The Just and the Unjust by Vaughan Kester

V >> Vaughan Kester >> The Just and the Unjust

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20

He felt her arms tighten about his neck.

"To-day?" she faltered miserably. "To-day--"

Her arms relaxed. He pressed his lips to her pale cold lips and to her
eyes, from which the light of consciousness had fled.

"General Herbert!" he called.

Instantly the general appeared in the doorway.

"She has fainted!" said North.

Her father turned as if with some vague notion of asking assistance, but
North checked him.

"For God's sake take her away while she is still unconscious!" and he
placed her in her father's arms. For a moment his hand lingered on the
general's shoulder. "Thank you--good-by!" and he turned away abruptly.

"Good-by--God bless you, John!" said the general in a strained voice.

He seemed to hesitate for a moment as if he wished to say more; then as
North kept his back turned on him, he gathered the unconscious girl
closer in his arms, and walked from the room.

North remained by the window, his hands clutching the bars with
convulsive strength, then the wind which blew fresh and strong in his
face brought him the sound of wheels; but this quickly died out in the
distance.

Brockett tiptoed into the cell.

"I am going to lie down and see if I can get some sleep," North said,
throwing off his coat. "If I sleep, call me as soon as it is light--good
night."

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

ON THE HIGH IRON BRIDGE

As the weeks had passed Marshall Langham had felt his fears lift
somewhat, but the days and nights still remained endless cycles of
torment. Wherever he turned and with whomsoever he talked the North case
was certain sooner or later to be mentioned. There were hideous rumors
afloat, too, concerning General Herbert's activity in behalf of the
condemned man, and in spite of his knowledge of the law, he was
profoundly affected by this wild gossip, this ignorant conjecture, which
reason and experience alike told him misstated every fact that bore on
the situation. He was learning just how dependent he had been on
Gilmore; no strange imaginings, no foolish vagaries had ever beset the
gambler, his brutal vigor had yielded nothing to terror or remorse.

He knew the Herberts had gone to Columbus to make a final appeal to the
governor. Father and daughter had been driven across the Square by
Thompson, the Idle Hour foreman, and they had passed below the windows
of Langham's office on their way to the station. It had seemed to him an
iniquitous thing that the old statesman's position and influence should
be brought into the case to defeat his hopes, to rob him of his
vengeance, to imperil his very safety. Racked and tortured, he had no
existence outside his fear and hate. All that day Langham haunted the
railway station. If any word did come over the wires, he wished to know
it at once, and if General Herbert returned he wished to see him, since
his appearance must indicate success or failure. If it were failure the
knowledge would come none too quickly; if success, in any degree, he
contemplated instant flight, for he was obsessed by the belief that then
he would somehow stand in imminent peril.

He was pacing the long platform when the afternoon train arrived, but
his bloodshot eyes searched the crowd in vain for a sight of General
Herbert's stalwart figure.

"He has just one more chance to get back in time!" he told himself. "If
he doesn't come to-night it means I am safe!"

His bloodless lips sucked in the warm air. Safe! It was the first time
in months he had dared to tell himself this; yet a moment later and his
fears were crowding back crushing him to earth. The general might do
much in the six hours that remained to him.

He was back at his post when the night train drew in, and his heart gave
a great leap in his breast as he saw the general descend from the
platform of the sleeper and then turn to assist Elizabeth. She was
closely veiled, but one glance at the pair sufficed.

Langham passed down the long platform. The flickering gas-jets that
burned at intervals under the wide eaves of the low station were
luminous suns, his brain whirled and his step was unsteady. He passed
out into the night, and when the friendly darkness had closed about him,
slipped a feverish palm across his eyes and thanked God that his season
of despair was at an end. He had suffered and endured but now he was
safe!

Before him the train, with its trailing echoes, had dwindled away into
the silence of the spring night. Scarcely conscious of the direction he
was taking he walked down the track toward the iron bridge. It was as if
some miracle of healing had come to him; his heavy step grew light, his
shaking hands became steady, his brain clear; in those first moments of
security he was the ease-seeking, pleasure-loving Marshall Langham of
seven months before.

As he strode forward he became aware that some one was ahead of him on
the track, then presently at the bridge a match was struck, and his
eyes, piercing the intervening darkness, saw that a man had paused there
to light a pipe. He was quite near the bridge himself when another match
flared, and he was able to distinguish the figure of this man who was
crouching back of one of the iron girders. A puff of wind extinguished
the second match almost immediately, and after a moment or two in which
the lawyer continued to advance, a third match was struck; at the same
instant the man must have heard the sound of Langham's approach, for as
he brought the blazing match to the bowl of a short black pipe, he
turned, standing erect, and Langham caught sight of his face. It was Joe
Montgomery. Another playful gust found Mr. Montgomery's match and the
two men stood facing each other in the darkness.

