Satan Sanderson Part 27

The listeners were silent. No one had ever heard such a speech from the huge owner of the dance-hall. The sheriff lighted a cigar before he said:

"That's all right, Devlin. We all understand your prejudices, but I'm afraid they haven't much weight with legal minds, like Mr. Felder's here, for instance."

"Excuse me," said Felder. "I fear my prejudices are with Devlin. Good night," he added, moving up the street.

"Where are you bound?" asked the other casually.

"To the jail," answered the lawyer, "to see a client--I hope."

The sheriff emitted a low whistle. "_I_ hope there'll be enough sane men left to get a jury!" he said.

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

THE HAND AT THE DOOR

At the sound of steps in the jail corridor and the harsh grating of the key in the lock, Harry rose hastily from the iron cot whereon he had been sitting and took a step forward.

"Jessica!" he exclaimed.

She came toward him, her breath hurried, her cheek pale. Tom Felder's face was at her shoulder. "I have a little matter to attend to in the office," he said, nodding to Harry. "I shall wait for you there, Miss Holme."

She thanked him with a grateful look, and as he vanished, Harry took her hand and kissed it. He longed to take her in his arms.

"I heard of it only at noon," she began, her voice uncertain. "I was afraid they would not let me see you, so I went to Mr. Felder. They were saying on the street that he had offered to defend you."

"I had not been here an hour when he came," he said.

"I know you have no money," she went on; "I know what you did with the gold you found. And I have begged him to let me pay for any other counsel he will name. I have not told him--what I am to you, but I have told him that I am far from poor, and that nothing counts beside your life. He says you have forbidden him to do this--forbidden him to allow any help from any one. Hugh, Hugh! Why do you do this? The money should be yours, not mine, for it was your father's! It _is_ yours, for I am your wife!"

He kissed her hand again without answering.

"Haven't I a right now to be at your side? Mayn't I tell them?"

He shook his head. "Not yet, Jessica."

"I must obey you," she said with a wan smile, "yet I would share your shame as proudly as your glory! You are thinking me weak and despicable, perhaps, because I wanted you to go away. But women are not men, and I--I love you so, Hugh!"

"I think you are all that is brave and good," he protested.

"I want you to believe," she went on, "that I knew you had done no murder. If an angel from Heaven had come to declare it, I would not have believed it. I only want now to understand."

"What do you not understand?" he asked gently.

She half turned toward the door, as she said, in a lower key: "Last night I was overwrought. I had no time to reason, or even to be glad that you had recovered your memory. I thought only of your escaping somewhere--where you would be safe, and where I could follow. But after you had gone, many things came back to me that seemed strange--something curious in your manner. You had not seemed wholly surprised when I told you you were accused. Why did you shut the cabin door, and speak so low?

Was there any one else there when I came?"

He averted his face, but he did not answer. She was treading on near ground.

"My horse came back this afternoon," she continued. "He had been ridden hard in the night and his flanks were cut cruelly with a whip. You did not use him, but some one did."

She waited a moment, still he made no reply.

"I want to ask you," she said abruptly, "do you know who killed Doctor Moreau?"

His blood chilled at the question. He looked down at her speechless.

"You must let me speak," she said. "You won't answer that. Then you do know who really did it. Oh, I have thought so much since last night! For some reason you are s.h.i.+elding him. Was it the man who was in the cabin--who rode my horse? If he is guilty, why do you help him off, and so make yourself partly guilty?"

He looked down at her and put a finger on her lips. "Do you remember what you told me last night--that you would believe what I did was for the best?"

"But I thought then you were going away! How can I believe it now? Why, they hang men who murder, and it is you who are accused! If you protect the real murderer, you will have to stand in his place. The whole town believes you are guilty--I see it in all their faces. They are sorry, many of them, for they don't hate you as they did, but they think you did it. Even Mr. Felder, though I have told him what I suspect, and though he is working now to defend you!"

"Jessica," he urged, "you must trust me and have faith in me. I know it is hard, but I can't explain to you! I can't tell you--yet--why I do as I am doing, but you must believe that I am right."

She was puzzled and confused. When she had put this and that together, guided by her intuition, the conclusion that he knew the guilty one had brought a huge relief. Now this fell into disarray. She felt beneath his manner a kind of appeal, a deprecation, almost a hidden pity for her--as though the danger were hers, not his, and she the one caught in this catastrophe. She looked at him pale and distraught.

"You speak as if you were sorry for me," she said, "and not for yourself. Is it because you know you are not in real danger--that you know the truth must come out, only you can't tell it yourself, or tell me either? Is that it?"

A wave of feeling pa.s.sed over Harry, of hopeless longing. Whichever way the issue turned there was anguish for her--for she loved him. If he were acquitted, she must learn that past love between them had been illicit, that present love was shame, and future love an impossibility.

Convicted, there must be added to this the bitter knowledge that her husband in very truth was a murderer, doomed to lurk in hiding so long as he might live. Yet not to rea.s.sure her now was cruelty.

"It is not that, Jessica," he said gravely; "yet you must not fear for me--for my life. Try to believe me when I say that some time you will understand and know that I did only what I must."

"Will that be soon?" she asked.

"I think it may be soon," he answered.

Her face lighted. The puzzle and dread lifted. "Oh, then," she said--"oh, then, I shall not be afraid. I can not share your thoughts, nor your secret, and I must rebel at that. You mustn't blame me--I wouldn't be a woman if I did not--but I love you more than all the world, and I shall believe that you know best. Hugh," she added softly, "do you know that--you haven't kissed me?"

Before her upturned, pleading eyes and trembling lips, the iron of his purpose bent to the man in him, and he took her into his arms.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

THE PENITENT THIEF

A frosty gloom was over the city of Aniston, moon and stars hidden by a cloudy sky, from which a light snow--the first of the season--was sifting down. The streets were asleep; only occasional belated pedestrians were to be seen in the chilly air. These saw a man, his face m.u.f.fled from the snowflakes, pa.s.s hurriedly toward the fountained square, from whose steeple two o'clock was just striking. The wayfarer skirted the square, keeping in cover of the buildings as though avoiding chance observation, till he stood on the pavement of a Gothic chapel fronting the open s.p.a.ce.

Here he paused and glanced furtively about him. He could see the entrance to the minister's study, at which he had so often knocked and the great rose-window of the audience-room where he had once gamed with Harry Sanderson. This was the building he must enter like a thief.

On the night of his flight from Smoky Mountain, Hugh had ridden hard till dawn, abandoning the horse to find its way back as best it might.

Hidden in a snug retreat, he had slept through the next day, to recommence his journeying at nightfall. He had thus been obliged to make haste slowly and had lost much valuable time. For two days after his arrival, he had hung about outside the town in a fever of impatience; for though he had readily ascertained that the premises were unoccupied, the first night he had been frightened away by the too zealous scrutiny of a policeman, and on the next he had been unable to force the door.

That morning he had secured a skeleton-key, and now the weather was propitious for his purpose.