The Tree of Knowledge: A Novel

by Mrs. Baillie Reynolds

On the further side of the lane was a very tall, quick-set hedge, thick and compact, without a hole or a rent anywhere. Below it was a deep ditch, along the brink of which Mr. Cranmer walked, eyeing the long grasses and weeds keenly for the smallest trace of trampling or disorder.

There was none.

Crossing the road again, he sat down on the stile leading to the Waste, and reflected.

Jane and Miss Brabourne had come up the lane from the direction of Edge Combe. They had crossed this piece of ground, noticed the artist at work, and proceeded to the farm beyond. In about half-an-hour they had returned by the road, to find the outrage committed and no traces of the robber to be seen.

It appeared unlikely, then, to say the least of it, that this robber should have come from the direction of Poole Farm.

Any loitering man would have been noticed by them as they passed; there was not a single clump of bush on the Waste large enough to conceal a man from the view of anyone crossing by the footpath. It seemed also to Mr. Cranmer to be exceedingly improbable that the villain should have approached along the road by which the carriage had come—that is to say, that he had been walking towards Edge Combe, because the artist had been sitting directly facing anyone who came from that direction, and must have seen and noticed a passer-by on that lonely road.

Probability then suggested it as most likely that the tramp, or whoever it was, who had struck to such purpose, had approached his victim from the direction of the village of Edge Combe—had simply walked along the lane, come up behind the unsuspecting artist, and without warning administered the blow on the head, which was quite enough to leave the strongest man helpless in his hands. Of course, it was all mere speculation, still, it might afford a clue; for, if a stranger, a tramp, or a suspicious-looking person had passed through the village that afternoon, he was certain to have been noticed, and probably there were several who could identify such a one.

Then, if he had approached along the lane, how had he escaped?

Most probably by simply walking on along the solitary lane till he came to the high-road. Here was another negative piece of evidence. If this had been his course, he must, when he reached the high-road, have turned to the right, towards Stanton, because Lady Mabel and her brother, driving from Philmouth, must have met him if he had turned to the left; and Mr. Cranmer clearly recollected that they had met no such person.

All this, of course, was very elementary reasoning; because there were a thousand places in which a tramp might have concealed himself, out of the main road. Yet it appeared to the young man likely that one who presumed sufficiently on the isolation of the neighborhood to commit such an assault in broad daylight, almost within view of the windows of a large farmhouse, would be hardy enough to adopt the course of simply walking off down the road after securing his booty,—a far safer plan and less likely to attract suspicion than skulking in fields or outhouses.