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what my uncle thinks, at any rate; and no wonder!"

"The man you speak of must be the one who claimed that you had stolen his saddle and bridle," said Elsie.

"Did

"Oh, the scoundrel!" exclaimed Kit. he claim that?" And he described Branlow's appearance.

"The very same!" said Elsie. "I knew he was a rogue, by the way he talked so smooth and plausible! And my brothers were afterward convinced of it."

"I am glad he is caught!" said Kit. "Caught?' said Elsie.

She had seated herself opposite him, and they were now conversing face to face, across the table. "Your brothers said he was," replied Kit. "And they talked as if he and I had been stealing horses together!"

"That's what they inferred; and it certainly looked as if you were in company with him," said Elsie. "But this is the first I have heard of his being caught."

"See here, Elsie!" called Tom, from the other room. When she appeared in the door-way, he beckoned her to come nearer, and whispered, “What are you talking with that fellow for? He's fibbing to you, with every word he says."

"I am afraid somebody has been fibbing to him," she replied, with a quiet sparkle in her moist eyes. "You never told us at home here of that other fellow's having been caught."

"That's bosh, of course," said Tom. " I thought I might frighten this one into owning up, if I let him think that the other one had done so." "I don't believe he has anything more to own up to than what he has been telling me," said Elsie. "You heard it?"

"Yes," Tom answered, carelessly; "and it's nothing new. He tried the story on us before ; but when we catch a thief in the very act of riding away on our horse, we are not to be fooled by any such pretense; are we, Lon?"

"Oh, you are not, are n't you?" she replied, with keen satire. “Who was fooled last night by the other one, as you call him? And who was the first to understand him?"

"Talk about his He has as open,

Kit to hear in the next room. surly, hang-dog look, Tom! honest a face as you have; and you can't wonder that he appeared a little surly, after your treatment of him. How would you look in his place, do you suppose? Not very angelic, I imagine."

"How could we treat him any differently?" Tom asked. "If you are going to take every rogue's explanation, when he is caught, for gospel truth, I fancy few thieves would be brought to justice." "That's so!" said Charley.

"Come, boys," said Lon, not deeming it worth while to argue the matter further. "You never can tell anything by what a rogue says. There 's only one thing you can rely upon and that's evidence. If his story is true, he 'll have a chance

to prove it." He had risen from the table; his brothers followed his example.

"I've no doubt that he will be able to prove it," Elsie persisted in saying. "But think what he may have to suffer first! You wont put him in jail, will you?"

"That will depend upon what the judge says, and not upon us at all," said Lon. "We have no right to keep him a prisoner here, at any rate, any longer than is necessary.”

"Wait, at least, until father comes home!" Elsie was fairly pleading Kit's cause by this time. "We shall probably meet him on the way," replied Lon.

66

He has n't eaten anything yet," said Elsie. "I'm sure that 's his own fault, then," said Tom. "He might have been eating when he was telling you fibs."

“Promise, at any rate, that you wont tie his hands again," was Elsie's answer.

"We wont tie him if he behaves himself," said Lon. "Come, my boy!" laying his hand on Kit's shoulder.

Kit rose with a fluttering heart.

"I don't suppose there 's any use of my telling you again what I've told you before,” he said, indulging a faint hope that Elsie's intercession might have changed her brothers' intentions toward him.

"Not a bit of use," Lon answered, kindly

"Of course, you were right, in his case," Tom enough, but firmly. "We'll give you a full and admitted.

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fair chance to tell it to the judge; but that's all we can do."

"Well! you have been good to me!" said Kit, his voice quivering, and his eyes glistening, as he turned a grateful look on Elsie. "Some time," he added, choking a little, and then resolutely mastering the passion that swelled his heart, "you 'll know that what I have told you is true, and then you wont be sorry you took my part."

"I know it well enough now," she replied, as Lon led him away; "but don't blame my brothers too much."

"Oh, I don't blame them!"

Kit mounted to the wagon-seat with Lon and Tom; and as he rode away amid the tall tree-trunks of the sunlit grove, he took off his base-ball cap to her, in a bar of the golden light, a smile of tender brightness suddenly irradiating his anxious face, as he looked back at her, while his lips shaped an inaudible "Good-bye!"

CHAPTER XVII.

THAT last smile of the captive lingered long with Elsie Benting, as she stood in the door of the old farm-house, while the wagon that bore him with Lon and Tom-(Charley rode on horse-back) — disappeared up the road beyond the grove.

