ut another matter. Do you know
anyone of the name of Polton?"
"Yes," replied Gummer, turning a dusky red. "I've just found out his
real name. I thought he was called Simmons."
"Tell us what you know about him," said Anstey, with a mischievous
smile.
"Well," said the boy, with a ferocious scowl at the bland and smiling
Polton, "one day he come down to the yacht when the gentlemen had gone
ashore. I believe he'd seen 'em go. And he offers me ten shillin' to let
him see all the boots and shoes we'd got on board. I didn't see no harm,
so I turns out the whole lot in the cabin for him to look at. While he
was lookin' at 'em he asks me to fetch a pair of mine from the fo'c'sle,
so I fetches 'em. When I come back he was pitchin' the boots and shoes
back into the locker. Then, presently, he nips off, and when he was
gone I looked over the shoes, and then I found there was a pair missing.
They was an old pair of Mr. Jezzard's, and what made him nick 'em is
more than I can understand."
"Would you know those shoes if you saw them!"
"Yes, I should," replied the lad.
"Are these the pair?" Anstey handed the boy a pair of dilapidated canvas
shoes, which he seized eagerly.
"Yes, these is the ones what he stole!" he exclaimed.
Anstey took them back from the boy's reluctant hands, and passed them up
to the magistrate's desk. "I think," said he, "that if your Worship will
compare these shoes with the last pair of moulds, you will have no doubt
that these are the shoes which made the footprints from the sea to
Sundersley Gap and back again."
The magistrates together compared the shoes and the moulds amidst a
breathless silence. At length the chairman laid them down on the desk.
"It is impossible to doubt it," said he. "The broken heel and the tear
in the rubber sole, with the remains of the chequered pattern, make the
identity practically certain."
As the chairman made this statement I involuntarily glanced round to the
place where Jezzard was sitting. But he was not there; neither he, nor
Pitford, nor Leach. Taking advantage of the preoccupation of the Court,
they had quietly slipped out of the door. But I was not the only person
who had noted their absence. The inspector and the sergeant were already
in earnest consultation, and a minute later they, too, hurriedly
departed.
The proceedings now speedily came to an end. After a brief discussion
with his brother-magistrates, the chairman addressed the Court.
"T
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