"Yes, unless you can work on the sympathies of old Johnson and that boy to let us off on some of the charges," remarked the leader, significantly.
"What do you mean? They are more bitter against me than all the rest of you," responded Bagsley, with some irritation in his tones.
"Yes, and for cause; but suppose you remove that cause?" said Brill, pointedly.
"And get myself in a worse scrape," snapped Bagsley.
"Not necessarily; you can put your conditions, and help yourself and the rest of us," was the hasty reply; for the papers were now completed, and the officers were handcuffing the prisoners together previous to leading them from the room.
Enough had been said, however, to excite in Bagsley's heart a hope he would not be slow to follow up.
The next step in the series of circumstances working favorably for the fulfillment of Budd's purpose occurred the next day, way off among the hills of New Hampshire. Bagsley, it will be remembered, was known, and however it may have been with his companions, he was not able to conceal his identity under a false name. The newspapers, therefore, recording the capture of the burglars, gave his name in full; and one of those papers went into the boyhood home of the unfortunate man, carrying dismay to his aged father and mother still abiding there. The name was that of their only son, from whom they had not heard in long months, and of whose career they had for a long time had misgiving.
So the aged father sat down, and with trembling hand wrote to the keeper of the jail asking for further particulars as to the robbery, and a complete identification, if possible, of the prisoner who bore his son's name. This letter in due time reached the jailer, and was at once taken to Bagsley's cell. He bore up bravely under the words the father had penned, but when he read at the bottom of the sheet a single line in the mother's handwriting--that line reading "If you are our Tommy, let us know at once, and we'll come to you and spare no expense to save you"--he broke completely down. The memory of his mother--of her love, that had ever stood ready to shield him--had touched his heart. He was not as hardened as he himself had thought, and a desire to see his mother once more before the prison-walls closed upon him for long years, and to hear from her own lips that she forgave her wayward boy, led him to answer his father's letter.