She hoped that they would meet her father before reaching the magistrate's office, and that he also would be quickly convinced of Kit's innocence. But when they had been gone adout half an hour, Mr. Benting, with her mother, returned home by another road.

They had seen nothing of the boys; and now Elsie had the surprising news to relate of her brothers' having found the horse, and their having stopped at home with the little rider in the white cap, on their way to Duckford village.

"But he 's no more a horse-thief than I am!" she asserted. "He is just a bashful boy. You should have seen how he blushed when I was talking to him! It's a strange story he tells, but I believe every word of it."

Mr. Benting, a tall man with white whiskers, and exceedingly pleasant eyes peering out from under bushy gray brows, stood by his buggy wheel at the door, looking down with a sort of humorous interest at the young girl, telling with no little dramatic effect the story of the supposed horse-thief.

"And I think it is too bad, too cruel," she said at the end, "that the poor boy should have to go to jail!"

"It would be too bad, truly," Mr. Benting replied, laying his hand fondly on her shoulder, "if he is as innocent as you suppose. But it is n't a very probable story, Elsie; now do you think it is? Consider a minute."

"I wish we had been at home," said Mrs. Benting, as he helped her from the buggy.

"So do I, for, after all, Elsie may be right. She is rather shrewd in her judgments of people. And I'll tell you what I'm going to do, little girl, to please you." (The paternal mouth puckered in a playful, affectionate smile.) "I am going to drive after the boys and see that they have made no mistake."

"Oh, what a dear, delightful old Papa!" Elsie cried, joyfully, putting up her face to kiss him.

66 "You'll have dinner first, wont you?" said Mrs. Benting.

"Shall I?" (He gave a sidelong, teasing look at Elsie.) "Well, never mind about dinner for me till I come back. I think I shall know when I see the fellow, how big a rascal he is. Though I warn you at the outset, little one, that the boys are probably right about him."

Entering the buggy as he spoke, he wheeled about among the trees, and disappeared up the dusty road.

The hour Elsie had to wait for his return seemed interminable. But at last, going out for the twentieth time to take a peep from under the maples, she saw the buggy and the wagon coming, with Charley on General galloping before.

Her father was alone in the buggy, but Lon and Tom were in the wagon. Where, then, was the youthful prisoner whom she had confidently expected to see returning with them?

"What did I tell you? " cried Charley, driving up under the trees. "The idea of your taking the part of such a fellow!"

Her face, bright at first with expectation, had assumed a shade of doubt, which now deepened to disappointment and dismay.

"Now, Charley," she remonstrated, "don't say that! What have you done with him?"

"Ask Father," replied Charley. "He'll tell you he had only to look at him to be perfectly sure of the kind of character he is."

"Don't tell me, Charles Benting!" exclaimed his sister, "that Father thought as badly of him as you boys did; I never will believe it!"

"He does think as badly of him as we do," he insisted, with a change of tense which she failed to notice. "And the judge

As he slipped off the horse he was careful to turn "But while we are considering," said Elsie, away his face, on which was a struggling smile he "they are putting him in jail! "

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Idid not wish her to see.

"What did he say?" she demanded.

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'He said it was a perfectly clear case. Stolen horse found in the possession of the boy who was seen to take it and ride it away, there was only one thing to be done about it."

"What was that?"

"Commit him to jail, of course." "Oh, he did n't!" said the indignant Elsie. "Yes, he did; sober truth!" Charley insisted. "Ask the boys; ask Father. Say, boys," to Lon and Tom, just then driving up,-" did n't the judge say it was a clear case and that he must go to jail? And does n't Father think of him just as we do? She wont believe a word I say!"

Lon and Tom were laughing. Mr. Benting's face likewise wore a good-humored smile as he drove up and heard the controversy. Getting no satisfaction from her brothers, she appealed to him. "Well, yes, my dear," he said, "I think my

of the Duckford justice, whom they had the luck to find alone at his desk and just thinking of going home to his dinner. Charley rode on to find a constable, while Lon and Tom went in and made oath to their complaint against the prisoner.

It seemed, indeed, a perfectly clear case; and the magistrate was impatient to sniff the odors of the roast beef which he knew was just then coming out of the home oven. He gave little heed and less belief to the boy's story; but promised that he should have ample opportunity to bring proof of it, at the hearing which he appointed for the following day.

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opinion of that boy is about the same as theirs. And the judge did commit him to jail. Charley has told you nothing but the truth; but he has n't told you quite all the truth. Why do you persist in teasing your sister, Charles?" he added, in a tone of not very severe reproof.

