Dick bowed his head in assent.
‘Good!’ said Mr. Hardesty, grasping the boy’s hand. ‘Take a little more of this,’ he continued, filling Dick’s glass. ‘Your aunt shall suffer for this yet, if there’s any law or justice in the land.’
‘Ain’t there no law,’ inquired Dick, pausing in his draught, ‘for suing an old lady for ’sault and batterhim?’
‘No, Dicky, I fear not in your case; but if I get any damages, I’ll give you half.’
Dick drained the contents of his glass, and shaking hands most cordially with Mr. Hardesty and Master John, bade them good night. It is scarcely necessary to add, that the last surviving male heir of the Sidebottoms was gloriously drunk in less than an hour, and made such a demonstration of that fact to his sober and discreet aunt, that she caused his head to be soused repeatedly in cold water, and then flogged him into sobriety.
It is not to be supposed that the disappearance of the village grocer from his usual post for a whole day together, and particularly on Christmas, that busiest of all days, failed to excite a degree of general curiosity and inquisitiveness as to the cause of his absence; but to the many inquiries of his friends touching that subject, he only replied by shaking his head and saying that time would show. Enough had leaked out, however, to satisfy the public that the affair was shrouded in a mystery that was worth the trouble of penetrating; so that when on the morning of the first of January immediately succeeding the year that had just closed, Mr. Thomas Hardesty and Miss Margaret Sidebottom were summoned each by three lusty cheers from the town-crier to appear before his worship the police judge of Idleberg, the populace rushed to the scene of judicial conflict, until the humble and contracted audience-chamber was crowded to overflowing.
The witnesses summoned in the case were Mrs. Jenkins, Jake Crow, and Master Dick Sidebottom. In due time the defendant came into court, leaning on the arm of her next friend and privy counsellor, Mrs. Jenkins, who as usual was attended by a bevy of young Jenkinses. Before embarking in this trying embassy, the ladies, by the way, had gone to the Madeira bottle; the one complaining of a pain in the breast, and the other of general nervousness. Mr. Hardesty was unattended, and so were his remaining witnesses.
The warrant gravely charged the defendant with stealing or causing to be stolen from the plaintiff, on the night of the twenty-fourth of December last past, a pair of boots and a pair of breeches, whose respective values were duly set forth. The reading of this document created quite a sensation throughout the court-room. Mrs. Jenkins was called and sworn. She deposed that on the night specified in the warrant, she had taken tea at the defendant’s house; that she was suddenly called home, missing thereby a great deal of anticipated pleasure; that the defendant passed the next day, being Christmas-day, at her (witness’s) house; and witness did not at any time see defendant steal or cause to be stolen from plaintiff the said boots and breeches, nor did she believe Miss Sidebottom to be capable of such an act; ‘and particular,’ she said in conclusion, ‘from such a pitiful old scamp as Tom Hardesty;’ and glancing around triumphantly at the audience, and scornfully at the plaintiff, she waited for the court’s cross-questions.
‘Is that all you know about the case, Madam?’ inquired his worship, smiling.
That was all.