Part 12

"Aw, that's all right," muttered the boy. "She's my sister, ain't she?"

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THE OLD GROVE CROSSING

By Albert H. Coggins

More mother's tears, and the fourth prisoner discharged! The judge began to fear permanent softening of the heart and therefore took grim satisfaction when the name Timothy McMenamin, alias "One Eyed Johnny," was called and there shambled into the dock a chronic old jail-bird whose appearance left no remote possibility of the further painful exercise of discretionary powers.

Silence reigned while his Honour scanned the card. From highway robbery and safe cracking the record of Timothy ran the entire gamut of inspiring action, and by some subtle mental telepathy the crowd knew that he had indeed been a man of parts. But now Timothy was in the sere and yellow and had fallen on evil days. The Judge read aloud from the present indictment, to which Timothy had sullenly pleaded "Guilty."

"Soliciting alms upon the public thoroughfare and vagrancy."

Then fraught with deep agrieve, his "Why--Timothy!" caught the levity of the crowded courtroom.

The Judge pursed pondering lips. Then a playful thought was his.

"Are you represented by counsel, Timothy?"

Timothy was not.

"Mr. Wallace!"

If a room may be said to gasp, that courtroom gasped.

William R. K. Wallace!

The rubber rattle of an impromptu assignment, usually thrown the teething tyro, given to the very leader of the bar!

His Honour was indeed facetious.

Wallace, engaged in an undertone confab with a court clerk, looked up, converted the instinctive gesture of impatience into one of good-natured acquiescence, and stepped forward. The crowd's tribute to supremacy: a hush so distinct as to seem almost audible.

The Judge assumed due solemnity.

"Mr. Wallace, we have here a knight-errant of most distinguished parts. He has sojourned in many public institutions. A most cosmopolitan citizen and of unquestioned social standing; having met some of the best wardens in the country. Some twenty years ago he committed a little indiscretion up in Montour County, dwelling there subsequently for a period of six months. That being your own native heath, Mr. Wallace, would it not be chivalric and neighbourly upon your part to volunteer your professional services!"

The crowd enjoyed the speech and scene. In all his years at the bar no one had ever seen William R. K. Wallace nonplussed. Now his Honour had succeeded in "putting one over" on him. His "Certainly, your Honour," was but instinctive. Of the purport of a possible plea Wallace had no remote idea. So he turned and indulged in a critically professional survey of his client.

As he took in the sullen figure, unshaven, unkempt, and hard, the forbidding aspect painfully accentuated by the patch over one sightless eye--what came of a sudden to the attorney? Masterful and adroit though he was, did he feel the utter futility of it all? It certainly seemed that Wallace--William R. K. Wallace--trembled through an acute second of actual stage fright, the horrible unnerved instant when the mind gropes and finds no substance of thought. Yes, his Honour had scored.

Then, himself again, he addressed the Court. Quietly, almost conversationally and entirely away from the subject at hand; but this was Wallace, and no one stayed him.

"I was born in Centre County, your Honour, not Montour, but so close to the county line that your Honour's impression is to all intents and purposes correct. So close, in fact, that right down the driveway, scarcely a hundred yards away, one could step into Montour County by crossing the railroad tracks, for _they_ were the county line at that corner."

Then for a few seconds he indulged in memory's visualization of early days. Still in a desultory way he continued:

"We lived there contentedly, your Honour, a good father, a sainted mother, myself a grown boy, and--and a baby sister.... She had come late.... Perhaps that's one reason we made so much of her. Just turned two she was, and a little bundle of winsomeness.... She gathered to herself all the glinting morning sunlight of the mountain tops."

People stirred restlessly. This was not like Wallace. True, he sometimes indulged in sentiment before a jury and ofttime moved the sturdy yeomanry to free some red-handed rascal regardless of the facts. But to parade his own early rural days and his little sister--well, it only indicated that he was sore pressed.

But now the discerning could note the least little shade of resonance and purpose. And, too, he half turned from time to time toward the man in the dock.

