The bay was dragged, various methods being used, but the bodies of Sandy
and Tom McAdam were not recovered. Mary McAdam with strained eyes and
rigid lips waited at the wharf as each party returned, and when at last
hope died in her poor heart, she set about the doing of two things that
she felt must be done.
The behaviour of the boys in the boat on the day of the accident had at
last reached her ears, for, with such excitement prevailing and Jerry-Jo
reduced to periods of nervous babbling as he repeated again and again the
story, Mary was certain of overhearing the details. As far as possible
she verified every word. That her sons had disobeyed her about the sail
there could be no doubt, and when she went to the shelf of the bar and
discovered the half-filled bottles which Sandy had put in the places of
the brandy and whisky, her heart gave up doubt. She relinquished all that
she had prided herself upon in the past. They had defied and deceived
her! They had permitted her to be mocked while she prated of her
superiority! It was bitter hard, but Mary McAdam made no feeble cry--she
prepared for the final act in the little drama. Beyond that she could
not, would not look.
"Dig me two graves," she commanded Big Hornby; "dig them one on either
side of my husband's."
"You'll be thinking the bodies will yet be found, poor soul?" Hornby had
a tender nature kept human by his hunger for his absent boys.
"I'm not thinking. I'm doing my part; let others do the same."
And then Mary went to Anton Farwell. Farwell, since the night of the
tragedy, was waiting, always waiting for the inevitable. Every knock at
his door brought him panting to his feet. He knew Doctor Ledyard would
come; he fervently hoped he would, and soon, but the days dragged on.
There were moments when the man had a wild desire to shoulder his bag and
set forth under shadow of the night and the excitement, for one of his
long absences, this one, however, to terminate as far from Kenmore as
possible. Once he had even started, but at the edge of the water where
his boat lay he halted, deterred by the knowledge that his safer course
lay in facing what he must face sooner or later. Now that he was known to
be alive it were easier to deal with one man than with the pack of
bloodhounds which that one man might set upon him. Always the personal
element entered in--it was weak hope, but the only one. He might win
Ledyard; he could not win the pack!
When Mary McAdam knocked on Farwell's door he thought the time had come,
but the sight of the distracted mother steadied him. Here was something
for him to do, something to carry him away from his lonely forebodings.
"Come in, Mrs. McAdam. Rest yourself. You look sorely in need of rest."
It was the early evening of a hot day. It was lighter out of doors than
in the cottage, for the shades were drawn at Farwell's windows; he
disliked the idea of being watched from without.
"I can't rest, Master Farwell, till I've done my task," said the poor
soul, sinking into the nearest chair. "And it's to get your help I've
come."
"I'll do what I can," murmured Farwell. "What I'll be permitted to do,"
he felt would be more true.
"I've said more than once, Mr. Farwell, that were my boys like other boys
I'd give up the business of the White Fish. Well, my lads were like
others, only they were keener about deceiving me. I thought I'd made them
strong and sure, but I did the same hurt to my flesh and blood that I did
to others. I put evil too close and easy to them. I prided myself on what
I had never done! They'll come back to me no more. Could I have a talk
with them, things might be straightened out; but I must do what is to be
done alone."
Not a quiver shook the low, severe voice. The very hardness moved Farwell
to deep pity.
"It's now, Mr. Farwell, that I'd have you come to the Lodge and help me
with my task, and when it's over I want you to stand with me beside those
two empty graves and say what you can for them who never had the right
mother to teach them. I'm no church woman; the job of priest and minister
sickens me, but I know a good man when I see one. You helped the lads
while they lived; you risked your life to help them home at the last; and
it's you who shall consecrate the empty beds where I'd have my lads lie
if the power were mine!"