Langham had been about to speak but the words died on his lips; a wave
of horror passed over him. He had known not quite ten minutes of
security and now it was at an end; his terror all revived; this hulking
brute who faced him there in the darkness menaced his safety, a few
drinks might give him courage to go to Moxlow or to the general with his
confession. How was he to deal with the situation?

"There ain't much Irish about me!" said Montgomery, with a casual oath.

There was a moment of silence. The handy-man was searching his pockets
for a fresh match.

"Why have you come back, Joe?" asked Langham finally, when he could
command himself.

Montgomery started violently and his pipe fell from his mouth.

"Is that you, Boss Langham?" he faltered.

He stared about him seeking to pierce the darkness, fearful that Langham
was not alone, that Gilmore might be somewhere near.

"Are you by yourself, boss?" he asked, and a tremor stole into his
hoarse throaty voice. He still carried the scars of that fearful beating
Gilmore had administered.

"Yes," said Langham. "I'm alone."

"I didn't know but Andy Gilmore might be with you, boss," said
Montgomery, clearing his throat.

"No, he's not here," replied Langham quietly. "He's left town."

"Yes, but he'll be comin' back!" said the handy-man with a short laugh.

"No, he's gone for good."

"Well, I ain't sorry. I hope to God I never see him again--he beat me up
awful! I was as good a friend as he'll ever have; I was a perfect yellow
dog to him; he whistled and I jumped, but I'll be damned if I ever jump
again! Say, I got about eighteen inches of old gas-pipe slid down my
pants leg now for Mr. Andy; one good slug with that, and he won't have
no remarks to make about my goin' home to my old woman!"

"You won't have to use it."

"I'm almost sorry," said Montgomery.

"I suppose that thirst of yours is unimpaired?" inquired Langham.

His burning eyes never for an instant forsook the dark outline of the
handy-man's slouching figure.

"I dunno, boss, I ain't been drinkin' much lately. Liquor's a bully
thing to keep the holes in your pants, and your toes out where you can
look at 'em if you want to. I dunno as I'll ever take up
whisky-drinkin' again," concluded Mr. Montgomery, with a self-denying
shake of the head.

"Are you glad to be back, Joe?" asked Langham.

It was anything to gain time, he was thinking desperately but to no
purpose.

"Glad! Stick all the cuss words you know in front of that and it will be
mild!" cried Montgomery feelingly. "It's pitiful the way I been used,
just knocked from pillar to post; I've seen dogs right here in Mount
Hope that had a lot happier time than I've been havin'--and me a married
man! I've always tried to be a good husband, I hope there won't be no
call for me to make a rough-house of it to-night!" he added playfully,
as he looked off across the bridge.

"I guess not, Joe," said Langham.

His fears assembled themselves before him like a phantom host. How was
he to deal with the handy-man; how would Gilmore have dealt with him?
Had the time gone by to bully and bribe, or was that still the method by
which he could best safeguard his life?

"Say, boss, what they done with young John North?" Montgomery suddenly
demanded.

"Nothing yet," answered Langham after an instant's pause.

"Ain't he had his trial?" Montgomery asked.

"Yes."

"Well, ain't they done anything with him? If he ain't been sent up, he's
been turned loose."

"Neither, Joe," rejoined Langham slowly. "The jury didn't agree. His
friends are trying to get the judge to dismiss the case."

"That would suit me bully, boss, if they done that!" cried the
handy-man.

Langham caught the tone of relief.

"I don't want to see him hang; I don't want to see no one hang, I'm all
in favor of livin', myself. Say, I had a sweet time out West! I'd a died
yonder; I couldn't stand it, I had to come back--just had to!"

He was shaking and wretched, and he exaggerated no part of the misery he
had known.

"When did you get in?" asked Langham.

"I beat my way in on the ten-thirty; I rode most of the way from
Columbus on top of the baggage car--I'm half dead, boss!"

"Have you seen any one?"

"No one but you. I got off at the crossin' where they slow up and come
along here; I wasn't thinkin' of a damn thing but gettin' home to my old
woman. I guess I'll hit the ties right now!" he concluded with sudden
resolution, and once more his small blue eyes were turned toward the
bridge.

"I'll walk across to the other side with you," said Langham hastily.

"The crick's up quite a bit!" said the handy-man as they set foot on the
bridge.

