by Unknown
Well, I decided there was something wrong. The next thing on the program was for him to come over and kill me, and I almost felt like calling to him and telling him he made a mistake.
But I listened and looked and I heard nothing and saw nothing. And then, suddenly, I knew what he was doing.
He was fishing through the body of the girl he had killed to take away all evidence!
And while I thought that, and was listening for some little sound, I heard something inside of me, an angel or a devil, shout:
“Now’s your chance!”
Well, I would have flopped at the thought, if I hadn’t already been in bed. But I listened and waited, and as nothing happened, I got braver and braver. And finally I sat up again.
There wasn’t any sound in the whole cabin. It was just as if the man had been swallowed up, and I was left alone with the dead body.
I got up and tip-toed across the floor, stooping, and feeling for the coal scuttle. Finally I touched it softly. I took a look at the screen and then got down on my hands and knees.
I took the ashes and laid them on the floor. I took them one by one, so as not to make any noise, but I did it as quick as I could. It was awfully hard to keep them from slipping from my hand. The muscles just seemed to have stopped working.
I got lower and lower without finding the paper. Then I stopped.
Sometimes you can tell that somebody’s around you without seeing or hearing them. Just a sixth sense, I reckon. I sat quiet. Then, slowly, I turned my head.
He was creeping toward me.
I could see him coming, but I couldn’t hear a sound. He came closer and closer. When he got right above me, he stopped and looked down.
I looked up. I tried to say something, but I couldn’t think of a word. I don’t think my tongue would have worked if I did.
He just looked at me. Then he said:
“What are you doing up?”
“The wood’s nearly gone. I’m hunting for good coals.”
I don’t know how I said it, but I did.
“All right. Go ahead and look. Don’t mind me.”
Well, I had to turn back and look. And all the time I felt him standing over me. I picked the coals over.… And I heard him take a step closer and heard his breath nearer and nearer.
He grabbed my neck. I gave a yelp and ducked low.
That saved my life, for my head hit the coal-scuttle and it fell over, knocking me sideways.… And I heard hard steel strike its tin side with an awful crack.
I was up in a second and running across the floor. I heard him swearing. I reckon he hurt his hand on the scuttle. I got to Jane’s end and beat it behind the screen. I didn’t have time to open that window, for everything was quiet now and I knew he was coming. So I stood behind the screen and waited … the dead body behind me, and him, creeping up, creeping up.
And I was waiting for him to jump around the corner, when I had a bright idea.
I knew he was right in front of the screen. I jumped on the edge of the bed and threw myself against the screen with all my might. He went over and the screen and me on top of him. And two jiffies later I had the window open and was outside.
I didn’t stop running until I brought up against a tree. Then I went to sleep.
I had an awful head when I woke up. But I forgot all about that when I saw how high the sun was. I just got up and loped, swift as anything, for the village.
All the fellows had moved from in front of the drug store down to the front of the courthouse, so I knew things must be interesting. When they saw me they all turned and hollered.
“There he is!” they yelled.
I couldn’t help glancing at the big limb Jim had pointed out the day before, but I kept going.
“What for did you make off you didn’t know nothing about this trial yesterday?” Jim asked me when I hove up. “They’ve been looking all over the lot for you!”
Well, I didn’t answer him, but I just pushed through into the courtroom. I reckon they had just started proceedings, for people had a sort of attitude of settling themselves and the clerk was droning a lot of stuff nobody was paying any attention to.
I kept pushing up front, and before anybody would let me pass he would have to stop me and tell me that everybody had been looking for me the day before. You could tell I was important. All the kids from school looked at me, jealous-like, and I could have had an awfully good time if I hadn’t been having such a rotten one.
You see, I felt something else in the air. I couldn’t quite tell what it was until I reached the bunch of hard guys in front. Then, as I started to push by one, he muttered:
“Save your breath, boy, save your breath. It’s all settled long ago.”
But just then the clerk saw me and shouted out:
“John Darrow!” so loud that the judge woke up.
Well, I shouted: “Present!” sort of getting it twisted with something else I couldn’t remember, and I walked up to the witness box. Then they started asking me a lot of fool questions, such as whether I was born or not. But all the time I was answering them I was looking out of the corner of my eye at different people.
Al was sitting directly beneath me. He looked lots better than he did the day before; like a person who knows it’s all over and is going to have a good time while it lasts. And he looked at me awfully friendly, almost as if he was sorry for me. And when he smiled he just as good as said:
“Don’t you worry, Jackie boy! I’m doomed anyhow and nothing you can say will make any difference. Just go right ahead and tell the truth and we’ll be as good friends as ever!”
I wanted to shout down to him that there was still a chance for him, but I decided I wouldn’t.
And then I saw Irene, over in the mourner’s bench, or whatever you call it. She didn’t look friendly like Al. You could tell by her pretty white face that she thought I was betraying them. I couldn’t look at her squarely.
The cop gave me a shove and I turned around to bat him in the eye. But he was pointing to the district attorney, and I’d suddenly realized I’d been wondering again and forgot to answer his questions.
Old Sparton was frowning at me.
