Shirley shook her head as though that were a thing out of the question.
"No, to your honest self," she said earnestly but kindly. "To the Billy
Murgatroyd that was."
For a moment they looked steadily into each other's eyes. From the time
of Miriam's exposure of him in the court-room there had never been any
admission, any concession on Murgatroyd's part. Nor was there any now;
but unknown to himself, there was an air of appeal, not wholly free from
anxiety even, for her face was again showing signs of hardness as he
spoke:--
"I can hardly do that. I cannot stop. And if I should--where is the
inducement? You have no apple to offer me; you are beyond my reach."
And as if to disprove his own words, an impulse of adoration, too
powerful to be checked, seized him, and he caught her hand and pressed
it.
A brief moment only Shirley allowed it to rest in his, then slowly
withdrew it; and her action told him plainer than words that there was
to be nothing further between them--she was through with him--she must
despise him. As an evangelist, as the good friend she had sent for him,
but as lovers--no, that was all over. And yet, had she faltered once,
had she but opened her arms to him, if only for the last time,
Murgatroyd could not tell what he would have done. In all probability he
would have suffered exile--sackcloth and ashes for his huge misdeed.
And the girl! Shirley felt, knew that there could be no compromise.
Murgatroyd must purge himself, even though it involved a lifetime of
shame. And after he had yielded up his shameless gains, what then?
Shirley did not know--she could not tell. But it was not given to
Murgatroyd to know that he was the subject of her perplexities; nor
could he read, as he should have, any hope in the words which she now
spoke:--
"And if I am out of your reach--it's your own fault. If you had been
half the man I thought, you would never have listened to me. But you
never cared for me, even though you said so," Shirley said, casting her
eyes down, not daring to look him in the face. "What you did, you did
for yourself and not for me. You were weak from the start. Any man who
would surrender his honesty even for a woman is not a man. I see now
that I ought not to have sent for you. I take back everything I have
said." She paused, and then concluded with a little shake of the head:--
"I wouldn't marry you now if you were the last man on earth!"
Both rose to their feet. Habit, perhaps, rather than any regret for her
words, induced her to dismiss him with a tender expression on her face.
And Murgatroyd bowed low over the hand she offered him, pressed it and
without a word of protest went out of the room. With his departure went
out the last glimmer of hope that he would ever return to his better
self. Nothing could stop him now. As for Shirley? The moment the door
closed on him she sank with a moan into a chair.
* * * * *
Thorne took an appeal from the verdict of conviction. He had been
careful to take exception to each bit of questionable evidence.
"I think," he assured Mrs. Challoner, "that I have found more than one
hook to hang a hat on. It looks to me like a reversal."
"I am sure it will be," she replied.
Her assurance was the same assurance that had sustained her in the
trial. There was still that mysterious something that Thorne could not
understand. She seemed the incarnation of hope.
"What do you think, chief?" asked McGrath of Murgatroyd, one day after
the appeal had been argued.
Murgatroyd shrugged his shoulders.
"That verdict will stick," was his only comment.
"By the way," said McGrath, "Pemmican keeps mum up there in jail; but
he's getting restless as thunder. He wants to know how soon you're going
to try him on this gambling charge."
Murgatroyd smiled.
"In due course," he returned, "but you can tell Pemmican unofficially
that the quickest way for him to get on trial--or in fact the quickest
way for him to get off without trial--to get out of jail, is to let me
know the name of the man higher up. I'm looking for John Doe, and I
expect to keep Pemmican under lock and key until I get him. You
understand?"
"He sure does kick," laughed McGrath.
Shirley and Miriam and even Challoner watched the course of events with
great interest. Miriam's mouth was sealed upon the question of the
bribe, but Challoner absorbed what he had heard in the court-room, and
hazy though it had been, he noted that Miriam's manner was still
hopeful, in fact, certain. Shirley, too, felt, rather than knew, that
Murgatroyd had removed from himself not the taint of bribery, but the
violation of his compact. She felt the thing was cut and dried.
One day the Clerk of the Court of Errors and Appeals placed in the hands
of a special messenger a document some five pages long. It was a carbon
copy.
"Take that to the prosecutor of the pleas," he commanded, "and tell him
it's advance. The original," he added, "will be on file to-morrow."
Murgatroyd received and read it with inward satisfaction. As he was
perusing it, Mixley rushed into his private room, and yelled in alarm:--
"Chief! Chief! Look at this!" He, too, held in his hand a document
composed of several sheets of yellow paper, scribbled over with a soft,
black, lead-pencil. "It's from the warden--" he whispered.
Murgatroyd laid down his carbon copy and took Mixley's yellow sheets. He
read the first page and rose to his feet.
"When did all this happen, Mixley?" he asked in a tense voice, with
difficulty restraining his excitement.
"About an hour ago."
"Who was the keeper that took this down?"
"Jennings."