"Through that valley the magnificent Blue Diamond Express went thundering by, bearing its burden of the prosperous and contented.... But then there were other trains, the long slow freights that wended their way, laden, down the valley. They, too, carried passengers ... on the couplings ... cramped up underneath ... or smuggled into the corner of a box car. These were of the underworld--the discontented and the disinherited. The tramp, the outcast ... perchance the criminal, making his getaway from city to city."

He glanced keenly, quickly; his client was beginning to emerge from stolid indifference.

"The Old Grove Crossing, as they called it, was not so well guarded twenty years ago as now, your Honour. And one day this little two-year-old took it into her baby head to roam. Perhaps childish fancy paints the wild flowers on a distant hill brighter, perhaps some errant butterfly winged its random way across the tracks--who knows?

"At all events, the wanderlust seized her tiny feet and she had come just so near Montour County that she had but to cross the far track to have completely changed jurisdiction. And there she stood, for a big, slow-moving train of empties occupied that track. Puzzled? Perhaps a little; but still it was a matter of no moment.... Neither, your Honour, was the big, thundering Blue Diamond. Why should it be? There existed in all this world no such thing as either evil or fear.... And so she waited, transfixed only by wonderment as the monster thing bore down on her.... I'm aware, your Honour, that in every well-appointed melodrama the hero always appears at the proper instant.... But in real life sometimes--well, we _have_ tried cases in our courts, the purpose of which was to determine the dollar value of that for which there can be no recompense--a baby life crushed out."

He paused for an impressive second.

"And this was my baby sister.

"Oh, yes, they saw her ... when less than two hundred feet away. Along that straightaway the Montour Valley Railroad Company, in its corporate wisdom, shot its Blue Diamond seventy miles an hour. The engineer was the best man on the line--and he fainted dead away. That's what their best man did. He had a baby of his own. Instinct made him throw on the brakes ... as well, a child's bucket of sand on the tracks! ... Down, down it came, shrieking, crashing, pounding, and swirling from side to side; belching its hell of destruction and rasping its million sparks as the brakes half gripped.... Only one small mercy vouchsafed--by its awful might and momentum--instant death!"

Dramatically Wallace passed his hand over his forehead. The Judge had done the same. So well had he played upon their emotions that he sensed to perfection the proper pause duration....

"No, your Honour," he said quietly, "she did not die. This little story of real life followed the conventional.... Sometimes God is as good as the dramatist. They told us the meagre details. _He_ didn't; he had a pressing engagement and slipped away, resuming, I suppose, his 'reservations' on his Blue Diamond.... He wasn't very prepossessing, anyway, from all accounts. Any ten-twenty-thirty dramatist could have given us a more presentable, better manicured hero."

Wallace sauntered a little.

"This object that tumbled from a box car, sprawled, picked himself up, and then jumped like a cat, was, as a matter of fact, a nobody, an outcast, a crook----"

Casually, it seemed, his hand rested on the bowed shoulder of the broken old man.

"Just a one-eyed yeggman, making his way----"

He got no further. The courtroom was in an uproar and unrestrained applause ran its riotous course. There was none to check it.

His Honour, savagely surreptitious with his handkerchief, finally took command of himself and the situation.

"Mr. Wallace, the Court requires no argument in this case. We will accept the guarantee of future good conduct which you were about to offer, and, if necessary, underwrite it ourselves.... Sentence suspended!"

Then as the Court was adjourned and they crowded about the pair of them, counsel and client, a shouldering, demonstrative throng a dozen deep, the Judge, before retiring stilled them for a brief afterword.

"Mr. Wallace, in the matter of the--ah, of certain refreshments, in which we had rendered a mental ruling incidental to the costs thereof, we would say that ruling is hereby reversed and the--the refreshments--are on--the Court."

