One evening in the following week, when we were sitting out on the lawn, the Squire smoking, Mrs. Todhetley nursing her face in her hand, with toothache as usual, Tod teasing Hugh and Lena, and I up in the beech-tree, a horseman rode in. It proved to be Mr. Jacobson. Giles took his horse, and he came and sat down on the bench. The Squire asked him what he'd take, and being thirsty, he chose cider. Which Thomas brought. "Here's a go," began Mr. Jacobson. "Have you heard what's up?" "I've not heard anything," answered the Squire. "Major Parrifer has a summons served on him for working in his garden on a Sunday, and is to appear before the magistrates at Alcester to-morrow," continued old Jacobson, drinking off a glass of cider at a draught. "No!" cried Squire Todhetley. "It's a fact. Blossom, our groom, has also a summons served on him to give evidence." Mrs. Todhetley lifted her face; Tod left Hugh and Lena to themselves: I slid down from the beech-tree; and we listened for more. But Mr. Jacobson could not give particulars, or say much more than he had already said. All he knew was, that on Monday morning George Reed had appeared before the magistrates and made a complaint. At first they were unwilling to grant a summons; laughed at it; but Reed, in a burst of reproach, civilly delivered, asked why there should be a law for the poor and not for the rich, and in what lay the difference between himself and Major Parrifer; that the one should be called to account and punished for doing wrong, and the other was not even to be accused when he had done it. "Brandon happened to be on the bench," continued Jacobson. "He appeared struck with the argument, and signed the summons." The Squire nodded. "My belief is," continued old Jacobson, with a wink over the rim of the cider glass, "that granting that summons was as good as a play to Brandon and the rest. I'd as lieve, though, that they'd not brought Blossom into it." "Why?" asked Mrs. Todhetley, who had been grieved at the time at the injustice done to Reed. "Well, Parrifer is a disagreeable man to offend. And he is sure to visit Blossom's part in this on me." "Let him," said Tod, with enthusiasm. "Well done, George Reed!" Be you very sure we went over to the fight. Squire Todhetley did not appear: at which Tod exploded a little: he only wished _he_ was a magistrate, wouldn't he take his place and judge the Major! But the Pater said that when people had lived to his age, they liked to be at peace with their neighbours--not but what he hoped Parrifer would "get it," for having been so cruelly hard upon Reed. * * * * *