To Him That Hath

by Leroy Scott

  CHAPTER VI

  JOHN ROGERS

  David flung himself at the story as though it were a city to be taken bystorm. He was full of power, of creative fury. His long-disused pen atfirst was stubborn, but gradually he re-broke it to work; and he wrotewith an ease, a surety of touch, a fire, that he had never felt before.He had half-a-dozen separate incentives, and the sum of these was a vastenergy that drove him conqueringly through obstacle after obstacle ofthe story.

  These early days of the story were high days with him. He forgot, whenwriting, his basement room, his janitor's work, his dishonour. Infinitylay between the end of December and the end of January; in a month hisspirits had risen from nadir to zenith. The world was his; nothingseemed beyond him. He even dared dream of passing Allen upon somemid-level and winning to the highest place in Helen Chambers's regard.The exhaustion of spirit at the end of each day's writing quenched thisdream; but it was nevertheless enrapturing while it lasted, and at timesDavid came near believing in it.

  David had asked both Rogers and the Mayor to aid him in securing Tom a_bona-fide_ position, and after the boy had been running thePan-American Cafe for a month, a place was found. Tom's wages had beena heavy drain upon David's meagre income, and it was with a feeling ofrelief that David announced the coming change one night as they werepreparing for bed.

  "I've got some great news for you, Tom," he began.

  "What's dat?" asked the boy, dropping the shoe he had just taken off.

  "A new job!" cried David, trying to infect Tom with enthusiasm."Delivery-boy on a wagon. You're to get four dollars a week--a dollarmore than you're getting. Think of that! You're in luck, my boy--you'regetting rich!"

  But David's enthusiasm did not take. There came no sparkle into theboy's eyes, no eagerness into his manner. He looked thoughtfully atDavid a moment, then shook his head.

  "I don't t'ink I'll take it."

  "What!" cried David. The possibility of refusal had not occurred to him.He plunged into a fervent portrayal of the advantages of the new place.

  "Mebbe you're right," Tom said, when the picture had been painted. "ButI'm gettin' used to t'ings at de Pan-American; I likes de boss an' Ilikes de woik. An' I don't need de extry dollar. No, I don't want nobetter job dan what I got. It suits me right up to de chin."

  He walked, in one shoe and in one stocking, across to David and held outhis hand. "But, pard"--a note of huskiness was in his voice--"pard, Iappreciate dat you was tryin' to do de fine t'ing by me. Shake."

  There was nothing more to be said. Tom went back to the Mayor, and Davidcontinued dropping in Saturdays an hour before pay-time.

  One evening in early February, just after David had coaled the furnaceand settled down to his story, he had a call from Bill Halpin, whom hehad not seen since their first meeting. Halpin leaned against the door,after it had been closed, and silently regarded David, a sneering smileupon his face.

  "Honest!" he shot out at length, with a short, dry laugh. It was hisfirst word since entering.

  David stared at the sarcastic, saturnine figure.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Honest! And I half believed you!" Again the short laugh. "You almostfooled Bill Halpin--which is sayin' you're pretty smooth." He jerked hishead upward. "What's your game?--yours and this man _Rogers_?"

  "See here, Halpin, what are you talking about?"

  "Oh, I suppose you'll say you don't know him. But since I met you on theBowery I've been around here twice, and both times I saw you two withyour noses together. You're a smooth pair. Come, what's your game?"

  "I don't understand you!"

  "Don't try to fool me, Aldrich," he drawled. "You can't. But don't tellme the game unless you want to. You know I wouldn't squeal if you did.All I want is for you to know you can't throw that honesty 'con' intome."

  David strode forward and laid sharp hold of Halpin's shoulders.

  "See here, Bill Halpin, what the devil do you mean?" he demanded.

  Halpin looked cynical, good-humoured disbelief back into David's eyes,and again let out a dry cackle.

  "Drop that actor business with me, Aldrich. I don't know what your gameis--but I know there is a game. If you want to find out how much I know,come on. Let's go out and have a drink."

  An hour later David stepped from the rear room of a Bowery saloon, andwalked dazedly through the spattering slush back to his house. He pausedbefore it, and looked irresolutely at Rogers's office window, whoseshade was faintly aglow. He began to pace up and down the block, hiseyes constantly turning to the window, his mind trying to determine hishonourable course. At length he crossed the street, entered the house,and knocked at Rogers's door.

  Rogers admitted him with a look of quiet surprise and led the way acrosshis office into the living-room behind, whose one window opened upon theair shaft. In this room were two easy chairs, a couch on which Rogersslept, a table with a green-shaded reading-lamp, two or threeprints--all utterly without taste. Everything was in keeping with thesurface commonplaceness of the man except a row of shelves containing acouple of hundred well-selected books.