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LOST AND FOUND

By John Kendrick Bangs

-- I --

The week-end was over, and Begbie had returned to town, restless, and strangely unhappy. There was within him a curious sense of something lost, and yet, now and then, the intimation of another something that seemed to be gain wholly would flash across the horizon of his reflections like a ray of sunshine attempting to penetrate a possible rift in the clouds.

He unpacked his suit-case listlessly, and compared its contents with the catalogue of his week-end needs which he always kept pasted on the inner side of the cover of his suit-case. Everything was there, from hair-brush to dinner-coat--and yet that sense of something left behind still oppressed him. A second time he went over the list and compared it with his possessions, to find that nothing was missing; and then on a sudden there flashed across his mind a full realization of what the lost object was.

"Ah!" he ejaculated with a deep sigh of relief.

"That's it! I will write at once to my hostess and ask her to return it."

## Action followed the resolution, and, seating himself at his

escritoire, Begbie wrote:

"The Mossmere, New York. "August ----, 19--.

"My Dear Mrs. Shelton:

"Upon my return from the never-to-be-forgotten series of golden hours at Sea Cliff I find that, after the habit of the departing guest, I have left at least one of my possessions behind me. It is of value perhaps to nobody but myself, but, poor as it is, I cannot very well do without it. It is my _heart_. If by some good chance you have found it, and it is of no use to you, will you be good enough some time soon, when you have nothing better to do, to return it to me? Or, if by some good fortune you find it worth retaining, will you please tell me so, that I may know that it is in your custody and is not lying somewhere cold and neglected? It is the only one I have, and it has never passed out of my keeping before.

"Always devotedly yours, "Harrison Begbie."

-- II --

It was on the morning of the second day after the mailing of this letter that Begbie found a dainty-hued missive lying beside his plate at the breakfast-table. It was postmarked Sea Cliff, and addressed in the familiar handwriting of his hostess. Feverishly he tore it open, and found the following:

"Sea Cliff, August ----, 19--.

"My Dear Mr. Begbie:

"What careless creatures you men are! I have found ten such articles as you describe in my house during the past ten days, and out of so vast and varied a number I cannot quite decide which one is yours. Some of them are badly cracked; some of them are battered hopelessly--only one of them is in what I should call an A1, first class, condition. I am hoping it is yours, but I do not know. In any event, on receipt of this won't you come down here at once and we can run over them together. I will meet you with the motor on the arrival of the 12:15 at Wavecrest Station.

"Meanwhile, my dear Mr. Begbie, knowing how essential a part of the human mechanism a heart truly is--_I send you mine_ to take the place of the other. You may keep it until your own is returned to you.

"Always sincerely, "Mary Shelton."

"P.S.--Telegraph me if you will be on the 12:15."

-- III --

Ten minutes later the following rush-message sped over the wires:

"New York, Aug. ----, 19--. "Mrs. Shelton, Sea Cliff, L. I.:

"Haven't time to wire you of arrival on 12:15. Am rushing to catch the 9:05.

"Harrison."

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YOU CAN NEVER TELL

By "B. MacArthur"

Very dimly shone the lamps of the rickshaws; very faintly came the tap-tap of the sandals passing to and fro on the Bund. Yokohama was going to sleep, and the great liners in the bay looked dark and ghost-like against the rising moon. The three men sitting on the terrace of the Grand Hotel met here every ninth week. They were captains of three of the liners. All were Englishmen. Blackburn, who commanded a ship owned and manned by Japanese, lit his pipe and gazed out across the harbour, drawing his hand over his brow and hair.

"Same old heat," he said.

The others nodded.

Bainbridge, a slight little man with fair hair, moved restlessly.

"A week, and we'll all be at opposite corners again," he said, "none of them much cooler."

"Not bad at home now," mused Villiers, broad and silent man, with the gray eyes of a dreamer. He leaned forward, smiling slightly.

"D'ye know, it's three years next month since I've seen th' wife. Devil of a life! And I don't see my way to getting back yet, either. No place for women, the East."

Bainbridge stared at him uneasily.

