Part 14

“She’s your wife, all the same,” Daniel remarked dryly, “and she’s going to help me save Leigh.”

“I’m done with her,” William retorted.

“You can’t say that--you won’t say it--if she sacrifices herself for us,” returned Daniel, watching him.

“I’m done with her,” William repeated, and closed his eyes, evidently considering that he had closed the subject.

Daniel observed him a moment in silence. He was perfectly aware that argument was useless, and he was not altogether prepared to argue for Fanchon. His brother--who looked ill and wretched--was apparently falling asleep, so Daniel went to the table, confiscated a half-empty bottle of whisky, and switched off the lights. He drew up the shades and opened all the windows, and the dead atmosphere of the room was revivified with sunshine and air.

Daniel looked at William again, but there was no movement or sound from him, so the lame brother left the room, closing the door softly behind him. He had a strange feeling as if he had closed it upon a corpse, as if the brother he had known had passed away, and into this shell that was left behind some other spirit had entered. The thought reminded Daniel of the seven devils of the Bible. Certainly the change in William was for the worse.

But he had no time to think of William. His business took him to Judge Jessup’s office, and from there to the court-house, where a panel of the grand jury had been summoned. As he made his way toward Jessup’s office he encountered a crowd on the main street, and saw a hearse proceeding toward the station, carrying a plain pinewood box. The inquest being over, Corwin’s body was to be shipped to New York.

Daniel had to wait for the hearse to pass, aware of the curious glances that came his way. A picture rose before his mind of a little girl of fifteen being married to a coarse brute more than twice her age, who wanted her to earn his living for him. If he could only get that picture clean-cut before a jury!

Daniel had that delicate keenness of perception that makes great orators feel their audiences. He knew intuitively the thing that touched the heart, he had latent in him a gift for playing on the feelings of the masses, as some musicians have in them a singular power to draw more music from the chords of their instruments than other men. He had perceived it, too, in Fanchon, if he could only mold her to her rôle. He was trying to marshal his thoughts, to see a way to bring Fanchon before the jury without losing the effect of her evidence, when he reached Jessup’s office.

The judge, who was waiting to go before the grand jury, was sitting in his swivel chair in his shirt-sleeves, with his hat on. He scarcely glanced up when Daniel entered, for he was listening to a visitor. Samuel Bernstein sat in the prisoner’s dock--as Daniel called the stiff chair by the window where the judge seated his doubtful clients and penalized them with a savage, unwavering observation. He was observing Bernstein now over the tops of his glasses, exactly as he would have observed a gipsy-moth. To his mind, Bernstein had been nearly as disastrous.

The motion-picture producer seemed to be suffering extremely from the heat. He had his hat off, and was mopping beads of perspiration from his forehead.

“Say, judge, I never thought about a kid like that usin’ shootin’-irons,” he said mournfully. “But I told him the truth--every bit of it! I’ll go on the stand an’ swear to it. You see, it was this way--I couldn’t get the thing to ’em, an’ I thought they oughter know.”

The judge glared at him in silence, then swung his swivel chair around a little and looked over the papers on his desk.

“Meddling, Mr. Bernstein; nothing at all but meddling in other people’s business,” he retorted shortly. “If I had my way there’d be a new law in this State. I’d send nosey people to the work-house, sir. I’d give ’em something to do. Here’s your deposition. Read it over. You’ll be called again, some time this afternoon.”

“Now, looka here, judge, I ain’t a meddler,” objected Bernstein plaintively. “That man Corwin was blackmailin’ the lady and I wanted to stop him. I’m conferring a favor now, sir, goin’ on the stand. Anybody who knows Sam Bernstein knows he ain’t goin’ to lie. I’ve got a reputation. This trial, sir, with me on the stand----” He paused regretfully. “Say, it would make just about three thousand feet of great stuff--and they won’t let me bring in my camera-men!”

“Confound your camera-men!” said the judge, and rose, slamming down the top of his desk. “Dan, you here? We’ve got to go over to the court-house now. You come over in half an hour, Bernstein. I reckon it isn’t more than one thousand feet of film to the square,” he added with a sudden, irresistible twinkle.