Langham glanced out into the gloom, where swollen by the recent rains
the stream splashed and whirled between its steep banks.

"Yes, way up!" he answered.

As he spoke he stepped close to Montgomery's side and raised his voice.

"Stop a bit," said Joe halting. "I shan't need this now," and he drew
the piece of gas-pipe from his trousers pocket. "I'd have hammered the
life out of Andy Gilmore!" he said, as he tossed the ugly bludgeon from
him.

"You haven't told me where you have been," said Langham, and once more
he pressed close to Montgomery, so close their elbows touched.

The handy-man moved a little to one side.

"Where _ain't_ I been, you better ask, boss," he said. "I seen more
rotten cities and more rotten towns and more rotten country than you can
shake a stick at; God A'mighty knows what's the good of it--I dunno!
Everybody I seen was strangers to me, never a face I knowed anywhere;
Chicago, Kansas City, St. Louis, Denver--to hell with 'em all, boss; old
Mount Hope's good enough for me!" And the handy-man shrugged his huge
slanting shoulders.

"Don't go so fast, Joe!" Langham cautioned, and his eyes searched the
darkness ahead of them.

"It's a risky business for you, boss," said the handy-man. "You ain't
used to this bridge like me."

"Do you always come this way?" asked Langham.

"Always, in all seasons and all shapes, drunk or sober, winter or
summer," said the handy-man.

"One wouldn't have much chance if he slipped off here to-night," said
Langham with a shudder.

"Mighty little," agreed Montgomery. "Say, step over, boss--we want to
keep in the middle! There--that's better, I was clean outside the rail."

"Can you swim?" asked Langham.

"Never swum a stroke. The dirt's good enough for me; I got a notion that
these here people who are always dippin' themselves are just naturally
filthy. Look at me, a handy-man doing all kinds of odd jobs, who's got a
better right to get dirty--but I leave it alone and it wears off. I'm
blame certain you won't find many people that fool away less money on
soap than just me!" said Joe with evident satisfaction. "The old woman's
up!" he cried, as he caught the glimmer of a light on the shore beyond.

Perhaps unconsciously he quickened his pace.

"Not so fast, Joe!" gasped Langham.

"Oh, all right, boss!" responded Montgomery.

Langham turned to him quickly, but as he did so his foot struck the
cinder ballast of the road-bed.

"Good night, boss!" said Joe, his eyes fixed on the distant light.

"Wait!" said Langham imperiously.

"What for?" demanded Montgomery.

"The water made such a noise I couldn't talk to you out on the bridge,"
began Langham.

"Well, I can't stop now, boss," said the handy-man, turning impatiently
from him.

"Yes, damn you--you can--and will!" and Langham raised his voice to give
weight to his words.

Montgomery rounded up his shoulders.

"Don't you try that, boss! Andy Gilmore could shout me down and cuss me
out, but you can't; and I'll peel the face off you if you lay hands on
me!" He thrust out a grimy fist and menaced Langham with it. There was a
brief silence and the handy-man swung about on his heel.

"Good night, boss!" he said over his shoulder, as he moved off.

Langham made no answer, but long after Joe's shuffling steps had died
away in the distance he was still standing there irresolute and
undecided, staring fixedly off into the darkness that had swallowed up
the handy-man's hulking figure.

Mr. Montgomery, muttering somewhat and wagging his head, continued along
the track for a matter of a hundred yards, when his feet found a narrow
path which led off in the direction of the light he had so confidently
declared was his old woman's. Then presently as he shuffled forward, the
other seven houses of the row of which his was the eighth, cloaked in
utter darkness, took shadowy form against the sky. The handy-man
stumbled into his unkempt front yard, its metes and bounds but
indifferently defined by the remnants of what had been a picket fence;
he made his way to the side door, which he threw open without ceremony.
As he had surmised, his old woman was up. She was seated by the table in
the corner, engaged in mending the ragged trousers belonging to Joseph
Montgomery, junior.

At sight of Joe, senior, she screamed and flung them aside; then white
and shaking she came weakly to her feet. The handy-man grinned genially.
He was not of demonstrative temperament.

"Joe!" cried Nellie, as she sprang toward him. "Dear Joe!" and she threw
her arms about him.

"Oh, hell!" said the handy-man.

Nellie was hanging limply about his neck and he was aware that she had
kissed him; he could not remember when before she had taken such a
liberty. Mr. Montgomery believed in a reasonable display of affection,
but kissing seemed to him a singularly frivolous practice.

"Oh, my man!" sobbed Nellie.

