Chapter 20

“I ain't no vagrant,” glared Billy, and limped away with old trusty under his left arm.

No one molested him as he walked in the arched and ivied gateway, for the gate keeper was off on a little private errand of his own at a place where prohibition had not yet penetrated. Billy felt too heavy and dizzy to mount his wheel, but he leaned on the saddle as he walked and tried to get things straight in his head. He oughtn't to have gone to sleep, that's what he oughtn't. But this job would soon be over and then he would hike it for home. Gee! Wouldn't home feel good! And Aunt Saxon would bathe his head with wych hazel and make cold things for him to drink! Aw, Gee!

The pedigreed dogs of which the place boasted a number came suddenly down upon him in a great flare of noise, but dogs were always his friends, why should he worry? A pity he couldn't stop to make friends with them just now. Some dogs! Here pup! Gee! What a dog to own! The dogs whined and fawned upon him. Pedigree or no pedigree, rags and whiskey and dirt notwithstanding, they knew a man when they saw one, and Billy hadn't batted an eyelid when they tried their worst tramp barks on him. They wagged their silky tails and tumbled over each other to get first place to him, and so escorted proudly he dropped old trusty by a clump of imported rhododendrons and limped up the marble steps to the wide vistas of circular piazzas that stretched to seemingly infinite distances, and wondered if he should ever find the front door.

An imposing butler appeared with a silver tray, and stood aghast.

“Shafton live here?” inquired Billy trying to look business like. “Like to see him er the missus a minute,” he added as the frowning vision bowed. The butler politely but firmly told him that the master and mistress had other business and no desire to see him. The young gentleman had come home, and the reward had been withdrawn. If it was about the reward he had come he could go down to the village and find the detective. The house people didn't want to interview any more callers.

“Well, say,” said Billy disgusted, “after I've come all this way too! You go tell 'er I've brought her jewels! You go tell 'er I've _gottum here!_”

The butler opened the door a little wider: he suggested that seeing was believing.

“Not on yer tin type!” snapped Billy, “I show 'em to nobody an' I give 'em to nobody but the owner! Where's the young fella? He knows me. Tell 'im I brang his ma's string o' beads an' things.”

Billy was weary. His head was spinning round. His temper was rising.

“Aw,--you make me tired! Get out of my way!” He lowered his head and made a football dive with his head in the region of the dignified butler's stomach, and before that dignitary had recovered his poise Billy with two collies joyously escorting him, stood blinking in wonder over the great beautiful living room, for all the world as pretty as the church at home, only stranger, with things around that he couldn't make out the use of.

“Where'ur they at? Where are the folks?” he shouted back to the butler who was coming after him with menace in his eye.

“What is the matter, Morris? What is all this noise about?” came a lady's voice in pettish tones from up above somewhere. “Didn't I tell you that I wouldn't see another one of those dreadful people to-day?”

Billy located her smooth old childish face at once and strode to the foot of the stairs peering up at the lady, white with pain from his contact with the butler, but alert now to the task before him:

“Say, Miz Shaf't'n, I got yer jools, would ya mind takin' 'em right now? 'Cause I'm all in an' I wantta get home.”

His head was going around now like a merry-go-round, but he steadied himself by the bannister:

“Why, what do you mean?” asked the lady descending a step or two, a vision of marcelled white hair, violet and lace negligee, and well preserved features, “You've got them _there_? Let me see them.”

“He's been drinking, Sarah, can't you smell it?” said a man's voice higher up, “Come away and let Morris deal with him. Really Sarah, we'll have to go away if this keeps up.”

“Say, you guy up there, just shut yer trap a minute won't ya! Here, Miz Shaf't'n, are these here yours?”

Billy struggled with the neck of his blouse and brought forth the leather bag, gripped the knot fiercely in his teeth, ran his fingers in the bag as he held it in his mouth, his lamed arm hanging at his side, and drew forth the magnificent pearls.

“William! My pearls!” shrieked the lady.

The gentleman came down incredulous, and looked over her shoulder.

