"That depends. It makes a difference how much Lamoury's hurt. The penalty might be severe if he's got a bad wound. But even then, if we could show that you didn't know he was there, or that the gun went off by accident, or that you were firing at something else, it would make a big difference. And if you can show that you weren't there at all--why, out you go, scot-free. But, Jim, you can see yourself that if you don't tell what you know, everybody'll think that you shot and meant to hurt Lamoury, and then it might go pretty hard with you. Now come, tell me what happened." "You'd better tell, Jimmie," said Mrs. Calkins, straightening up from her wash-tub. "You won't find any better friends than Mr. Farnsworth and Miss Ware." The young man, as he talked, watched the boy curiously. Jim flushed and squirmed, and looked now at the floor and now out at the window, with a marked uneasiness and embarrassment that greatly puzzled his friend. And when he stopped, and the boy had to answer, his distress became really pitiable. "Can't you tell me, Jim?" Mr. Farnsworth hazarded, after a little, putting a kindly hand on the boy's arm, while Mrs. Calkins stood quiet by her tub in friendly expectation. But Jim remained dumb. After waiting a little, Farnsworth, seeing the boy so miserable, took pity on him. "Well, never mind, Jim," he said. "You needn't tell if you don't want to." He would have to let Nancy coax it out of him. But he was puzzled, impressed with a sense of mystery and with a growing conviction that the boy was shielding some one else. He began to talk cheerfully of other things, hoping that Jim might perhaps drop a useful hint, or, at least, that the boy would gain confidence in him as a friend. By chance he asked:-- "Where did you get the knife, Jim?" "Mr. Peaslee gave it to me." "Peaslee!" exclaimed Farnsworth. He well knew the "closeness" of his fellow juror. "It isn't much of a knife," said Jim, apologetic but pleased. Jim's views of the world were changing: his father, although a bandit chief, had let him go to jail, while this stingy old man, with no halo of adventure about him, gave him a knife; and here were Miss Ware and Mr. Farnsworth and Mrs. Calkins and the jailer, none of them smugglers, who were very kind. Farnsworth rose to go. Then Jim, summoning all his courage, asked a question which had long been trembling on his lips. "What do they do to smugglers, Mr. Farnsworth?" "Fine 'em, or put 'em in jail, or both. Why?" "Nothing much," said Jim, but obviously he was cast down. Farnsworth walked thoughtfully toward his store. "By George!" he thought suddenly. "I wonder--" The gossip about the senior Edwards had occurred to him, and at the same time he remembered the quarrel with Lamoury. "But what nonsense!" he thought. "If Edwards wanted to shoot any one he wouldn't do it in his own back yard, and he wouldn't treat his own boy that way, either." Still, the idea clung to him.