Part 6

He snatched a nice white hair-brush and brushed his hair vigorously, parting it in a way he had never done before, and bungled a knot in the blue tie she had laid out; then, grasping a gray felt hat that seemed to wink at him from the tray of the trunk, he hurried down-stairs, as pleasant-appearing a young man as ever one would need to see. He caught a glimpse of himself in a long old mirror between two windows in the living-room as he came down-stairs, and he said to himself:

“Why, I don’t look in the least like myself. I look a new man. Nobody would ever dream that I’m a murderer!”

He carried two pans of scalloped oysters across the lawn to the church, while Mrs. Summers walked beside him and carried the third, and guided him to the church kitchen door. Now, here would be a good chance to escape when she went inside the kitchen, only he would simply have to take one of those pans of oysters with him, for they were making him giddy now with their delicious odor. He wished he had remembered to bring his old overcoat with him, for it was cold out here in the chill November air.

But Mrs. Summers gave him no chance to escape. She swung the door open and ushered him inside, where he was surrounded by a bevy of young people, who fairly took him into their arms with welcome, and almost carried him on their shoulders into a great banquet-hall, where tables were set with flowers and overflowing plates of good things, and the odors of wonderful food were more than human starving man could resist. He let them shut the door and draw him inside. Only, when he lifted his eyes and met the eyes of one girl in blue whom they introduced as Anita, and who looked at him as if she knew he was a sham, and despised him, did he come to himself and wish he could run away.

But Anita dealt her glancing blows and passed indifferently, and he was hurried eagerly into the banquet-room, and placed in the seat of honor beside the minister, who had also just arrived.

There was a great excitement, for some one had just come in with grave face and open evening paper, stating that the name of Allan Murray was among those who were seriously injured in the wreck.

Murray couldn’t help feeling a twinge of relief and security as he heard that. At least he could eat his dinner in peace, without any more likelihood than there had been for the last three weeks that he would be apprehended and lodged in jail before the meal was over.

But his relief was but short-lived, for another difficulty approached. The minister leaned over, smiling, and said in a low tone:

“Murray, they’re going to call on you to ask a blessing.”

Murray’s heart stood still, and he felt a trembling sensation creeping over him, as if the enemy after a brief respite had him in sight again. Whatever a blessing was, he didn’t know. If the man had asked him to “say grace,” he might have understood. But a “blessing”! Well, whatever it was, he had best keep out of it, so, gripping his self-control together again, he endeavored to look as if nothing extraordinary had been asked of him, and leaned engagingly toward the minister.

“Doctor, I hope you’ll excuse me from doing anything tonight. I’m simply all in. That wreck--!”

“Oh, certainly,” the minister hastened to assure him. “I shouldn’t have asked, and of course everybody will understand. But you are so well known as an active Christian worker, you know, that it was but natural to feel it appropriate. Still, of course I understand. I’ll just tell the young president of this affair how it is, and she’ll excuse you. I guess you must have a good appetite by this time if you’ve just arrived from the wreck?” he finished kindly.

“I’ll say!” said Murray, glad that there was one question he could answer truthfully.

Then suddenly a silence spread over the entire chattering company, and Murray looked up to see the girl in blue, the one that had looked through him with scorn, whom they called Anita, standing at the middle table on the opposite side of the room, about to speak.

“Mr. Harrison, will you ask God’s blessing?”

Her voice rang clear, and her eyes seemed to sweep the speaker’s table where he sat, and touch him with a slight look of disapproval. Somehow he felt that that girl was suspecting him. It was almost like having a police officer standing over there looking at him. It gave him a feeling that if he should dare get up and try to slide away unnoticed, she would immediately call the whole company to order and have him seized.

These things had for the moment engrossed his mind so that he had not taken in what the girl had been saying. But all at once he noticed that everybody in the room but himself was sitting with bent head in an attitude of prayer. At least, everybody except one girl. It was perhaps the ardent furtive glance in Jane’s eyes raised from a bent head to watch him that finally called him to himself, and made him involuntarily close his eyes and bend his head. He felt as if he had been caught thinking by Jane, and that there was no knowing but she would interpret his thoughts. She seemed so almost uncanny in her ability to creep into intimacy without encouragement.

But his eyes once closed, the words of Anita came back to him like an echo, especially that word “blessing.” It was the same unusual word the minister had used, and he had used it in much the same phrase, “Ask a blessing.” So this was what they meant, make a prayer! Gosh! Was that what they had wanted him to do? What he was supposed to be able to do? He had indeed assumed a difficult character, and one he would never have voluntarily chosen. What should he do about it? Would it happen again? And could he invent another excuse, or would that lay him open too much to suspicion? What did they say when they made a prayer over a table like that? Could he fake a prayer? He had tried faking almost everything. He was known at home as a great mimic. But to mimic something about which he knew nothing would be a more difficult task than any he had ever before undertaken in that line. He set his mind to listen to the words that were being spoken.