Farwell got up and paced the room restlessly. Suddenly, with Ledyard's
recognition, the poor shell of respectability and self-respect which,
during his lonely years, had grown about him, was torn asunder, and he
was what he knew the doctor believed him. To such, Mary McAdam's request
seemed a cruel jest, a taunt to drive him into the open. And yet he knew
that up to the last ditch he must hold to what he had secured for
himself--the trust and friendship of these simple people. Hard and
distasteful as the effort was he dared not turn himself from it. Full
well he knew that Ledyard's magnifying glass was, unseen, being used
against him even now. The delay was probably caused by the doctor's
silent investigation of his recent life, his daily deeds. He could well
imagine the amusement, contempt, and disbelief that would meet the story
of his poor, blameless years during which he had played with children,
worked in his garden, been friends with the common folk, not from any
high motive, but to keep himself from insanity! He had had to use any
material at hand, and it had brought about certain results that Ledyard
would dissect and toss aside, he would never believe! Still the attempt
to live on, as he had lived, must be undertaken. A kind of desperation
overcame him.
What did it matter? He might just as well go on until he was stopped. He
was no safer, no more comfortable, sitting apart waiting for his summons.
He would, as far as in him lay, ignore the menacing thing that hovered
near, and play the part of a man while he might.
"I'm ready to go with you, Mrs. McAdam," he said, turning for his hat,
"and as we go tell me what you are about to do."
It was no easy telling. The mere statement of fact was so crude that
Farwell could not, by any possibility, comprehend the dramatic scene he
was soon to witness and partake of.
"I'm going to keep my word," Mary McAdam explained. "I'll not be waiting
for the license to be given, or taken away, I'll keep my word."
It was a still, breathless night, with a moon nearly full, and as Mrs.
McAdam, accompanied by Farwell, passed over the Green toward the Lodge,
the idlers and loiterers followed after at a respectful distance. Mary
was the centre of attraction just then, and Farwell always commanded
attention, used as the people were to him.
"Come on! come on!" called Mary without turning her head. "Bring others
and behold the sight of your lives. Behold a woman keeping her word when
the need for the keeping is over!"
A growing excitement was rising in Mary's voice; she was nearing the end
of her endurance and was becoming reckless.
By the time the Lodge was reached a goodly crowd was at the steps leading
up to the bar. Jerry McAlpin was there with Jerry-Jo beside him. Hornby,
just come from the digging of the two graves, stood nearby with the scent
of fresh earth clinging to him.
Suddenly Mary McAdam came out of the house, her arms filled with bottles,
while behind her followed Farwell rolling a cask.
What occurred then was so surprising and bewildering that those who
looked on were never able to clearly describe the scene. Standing with
her load, Mary McAdam spoke fierce, hot words. She showed herself no
mercy, asked for no pity. She had dealt in a business that threatened the
souls of men and boys, made harder the lives of women. She had blinded
herself and made herself believe that she and hers were better, stronger
than others, and now----
Mary was magnificent in her abandon and despair. Her words flowed freely,
her eyes flashed.
[Illustration: "'And now,' she cried, 'I'll keep my word to you. Here!
here! here!' The bottles went whirling and crashing on the rocks near the
roadway"]
"And now," she cried, "I'll keep my word to you. Here! here! here!"
The bottles went whirling and crashing on the rocks near the roadway.
"And you, Master Farwell, break open the keg and set the evil thing
free."
This Farwell proceeded to do with energy born of the hour. "And fetch out
all that remains!" shrieked Mary. "Here, you! McAlpin, I'll have none of
your help! Stay in your place; I'd not trust you inside when all's as
free as it is to-night. You have your lad--heaven help you! Keep him and
give him a clean chance. Nor you, Hornby! Out with you! It's a wicked
waste, is it? Better so than what I suffer. Your lads are above ground,
though out of your sight, Hornby, while mine----Here, Master, more! more!
let us water the earth."
The mad scene went on until the last drop of liquor was soaking into the
earth or dripping from the rocks.
White-faced and stern, Farwell carried out the mother's commands and
heeded not the muttered discontent or the approach of the horse and buggy
bearing Doctor Ledyard and Dick Travers. He was one in the drama now and
he played his part.
At the close a dull silence rested on the group, then Mary McAdam made
her appeal. Her voice broke; her hands trembled. She looked aged and
forlorn.
"And now," she said; "who'll come to the graveyard with me?"
She need not have asked. To the last child they followed mutely. They
were overcome by curiosity and fear, and the faces in the dull light of
the late day and early night looked ghostly.