"To punish her for crowing over us, as she will when she hears the rest," Charley made answer. "Oh, tell me, Father!" cried the eager Elsie. And he told briefly what it is now time for us to relate a little more in detail.

The boys, finding they had missed their father on the way to the village, proceeded to the office

"Suppose I can't get my friends here by that time?" queried Kit.

"The hearing may be postponed, in that case. You can employ counsel, and the court will do everything for you that is deemed necessary and proper."

With these words the judge rose from his seat, putting on his hat; and Kit, for want of bail, was marched out in charge of the constable.

He was thinking dejectedly of the strait to which his blundering had at last brought him; the degradation of being put into the lock-up; the expense of a lawyer; the difficulty of getting Uncle Gray

or any one else to come and testify in his behalf; the distress of his widowed mother, and the amusement or disgust of enemies and friends, when they should hear of his predicament; with all the wretchedness of uncertainty and delay in the disentanglement of this dreadful snarl in which he had enwound himself; - he was thinking of all this, as he walked away with the officer, when a voice called out:

"Wait a minute!"

It was the voice of Lon Benting.

Lon and his brothers had found time to cool off, after the first flush of victory; and Elsie's more favorable opinion of the prisoner was beginning to influence them. Then Kit's straightforward recital of his story to the judge, without contradiction of his previous statements in the least particular, shook their boyish self-confidence, and caused them to look furtively at one another, with misgivings which each tried to conceal.

In short, the more they saw of Kit, the less of a villain he appeared to be, and the more they distrusted their suspicions. It was not half the satisfaction they had anticipated to see him led away to the lock-up. Lon and Tom, especially, were feeling the weight of their responsibility in the doubtful business, when they were vastly relieved at sight of a well-known buggy coming down the street.

"It's Father!" Tom said to the justice, who was again on the point of hurrying off to his dinner. "He will want to see you."

Mr. Benting being a citizen whom every one was glad to oblige, the magistrate paused reluctantly, and stood by his door while the buggy drove up to it. The officer also stopped, a few paces off, with his prisoner. There were a few spectators, who had witnessed the scene in the office, and more were gathering; men walking leisurely across the street, and boys in the distance running and shouting.

"What's going on here?" said Mr. Benting, drawing rein. "You've got General, I see, boys!" eying the horse with satisfaction. "And the rogue is that the rogue?" peering out from under his bushy gray brows at the little captive.

"All that we know about him is that we caught him riding our horse away," said Tom.

"How much of a rogue he is," added Lon, "remains to be proved."

Kit could not help noticing the changed manner toward him of Elsie's big, obstinate brothers. Very different now the tone which had been so boisterous, and the judgment which had been so stern. "How is it, Judge?" Mr. Benting inquired. "There seemed abundant evidence to justify a commitment," the judge explained.

stood looking down searchingly at the miserable youngster.

Conscious of the scrutiny, and aware of many eyes fixed upon him, looking for signs of guilt in his burning face, poor Kit was very much abashed. His head was hot, his temples were throbbing, his cheeks on fire; and to save his life he could not have kept his suffused eyes from falling, before Mr. Benting's searching gaze. First they dropped from that gentleman's eyes to his white whiskers; then went down his coat-front button by button; switched off on the right leg, descended that to the boot, and so glided to the ground.

The very necessity he felt of standing up stoutly, and answering the gaze of Elsie's father with an air of open innocence, helped to betray him into this appearance of guilt. He was angry with himself, for his blushes and weak eyes; and with quick, fierce breath, and teeth set hard, he struggled to regain his self-control.

"Come!" said Mr. Benting, eying him with an expression of keen curiosity tempered by humorous compassion, "tell me frankly just how much of a rogue you are."

CHAPTER XVIII.

THEN Kit looked up. He was himself again. "I'm not used to being called a rogue," he replied; "and I can't answer such a question as that."

"But they say you were taken while riding away on my horse," said Mr. Benting. "How do you account for that?"

"I've explained, five or six times already, how that happened," said Kit, in a grieved and disappointed tone. "But I'll explain once more, and be glad to, if it will do any good."

Mr. Benting turned to the judge.

"This is hardly the place to talk with him; and, if you've no objection, I'd like to see him a few minutes in your office."

"Certainly," said the judge, with a despairing thought of his dinner. And again entering his office in company with Kit and the constable, Mr. Benting and Lon and Tom, he closed the door and shut out the crowd.