The first thing he noticed about this “blessing” business was that the minister was talking in a conversational tone of voice, as if addressing some other mortal; though with a deferential tone as to One in Authority, yet on a familiar, friendly basis. The tone was so intimate, so assured, as if addressed to one the speaker knew would delight to honor his request, that Murray actually opened the fringes of one eye a trifle to make sure the man by his side was not addressing a visible presence.

There was something beautiful and strong and tender about the face of the minister with his eyes closed, standing there in the hush of the candle-lighted tables, the tips of his long, strong fingers touching the tablecloth, the candle-light flickering on his rugged face, peace upon his brow, that impressed Murray tremendously in the brief glance he dared take. And the words from those firm lips were no less awesome. A thrill of something he had never quite experienced before ran down his spine, a thrill not altogether unpleasant.

Those words! They sank into his soul like an altogether new lesson that was being learned. Could he ever repeat it and dare to try to get away with a prayer like that?

“We thank Thee for the new friend that has come among us to live, who is not a stranger, because he is the son of those whom we have long loved and known. We thank Thee for the beautiful lives of his honored father and mother, who at one time walked among us, and the fragrance of whose living still lingers in the memory of some of us who loved them. We thank Thee also that he is not only born of the flesh into the kingdom, but that he has been born again, of the Spirit, and therefore is our brother in Christ Jesus--”

There was more to that “blessing,” although the stranger guest did not hear it. He felt somehow strangely ashamed as these statements of thanksgiving fell from the pastor’s lips, as though he were being held up to honor before One who knew better, who was looking him through and through with eyes that could not be deceived. So now there were two in that room whose eyes were hostile, who knew that he was false, that he did not belong there, the girl they called Anita, and the Invisible One whose blessing was being invoked. And while he felt a reasonable assurance that he could escape and flee from the presence of that scornful girl, he knew in his heart that he could never get away from the other, who was the One they called God. God had never been anything in his life but a name to trifle with. Never once before had he felt any personality or reality to that name God. It filled him with amazement that was appalling in its strangeness. He felt that life hitherto had not prepared him for anything like a fact of this sort. Of course he knew there were discussions of this sort, but they had never come near enough to him for him even to have recognized an opinion about them before. Why they did now he did not understand. But he felt suddenly that he must get out of that room; even if he starved to death, or was shot on the way, he must get away from there.

He opened his eyes cautiously, glanced about furtively for the nearest unguarded exit, and saw the eyes of Jane watching him greedily. She even met his glance with a feather of a smile flitting across her mobile young lips; a nice enough comradely smile, if he only had been in the mood to notice, and if she hadn’t been so persistent and forward; but it annoyed him. He closed his eyes quickly as if they had not been opened, and when he tried to glance about again took the other direction, where he thought he remembered seeing a door into a passageway.

But a dash of blue blocked the passageway. Somehow Anita, in the blue gown, had got there from her position at the other end of the room. She was standing, leaning against the door frame almost as if she were tired. Her shapely little head rested against the wall, and her eyes were closed. There was almost a weary look in the droop of her lips, and the way she held the silver tray down by her side. Somehow she seemed different now when she was not looking at him. There was something attractive about her, a sweet good look that made him think of something pleasant. What was it? Oh! _Bessie!_

Like a sharp knife the thought went through his heart. Yes, Bessie had a good sweet look like this girl, and Bessie would have had eyes of scorn for any one who was not true to the core. Up in heaven somewhere, if there was such a place as heaven--and now that he was sure he had lost it he began to believe that there was--Bessie was looking down on him with scorn. A murderer, he was, and a coward! Here he was sitting at a meal that was not his, wearing a suit and a name that were not his, hearing God’s blessing invoked upon him and his, and too much of a coward to confess it and take his medicine. Obviously he could not steal out now with that blue dress blocking the way. He must stay here and face worse perhaps than if he had never run away. What had he let himself in for in assuming even for a brief hour another man’s name and position in life? It was clear that this Allan Murray, whom he was supposed to be, was a religious man, come of religious parents; so much of his new-found character he had learned from the minister’s prayer. Now how in time was he to carry out a character like that and play the part? He with the burden of a murderer’s conscience upon him!

