"It was all Roger's fault," she cried. "I saw it, heard it all. The
poor man is starving and wanted to work for food, and Roger was
rude to him."
Her uncle looked at her, and at me, and at the boy, who had risen
from the ground, wearing a sullen and crestfallen look.
"Is that the right of it, Roger?" asked the gentleman.
"He said so, sir," he replied, "but he looks such a villainous
tramp, and you know what lies they tell--why, look here!" He
stooped and picked something from the ground. "He said he was
hungry, and look at this!"
He held up my crown piece, which in the violence of my movements, I
suppose, had sprung out of my tattered garment. I felt my cheeks
flush hotly, and was stricken dumb in the face of this mute
evidence giving me the lie. The girl gazed at me for a moment;
then, her lip curling with disdain, she turned her back and walked
up the path towards the house.
"Well, rascal?" said the gentleman sternly.
"It is mine, truly," I said. "But--"
"Go fetch the men," he said to the boy.
"As sure as I'm alive I'll commit you for a rogue and vagabond, for
mendicancy and assault."
He drew his horse across the gate so that I could not escape, while
the boy hastened to the house.
"You are a magistrate, sir," I ventured to say, "and sure 'tis not
your custom to condemn your prisoners unheard."
"Adzooks, you teach me my duty?" he cried in a rage. "You insolent
scoundrel!"
I held my peace, and in a few moments the boy returned, with two
stablemen.
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