was the reply.
“No doubt. But you have a good hard head, and there is nothing serious the matter, the doctor says. But it may be some days before it will be prudent for you to go out, so, as we want to get on the traces of the fellow who struck you at once, Mr Elliot has kindly come over to take your deposition here, instead of waiting till you were fit to go to Penredding.”
When Tom Buller saw the woman and children, and then afterwards their strong bread-earner reduced to such a condition, he indeed felt heartily glad that there was no truth in the accusation against him. To have had any part in bringing about such a scene of family distress would have been too much for him.
The wounded man told his story clearly enough, and then Tom Buller was told to stand in the light where he could see him clearly.
“Noa,” said the wounded man, “I could not say who it wor. There was a bright moon, but the boy was in the shadow, and I got no clear look at his face; but he wor one of the Weston young gentlemen, I am sartin of that. A bit bigger than him, I should say, but I couldn’t say for sure. He wor a strong un, I know that.”
When all this was written down, back they went to Penredding again, slower now, for the snow was getting deep, and assembled once more in Mr Elliot’s study, where Buller was warned against criminating himself, and then allowed to speak. He had been out that night, but in a contrary direction, skating; no one had seen him, and he had no witnesses.
“There is hardly any case,” said Mr Elliot. “The boy owns that he was out the night of the assault, and the gamekeeper swears he was struggling with a boy, whom he thinks was rather bigger. But there are no marks of any struggle having taken place upon the lad. There may be reason for suspicion, but nothing more.”
“Exactly; and I do not ask for a committal, but only for a remand, to give the police an opportunity of collecting further evidence,” said Lord Woodruff.