"Yes, deuce of a life," he assented, "but worse for the women, even in England. Always standing on their own legs, as it were, pinching and skimping for a chap they only see once in a couple of years. I say, y'know, it's rotten bad for them, at best."

"Quite right," said Villiers, "and it is an experience that is bound to have its effect. The strong woman will be stronger, the weak woman weaker, and the bad woman--will go under."

Blackburn smiled.

"Then we are three lucky chaps," he said, and blew a ring of smoke and looked at it rather sentimentally.

Villiers laughed.

"The queer part about it is the faith they've got. It's that which pulls them through. I believe if I wrote the wife to-night that I'd a Japanese girl in Nagasaki she'd never believe me, though she's quite sophisticated enough to be cognizant of the prevalence of that sort of thing out here. She takes the attitude that such things might happen--but not to her or hers. It's rather a potent point of view."

"It's an absurd point of view--no offence to you, old chap," said Bainbridge. "Suppose it was a fact and she had to face it--what would be her attitude?"

"It couldn't be a fact so long as she felt as she does about it," answered Villiers; "it is that which insures her being quite right in her belief."

"Oh, rot!" said Bainbridge. "You're an idealist." He took a deep drink from his tall glass. "I'll bet you if all three of us wrote home to-night in the light of remorseful confession every one of us would receive replies, next mail out, to the same effect."

"There's just one way to prove that," said Villiers, "and that's to write."

"Done!" said Bainbridge.

"Hold on, old chaps!" Blackburn knocked out the ashes from his pipe. "D'ye know you're about to play a devilish risky game? Shouldn't care to enter it myself. Luck to you, however, if you must. But both of you are taking too much for granted."

"You hold the stakes, then," said Villiers complacently. "Next trip we meet here, as per schedule, we'll have our mail first thing and rendezvous at eight for supper. If we can't read our letters aloud we can at least describe the attitude taken therein, which is the point under discussion."

"Very well," said Blackburn, "but I warn you it's a silly affair."

* * * * *

Nine weeks later Blackburn, tying his tie before the mirror in his cabin, felt a curious interest in seeing his two friends as had been arranged at their previous meeting. They would have received their mail from home even as he had received his, but it was with a thrill of satisfaction that he remembered he had not endangered his own or his wife's happiness in what he considered the mad manner of his friends.

Very promptly, then, and most serene, he appeared on the terrace and seated himself at the usual table to await their arrival.

Bainbridge presently appeared and, after greeting Blackburn, sat down and lit a pipe. They talked spasmodically. A curious tranquillity seemed to have enveloped the little man, which so held Blackburn's attention that he could think of nothing to say. They sat in silence, Blackburn mentally taking stock of his friend. All his nervousness and cynicism seemed to have left him, and his eyes, usually so furtive, looked very still and deep.

"Wonder why Villiers doesn't come along," said Blackburn at last.

Bainbridge nodded.... "I'll read you my letter now," he said, and in a lower voice: "By Jove, old chap, I was quite wrong, d'ye know? Never would have believed it possible any one could feel so about a chap like me."

He laid the letter on the table. "Wonderful thing that," he said; and Blackburn took it.

"Are you quite sure you want me to read this?" he asked.

"Quite," replied Bainbridge, "because--because it's changed things so--for me, you know."

Blackburn read:

"Dear Lad:

"Something in my heart tells me this horrible thing isn't true. It can't be. Such things may happen to people, but somehow I can't feel it has happened to me and mine. But if it has--and you will begin again because your best nature still cares for me--won't you begin right now, because I love you and will try to forget. I can't write more.

"Minnie."

When Blackburn had finished he folded it very gently and handed it to Bainbridge.

"I congratulate you, old fellow," he said gravely, and then: "Let's go up to Villiers' room and stir him up. He may be snoozing."

They rose and climbed the stairs to the room Villiers was wont to occupy during his stay in port. The door was unlocked, and after knocking and receiving no reply they entered. It was so dark at first they could see nothing. Blackburn, dimly discerning the bureau, shuffled toward it to light the gas. But before he reached it his foot struck a soft object, and simultaneously a nauseous wave of horror swept over him.