The “blessing” was over, to his infinite relief, and a bevy of girls in white aprons, with fluttering ribbon badges and pretty trays, were set immediately astir. The minister turned to him with a question about the wreck, and he recalled vaguely that there had also been a word of thanksgiving in that prayer about the great escape he was supposed to have made. He grasped at the idea eagerly, and tried to steer the conversation away from himself and into general lines of railroad accidents, switching almost immediately and unconsciously to the relative subject of automobile accidents; and then stopping short in the midst of a sentence, dumb, with the thought that he had killed Bessie in an automobile accident, and here he was talking about it--telling with vivid words how a man would drive and take risks, and get used to it. Where was it he had heard that a guilty man could not help talking about his guilt, and letting out to a trained detective the truth about himself?

His face grew white and strained, and the minister eyed him kindly.

“You’re just about all in, aren’t you?” he said sympathetically. “I know just how it is. One can’t go through scenes like that without suffering, even though one escapes unscathed himself. I was on a train not long ago that struck a man and killed him. It was days before I could get rested. There is something terrible about the nerve-strain of seeing others suffer.”

And Murray thankfully assented and enjoyed a moment’s quiet while he took a mouthful of the delicious fruit that stood in a long-stemmed glass on his plate.

But the minister’s next sentence appalled him:

“Well, we won’t expect a speech from you tonight, though I’ll confess we had been hoping in that direction. You see, your fame has spread before you, and everybody is on the _qui vive_ to hear you. But I’ll just introduce you to them sometime before the end of the program, and you can merely get up and let them see you officially. I know Mr. Harper will be expecting something of that sort, and I suppose you’ll want to please him. You see, he makes a great deal of having found a Christian young man for teller in his bank.”

The minister looked at him kindly, evidently expecting a reply, and Murray managed to murmur, “I see,” behind his napkin, but he felt that he would rather be hung at sunrise than attempt to make a speech under these circumstances. So that was his new character, was it? A Christian young man! A young Christian banker! How did young Christian bankers act? He was glad for the tip that showed him what was expected of him, but how in thunder was he to get away with this situation? A speech was an easy enough matter in his own set. It had never bothered him at all. In fact, he was much sought after for this sort of thing. Repartee and jest had been his strong points. He had stories bubbling full of snappy humor on his tongue’s tip. But when he came to review them in his panic-stricken mind he was appalled to discover that not one was suitable for a church supper on the lips of a young Christian banker! Oh gosh! If he only had a drink! Or a cigarette! Didn’t any of these folks smoke? Weren’t they going to pass the cigarettes pretty soon?

X

Somewhere about half-past ten that supper was over. It seemed more like a week to the weary wanderer, though they professed to be hurrying through their program because he must be tired.

He really had had a very good time, in spite of the strangeness of the situation and his anxiety lest his double might appear on the scene at any moment to undo him. He had tried to think what he would say or do in case that should happen, but he could only plan to bolt through the nearest entrance, regardless of any parishioner who might be carrying potato salad or ice-cream, and take advantage of the natural confusion that would arise in the event of the return of another hero.

Having settled that matter satisfactorily, his easy, fun-loving nature actually arose to a moderate degree of enjoyment of the occasion. He had always taken a chance, a big chance, and in this kindly, admiring atmosphere his terror, that had driven him from one point to another during the last few weeks, had somewhat subsided. It was more than half-way likely that the man he was supposed to be was either hurt seriously or dead, seeing that they had had no direct word from him, and it was hardly probable he would appear at the supper at this late hour, even if he did get a later train to Marlborough. So, gradually, the tense muscles of his face relaxed, the alert look in his eyes changed to a normal twinkle, for he was a personable young man when he was in his own sphere, and his tongue began to be loosed. As his inner man began to be satisfied with the excellent food, and he drank deeply of the black coffee with which they plied him, he found a feeble pleasure in his native wit. His conversation was not exactly what might have been termed religious, but he managed to keep out of it many illusions that would not have fitted the gathering. He was by no means stupid, and some inner sense must have taught him, for he certainly was among a class of people to whom his previous experience gave him no clue. They were just as eager and just as vivacious over the life they were living and the work they were doing as ever the people with whom he was wont to associate were over their play. In fact, they seemed somehow to be happier, more satisfied, and he marvelled as he grew more at his ease among them. He felt as if he had suddenly dropped out of his own universe and into a different world, run on entirely different principles. For instance, they talked intermittently, and with deep concern, about a man whom they called John, who was suffering with rheumatic fever. It appeared that they went every day to see him, that he seemed of great importance to their whole group; some of them spoke of having spent the night with him, and of feeling intensely his suffering, as if it were their own, and of collecting a fund wherewith to surprise him on his birthday. They spoke of him with honor and respect, as if he were one with many talents, whom they deeply loved. They even spoke of his smile when they came into his sick-room, and of the hothouse roses that some one had sent him, how he enjoyed them. And then quite casually it came out that the man was an Italian day-laborer, a member of a Mission Sunday-school which this church was supporting! Incredible story! Quite irrational people! Love a day-laborer! A foreigner! Why, they had spoken of him as if he were one of their associates!