  Rogers motioned David to a chair and he himself leaned against histable, his hands folded across the copy of "Pere Goriot" he had beenreading.

  "I'm very glad you came in," he said, in his low, even voice.

  David gazed at Rogers in his attitude of waiting ease, and he suddenlyfelt that to speak to this unsuspecting man was impossible. It did notoccur to him that perhaps Rogers had caught his strained look, and thatperhaps this ease might be the mask of an agitation as great as his own.He dropped his eyes. But it was his duty to speak--and, in a way, hisdesire. He forced himself to look up. Rogers had the same look andattitude of quiet waiting.

  "Mr. Rogers," David began, with an effort, "I have just been toldsomething that I think I am bound to tell you. You hired me, befriendedme, in the belief that I knew nothing about you. I feel it would not behonourable in me to remain your employe, in a sense your friend, if Iconcealed from you that I know what may be your secret. And there isanother reason why I want you to know that I know: if the story is true,I want to tell you how much I sympathise."

  "Go on," said Rogers in his even voice.

  "It's doubtless all a mistake," said David, hurriedly, feeling that itwas not. "I've just had a talk with a man I knew in prison--Bill Halpin.He's called to see me several times. He happened to see you. Somethingabout you struck him at once as familiar, but he could not recogniseyou. He saw you again, and he thought he placed you. He called here, hada talk with you, and on going away purposely shook hands. There was nogrip in your little finger--you could only half bend it. He said heplaced you by that."

  Rogers still leaned against the table, his figure quiet as before--butDavid could see that the quiet was the quiet of a bow drawn to thearrow's head. The tendons of his hands, still holding the book, werelike little tent-ridges, and his yellowish face was now like paper.

  "And who did he say I am?" his low voice asked.

  "He told me that fifteen years ago you and he were friends, pals--thatyou were a famous safe-breaker--that you were 'Red Thorpe.'"

  Instantly Rogers was another man--tense, slightly crouching as thoughabout to spring, his eyes blazing, on his face the fierce look of thehaunted creature that knows it is cornered and that intends to fight tothe last. A swift hand jerked open a drawer of the table, and stretchedtoward David. In it was a revolver.

  David sprang to his feet and stepped back. Rogers glared at him for amoment, and for that moment David expected anything. Then suddenlyRogers said, "What a fool!--to be thinking of that!" and tossed thepistol into the open drawer.

  Defiantly erect, he folded his arms, his fierce pallor suggestive ofwhite heat, his eyes open furnace-doors of passion.

  "Well, you've got me!" he said, with strange guttural harshness. "I'vebeen expecting this minute for ten years. What're you going to do?Expose me, or blackmail me?"

  David got back his breath. "I don't understand. Halpin told me he didn
'tthink the police were after you."

  "They're not. I don't owe the State a minute."

  "Then why do you talk of exposure?"

  "You understand--perfectly!" His words were a blast of furnace-hotferocity. "You know what would happen if my clients learned I'm anex-convict. They'd take every house from me--I'd again be an outcast.You know this; you know you've got your teeth in my throat. Well--I'llpay blood-money. I have paid it. A police captain found me out, and forfive years sucked my blood--every cent I made--till he died. I'll payagain--I can't help myself. How much do you want?--blood-sucker!"

  These hot words, filled with supremest rage and despair, thrilled Davidinfinitely; he felt the long struggle, the tragedy, behind them.

  "You mistake me," he cried. "I've told you what I have because I thoughtto tell was my duty to you. Betray you, or accept money for silence--Inever could! Surely you know I never could!"

  "For ten years I've touched no man's penny but my own," he saidfiercely. "In money matters, I've been as honest as God!"

  The rage was dying out of his face, and despair was growing--the despairthat sees nothing but defeat, failure. He looked unbelief at David.

  "But what difference does that make to you?" he asked bitterly."Well--how much is it to be?"

  The piercing brothership that had been surging up in David for thisdesperate, defiant, suspicious man, swept suddenly to the flood.

  "Don't you see that we're making the same fight?" he cried withpassionate earnestness. "I admire you! I honour you! Your secret is assafe with me as in your own heart."

  David stretched out his hand. "I honour you!" he said.

  For several moments Rogers's gaze searched David's soul. "You'respeaking the truth--man?" he asked in a slow, harsh whisper.

  "I am."

  He continued staring at David's open face, flushed with its fervidkinship. "If you're lying to me--!" he whispered. Then he held out hishand, and his thin fingers gripped about David's hand like tight-drawnwires.

  "During the month I've known you, you've seemed a white man. I think Ibelieve you. But, man! don't play with me!" he burst out with suddenappeal. "If there's any trick in you, out with it now!"