Even Bernstein laughed.

The judge, linking his arm in Daniel’s, kept pace with the younger man as they walked up the main street toward the old court-house. It was a little past ten o’clock now, and the street was full. Daniel noticed that the tide was flowing toward the court-house. His cheeks reddened angrily under the curious glances of men and women in the crowds.

There had been a strong element of sympathy for Corwin. He had been freehanded, and had made himself at home in local sporting circles. Daniel, with his fine perception of the trend of human feeling, knew that the sympathy was not all on their side. Fanchon’s famous dance at the church musicale, and her frequent appearances with the man himself, had all worked against her. It did not seem quite fair to lay all the blame on Corwin.

If William had shot him, the thing would have been understood. Leigh’s act was subject to terrible misinterpretations. It seemed as if the Carter family had employed a boy to do the shooting in the hope of getting off scot-free. To half the men on the street it looked like a case of sheer cowardice on the husband’s part, and Daniel knew it. He had that kind of sensitiveness--wrought up by much solitary suffering and introspective thought--that made this consciousness of the possible charge of cowardice against them all a kind of torture. He was very white, and his eyes sparkled dangerously.

“He looks as if he might kill a man, lame as he is,” one of the bystanders whispered, and Daniel heard it.

“I don’t know that we can get an indictment for manslaughter, Dan,” said the judge, in his ear. “Seems to me it’ll be murder, but there’s no telling with that jury.”

Daniel, thinking of Leigh’s boyish face and girlish eyes, set his teeth very hard. At that moment he had no feeling of pity for Fanchon.

“When a man gets married the way William did,” remarked the judge, “it’s mighty like putting your hand into a grab-bag at a church fair. You’re not going to get anything useful out of it.”

Daniel said nothing.

They crossed the square and ascended the court-house steps half an hour before the time set for the grand jury.

Meanwhile, Mr. Carter came down to Judge Jessup’s office and collapsed there. He had intended to go on to the court-house, but he could not. He sat down limply in the judge’s chair with one hand on the telephone, waiting to be called.

He had passed a terrible night. Mrs. Carter had indulged in the only fit of hysterics she had ever had in her life, and her husband had thought, at first, that it was apoplexy. He had summoned Dr. Barbour, rousing the good man from his bed, and had caught a lecture for it.

“Never seen a woman in hysterics before?” the doctor asked fiercely. “Put her feet in hot mustard water. I reckon that when you see a real fit you’ll turn in the fire-alarm!”

But he was unable to eradicate Mr. Carter’s first impressions. Thinking it over now, he shook his head.

“Never saw her like that in her life before,” he reflected. “Had seven children and lost three--and never threw a fit before! If Leigh----”

He stopped at that; he couldn’t go any further. He rose and pulled off his coat and unbuttoned his collar. He felt that the heat--it was only an ordinary summer day--was intolerably oppressive. Then he took down the telephone receiver absently, and had to assure central that he didn’t want anything.

“Knocked it off by accident,” he explained mendaciously.

But the incident embarrassed him, and he collapsed into the chair again and fanned himself with his hat. Then the telephone-bell rang sharply in his ear, and he seized the receiver. A tremulous young voice called:

“Is Judge Jessup there?”

“No, the judge has gone over to the court-house. This is Mr. Carter--Johnson Carter.”

“Oh, papa!” It was Emily, and he could almost feel her tears through the instrument. “Mama thought you might be at the judge’s office. Got any news about Leigh?”

“Not yet!” Mr. Carter was hoarse, but he cleared his throat. “How’s mama?”

“She’s all right; she’s just taken peppermint tea. Papa, I’ve got something to tell you.”

Her voice seemed to die away, but he heard her blowing her nose.

“What is it, Emmy?”

“F-Fanchon’s going--she’s got the expressman here for her trunks.”

“Glad of it!” said Mr. Carter dryly. “If she wants a taxi, I’ll send it.”

“Oh, papa!”

“Yes?”

“Mama says she’ll die if she doesn’t know about Leigh soon!”

“I can’t help it, I--say, I see the judge and Dan coming--I’ll call you up again in a minute!”

