The old bay horse that crawled back to Ringwood with Allis Porter after
her interview with Crane must have thought that the millennium for
driving horses had surely come. Even the ambition to urge the patriarch
beyond his complacent, irritating dog trot was crushed out of her by the
terrible new evidence the banker had brought in testimony against her
lover.
“I didn't need this,” the girl moaned to herself. In her intensity of
grief her thoughts became audible in expressed words. “Oh, God!” she
pleaded to the fields that lay in the silent rapture of summer content,
“strengthen me against all this falseness. You didn't do it, George--you
couldn't--you couldn't! And Alan! my poor, weak brother; why can't you
have courage and clear your friend?”
Her heart rose in angry rebellion against her brother, against Crane,
against Providence, even against the man she loved. Why should he
sacrifice both their lives, become an outcast himself to shield a boy,
who in a moment of weakness had committed an act which might surely be
forgiven if he would but admit his mistake? yes, it might even be called
a mistake. The punishment accepted in heroic silence by Mortimer was
out of all proportion to the wrong-doing. It meant the utter ruin of two
lives. Firmly as she believed in his innocence, a conviction was forced
upon her that unless Alan stood forth and boldly proclaimed the truth
the accumulated guilt--proof would cloud Mortimer's name, perhaps until
his death. Even after that his memory might linger as that of a thief.
The evening before Alan had been at Ringwood and Allis had made a final
endeavor to get him to clear the other's name by confessing the truth
to Crane. On her knees she had pleaded with her brother. The boy had
fiercely disclaimed all complicity, protested his own innocence with
vehemence, and denounced Mortimer as worse than a thief in having
poisoned her mind against him.
In anger Alan had disclosed Mortimer's treachery--as he called it--and
crime to their mother. Small wonder that Allis's hour of trial was a
dark one. The courage that had enabled her to carry Lauzanne to victory
was now tried a thousandfold more severely. It seemed all that was left
her, just her courage and faith; they had stood out successfully against
all denunciation of Lauzanne, and, with God's help, they would hold her
true to the man she loved.
Even the pace of a snail lands him somewhere finally, and the unassailed
Bay, with a premonition of supper hovering obscurely in his lazy mind,
at last consented to arrive at Ringwood.
Allis crept to her father like a fearsome child avoiding goblins.
Providentially he had not been initiated into the moral crusade against
the iniquitous Mortimer, so the girl clung to him as a drowning person
might to a plank of salvation. She longed to tell him everything--of her
love for Mortimer, perhaps he had guessed it, for he spoke brave words
often of the sturdy young man who had saved her from Diablo. Perhaps she
would tell him if she felt her spirit giving way--it was cruel to stand
quite alone--and beseech him, as he had faith in her, to believe in her
lover.
Allis went to the tea table by her father's side, fearing to get beyond
his hearing; she dreaded her mother's questioning eyes. What could be
said in the accused man's defense, or in her own? Nothing; she could
only wait.
A square old-fashioned wooden clock on the mantelpiece of the sitting
room had just droned off seven mellow hours, when the faint echo of its
music was drowned by the crunch of gravel; there was the quick step of
somebody coming up the drive; then the wooden steps gave hollow notice.
The visitor's advent was announced again by the brass knocker on the
front door.
“I'll go,” said Allis, as her mother rose. The girl knew who it was
that knocked, not because of any sane reason; she simply knew it was
Mortimer.
When she opened the door he stepped back hesitatingly. Was he not a
criminal--was he not about to leave his position because of theft?
“Come in,” she said, quietly; “I am glad you have come.”
“Shall I? I just want to speak to you for a minute. I said I would come.
But I can't see anybody--just you, alone.”
“I understand,” she answered. “Come inside.”
“I am going away,” he began; “I can't stand it here.”
“You have done nothing--nothing to clear yourself?”
“Nothing.”
“And you won't?”
“No.”
“Is this wise?”
“It is the inevitable.”
They were silent for a little; they were both standing. The girl broke
the stillness.
“I am glad you have come, because I can tell you again that I know you
are innocent. I know it, because my heart repeats it a thousand times a
day. I listen to the small voice and I hear nothing else.”
“You never waver--you never doubt?”
“Never.”
“You never will?”
“Never.”
“Then I care not. Other men have had misfortune thrust upon them and
have borne it without complaint, have had less to solace them than you
have given me now, and I should be a coward if I faltered. Some day
perhaps, you will know that I am worthy of your faith: God grant that
the knowledge brings you no fresh misery--there, forgive me, I have said
too much; I am even now a coward. If you will say good-bye I'll go.”
“Good-bye, my hero.” She raised her eyes, blurred with tears, and
held out her hand gropingly, as one searches in the dark, for the room
whirled like a storm cloud, and just faintly she could see the man's
strong face coming to her out of the gloom like the face of a god. He
took her hand. “Good-bye,” his voice vibrated brokenly; “if--if Justice
wills that my innocence be known some day, may I come back? Will you
wait, believing in me for a little?”
“Forever.”
He drew her to him by the hand he still clasped, and put his strong arms
about her. What mattered it now that he had been falsely accused--what
mattered it to either of them that he must accept the grim penalty of
his endeavor? With them in the soft gloom was nothing but love, and
faith, and innocence; and within the strong arms a sense of absolute
security, as though the false accusing world had been baffled, beaten
down, and the victory theirs--love.
He raised the girl's face and kissed her. “Let God witness that I press
your brave lips in innocence,” he said; “and in this pledge I love you
forever and ever.”
“Amen,” came from Allis involuntarily; it sounded to them both like the
benediction of a high priest.
“Amen,--” he responded. To speak again would have been sacrilege.
He put her from him gently, turned away and walked quickly from the
house.
The girl sat for a long time a gray shadow in the gathering darkness.
He was gone from her. It seemed as though she had scarce spoken the
encouragement she wished to give him. It had been a meeting almost
without words; but she felt strangely satisfied. The accusing revelation
that had come from Crane in the afternoon had been a crushing blow. It
was a mistake, of course; it wasn't true--somehow it wasn't true, but
still it had stunned. Now in the gloaming she sat with an angel of
peace; big, steadfast, honest eyes, full of thankfulness, looked
lovingly at her from where he had stood. If she could sit there forever,
with the echo of his deep “Amen” to their love lingering in her ears,
she would ask no further gift of the gods.
Mortimer, as with swinging stride he hurried toward the village, let his
mind flit back to the room of gray shadows. How little he had said!
Had there been aught spoken at all? The strong arms still tingled with
tender warmth where the impress of an angel had set them thrilling
ecstatically. Yes, what mattered their speech? There had been little
of the future--no promise to send word of his well-being--but let the
future look to itself. In the present he was king of a love realm that
was greater than all the world.
Field after field flitted by, studded here and there by square, gray
specters of ghost-like houses that blinked at him with red dragon eyes.
Sub-consciously he knew the eyes were searching out the secret that made
him in all his misery of misfortune so happy. And he would answer to the
eyes, dragon or human, without fear and without shame--because he was
innocent--that it was love, the greatest thing in all the world, the
love and faith sublime of a good, true woman. Woman had he said?--an
angel!