This must be the place," muttered the Virginian, stopping under the
electric light and looking up at the big house on the avenue. "That
fellow said I would know the place by the copper-studded door, and
there it is, as certain as there are back taxes in Gullmore." With that,
Colonel Moseby Allen walked up the granite steps and began to grope
about in the dark door-way for the electric bell. He could find no trace
of this indispensable convenience, and was beginning to lapse into a
flow of half-suppressed curses, when he noticed for the first time an
ancient silver knocker fastened to the middle of the door. He seized it
and banged it vigorously.
The Virginian stood in the dark and waited. Finally he concluded that
the noise had not been heard, and was about to repeat the signal when
the door was flung suddenly open, and a tall man holding a candle in his
hand loomed up in the door-way.
"I am looking," stammered the southerner, "for one Randolph Mason, an
attorney-at-law."
"I am Randolph Mason," said the man, thrusting the silver candlestick
out before him. "Who are you, sir?"
"My name is Allen," answered the southerner, "Moseby Allen, of Gullmore
county, West Virginia."
"A Virginian," said Mason, "what evil circumstance brings you here?"
Then Allen remembered the instructions which Parks had given him so
minutely. He took off his hat and passed his hand across his forehead.
"Well," he said, "I suppose the same thing that brings the others. We
get in and plunge along just as far as we can. Then Fate shuts down
the lid of her trap, and we have either to drop off the bridge or come
here."
"Come in," said Mason. Then he turned abruptly and walked down
the hall-way. The southerner followed, impressed by this man's
individuality. Allen had pushed his way through life with bluff and
bluster, and like that one in the scriptural writings, "neither feared
God nor regarded man." His unlimited assurance had never failed him
before any of high or low degree, and to be impressed with the power of
any man was to him strange and uncomfortable.
Mason turned into his library and placed the candlestick on a table in
the centre of the floor. Then he drew up two chairs and sat down in one
of them motioning Allen to the other on the opposite side of the table.
The room was long and empty, except for the rows of heavy book-cases
standing back in the darkness. The floor was bare, and there was no
furniture of any kind whatever, except the great table and the ancient
high-back chairs. There was no light but the candle standing high in its
silver candlestick.
"Sir," said Mason, when the Virginian had seated himself, "which do you
seek to evade, punishment or dishonor?"
The Virginian turned round, put his elbows on the table, and looked
squarely across at his questioner. "I am not fool enough to care for the
bark," he answered, "provided the dog's teeth are muzzled."
"It is well," said Mason, slowly, "there is often difficulty in dealing
with double problems, where both disgrace and punishment are sought to
be evaded. Where there is but one difficulty to face, it can usually be
handled with ease. What others are involved in your matter?"
"No others," answered the Virginian; "I am seeking only to save myself."
"From the law only," continued Mason, "or does private vengeance join
with it?"
"From the law only," answered Allen.
"Let me hear it all," said Mason.
"Well," said the Virginian, shifting uneasily in his chair, "my affairs
are in a very bad way, and every attempt that I have made to remedy
them has resulted only in disaster. I am walking, with my hands tied,
straight into the penitentiary, unless some miracle can be performed in
my favor. Everything has gone dead against me from my first fool move.
Four years ago I was elected sheriff of Gullmore county in the State
of West Virginia. I was of course required by law to give a large bond.
This I had much difficulty in doing, for the reason that I have no
estate whatever. Finally I induced my brother and my father, who is
a very old man, to mortgage their property and thereby secured the
requisite bond. I entered upon the duties of my office, and assumed
entire control of the revenues of the county. For a time I managed them
carefully and kept my private business apart from that of the county.
But I had never been accustomed to strict business methods, and I soon
found it most difficult to confine myself to them. Little by little I
began to lapse into my old habit of carelessness. I neglected to keep
up the settlements, and permitted the official business to become
intermixed with my private accounts. The result was that I awoke one
morning to find that I owed the county of Gullmore ten thousand dollars.
I began at once to calculate the possibility of my being able to meet
this deficit before the expiration of my term of office, and soon found
that by no possible means would I be able to raise this amount out of
the remaining fees. My gambling instincts at once asserted themselves.