He hung up the receiver and rushed to the door. Judge Jessup and his son came in soberly. The judge threw his hat down on the table and said nothing.

“Indicted for murder--second degree, father,” said Daniel, averting his eyes.

Mr. Carter tottered to a chair and covered his face with his hands. In the silence of the little office they heard the first shrill cry of a newsboy.

“Extry! Extry! Leigh Carter indicted for murder! Extry!”

Mr. Carter groaned aloud. Then he remembered.

“Dan, Emmy ’phoned me a few minutes ago. That--that woman’s leaving the house--bag and baggage. If you want to ask her anything----”

Judge Jessup interrupted with a roar.

“Get a taxi, Dan! Catch her, don’t let her go! I’ll subpœna her, if necessary. Stop her!”

Daniel, who had turned a startled face on his father, nodded at the judge.

“’Phone mother, father,” he said quietly. “It isn’t fair to keep her waiting even ten minutes. I’ll go out there at once.”

As he spoke, he whistled for a passing taxi. He heard his father’s shaking voice at the phone as he went out.

The cab went off at top speed, and Daniel sank back in the corner, resting his head against the stiff old cushion. He felt a great weariness, a sensation of defeat and despair. He had fought hard for an indictment for manslaughter, but had succeeded in getting a second degree of murder only by the most strenuous effort and the appeal of Leigh’s obvious youth. Daniel knew that they had a hard fight before them, and he doubted the boy’s nerve. The whole thing was hideous to him.

He looked out with dull eyes, aware of the swift passing of the street corners. The taxi swung into the church lane with a shriek of its warning horn, and Daniel looked around at the church door, thinking of Virginia.

The next moment he saw her. The old wagonette and the two fat horses appeared, progressing slowly toward town. Colonel Denbigh and his granddaughter were sitting in the vehicle, facing each other on the two long seats.

Virginia saw Daniel and waved to him. He knew that they had the news, for the colonel was reading an extra, and Virginia’s face was full of it. She seemed to fling him a message of sympathy and courage and faith. Daniel felt it. It roused him. He felt suddenly the impulse of the fighter, and he shut his teeth on it. He must win, he would win!

He was still feeling it when the taxi stopped abruptly at the Carter gate and the chauffeur got down to collect his fare. Daniel paid it absently, aware that the man was staring at the figure that he saw on the piazza.

In the midst of a pile of luggage stood Fanchon. She was dressed for the street, and wore a hat and a fashionable veil that made a singular figure on the side of her pale cheek, like the tail of a black dragon. She was leaning against a trunk that stood on end, her dark eyes fixed gloomily on her approaching brother-in-law.

“What’s this, Fanchon?” he asked quickly. “You’re not going to fail me?”

She shook her head.

“I couldn’t stay here! You can tell William that he can come home. I’m going over to a boarding house on the turnpike. I found it once----”

She blushed suddenly and pitifully, and Daniel knew she referred to her ride. He drew a breath of relief.

“I’m sorry,” he began, half ashamed that she felt driven from the house, and painfully remembering William.

She caught his sleeve, her hand shaking.

“Daniel, tell me--the indictment?”

“Murder in the second degree.”

She reeled back, clutching at the trunk, her face deathly and her fawn-like eyes fixed on his.

“What--what’s the penalty?”

“In this State, imprisonment--five to eighteen years.”

“Five to eighteen years--in prison--for--for Leigh!” she repeated slowly, gasping.

She sank down, leaning on the trunk, and trembling, her eyes still fixed on Daniel’s white, set, unpitying face.

“_Mon Dieu!_” she cried at last, and burst into passionate tears.

XXI

COLONEL DENBIGH was reading the morning paper. He had breakfasted lightly, and he sat on the rear veranda smoking a long cigar. His face was troubled. He had a sincere friendship for the Carters, and he fairly twinged as he read the flaring headlines. There were three columns devoted to the Corwin murder, with a snap-shot of Leigh being led from the court-house to the police van. Half-way down the first column there was an extra large caption to one paragraph:

MRS. WILLIAM CARTER, THE CAUSE OF THE TROUBLE, ONCE A BEAUTIFUL VAUDEVILLE DANCER

The colonel slapped his paper down on his knee with a groan.

