‘Yes. Jury said “not guilty”, and I reckon that sounded good to Jasper. I was right glad he come off so easy. Glad, I am, sure and certain, mighty glad. I said to myself at the time, “What,” I said, “will become of poor Mrs Kent and the youngone?” That’s what I said. “They could come over here and stay till they find a place to go,” I said.’

Ellen knew that this was true, that Marthy had said this and that Marthy would have taken her in. ‘It’s all past and over now, I reckon,’ she said.

‘They said Jasper Kent he had a close shave that time, nohow,’ Marthy said, holding to the matter. ‘Said the lawyers traded cases, swapped. “I let you win this-here and you let me have that-there.” That’s how it was said it was. Some even said the lawyers played cards half the night before, and traded the cases back and forth all night, sometimes Kent was in the win and again the State – that’s Wingate’s side. That-there lawyer he ran for the legislature next election and that was what was told in the speeches. Said if they had quit the game, say, at ten o’clock Jasper Kent would ’a’ been in the prison right now. That’s what was told. But I reckon it wasn’t so bad as that nohow. They traded cases about, it was said, but maybe the card game might ’a’ been campaign talk, election time. The other man won to the legislature, nohow. You never heared about all this, you gone from here, I reckon. It made a heap of talk up at the shop and all around.’

‘But I thought… I thought…’ Ellen was greatly surprised, but she checked her speech before she had said what she thought, which was that the jury had found the right and had established it, finding it on Henry’s statement. She had sold her calf to pay the lawyer. She had thought that the jury had set a certain way as right and had made every other way wrong. ‘But it’s all over and done now, I reckon. All forgot. No call to bring it up and to hold it in mind. It was right worrysome whilst it was a-goen on, but it’s over now,’ she said.

‘Yes, it was worrysome, I reckon, and a right close shave for Jasper Kent, they said. I often say Bill he don’t amount to shucks, but then he ain’t never been in trouble yet in court, no way or how, and I reckon I got a right smart to be thankful about. Never yet in no sort of trouble to bring worry to a body.’

‘But it’s all over now, I’d reckon, and no call to keep in mind about it, I say. Whatever it was and however it come, it’s over, ain’t it?’

‘Maybe it is. I hope so, nohow. It wouldn’t surprise me though if Jasper Kent, he saw trouble about it yet. I’d fear trouble about it all some way. I always said, Jasper Kent, he might maybe see a sight of trouble over that-there barn even yet and over that-there horse he burned up. It’s a right serious thing. It was said the reason Jasper couldn’t get a better place to work – Goddard’s is no good place, everybody knows – was because of that-there trouble he was in. Nobody wanted a man that was known to ’a’ been in court that way, up for burnen a man’s barn for spite. Folks is mean that way. Wish you no harm, but at the same time hire somebody else. That was why he had to stay to Goddard’s, the worst place in the county, I reckon, treats his men like dirt. Bad place, every body knows.’