  "If there was, now would be my time, wouldn't it?"

  They stood so for a moment, hands gripped, eyes pointed steadily intoeyes.

  "Yes, I believe you!" Rogers breathed, and sank into a chair and let hishead fall into his hand. David also sat down.

  Presently Rogers looked up.

  "I guess I was very harsh," he said weakly. "But you can't guess what Iwas going through. It was the moment I had feared for ten years. Itseemed that the world had fallen from beneath me."

  "I understand," said David.

  "But you cannot understand the ten years of fear, of suspense--of fearand suspense that walk with you, eat with you, sleep with you."

  He sat looking back into the years. After a space, the hunger forsympathy, the instinct to speak his decade of repressed bitterness,prompted him on.

  "I was one of those thousands and thousands that never had a chance whenboys. I had no very clear idea between right and wrong; there was no oneto show me the difference. I was full of life and energy, and I hadbrains. I could easily have been turned into the right way--but therewas no one. So I turned into the wrong. About that part of my lifeHalpin told you."

  "He said you were the cleverest man in your line."

  Rogers seemed not to hear the praise. "A man may begin to think whilehe is still a boy; if he has spirit and animal energy, he doesn'tbegin to think till later. I was twenty-seven. I had been two yearsin Sing Sing and had three more years to serve. It wasn't the warden'swords that started me thinking, nor the chaplain's sermons.Chaplains!--bah!--frocked phonographs! It was two old men I happened tosee there--mere cinders of men. The thought shot into me, 'There's whatyou're going to be at sixty-five!'

  "I couldn't get away from that thought. My mind forced me to study myfriends; there was not one old man among them who was living a peaceful,comfortable life. That burnt-out, hunted old age--I revolted from it! Idid a lot of thinking. I decided that, when I got out, prison gatesshould never have reason to close on me again.

  "Finally, I was discharged. I knew it was hard for an ex-convict to getwork, but I thought it would be easy for me. I was willing, clever,adaptable. But--oh, God! you know what the fight is, Aldrich!"

  "I do!" said David.

  Rogers was on his feet now, his eyes once more glowing. He began to pacethe floor excitedly.

  "Your fight was easy to mine. But I'll skip it--you know what thefight's like. It's enough to say that I found the world would notreceive me as my old self. I changed my name; I grew a beard; I began towear glasses; I dyed my red hair brown; I smothered down my spirit. Ibecame John Rogers.

  "A friend of mine in a Chicago real estate office, in which I onceworked for a couple of weeks as a clerk, sent me an envelope and a sheetof paper of the firm. On the paper I wrote a letter of recommendationfrom the firm. I had told my story to the Mayor of Avenue A--it wasbecause he knew I would sympathise with you that he brought you tome--and he helped me. I got my first job.

  "Think of that, Aldrich!" He held a trembling fist in David's face, andlaughed harshly. "I had to become a disguise, I had to lie, I had tocommit forgery, to get a chance to be honest! Oh, isn't this a sweetworld we're living in!

  "And ever since, my life has been one great lie! A lie for honesty! Butthe lie has done for me what truth could not do. I'm respected in asmall way. I'm successful in a small way. But, man, how that smallnesschafes me! How I am shackled! I should be respected, be successful, in alarge way. I'm cleverer than most of the men in my line. I have brains.I see big business opportunities. But I dare not take them. I mustalways be pulling back at the reins. If I let myself out, I shouldbecome prominent. Men would begin to ask, 'Who is that fellow Rogers?'and pretty soon some one would be sure to find out. And down I'd go! Imust keep myself so small that I'll not be noticed--that's my onlysafety!"

  He paused. David could say nothing.

  "And always the lie that saved me is threatening to destroy me," Rogerswent on, in a lower voice. "God, how I've worked to get to this poorplace! How I want to live peacefully, honestly! But some day someonewill find out I'm an ex-convict. A breath, and this poor house of cardsI've worked so hard to build and protect will go flat! And I cannotbegin all over again. I cannot! I haven't the strength. This is going tohappen--I feel it! And how I fear it! How I've feared it for ten longyears! Man, man, how I fear it!"

  He dropped exhausted into a chair, and almost at once a cough began toshake him by the shoulders.

  "And this disease"--a hand pressed itself upon his chest--"it's anotherprison gift!" he gasped, bitterly.

  There was not a word in David. He reached out and gathered one ofRogers's thin hands in both of his; gathered it in the clasp of hissoul. The cough ceased its shaking and Rogers looked up. He gazed at thetears, at the quivering brothership, in David's face. Thus he sat,silent, gripping David's hands; then, slowly, his own tears started.

  "Man, dear," he whispered brokenly, "I think I'm going to be glad youfound me out!"