“By gum!” he ejaculated softly.

Plato thrust his head out of the door.

“Miss Jinny done say she don’ want dat speckled hen killed fo’ dinner to-morrer, suh.”

The colonel’s mouth twisted under his white mustache.

“Why not?”

“Miss Jinny, she’s been makin’ a pet ob her, yessuh. She say dat speckled hen ain’t gwine ter be killed, an’ I kin take de rooster. Miss Jinny, she say she’s fo’ woman’s rights, col’nel.”

The colonel grinned sardonically.

“You get a steak, Plato. We’ve got to stand up for our own sex. I’m going to keep that rooster.”

“Yessuh, dat we has!” Plato edged back toward the door as he heard Virginia coming. “Mis’ Wilyum Carter done run away from her husband yes’day,” he added in a stage whisper. “Mirandy, de girl dat works dere, done tole me so, yessuh!”

The colonel scowled.

“You tell Miranda to stop gossiping,” he said sharply.

Plato grinned.

“Dat’s woman’s rights, yessuh. Mirandy says so!”

The colonel caught the old negro’s eye and shook with silent laughter.

“Mind your own business, you old rogue!” he said shortly, resuming his paper.

He heard Plato’s discreet retirement and then a frou-frou of skirts. Virginia, in the freshest of white gowns, came out. She was very pale, and there was a little line of worry between her brows.

“Anything new, grandpa?” she asked eagerly, looking at his newspaper. “Can they get Leigh out on bail?”

The colonel shook his head sadly.

“Think of a boy like that held for murder! Bless my soul, it seems as if it was only last year when I saw him in rompers and eating a lollypop. I remember perfectly--the stick was in his mouth and the lollypop all over his face. Good Lord! And he’s shot a man!”

“He’s such a nice boy,” said Virginia. “He has such a sweet, dreamy face, and his eyes are beautiful. Haven’t you noticed how he’s grown up?”

“Yep!” the colonel snapped, frowning at space. “I did notice he was getting to be quite a young lady.”

Virginia laughed musically.

“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?” Then her face sobered. “I’ve just telephoned to Mrs. Carter--I mean Mrs. Johnson Carter,” she explained, blushing suddenly; “and there doesn’t seem to be anything that we can do.”

The colonel nodded thoughtfully.

“I saw Dr. Barbour last night. He says there’s nothing we can do.”

Virginia looked thoughtfully across the green lawn toward the street. It was screened from view here by the colonel’s horse-chestnut, but she glimpsed a strip of the street below the side gate. The sunlight, shining through the honeysuckle on the veranda, flashed on her white gown with glorification, as if it shouted halleluiah, and it shone, too, in her clear eyes. The colonel, who was watching her, thought her the loveliest thing on earth.

“I’m afraid there’s a terrible time down there,” she remarked regretfully. “I mean at the Carters.”

The colonel assented. He was thinking. He dreaded to tell her.

“Jinny, Plato says that----”

He got no farther; she had uttered a soft exclamation and gone down the steps.

“There’s Dan, grandpa!” she said in evident surprise.

The colonel watched her go on to meet Daniel Carter and he saw the change in the young man’s face as they met on the lawn. Daniel was very pale, and he limped badly toward her.

“By gum!” said the colonel below his breath. “I wonder if she knows! Women don’t like weakness, I’m afraid. Nothing that’s been injured appeals--not really. Girls like to imagine demigods. And that poor boy’s breaking his heart for her, by gum!”

Meanwhile, Virginia turned with Daniel, and they came toward the veranda. The colonel rose and descended the steps.

“Dan,” he said in a hoarse voice, holding out his hand, “if there’s anything I can do----”

Daniel shook his head, the muscles of his white face twitching a little from weariness and pain.

“Nothing at all, Colonel, except--to feel for us!”

“Come and sit with us on the piazza,” suggested Virginia. “Can’t you, Dan?”

He shook his head.