He looked into their faces and saw something beautiful; perhaps he would have named it “love” if he had known more about that virtue; or perchance he might have called it “spiritual” if he had been brought up to know anything but the material in life. As it was he named it “queer,” and let it go at that. But he liked it. They fascinated him. A wild fancy passed through his mind that if he ever had to be tried for murder he would like it to be here, among a people who thought and talked as these people did. They at least would not judge him before he had been tried. They were even fair and just and kind to common people whom one never expected to do right, of course, in the world where he came from. Then it flashed across him that he was not being square with these people. They thought him like themselves, and he was not. He did not even know what they meant by some of the things they said.

Between such weird thoughts as this he certainly enjoyed his dinner, wineless and smokeless even though it was. There was a taste about everything that reminded him of the days when he used to go up to Maine as a little boy, and spend the summers with his father’s maiden sister, Aunt Rebecca, long since dead. Things had tasted that way there, wonderful, delectable, as if you wanted to eat on forever, as if they were all real, and made with love. Queer how that word love kept coming to him. Ah! Yes, and there was Mrs. Chapparelle. She used to cook that way, too. It must be when people cooked with their own hands instead of hiring it done that it tasted that way. Mrs. Chapparelle and the pancakes, and the strawberry shortcake with cream, made of light puffy biscuit, with luscious berries between, and lots of sugar. Mrs. Chapparelle! Her face had begun to fade from his haunted brain since the night he had looked into her kitchen window and had seen her go briskly to the door in answer to the ring. What had she met when she opened that door? A white-robed nurse, and behind her men bearing a corpse? Or had they had the grace to send some one to break the news first?

The thought struck him suddenly from out the gaiety of the evening, and he lifted a blanched face to Anita as she put before him his second helping of ice-cream and another cup of coffee.

And he was a murderer! He had killed little Bessie Chapparelle, a girl a good deal like this Anita girl, clean and fine, with high ideals. What would these people, these kind, good people, think of him if they knew? What would they do? Would they put handcuffs on him and send for the police? Or would they sit down and try to help him out of his trouble? He half wished that he dared put himself upon their mercy. That minister now. He looked like a real father! But of course he would have to uphold the law. And of course there wasn’t anything to do but hang him when he had killed a little girl like Bessie! Not that he cared about the hanging. His life was done. But for the sake of his mother, who had never taken much time out of her social duties to notice him, and the father who had paid his bills and bawled him out, he was running away, he told himself, so that they would not have to suffer. Just how that was saving them from suffering he didn’t quite ever try to explain to himself. He was running away so there would not be any trial to drag his father and mother through. That was it.

He ate his ice-cream slowly, trying to get a hold upon himself once more, and across the room Anita and Jane happened to be standing together for an instant in a doorway.

“Isn’t he stunningly handsome, Anita? Aren’t you just crazy about him?” whispered Jane effusively.

“He’s good-looking enough,” admitted Anita, “but I’m afraid he knows it too well.”

“Well, how could he help it, looking like that?” responded the ardent Jane, and flitted away to take him another plate of cake.

But the crowning act of his popularity came when Mr. Harper, president of the bank, senior elder in the church, and honored citizen, came around to speak with the young man and welcome him to the town. He had been detained and came in late, being rushed to his belated supper by the good women of the committee. He had only now found opportunity to look up the new teller and speak to him.

Murray rose with a charming air of deference and respect, and stood before the elder man with all the ease that his social breeding had given him. He listened with flattering attention while the bank president told him how glad he was to have a Christian young man in his employ, and how he hoped they would grow to be more than employer and employed.

Murray had dreaded this encounter if it should prove necessary, as he feared the president would have met his young teller before this occasion, and would discover that he was not the right man. But Elliot Harper stood smiling and pleased, looking the young man over with apparently entire confidence, and Murray perceived that so far he was not discovered.

It was easy enough to assent, and be deferential. The trouble would come when they began to ask him questions. He had settled it in his mind quite early in the evening that his strong point was to be as impersonal as possible, not to make any statements whatever about himself that could possibly not be in harmony with the character of the man he represented, as he thought they knew him, and to make a point of listening to others so well that they should think he had been talking. That was a little trick he learned long ago in college when he wanted to get on the right side of a professor. It came back quite naturally to him now.

So he stood with his handsome head slightly bowed in deference and his eyes fixed in eager attention, and the entire assembly fastened their eyes upon him, and admired.