“I believe they are, Sarah,” he said.

Billy leered feverishly up at him, and produced a sheaf of papers, seemingly burrowing somewhere in his internal regions to bring them forth.

“And here, d'these b'long?”

The master of the house gripped them.

“Sarah! The bonds! And the South American Shares!” They were too busy to notice Billy who stood swaying by the newel post, his duty done now, the dogs grouped about him.

“Say, c'n I get me a drink?” he asked of the butler, who hovered near uncertain what to be doing now that the tide was turned.

The lady looked up.

“Morris!”

He scarcely heard the lady's words but almost immediately a tall slim glass of frosty drink, that smelled of wild grapes, tasted of oranges, and cooled him down to the soul again, was put into his hand and he gulped it greedily.

“Where did you say you found these, young man?” The gentleman eyed him sternly, and Billy's old spirit flamed up:

“I didn't say,” said Billy.

“But you know we've got to have all the evidence before we can give the reward--!”

“Aw, cut it out! I don't want no reward. Wouldn't take it if you give it to me! I just wantta get home. Say, you gotta telephone?”

“Why certainly.” This was the most astonishing burglar!

“Well, where is't? Lemme call long distance on it? I ain't got the tin now, but I'll pay ya when I git back home!”

“Why, the idea! Take him to the telephone Morris. Right there! This one--!”

But Billy had sighted one on a mahogany desk near at hand and he toppled to the edge of the chair that stood before it. He took down the receiver in a shaky hand, calling Long Distance.

“This Long Distance? Well, gimme Economy 13.”

The Shaftons for the instant were busy looking over the papers, identifying each jewel, wondering if any were missing. They did not notice Billy till a gruff young voice rang out with a pathetic tremble in it: “That you Chief? This is Billy. Say, c'n I bother you to phone to Miss Severn an' ast her to tell m'yant I'm aw'wright? Yes, tell her I'll be home soon now, an' I'll explain. And Chief, I'm mighty sorry those two guys got away, but I couldn't help it. We'll get 'em yet. Hope you didn't wait long. Tell you more when I see ya, S'long--!”

The boyish voice trailed off into silence as the receiver fell with a crash to the polished desk, and Billy slipped off the chair and lay in a huddled heap on the costly rug.

“Oh, mercy!” cried the lady, “Is he drunk or what?”

“Come away Sarah, let Morris deal--”

“But he's sick, I believe, William. Look how white he is. I believe he is dead! William, he may have come a long way in the heat! He may have had a sunstroke! Morris, send for a doctor quick! And--call the ambulance too! You better telephone the hospital. We can't have him here! William, look here, what's this on his sleeve? Blood? Oh, William! And we didn't give him any reward--!”

And so, while the days hastened on Billy lay between clean white sheets on a bed of pain in a private ward of a wonderful Memorial Hospital put up by the Shaftons in honor of a child that died. Tossing and moaning, and dreaming of unquenchable fire, always trying to climb out of the hot crater that held him, and never getting quite to the top, always knowing there was something he must do, yet never quite finding out what it was. And back in Sabbath Valley Aunt Saxon prayed and cried and waited and took heart of cheer from the message the Chief had sent to Lynn. And quietly the day approached for the trial of Mark Carter, but his mother did not yet know.

XXV

Mrs. Gibson, the wife of the comparatively new elder of the Sabbath Valley church was a semi-invalid. That is she wasn't able to do her own work and kept “help.” The help was a lady of ample proportions whose husband had died and whose fortunes were depleted. She consented to assist Mrs. Gibson provided she were considered one of the family, and she presented a continual front of offense so that the favored family must walk most circumspectly if they would not have her retire to her room with hurt feelings and leave them to shift for themselves.

On the morning of the trial she settled herself at her side of the breakfast table, after a number of excursions to the kitchen for things she had forgotten, the cream, the coffee, and the brown bread, of which Mr. Gibson was very fond. She was prepared to enjoy her own breakfast. Mr. Gibson generally managed to bolt his while these excursions of memory were being carried on and escape the morning news, but Mrs. Gibson, well knowing which side her bread was buttered, and not knowing where she could get another housekeeper, usually managed to sit it out.