“I’ve got to go on to the office, and then over--to the jail. I was passing--I had to stop to say ‘howdy,’ as Plato would express it. Mother’s been ill in bed since yesterday. She wanted me to thank you both for the flowers and for your messages.”

“Flowers and messages are mighty poor substitutes for deeds,” rejoined the colonel bluntly. “You know I’ll go bail for Leigh, if you wish it.”

“Mr. Payson did that at once, thank you. We had Leigh out to see mother, but we couldn’t keep reporters away from him, and we thought it best for him to go back to jail for the present. You see, he wants to go to Fanchon, to express his championship and all that. It’s a hard situation, colonel, any way we can fix it. Leigh’s been in a state of collapse, too--lost his nerve at first.”

“He’s nothing but a kid,” said the colonel with indignation. “I--by gum, Dan, I don’t like to say what I think!”

Virginia clapped her soft hand over his mouth.

“Not another word, grandpa!”

Daniel smiled.

“Never mind, Virginia, the newspapers are blatant. My father read the paper this morning and broke the cream-pitcher--the Wedgewood one, too.”

The colonel caught Virginia’s restraining hand and held it.

“Dan, how’s William?”

Daniel, who was looking at Virginia, became very grave.

“I don’t know how to answer that, colonel. He’s heartbroken over Leigh, I think. He and his wife”--Daniel hesitated, his eyes on Virginia--“have separated,” he concluded in a low voice.

The colonel, who knew it, only wagged his head soberly, but Virginia started. A deep blush rose from her throat to her white forehead. Her eyes fell before Daniel’s, and he saw her hands tremble.

“She loves him still!” he thought bitterly.

He turned, looking paler than ever.

“I must go on. I only stopped to thank you both for your sympathy. We”--he hesitated again--“we appreciate it.”

The colonel laid his hand on the younger man’s shoulder, and his eyes misted.

“I’ll walk to the street with you, Dan,” he said, swallowing a lump in his throat. “I reckon there isn’t much we can do--any of us--but to stand by you-all.”

Daniel looked back at Virginia, raising his hat again, and the two men walked away across the long lawn to the group of cedars that grew by the side gate.

Virginia, left alone, turned and entered the house. She was very pale now, and her lips trembled. She went into the drawing-room and stood looking at the little old picture of William as a boy. She had looked at it a thousand times before, and she remembered that once she had kissed it. They had always been fond of each other and then--or was it a dream?--he had asked her to marry him. They had planned their happiness gaily, with youthful laughter at sorrow and doubt. She had loved him, and he had married--this woman!

Virginia would have been less than human if she had not thrilled at the thought that he must regret it. She felt that he did. He had already almost said so. He had been caught; she knew it! What woman, placed as Virginia was, would not have felt that! In the rush of sympathy for him she blamed only Fanchon.

She remembered the night at the Sunday-school hall and Fanchon’s blanched face at the sight of Corwin. Corwin had made Virginia shudder; but such men as this had been Fanchon’s associates, such men as Corwin had been part of her life, and William Carter had unwittingly married her! In the storm of her resentment, Virginia felt only that William needed her sympathy, he even needed--it was on the tip of her tongue to say--her love!

Then the thing suddenly stood out before her; she saw it in all its horrible nakedness and cruelty. The poor little wayward dancer caught in the snare of her past--whatever that past might be--and in the midst of her fancied security assailed and ruined, snatched from her new happiness, talked about, shamed, and at last cast out!

Yet--poor William! Tears rushed to Virginia’s eyes. Her heart yearned over him. At that moment, when William was breaking with the wife that he had preferred to her, when he was crushed by the scandal that the woman had made of his life, Virginia forgave him.

She sank down on the piano-stool under his childish picture, and, covering her face with her hands, she wept--not for herself, as Fanchon had done, but for William. She had fought hard to crush out her love for him, but at that moment she felt that she had not succeeded, that it was too strong for her, and she trembled.

She trembled at the thought of the look on his face when she had seen him last. She knew that he had come back to her. Virginia, who could not see into the future, still felt a thrill of terror at her heart. It was as if an invisible power walked with her, an invisible hand thrust her toward unforeseen perils, and into ways that she knew not.