As Farwell stood near Mary McAdam by the newly made graves, he raised
his eyes and found Ledyard's stern, yet amused, ones on his face. For
a moment he quivered, but with the courage of one facing an operation,
the outcome of which he could not know, he returned the look steadily.
He heard his own voice speaking words of helpfulness, words of
memory-haunted scenes. He told of Tom's courage and Sandy's sunshiny
nature. 'Twas youth, he pleaded for them, youth with its blindness and
lack of foresight. He recalled the last dread act as Jerry-Jo had
depicted it. The older brother risking all for the younger. The
smile--Sandy's last bequest--the moving lips that doubtless spoke words
of affection to the only one who could hear them. Together they had
played their pranks, had trod the common path; together they
went--Farwell paused, then returned Ledyard's sneering gaze
defiantly,--"To God who alone can understand and judge!" This was
flung out boldly, recklessly.
With ceremony and the sound of sobbing, the empty graves were refilled,
and the strange company turned away.
Then, alone and spent, Farwell returned to his cottage with a sure sense
that before he slept he would know his fate, for he acknowledged that his
fate lay largely, now, in the hands of the man who no longer had any
doubt of his identity.
It was half-past eight when the buggy passed Farwell's window bound for
the Hill Place. Young Travers was driving and the seat beside him was
empty! Nine o'clock struck; the lights went out in the village, but
Farwell rose and trimmed his lamp carefully. Ten o'clock--all Kenmore,
excepting Mary McAdam, slept. Still Farwell waited while his clock ticked
out the palpitating seconds. The moonlight flooded the Green. Where was
he, that waiting man who was to come and give the blow?
It was nearly eleven when Farwell saw him advancing across the Green. He
had been down by the water, probably hiding in some anchored boat until
he was sure that he would not be seen. As he reached the door of
Farwell's house a clear voice called to him:
"Will you come in, or would you prefer to have me come out?"
This took Ledyard rather at a disadvantage. He could hardly have told
what he expected, but he certainly did not look for this calm acceptance
of him and his errand.
"I'll come in. I see you have a light. Thank you"--for Farwell had
offered a chair near the table--"I hope I'm not disturbing you."
The irony of this was apparently lost upon Farwell. He sat opposite
Ledyard, his arms folded on the table, waiting.
"So you're alive!"
"So it seems--at least partly so." Farwell parried the blows as one does
even when he sees failure at hand.
"Perhaps you know your death was reported some years ago? There was a
full account. You were escaping into Canada. The _La Belle_ was the name
of the boat. It went down near here?"
"Off Bleak Head," Farwell broke in.
"Thanks. There was even a picture of you in the papers," Ledyard said.
"A very poor one, I recall." Now that he was on the dissecting table,
Farwell found himself strangely calm and collected. He saw that his
manner irritated Ledyard; felt that it might ruin his chances, but he
held to it grimly.
"So you saw--the papers?" The eyes under the shaggy brows looked ugly.
"Oh, yes. I had them all sent to me. It was very interesting reading
after I got over the shock of the wreck and had accepted my isolated
position."
"I suppose--Boswell keeps in touch with you--damn him!"
"Do you begrudge me--this one friend?"
"Yes. You have put yourself outside the pale of human companionship and
friendships."
To this Farwell made no rejoinder. Again he waited.
"What do you think I'm going to do about it, now that I've run you down
so unexpectedly?"
"I have supposed you would tell me, once we got together."
"Well, I've come to tell you!"
Ledyard leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs out before
him.
"But first I'm going to ask you a few questions. Your answers won't
signify much one way or the other, but I'm curious. Why did you make such
a fight--just to live? It must have been a devil of a game."
Farwell leaned against the table and so came nearer to his inquisitor.
"It was," he said quietly, "and I wonder if you can understand why it is
that I'm glad to tell--even you about it? I don't expect sympathy, pity,
or--even justice, but when a man's been on a desert isle for years it's a
relief to speak his own tongue again to any one who can comprehend and
who will listen."
"I'm prepared to listen," Ledyard muttered, and shrugged his heavy
shoulders; "it will pass the time."