"My God! Light a match," he said.

Bainbridge did so and, stepping over the prone figure, lit the gas with trembling hands.

Villiers was quite dead. His gun lay by his side, and in a little pool of blood by his right temple a crumpled letter lay, face up.

"Nothing should be touched," said Blackburn, "until the proper steps have been taken--except----"

Bainbridge stooped and lifted the bloody page.

"Except this," he said, and, folding it carefully, put it in his wallet.

* * * * *

When, many hours later, Blackburn was aboard his ship, he locked his cabin door, and Bainbridge, who had accompanied him for the purpose, spread out the sheet and read it slowly.

"My Dear Frank:

"Your rather extraordinary epistle has reached me, and I assure you it was quite unnecessary. You surely do not expect me to have lived all these years alone and to have known men as I do without realizing that I could scarcely expect you to live the life of a celibate in the 'Far East.' In this strange little game of life we must take our pleasures as they come, and I have taken mine even as I have not prevented you from taking yours. Foolish boy! If you expected me to have hysterics over your self-imposed confession you may be relieved to know that I merely laughed at it. We are all in the same boat, we sinners, so why should one of us cavil at another? Cheer up and don't take life so seriously.

"Sue."

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THE ESCAPE

By A. Leslie Goodwin

The tent flap lifted and dropped. The prisoner could make out the dim outlines of a man's form.

"To be shot at sunrise, eh?"

The prisoner stirred quickly. That voice was strangely familiar to him.

The figure moved nearer. A knife flashed and the prisoner's bonds fell off.

"Follow me, and not a sound."

They crept out of the tent, past a dozing sentry, and across a dark field.

"Now," said the guide, as they straightened up in the shadow of a hedge, "a proposition, for cousins will be cousins, even in war."

He paused, looked warily around, and emitted a low chuckle.

"Six months ago," he continued, "when I was captured by your side and sentenced to be shot you rescued me, as I have you. You showed me our lines and gave me two minutes to get away. After that two minutes you were to fire, and you----"

He stopped, wheeled like a flash, but too late. A shot rang out, and another.

The two men stiffened, leaned toward each other, gasped, and dropped to the ground.

Around the corner of the hedge stepped the sentry, a smoking automatic in his hand.

"Huh!" he growled, stirring the prostrate figures with his foot. "Relatives have no business on opposite sides, anyway."

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TWO LETTERS, A TELEGRAM, AND A FINALE

By H. S. Haskins

"New York, September 10.

"Dearest Marian:

"Is it not time to break silence? Three months have passed since we quarrelled on the eve of your departure for the mountains. I wrote twice during the first week. You did not answer. Pride forbade my risking another rebuff.

"Frequently I have been so desperate that it has consoled me to run into needless danger. Often, during the summer, I have swum out beyond the breakers when there was a heavy undertow. I have taken automobile tours by myself, speeding at seventy miles an hour over narrow roads along mountainsides.

"These foolhardy adventures were backed by what must seem to you an unaccountable desire for revenge. I pictured your face as you read an account of my death; gloated over the horror in your eyes when they scanned the ghastly details.

"I invented such news items as these: 'Blake's body was cast up on the beach, horribly gashed by the rocks'; or, 'The automobile leaped into a chasm. Blake, clinging to the wheel, was crushed into an unrecognizable mass when the car turned turtle.'

"This desire to punish you for your neglect seems a barbarous instinct or a childish whim, as you choose. But, ashamed of it as I may be, and struggle against it as I will, such a thought is often with me.

"Take this morning, for instance: alighting from the train at Jersey City, I stopped to admire the huge locomotive which has been lately put on the morning express. I laid my hand on one bulky cylinder. 'What if this monster should explode with me standing here!' I thought. 'What if one side of my face and my right arm were blown off! What would she say, my little Princess of Indifference, far away in her mountain fastness?'