“Don’t hesitate, boy!” he was saying. “What time was it when you were walking up the Avenue?”
“One o’clock.”
“One o’clock.… Two o’clock is probably nearer right.… And you saw somebody running away from something?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Whose house was he running away from?”
“Old—Mr. Carr’s.”
“Mr. Carr’s house … At two o’clock in the morning.”
“One o’clock,” I interrupted him.
He glared at me. Then he said, leaning way forward:
“And who was the man who was running away from Mr. Carr’s house at two o’clock in the morning?”
I was aching and feeling sore and generally rotten. That always makes me obstinate. So I said:
“I won’t answer until you say it right!”
There was a giggle in the courtroom and the Judge pounded his gavel. Sparton frowned at me until his eyes almost touched. But he said, finally:
“Well, at one o’clock, then.”
I had to say it now. I tried to say it loud, as if it didn’t mean anything. But it was hardly more than a whisper, a whisper in the big, quiet room:
“Alfred Burnet.”
I could hear the big breath that everybody took. And I could feel Irene’s eyes without looking at them. Then Sparton asked me a few more questions, and after I’d answered them, he turned around and smiled as if it was all over. And I could see the hard guys tensioning, as if they were getting ready to run in when the jury pronounced the verdict. I could see a bit of rope dangling behind some of them.
Sparton lifted the German trench knife, sort of careless-like.
“Do you recognize this knife?” he asked, as if it didn’t much matter whether I did or not.
“Yes,” I said.
“Alfred Burnet’s.”
He turned around and faced the jury and shrugged his shoulders.
That was enough for me. I stepped to the edge of the stand and grabbed the rail, hard.
“But Al Burnet didn’t do it, just the same!” I shouted at him.
You ought to have heard the silence in that courtroom! I could just feel everybody’s eyes coming out of their sockets. But I didn’t look. I had a hard enough job holding on.
Old Sparton swung around and looked at me. He was too surprised to be mad.
“What are you talking about, boy? Nobody asked your opinion about that!”
“No, but I’m giving it just the same!” I shouted.
With that the Judge said something and the cop started to shove me out of the box. But I ducked, and when I came up I shouted, quick:
“I’ll bet the same person killed Old Man Carr what killed Jane Brewster!”
“What?”
Judge Wharton jumped up and stared at me. All over the room there was a great commotion. Everybody looked at me as if I just dropped from Mars—except the kids at school. Gee, they were jealous! And I felt mighty cocky at having broken the news.
“What did you say?” the Judge shouted.
“Jane Brewster was murdered, sir,” I said in a quiet sort of voice. “Somebody killed her in a cabin in the woods about five miles from here. Stuffed something in her mouth and stabbed her in the heart.”
There was a gasp of horror all over the courtroom. Somebody started crying, a sort of smothered whimpering. It was little Ruthy Bingham, a girl who Jane had sort of mothered.
The Judge pulled himself together and looked very business-like, as if such things were mere trifles in a busy day.
“Officer Sullivan!” he ordered. “Find out from the witness the location of the cabin the moment he finishes testifying. The coroner and his men will go with you, examine the evidence and dispose of the body.”
Everybody settled down, and I thought that that thrill was over, at least until the end of this trial, when I happened to look at Sparton’s face.
It was as white as a sheet, and he was glaring at me so fierce that I was glad there was a cop around—for the first time in my life.
When the room got silent again, Sparton leaned forward.
“So little Jane Brewster has been murdered, has she?”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
He took a step toward me and spoke, very quietly.
“And you know who murdered her, do you?”
“Why—” I hesitated.
He took another step toward me; and he was smiling, sort of knowing.
“And you know who murdered her, do you? You, and you alone?”
I’d forgotten all about that part of it for the moment. I’d been alone with her when she was murdered; and I didn’t know who did it. I didn’t feel quite so proud now of having broken the news.
Sparton kept coming nearer and nearer, and everybody in the room, including myself, held our breaths until we almost busted. Then Sparton spoke again, very, very low.
“And you know who murdered her,” he said again. Then, suddenly, he raised his finger and pointed it at me. “Who murdered Jane Brewster?” he shouted.
I almost fainted away. I just held tight to the rail to keep myself up. But it wasn’t because I was feeling guilty like you do when you’re not and people think you are. It was because I was staring at Sparton’s hand. For on the finger he pointed with was a long, funny-shaped bloodstone!
I stood staring at him. And he stared at me, while his dirty grin grew wider and wider. And I could feel everybody else in the room staring at both of us.
Then I leaned way forward, and in a voice that was hoarse and not much better than a whisper, I said:
“You did it!”
Well, everybody busted. And it was a good five minutes before order was re-established and the cops had got Sparton’s hands off of me.
They held him away from me, while he kept saying:
“Prove it! prove it!” in a voice that sounded as though he was talking to the Angel of Death.
“By that ring on your finger!” I shouted back.
Then the Judge stood up.
“That’s a serious accusation, young man!” he said. “And the whole affair is very irregular. If you can’t offer some other proof than that, you had better descend and let us go on with the trial.”