“Well, this is a great day for Sabbath Valley,” said Mrs. Frost mournfully, spreading an ample slice of bread deep with butter, and balancing it on the uplifted fingers of one hand while she stirred the remainder of the cream into her coffee with one of the best silver spoons. She was wide and bulgy and her chair always seemed inadequate when she settled thus for nourishment.

“A great day,” she repeated sadly, taking an audible sip of her coffee.

“A great day?” repeated little Mrs. Gibson with a puzzled air, quickly recalling her abstracted thoughts.

“Yes. Nobody ever thought anybody in Sabbath Valley would ever be tried for murder!”

“Oh!” said Mrs. Gibson sharply, drawing back her chair as if she were in a hurry and rolling up her napkin quickly.

“Yes, poor Mark Carter! I remember his sweet little face and his long yellow curls and his baby smile as if it were yesterday!” narrowing her eyes and harrowing her voice, “I wonder if his poor mother knows yet.”

“I should hope not!” said Mrs. Gibson rising precipitately and wandering over to the window where hung a gilded canary cage. “Mrs. Frost, did you remember to give the canary some seed and fresh water?”

“Yes, I b'lieve so,” responded the fat lady, “But you can't keep her from knowing it always. Whatt'll you do when he's _hung?_ Don't you think it would be easier for; her to get used to it little by little?”

“Mrs. Frost, if you were a dog would you rather have your tail cut off all at once, or little by little?” said Mrs. Gibson mischievously.

“I shouldn't like to have it cut off at all I'm quite sure,” said Mrs. Frost frostily.

“Well, perhaps Mrs. Carter might feel that way too,” said the lady bending over a rose geranium and pinching a leaf to smell.

“I don't understand you,” said Mrs. Frost from her coffee cup, “Oh, you mean that perhaps Mark may not be convicted? Why, my dear lady, there isn't a chance at all, not a chance in the world for Mark, and while I'm real sorry I can't say I'd approve. Think of how he's carried on, going with that little huzzy of a Cherry. Mrs. Harricutt says she saw him have her out riding in his automobile one day--!”

“Oh,--_Mrs. Harricutt!”_ said Mrs. Gibson impatiently, “Mrs. Frost, let's find something pleasanter to talk about. It's a wonderful morning. The air's like wine. I wonder If I couldn't take a little walk. I mean to ask the doctor.”

“My dear woman,” said Frost patronizingly, “You can't get away from the unpleasant things in this world by just not talking about them!”

“It seems not,” said the Gibson lady patiently, and wandered out on the porch.

Down the street Marilyn lingered by her mother's chair:

“Are you--going to Economy to-day, mother?”

“Yes, dear, your father and I are both going. Did you--think you ought--wanted to--go dear?”

“Oh, I should _hate it!”_ cried Lynn flinging out her hands with a terrible little gesture of despair, “But I wanted to go just to stand by Mark. I shall be there anyway, wherever I am, I shall see everything and feel everything in my heart I know. But in the night it came to me that some one ought to stay with Mrs. Carter!”

“Yes, dear! I had hoped you would think of that. I didn't want to mention it because I wanted you to follow your own heart's leading, but I think she needs you. If you could keep her from finding out until it was over--”

“But suppose--!”

“Yes, dear, it is possible. I've thought of that, and if it comes there will be a way I'm sure, but until it does--_then_ suppose--”

“Yes, mother, I'll go and make her have one happy day first anyway. If any of those old vultures come around I'll play the piano or scream all the while they are there and keep them from telling her a thing!”

“I think, dear, the vultures will all be in Economy to-day.”

“All except Mrs. Frost, mother dear. She can't get away. But she can always run across the street to borrow a cup of soda.”