"Oh, cheese it, and let me loose--I don't like this to-do! Can't a
married man come home without all this fuss?"

"Dear Joe, you've come back to me and your babies!" And the tears
streamed down her cheeks.

"I don't need you to tell me that--I got plenty sense enough to know
when I'm home!" said Montgomery, not without bitterness.

"I mourned you like you was passed away, until your letter come!" said
Nellie, and the memory of her sufferings set her sobbing afresh.

"Oh, great hell!" exclaimed Joe dejectedly. "Why can't you act
cheerful? What's the good of takin' on, anyhow--I don't like tombstone
talk."

"It was just the shock of seein' you standin' there in the door like I
seen you so often!" said Nellie weakly.

"If that ain't a woman for you, miserable because she's happy. Say, stop
chokin' me; I won't stand for much more of this nonsense, you might know
I don't like these to-dos!"

"You don't know what I've suffered, Joe!"

"That's a woman for you every time--always thinkin' of herself! To hear
you talk any one would think I'd been to a church picnic; I look like
I'd been to a picnic, don't I? Yes, I do--like hell!"

"They said you would never come back to me," moaned Nellie.

"Who said that?" asked Mr. Montgomery aggressively.

"Everybody--the neighbors--Shrimplin--they all said it!"

"Ain't I told you never to listen to gossip, and ain't I always done
what's right?" interrogated the handy-man severely.

"Yes, always, Joe," said Nellie.

"Then you might know'd I'd come back when I got plenty good and ready. I
fooled 'em all, and I'm here to stay--that is if you keep your hands off
me!"

"You mean it, Joe?" asked Nellie.

"What? About your keepin' your hands off me? Yes, you bet I do!"

And Montgomery by a not ungentle effort released himself from his wife's
embrace. This act so restored his self-respect that he grinned
pleasantly at her.

"I don't know when I been so happy, Joe--it's awful nice to have you
back!" said Nellie, wiping her eyes on the corner of her apron.

"There's some sense in your sayin' that," said the handy-man, shaking
his head. "You ought to feel happy."

"You don't ask after your children, Joe.--"

"Don't I? Well, maybe you don't give me no time to!" said Mr.
Montgomery, but without any special enthusiasm, since the truth was that
his interest in his numerous offspring was most casual.

"They're all well, and the littlest, Tom--the one you never seen--has
got his first tooth!" said Nellie.

Joe grunted at this information.

"He'll have more by and by, won't he?" he said.

"How you talk, of course he will!"

"He'd have a devil of a time chewin' his food if he didn't," observed,
the handy-man with a throaty chuckle.

"And, Joe, I got the twenty dollars you sent!"

"Is any of it left?" inquired Mr. Montgomery, with sudden interest.

"The rent and things took it all. That was the noblest act you ever
done, Joe; it made me certain you was thinkin' of us, and from the
moment I got that money I was sure you would come back no matter what
people said!"

"Humph!" said Joe. "Is there anything in the house fit to eat? Because
if there is, I'll feed my face right now!"

"Do set down, Joe; I'll have something for you in a minute--why didn't
you tell me you was hungry?"

She was already rattling plates and knives at the cupboard, and Joe took
the chair she had quitted when he entered the house, stretching his legs
under his own table with a sense of deep satisfaction. He had not
considered it worth his while to visit the kitchen sink, although his
mode of life, as well as his mode of travel for days past, had covered
him with dust and grime; nor did he take off his ragged cap. It had
always been his custom to wear it in the privacy of his own home, it was
one of the last things he removed before going to bed at night; at all
other times it reposed on the top of his curly red head as the only safe
place for a cap to be.

"I was real worried about Arthur along in March," said Mrs. Montgomery,
as such odds and ends as had survived the appetites of all the little
Montgomerys began to assemble themselves on the table.

"What's he been a-doin'?" inquired Arthur's father.

"It was his chest," explained Nellie.

Joe grunted. By this time his two elbows were planted on the edge of the
table and his mouth was brought to within six scant inches of his plate.
The handy-man's table manners were not his strong point.

"Oh, I guess his chest is all right!" he paused to say.

"I thought it was best to be on the safe side, so I took him up-town and
had his health examined by a doctor. He had to take off his shirt so he
could hear Arthur's lungs."

"Well, I'm damned,--what did he do that for?" cried Joe, profoundly
astonished.

"It was a mercy I'd washed him first," added Nellie, not comprehending
the reason of her husband's sudden show of interest though gratified by
it.

"Lord, I thought you meant the doctor had took off his shirt!" said Joe.
"He's all right now, ain't he?"