I took five thousand dollars, went to Lexington, and began to play the
races in a vain, reckless hope that I might win enough to square my
accounts. I lost from the very start. I came back to my county and went
on as before, hoping against hope that something would turn up and
let me out. Of course this was the dream of an idiot, and when the
opposition won at the last election, and a new sheriff was installed,
and I was left but a few months within which to close up my accounts,
the end which I had refused to think of arose and stared me in the face.
I was now at the end of my tether, and there was nothing there but
a tomb. And even that way was not open. If I should escape the
penitentiary by flight or by suicide, I would still leave my brother and
my aged father to bear the entire burden of my defalcations; and when
they, as my bondsmen, had paid the sum to the county, they would all be
paupers."
The man paused and mopped the perspiration from his face. He was now
terribly in earnest, and seemed to be realizing the gravity and the
hopelessness of his crime. All his bluster and grandiloquent airs had
vanished.
"Reckless and unscrupulous as I am," he went on, "I cannot bear to
think of my brother's family beggars because of my wrong, or my father
in his extreme old age turned out from under his own roof and driven
into the poor-house, and yet it must come as certainly as the sun will
rise tomorrow."
The man's voice trembled now, and the flabby muscles of his face
quivered.
"In despair, I gathered up all the funds of the county remaining in my
hands and hurried to this city. Here I went to the most reliable broker
I could find and through him plunged into speculation. But all the
devils in hell seemed to be fighting for my ruin. I was caught in that
dread and unexpected crash of yesterday and lost everything. Strange
to say, when I realized that my ruin was now complete, I felt a kind of
exhilaration,--such, I presume, as is said to come to men when they are
about to be executed. Standing in the very gaping jaws of ruin, I
have to-day been facetious, even merry. Now, in the full glare of this
horrible matter, I scarcely remember what I have been doing, or how I
came to be here, except that this morning in Wall Street I heard some
one speak of your ability, and I hunted up your address and came without
any well defined plan, and, if you will pardon me, I will add that it
was also without any hope."
The man stopped and seemed to settle back in his chair in a great heap.
Randolph Mason arose and stood looking down at the Virginian.
"Sir," said Mason, "none are ever utterly lost but the weak. Answer my
question."
The Virginian pulled himself together and looked up.
"Is there any large fund," continued Mason, "in the hands of the
officers of your county?"
"My successor," said Allen, "has just collected the amount of a levy
ordered by the county court for the purpose of paying the remainder due
on the court-house. He now has that fund in his hands."
"When was the building erected?" said Mason.
"It was built during the last year of my term of office, and paid for in
part out of levies ordered while I was active sheriff. When my successor
came in there still remained due the contractors on the work some thirty
thousand dollars. A levy was ordered by the court shortly before my term
expired, but the collection of this levy fell to the coming officer, so
this money is not in my hands, although all the business up to this time
has been managed by me, and the other payments on the building made
from time to time out of moneys in my hands, and I have been the chief
manager of the entire work and know more about it than any one else. The
new sheriff came into my office a few days ago to inquire how he was to
dispose of this money."
Mason sat down abruptly. "Sir," he said almost bitterly, "there is not
enough difficulty in your matter to bother the cheapest intriguer in
Kings county. I had hoped that yours was a problem of some gravity."
"I see," said the Virginian, sarcastically, "I am to rob the sheriff of
this money in such a manner that it won't be known who received it, and
square my accounts. That would be very easy indeed. I would have only to
kill three men and break a bank. Yes, that would be very easy. You might
as well tell me to have blue eyes."
"Sir," said Randolph Mason, slowly, "you are the worst prophet unhung."
"Well," continued the man, "there can be no other way, If it were turned
over to me in my official capacity what good would it do? My bondsmen
would be responsible for it. I would then have it to account for, and
what difference, in God's name, can it make whether I am sent to the
penitentiary for stealing money which I have already used, or for
stealing this money? It all belongs to the county. It is two times six
one way, and six times two the other way."
"Sir," said Mason, "I retract my former statement in regard to your
strong point. Let me insist that you devote your time to prophecy. Your
reasoning is atrocious."
"I am wasting my time here," muttered the Virginian, "there is no way
out of it."
Randolph Mason turned upon the man. "Are you afraid of courts?" he
growled.
"No," said the southerner, "I am afraid of nothing but the
penitentiary."
"Then," said Mason, leaning over on the table, "listen to me, and you
will never see the shadow of it."