So Lynn knelt for a moment in her quiet room, then came down, kissed her mother and father with a face of brave serenity, and went down the maple shaded street with her silk work bag in her hand. And none too soon. As she tapped at the door of the Carter house she saw Mrs. Frost ambling purposefully out of the Gibson gate with a tea cup in her hand.

“Oh, hurry upstairs and stay there a minute till I get rid of Mrs. Frost,” Lynn whispered smiling as her hostess let her in. “I've come to spend the day with you, and she'll stay till she's told you all the news and there won't be any left for me.”

Mrs. Carter, greatly delighted with Lynn's company, hurried obediently up the stairs and Lynn met the interloper, supplied her with the cup of salt she had come for this time, said Mrs. Carter was upstairs making the beds and she wouldn't bother her to come down,--_beds,_ mind you, as if Mark was at home of course--and Mrs. Frost went back across the street puzzled and baffled and resolved to come back later for an egg after that forward young daughter of the minister was gone.

Lynn locked the front door and ran up stairs. She tolled her hostess up to the attic to show her some ancient gowns and poke bonnets that she hadn't seen since she was a little girl in which she and Mark used to dress up and play history stories.

Half the morning she kept her up there looking at garments long folded away, whose wearers had slept in the church yard many years; trinkets of other days, quaint old pictures, photographs and daguerreotypes, and a beautiful curl of Mark's--:

“Marilyn, I'm going to give that to you,” the mother said as she saw the shining thing lying in the girl's hand, “There's no one living to care for it after I'm gone, and you will keep it I know till you're sure there's no one would want it I--mean--!”

“I understand what you mean,” said Marilyn, “I will keep it and love it--for you--and for him. And if there is ever anybody else that--deserves it--why I'll give it to them--!” Then they both laughed to hide the tears behind the unspoken thoughts, and the mother added a little stubbed shoe and a sheer muslin cap, all delicate embroidery and hemstitching:

“They go together,” she said simply, and Lynn wrapped them all carefully in a bit of tissue paper and laid them in her silk bag. As she turned away she held it close to her heart while the mother closed the shutters. She shuddered to think of the place where Mark was sitting now, being tried for his life. Her heart flew over the road, entered the court and stood close by his side, with her hand on his shoulder, and then slipped it in his. She wondered if he knew that she was praying, praying, praying for him and standing by him, taking the burden of what would have been his mother's grief if she had known, as well as the heavy burden of her own sorrow.

The air of the court room was heavy for the place was crowded. Almost everybody from Sabbath Valley that could come was there, for a great many people loved Mark Carter, and this seemed a time when somehow they must stand by him. People came that liked him and some that did not like him, but more that liked him and kept hoping against hope that he would not be indicted.

The hum of voices suddenly ceased as the prisoner was led in and a breath of awe passed over the place. For until that minute no one was quite sure that Mark Carter would appear. It had been rumored again and again that he had run away. Yet here he was, walking tall and straight, his fine head held high as had been his wont. “For all the world like he walked when he was usher at Mary Anne's wedding, whispered Mrs. Hulse, from Unity.”

The minister and his wife kept their eyes down after the first glimpse of the white face. It seemed a desecration to look at a face that had suffered as that one had. Yet the expression upon it now was more as if it had been set for a certain purpose for this day, and did not mean to change whatever came. A hopeless, sad, persist look, yet strong withal and with a hint of something fine and high behind it.

He did not look around as he sat down, merely nodded to a few close to him whom he recognized. A number, pressed close as he passed, and touched him, as if they would impress upon him their loyalty, and it was noticeable that these were mostly of a humble class, working men, boys, and a few old women, people to whom he had been kind.

Mrs. Severn wrote a little note and sent it up to him, with the message, “Lynn is with your mother.” Just that. No name signed. But his eyes sought hers at once and seemed to light, and soon, without any apparent movement on his part a card came back to her bearing the words: “I thank you,” But he did not look that way again all day it seemed. His bearing was quiet, sad, aloof, one might almost have said disinterested.