"Yes, but he did have such an alarmin' cough; it hung on and hung on, it
seemed to me like it was on his chest, but the doctor said no, and I was
that relieved! I used some of the twenty dollars to pay him and to get
medicine from the drug store."

Joe was cramming his mouth full of cold meat and bread, and for the
moment could not speak; when at length he could and did, it was to say:

"I hear Andy Gilmore's left town?"

"Yes, all of a sudden, and no one knows where he's gone!"

"I guess he's had enough of Mount Hope, and I guess Mount Hope's had
enough of him!" remarked Joe.

"They say the police was goin' to stop the gamblin' in his rooms if he
hadn't gone when he did."

"Well, I hope he'll catch hell wherever he is!" said Joe, with a sullen
drop to his voice.

"For a while after you left, Joe, they didn't give me no peace at
all--the police and detectives, I mean--they was here every day! And
Shrimplin told me they was puttin' advertisements in the papers all over
the country."

"What for?" inquired Montgomery uneasily.

"They wanted to find out where you'd gone; it seemed like they was
determined to get you back as a witness for the trial," explained
Nellie.

Montgomery's uneasiness increased. He began to wonder fearfully if he
was in any danger, vague forebodings assailed him. Suppose he was
pinched and sent up. His face blanched and his small blue eyes slid
around in their sockets. Nellie was evidently unaware of the feeling of
terror her words had inspired, for she continued:

"But it didn't make no difference in the end that you wasn't here, for
everybody says it was you that hanged John North; you get all the credit
for that!"

Montgomery's hands fell at his side.

"Me hanged John North! _Me hanged John North!_" he repeated. "But he
ain't hanged--God A'mighty, he ain't hanged yet!"

His voice shot up into a wail of horrified protest. Nellie regarded him
with a look of astonishment. She had been rather sorry for young John
North, but she had also felt a certain wifely pride in Joe's connection
with the case.

"No, he ain't hanged yet but he will be in the morning!" she said.

The handy-man sprang to his feet, knocking over the chair in which he
had been seated.

"What's that?" he roared.

"Why, haven't you heard? He's to be hung in the morning."

Joe glared at her with starting eyes.

"What will they do that for--hang him--hang John North!" He tore off his
ragged cap and dashed it to the floor at his feet. "To hell with Andy
Gilmore and to hell with Marsh Langham--that's why they drove me out of
town--to hell with 'em both!" he shouted, and his great chest seemed
bursting with pent-up fury.

"Why, whatever do you mean, Joe?" cried Nellie.

"He never done it--you hear me--and they _know_ it! You sure you got the
straight of this--they are goin' to hang young John North?" He seized
her roughly by the shoulders.

"Yes--how you take on, Joe--"

"Take on!" he shouted. "You'd take on too if you stood in my place.
You're sure you know what you're talkin' about?"

"I seen the fence around the jail yard where they're goin' to hang him;
I went over on purpose yesterday with one of the neighbors and took
Arthur; I thought it would be improvin', but he'd seen it before. There
ain't much he don't see--for all I can do he just runs the streets."

Joe's resolution had been formed while she was speaking, and now he
snatched his ragged cap from the floor.

"You stay right here till I get back!" he said gruffly.

It was not his habit to discuss affairs of any moment with Mrs.
Montgomery, since in a general way he doubted the clearness of the
feminine judgment, and in the present instance he had no intention of
taking her into his confidence. The great problem by which he was
confronted he would settle in his own fashion.

"You ain't in any trouble, Joe?" and Nellie's eyes widened with the
birth of sudden fear.

The handy-man was standing by the door, and she went to his side.

"Me? No, I guess not; but I got an everlastin' dose of it for the other
fellow!" and he reached for the knob.

"Was it what I said about the police wantin' you?" his wife asked
timidly.

She knew that his dealings with the police had never been of an
especially fortunate nature. He shook off the hand she had placed on his
arm.

"You keep your mouth shut till I get back!" he said, and pushing open
the door, passed out.

The night had cleared since he crossed the bridge, and from the great
blue arch of heaven the new moon gave her radiance to a sleeping world.
But Montgomery was aware only of his purpose as he slouched along the
path toward the railroad track. The horror of North's fate had fixed his
determination, nothing of terror or fear that he had ever known was
comparable to the emotion he was experiencing now. He did not even
speculate on the consequences to himself of the act he had decided on.
They said that he had hanged John North--he got the credit for
that--well, John North wasn't hanged yet! He tossed his arms aloft. "My
God, I didn't mean to do that!" he muttered.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20