There Mr. Benting sat down in a leather-cushioned chair, and in a kindly but searching manner questioned Kit, who stood before him, still flushed, but resolute.

"I've heard something of your story, and 1 must say it has n't seemed to me very probable. But it may be true, for all that. 'Truth is stranger than fiction' is an old saying, and a true one. Where did you mount my horse, when you mis

Mr. Benting alighted from his buggy, and took him for your uncle's?"

"Under one of the cattle-sheds at the fair," said

Kit.

"As I remember them, those sheds are very low-roofed. I should have thought that you could not mount very comfortably under them."

"I could n't; I had to stoop. I hit my head as it was." Kit's voice was growing steady, his countenance more and more open, and now something like a smile lighted it up as he added: “I remember how the oyster-crackers spilled out of my breast-pockets as I leaned over on the horse's neck."

"We found oyster-crackers scattered on the ground," said Lon, willing to corroborate this part of the boy's story.

'Why did n't you lead the horse out before you mounted?" Mr. Benting inquired. "It seems to me that that would have been the most natural thing to do."

"So it would. But the fellow who helped me off had arranged everything. He did all he could to confuse me, and then he boosted me on the horse and hurried me off before I could see through his trick. Of course," Kit added, with beaming candor, "if he had let me lead the horse out from under the dark shed I should have noticed the difference between him and our Dandy."

"Is Dandy the name of your horse? "Yes, sir; Dandy Jim. It's the name he had when my uncle bought him." Kit smiled again. "I don't suppose my uncle would have given a horse such a name as that."

"Why not?"

"I can hardly explain. Only Uncle Gray is n't the kind of man to think of that kind of name." "What sort of a man is he?" "Rather serious; what you would call a practical man; not much nonsense about him.”

"It strikes me," remarked Mr. Benting, "that such a man -a practical man, as you call himwould have managed this affair a little differently when he found that a boy acting for him had brought home the wrong horse. I can hardly conceive of his allowing you to come alone to return him."

"He would have come himself," replied Kit; "he spoke of it- -but he was sick this morning. And as I had made the blunder, I thought that I ought to correct it."

"What's his ailment?"

A peculiarly bright look flashed out of Kit's eyes as he answered, using the flat, vernacular pronunciation of the word:

"Azmy.' That 's what Uncle and Aunt call it. He was chilled by the damp air, when he went out to look at the horse last night, and this morning he had a bumble-bees' nest in his throat."

"What does he do for his asthma?" Mr. Benting inquired.

"He shuts himself up in his room and burns an herb that has been steeped in saltpeter. The smoke would kill me," - Kit smiled again," but he thinks it cures him."

Mr. Benting had several more questions to ask about the uncle and aunt, and the farm, and Kit's father and mother; to all which he received such prompt and natural replies, often spiced with humor, that he was forced to conclude that so much, at least, of the boy's story was not all fiction. He then wished to know why Kit, who claimed to have been on his way to Peaceville when captured, was first seen riding in the other direction. That brought out the story of the knife, which Mr. Benting asked to see. Examining it, he found the letters C. D. engraved on the handle.

"Are these your initiais?" he asked.

"Yes, sir,” replied Kit, who had already told his name, first to the Benting boys, then to the judge, and lastly to Mr. Benting himself. "They were my father's initials, too; the knife used to belong to him. I thought more of it for that reason; I never supposed it would be the means of getting me into trouble!"

Mr. Benting gave back the knife; then he turned to the judge.

"I believe this is an honest boy," he said, “and if you will fix his bail at a reasonable figure, I will be his surety."

"I am glad to hear it," said the judge, perhaps almost as much on Kit's account as out of regard for his dinner.

A bond was quickly filled out and duly signed; and Kit, to his great joy, was declared free to proceed about his business until his presence should be again required by the court.

"Now, the best thing you can do," said Mr. Benting, "is to go home with me and stay till you get over your fatigue and worry. I'll promise you better treatment than you have received from my boys hitherto."

Kit thought of Elsie and the charming old farmhouse at Maple Park, with a thrill of pleasant anticipation. But the gleam that crossed his face was quickly succeeded by shadow.

"I should be very glad indeed to do that," he replied. "But I must make one more attempt to find my uncle's horse, before I go anywhere to rest."

"How will you begin?" asked Mr. Benting.

"I shall go to Peaceville, where I certainly saw him yesterday, and try to trace him from there. If your sons," Kit added, with a glance at Lon, "will tell me all they found out about the fellow

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