Mark's lawyer was one whom he had picked out of the gutter and literally forced to stop drinking and get back on his job. He was a man of fine mind and deep gratitude, and was having a frantic time with his client, for Mark simply wouldn't talk:

“I wasn't there, I was on Stark mountain, I am, not guilty,” he persisted, “and that is all I have to say.”

“But my dear friend, don't you realize that mere statements unadorned and uncorroborated won't get you anywhere in court?”

“All right, don't try to defend me then. Let the thing go as it will. That is all I have to say.” And from this decision no one had been able to shake him. His lawyer was nearly crazy. He had raked the county for witnesses. He had dug into the annals of that night in every possible direction. He had unearthed things that it seemed no living being would have thought of, and yet he had not found the one thing of which he was in search, positive evidence that Mark Carter had been elsewhere and otherwise employed at the time of the shooting.

“Don't bother so much about it Tony,” said Mark once when they were talking it over, or the lawyer was talking it over and Mark was listening. “It doesn't matter. Nothing matters any more!” and his voice was weary as if all hope had vanished from him.

Anthony Drew looked at him in despair:

“Sometimes I almost think you _want_ to die,” he said. “Do you think I shall let you go when you pulled me back from worse than death? No, Mark, old man, we're going to pull you through somehow, though I don't know how. If I were a praying man I'd say that this was the time to pray. Mark, what's become of that kid you used to think so much of, that was always tagging after you? Billy,--was that his name?”

A wan smile flitted across Mark's face, and a stiff little drawing of the old twinkle about eyes and lips:

“I think he'll turn up some time.”

The lawyer eyed him keenly:

“Mark, I believe you've got something up your sleeve. I believe that kid knows something and you won't let him tell. Where is he?”

“I don't know, Tony” and Mark looked at him straight with clear eyes, and the lawyer knew he was telling the truth.

Just at the last day Anthony Drew found out about the session meeting. But from Mark he got no further statement than the first one. Mark would not talk. An ordinary lawyer, one that had not been saved himself, would have given up the defense as hopeless. Anthony simply wouldn't let Mark go undefended. If there were no evidence he would make some somehow, and so he worked hoping against hope up to the very last minute. He stood now, tall, anxious, a fine face, though showing the marks of wreck behind him, dark hair silvered at the edges, fine deep lines about his eyes and brows, looking over the assembled throng with nervous hurrying eyes. At last he seemed to find what he wanted and came quickly down to where the minister sat in an obscure corner, whispering a few words with him. They went out together for a few minutes and when they came back the minister was grave and thoughtful. He himself had scoured the country round about quietly for Billy, and he was deeply puzzled. He had promised to tell what he knew.

The business of the day went forward in the usual way with all the red tape, the cool formalities, as if some trifling matter were at stake, and those who loved Mark sat with aching hearts and waited. The Severns in their corner sat for the most part with bended heads and praying hearts. The witnesses for the prosecution were most of them companions of the dead man, those who had drank and caroused with him, frequenters of the Blue Duck, and they were herded together, an evil looking crowd, but with erect heads and defiant attitude, the air of having donned unaccustomed garments of righteousness for the occasion, and making a great deal of it because for once every one must see that they were in the right. They were fairly loud mouthed in their boasting about it.

There was the little old wizened up fellow that had been sitting with the drinks outside the booth the night Billy telephoned. There were the serving men who had waited on Mark and Cherry. There was the proprietor of the Blue Duck himself, who testified that Mark had often been there with Cherry, though always early in the evening. Once he had caught him outside the window looking in at the dancers as late as two o'clock at night, the same window from which the shot was fired that brought Dolph to his death. They testified that Mark had been seen with Cherry much of late driving in his car, and that she had often been in deep converse as if having a hot argument about something.

The feeling was tense in the court room. Tears were in many eyes, hopeless tears in the eyes of those who had loved the boy for years.

But the grilling order marched on, and witness after witness came, adding another and another little touch to the gradually rising structure that would shut Mark Carter away from the world that loved him and that he loved forever.