Well, I was stumped—for a second. And then I remembered the thing that had made me in such a sweat to testify: the paper Jane had written. My hand had landed on it the night before, just as the woodsman collared me, and I found it clutched in my fingers that morning when I woke up in the woods. While I was hurrying to town, I glanced at it, and read enough to realize that Jane had had some dope on the real murderer; but I had reached the courthouse before I’d found out who did it, and I had slipped it in my pants pocket and forgot about it.
I fished it out and handed it to the Judge.
“This is what Jane Brewster was writing night before last when I found her in the woods, Your Honor,” I said. “She slipped it into the coal-scuttle and I only got it last night.”
The Judge settled himself and commenced to read.
“ ‘This is the truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God,’ ” he read, “ ‘only you got to give me a two days’ start before you show this to anybody, whoever you are. I’m going to hide this, and then if somebody else gets blamed for Mr. Carr’s murder than the right person, I’ll write somebody where this is hid and he can show it to the police.
“ ‘I saw Mr. Carr just after he was murdered. I went up to his room, and he was lying just as still, and while I was looking at him, the door opened, and who was standing there but Horace Sparton with a knife in his hand!’ ”
“She’s a liar!”
The Judge stopped reading, and everything was dead still. Everybody looked at Horace Sparton. He was as white as a sheet, and he was standing up and clutching the back of his chair. The Judge glared at him a minute. Then he went on reading:
“ ‘Mr. Sparton was dressed like a woodsman and he had a black, false beard in his hand. I reckon it had slipped off and he was just putting it up to his face again. But when he saw me, he gave a yell, and I turned and ran.’ ”
So he had that costume on tap all the time for his dirty work! Sparton must have known that I was thinking of that, for, scared as he was, he turned and glanced at me. I was awfully sore at him, until I happened to look in back of him, and saw the hard-boiled eggs crowding up to the rail. The guy with the rope was rubbing his hands.
That made me a little sorry for him. But I was sorrier for his daughter, Miriam. She was having a pretty rough time of it! First her lover was accused of the murder, and they let up on him, only to prove it was her father. Everybody in town knew he wasn’t a model father, but still, your old man is your old man!
Miriam was sitting with her head very low and her face very white, and Al was looking at her as if he wasn’t awfully glad at what was happening. Lots of us felt sorry for her, while the Judge read on, until something he read made us all sit up and take notice and not feel so blooming sorry.
“ ‘I reckon I know why Mr. Sparton killed Mr. Carr,’ ” he read. “ ’Mr. Carr got friendly and confidential with me one time and he told me a lot about himself. He told me he had a daughter once, which I had heard; but that after he was put in jail, his wife was so ashamed that she got sick and died. And before she died she made him promise to put their daughter somewhere where she wouldn’t ever know he was her father. So he gave her to Mr. Sparton, when they were East together, just before Mrs. Sparton died, and he was giving him a lot of money to support her.
“ ‘And then he made out his will to Mr. Sparton, instead of to her. But when he found that Al Burnet and she were in love with each other, that tickled him, because he liked Al, although he was too stingy to give him anything. And he told me that the day they were engaged, he was
going to change the will, leaving everything to Al. He said he had told Mr. Sparton, too.’ ”
Well, all over the courtroom there was a stir. Miriam was staring at the Judge as if she couldn’t believe her ears. And Sparton had sunk into his seat with his back to the Judge, as if he was too weak ever to stand up again.
But he jumped up with a yell, as if he had sat on a tack. For out of the corner of his eyes he had seen the rope which the guy was fixing in a knot. Sparton stared at it a minute, and then at the man, who was watching him with a smile, and then, slowly, he swayed and fell over onto the floor.
That was the signal. With a howl like a lot of wild beasts just let out of their cages, the whole bunch rushed in and made for Sparton. Somebody put the rope around his neck, while the others kept the cops off. Then they dragged him out of the courtroom.
Sparton had about five more minutes of consciousness. They could have taken him out and done the job without waking him up, but that wasn’t their style. They wanted him to know what was happening and see how he took on.
The crowd stood around in a circle under the tree while he stood there and confessed it was all true.
“I got Burnet’s trench knife out of his house when he was away in Denver,” he said in a whisper, “because—because I wanted him to get the blame.”
“Is that all you got to say?” said one of the bums, sticking his jaw into Sparton’s face, real brave-like.
“That’s all.”
“Then all right, boys! Hoist her up!”
And that was enough for me. I turned around, and took my two legs, that were sort of wobbly, firmly in hand, so to speak, and sent them home.
It was six months before Al and Miriam were married. Everybody went to the wedding, for everybody knew now that Al was innocent. They believed him when he said he just went to his stepfather’s house to borrow enough money to get his sister a square meal. And anyhow, they wouldn’t have been awfully particular, even if they weren’t sure, seeing as how Al was a rich man now.
Al and Miriam were married in the big Carr house where he and Irene were living. They invited me to go, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have anything to wear. My suit had long ago got so that if I’d worn it, there’d be a law against it, and I’d thrown it away and had been wearing my other suit regular since spring.