"After the thing was done," Farwell plunged in, "the thing I--had to
do--I was dazed; I couldn't think clear. I'd been driven by drink
and--and other things into a state bordering on delirium. Afterward, when
they had me and I was forced to live normally, simply, I began to think
clearly and suffer. God! how I suffered! I faced death with the horror
that only an intelligent person can know. I saw no escape. The trial, the
verdict, brought me closer and closer to the hideous reality. At first
I thought it could _not_ happen to me--to me! But it could! I sat day
in and day out, looking at the electric chair! That was all I could see:
it stood like a symbol of all the torture. I wondered how I would
approach it. Would I falter, or go as most poor devils do--steadily? I
saw myself--afterward--all that was left of me to give back to the world.
Oh! I suffered, I suffered!"
The white, haggard face held Ledyard's fascinated gaze, but drew no word
from him.
Farwell loosened the neck of his shirt--he was stifling, yet feeling
relief as the past dreams of his lonely life formed themselves into
words.
"At night I was haunted by visions," the low, vibrant voice rushed on.
"It was worse at night when semi-unconsciousness made me helpless. I'd
wake up yelling, not with fright, but pain, actual pain--the hot, knifing
pain of an electric current trying to find my heart and brain.
"Then they said I was mad. Well, so I was; and the fight was on! At first
there was a gleam--the chair faded from sight. If I lived--there was
hope; but I was mistaken. You know the rest. The legal struggle, the
escapes and captures. One friend and much money did what they could; it
wasn't much.
"You've seen a cat play with a mouse? The mouse always runs, doesn't it?
Well, so did I, though I didn't know where in God's world I was running,
nor to what."
For some minutes Farwell had been speaking like a man distraught by
fever. He had forgotten the listener across the table; he was remembering
_aloud_ at last, with no fear of consequences. He did not look at
Ledyard, and when he spoke again it was in a calmer tone.
"It was on the last run--that I was supposed to have drowned. Well, I did
die; at least something in me died. I lost breath, consciousness, and
when I came to I was a poor, broken thing not worth turning the hounds
on. I'm done for as far as the past's concerned. I'm a different man--not
a reformed one! God knows I never played that rôle. I'm another man. I
took what I could to keep me from insanity. I had to do something to
occupy my time. That's why I've taught these poor little devils; it
wasn't for them, it was for me; and when they grew to like me and trust
me--I was grateful. Grateful for even that!"
Ledyard was holding the white, drawn face by his merciless eyes. So he
looked when a particularly interesting subject lay under his knife and he
was all surgeon--no man.
"But you're not equal to going back to the States without being hauled
there--and taking your medicine?" he asked calmly.
"No. I suppose in the final analysis all that justice demands is that I
should be put out of the way--out of the way of harming others? Well,
that's accomplished. I don't suppose your infernal ideas of justice claim
that a man should be hounded beyond death, and every chance for right
living be barred from him? If a poor devil ever can expatiate his sin and
try to live a decent life, why shouldn't he be given the opportunity here
and now instead of in some mythical place among creatures of one's
fancy?"
"You didn't argue that way when you shot Charles Martin down, did you? He
was my friend; he had to--take his medicine!" Ledyard almost snarled out
these words. "He may have deserved his punishment for the lapses of his
life--but you were not the one to deal it. His family demand and should
have justice for him--I mean to see that they shall. Martin, for all his
folly was a genius, and gave to the world his toll of service. Why should
you, who gave nothing, escape at his expense?"
"Martin was no better, no worse, than I. He and I lived on the same plane
then; had the same interests. Had I not killed him, he would have killed
me. He swore that."
"But you took him--at a disadvantage, like the damned----" Ledyard
paused; he was losing his self-control. The calm, living face across the
table enraged him.
"I met him in the open; I did not know he was unarmed. I drew my pistol
in full view. A week before he had done the same; I escaped. No one
believed that when I told it at the trial. I had no witnesses; he had
many when I took my revenge."
"Who could believe you? What was your life compared with his?"
"Exactly. Perhaps that is why I--I kept running. Martin only dipped into
such lives as mine was then; he always scurried back to respectability
and honour; I grovelled in the mire and got stuck! When you get stuck you
get what the world calls--justice."
"I recall"--Ledyard's face was hardening--"I recall you always squealed.
You were always the wronged one; society was against you. Bah!"
