At this Cave sat up, full of animation.
“I can help the poor fellow, I think,” he said. “I went to see him as soon as they put him in jail—a wretched looking object in rags he was, too. He seemed to put great faith in you, and I did not tell him of some evidence that I have got hold of. The fellow’s going to get clear between us, I think.”
Pembroke sat up too, and took the cigar out of his mouth. The lawyer’s instinct rose within him, and he took to his profession like a pointer to his field work.
“You see, having been away during Hackett’s time, I know nothing of his habits or associations except from hearsay. Any lawyer in the county could do better for poor Bob Henry than I—in that way.”
“Hackett, you know, was a Northern man, who came down here and bought property during the war. He was a rabid Southerner. I distrusted the man for that alone. He was related to our friends, the Hibbses. I always suspected he had something to do with that gang of deserters down by the river, and if he was not a spy, then John Cave is a fool.”
“Well—what else?”
“Of course you know about Bob Henry’s buying the land of him, and the money he owed him, and the fight. The negro, after Hackett had struck him and insulted his wife, struck him back with a stick. Now the Hibbses, and everybody else for that matter, think that blow killed him. You see, among the people Hackett had a kind of false popularity, as a Northern man who has espoused Southern sentiments—a hypocrite, in short. The feeling against that poor black wretch was savage.”
“So,” said Pembroke, “instead of proving that the blow did kill Hackett, the jury will want it proved that it didn’t kill Hackett.”
“Exactly.”
“Hackett, I understand, was a convivial soul. It can be proved that he mounted his horse, rode home, and six hours afterward was walking about. It never seemed to occur to these country doctors to look for any other injury than the bruise on the head, when they found him as good as dead next morning. I hear, though, that people who passed his house at night would often hear shouting and carousing. Now, who did that shouting and carousing? Not the gentlemen in the county, certainly, nor anybody else that I can find out. This fits in with your account of his associating with deserters. I have always had a theory that he received an injury that killed him between the time he was seen alive and apparently well, and when he was found dying in his bed.”