Farwell sat unmoved under this attack.
"I'm not squealing now," he said quietly; "I am merely defending myself
as I can. That's the prerogative of any human being, isn't it? Why, see
here, Ledyard, there's one thing men like you never comprehend. On the
different stratas of life exactly the same passions, impulses, and
emotions exist; it's the way they're dealt with, how they affect people,
that makes the difference. Up where you live and breathe they love and
hate and take revenge, don't they? That's what happened down where I
wallowed and where Martin sometimes came--to enjoy himself!"
And now Farwell clutched his thin hands on the table to stay their
trembling as he went on:
"I loved--the woman in the case. That sounds strange to you, but it's the
only thing I warn you not to laugh at! I loved her because she was
beautiful, fascinating, and as--as bad as I. I knew the poor creature had
never had half a show. She was born in evil and exploited from the cradle
up. Martin knew it, too, and took advantage. She was fair game for him
and his money. When he came down to hell to play, he played with her and
defied me. But on my plane it was man against man, you see, and when he
flung his plaything aside, she came to me; that's all! She told me how he
had brought her where she was--yes, damn him! when she was innocent! She
paid her toll then, _not_ for his money--though who would believe
that?--but for the chance to be decent and clean. He told her, when
she was only sixteen, that the one way she could prove her vows to him
was to give herself to him. If she trusted him so far, he could trust
her. She trusted, poor child! Two years later he married up on his higher
plane--your plane--and laughingly offered a second best place to her. It
was the only bargain she could make then! The rest was an easy downhill
grade.
"Well, I took her. I was all you say, but I meant to do the right
thing by her, and she knew it! Yes, she knew it, and later he came back
and tried to get her away. After I shot him and went to her with the
story--she told me she'd pull herself together and wait for me
until--until I came for her. She understood!"
Ledyard moistened his lips and set his jaws harshly. The story had not
moved him to pity.
"And--where is she now?" he asked.
"In New York, I suppose. She thinks me dead."
"Boswell tells you that?"
"Yes. And he will never let her know. Unless I----"
"You expect to go back--some day?"
Farwell gave a dry, mirthless laugh at this, and then replied:
"After I've been dead long enough, when I've been good long enough,
perhaps. You know even in a disembodied spirit hope dies hard. Yes--I
_had_ hoped to go back."
"I--I thought so." Ledyard leaned forward and across the table; his face
was not three feet from Farwell's.
"I like to trace diseases down to the last germ," he said. "You're a
disease, Farwell Maxwell, a mighty, ugly, dangerous one. You oughtn't to
be alive; you're a menace while you have breath in your body; you should
have died years ago in payment of your debt, just as Martin did, but you
escaped, and now some one has got to keep an eye on you; see that you
don't skip quarantine. You understand?"
Farwell felt the turning of the screw.
"I'm going to be the eye, Maxwell. You're going to stay right where you
are until you pass off this sphere. Remembering what you once were, your
pastimes and love of luxury, this seems as hellish a place and existence
as even you deserve. When I saw you last night"--and here Ledyard
laughed--"it was all I could do to control myself. You play your part
well; but you always had a knack for theatricals. I know I'm a hard,
unforgiving man, but there is just one phase of human nature that I will
not stand for, and that is the refusal to take the medicine prescribed
for the disease. What incentive have people for better living and upright
thinking if every devil of a fellow who gets through his beastiality is
permitted to come up into the ranks and march shoulder to shoulder with
the best? If it's living you want and will lie for, steal for, and beg
for--have it; but have it here where the chances are all against your old
self. You'll probably never murder any one here or ruin the women; so
grovel on!"
As he listened Farwell seemed to shrink and age. In that hour he
recognized the fact that through all the years of self-imposed exile he
had held to the hope of release in the future: the going back to that
which he had once known. But looking at the hard, set face opposite he
knew that this hope was futile: he must live forever where he was, or, by
departing, bring about him the bloodhounds of justice and vengeance.
Ledyard had but to whistle, he knew, and again the pursuit would be keen,
and in the end--a long blank lay beyond that!
"You will--stay where you are!" Ledyard was saying.
"Surely. I intend to stay right here."
Then Farwell laughed and leaned back in his chair.