THE PARDON.
When the men whom Michael Sunlocks sent into the interior after
Adam Fairbrother and his shipwrecked company returned to him
empty-handed, he perceived that they had gone astray by crossing a
great fiord lying far east of Hekla when they should have followed
the course of it down to the sea. So, counting the time that had been
wasted, he concluded to take ship to a point of the southern coast in
the latitude of the Westmann Islands, thinking to meet old Adam
somewhere by the fiord's mouth. The storm delayed him, and he reached
the fiord too late; but he came upon some good news of Adam there:
that, all well, though sore beset by the hard weather, and enfeebled
by the misfortunes that had befallen them, the little band of
ship-broken men had, three days before his own coming, passed up the
western bank of the fiord on foot, going slowly and heavily laden,
but under the safe charge of a guide from Stappen.
Greatly cheered in heart at these good tidings Michael Sunlocks had
ordered a quick return, for it was unsafe, and perhaps impossible, to
follow up through the narrow chasms of the fiord in a ship under
sail. On getting back to Reykjavik he intended to take ponies across
country in the direction of Thingvellir, hoping to come upon old Adam
and his people before they reached the lake or the great chasm on the
western side of the valley, known as the Chasm of All Men.
And thinking, amid the flutter of joyful emotions, that on the
overland journey he would surely take Greeba with him, for he could
never bear to be so long parted from her again, all his heart went
back to her in sweet visions as his ship sped over the sea. Her
beauty, her gentleness, her boldness, her playful spirits, and all
her simple loving ways came flowing over him wave after wave, and
then in one great swelling flood. And in the night watches, looking
over the dark waters, and hearing nothing but their deep moan, he
could scarce believe his fortune, being so far away from the sight of
her light figure, and from the hearing of her sweet voice, that she
was his--his love, his wife, his darling. A hundred tender names he
would call her then, having no ear to hear him but the melancholy
waves, no tongue to echo him but the wailing wind, and no eye to look
upon him but the eye of night.
And many a time on that homeward voyage, while the sails bellowed out
to the fair breeze that was carrying him to her, he asked himself
however he had been able to live so long without her, and whether he
could live without her now if evil chance plunged his great happiness
into greater grief. Thinking so, he recalled the day of her coming,
and the message he got from the ship in the harbor saying she had
come before her time, and how he had hastened down, and into the
boat, and across the bay, and aboard, with a secret trembling lest
the years might have so changed her as to take something from her
beauty, or her sweetness, or her goodness, or yet the bounding
playfulness that was half the true girl's charm. But, oh, the
delicious undeceiving of that day, when, coming face to face with her
again, he saw the rosy tint in her cheek and the little delicate
dimple sucked into it when she smiled, and the light footstep, and
the grace of motion, and the swelling throat, and the heaving bosom
and the quivering lids over the most glorious eyes that ever shone
upon this earth! So, at least, it had seemed to him then, and still
it seemed so as his ship sailed home.
At Smoky Point they lay off an hour or two to take in letters for the
capital, and there intelligence had come aboard of the arrest, trial,
and condemnation of Jason for his design and attempt upon the life of
the President. Michael Sunlocks had been greatly startled and deeply
moved by the news, and called on the master to weigh the anchor
without more delay than was necessary, because he had now a double
reason for wishing to be back in Reykjavik.
And being at length landed there he galloped up to Government House,
bounded indoors with the thought of his soul speaking out of his
eyes, and found Greeba there and every one of his sweetest visions
realized. All his hundred tender, foolish, delicious names he called
her over again, but with better ears to hear them, while he enfolded
her in his arms, with both her own about his neck, and her beautiful
head nestling close over his heart, and her fluttering breast against
his breast.
"Dearest," he whispered, "my darling, love of my life, however could
I leave you so long?"
"Michael," she whispered back, "if you say any more I shall be
crying."
But the words were half smothered by sobs, for she was crying
already. Seeing this, he sheered off on another tack, telling her of
his mission in search of her father, and that if he had not brought
the good man back, at least he had brought good news of him, and
saying that they were both to start to-morrow for Thingvellir with
the certainty of meeting him and bringing him home with great
rejoicings.
"And now, my love, I have a world of things to attend to before I can
go," said Michael Sunlocks, "and you have to prepare for two days in
the saddle over the snow."
Greeba had been smiling through the big drops that floated in her
eyes, but she grew solemn again, and said--
"Ah, Michael, you cannot think what trouble we have all had while you
have been away."
"I know it--I know all," said Michael Sunlocks, "so say no more about
it, but away to your room, my darling."
With that he rang a hand-bell that stood on the table, and Oscar, his
servant, answered the call.
"Go across to the jail," he said, "and tell Jon that his prisoner is
not to be removed until he has had orders from me."
"What prisoner, your Excellency?" said Oscar.
"The prisoner known as Jason," said Michael Sunlocks.
"He's gone, your Excellency," cried Oscar.
"Gone?"
"I mean to the Sulphur Mines, your Excellency."
"When was he sent?"
"Yesterday morning, at daybreak, your Excellency."
Michael Sunlocks sat at a table and wrote a few lines, and handed
them to his man, saying, "Then take this to the Lagmann, and say I
shall wait here until he comes."
While this was going forward Greeba had been standing by the door
with a troubled look, and when Oscar was gone from the room she
returned to her husband's side, and said, with great gravity,
"Michael, what are you going to do with that man?"
But Michael Sunlocks only waved his hand, and said, "Nay, now,
darling, you shall not trouble about this matter any more. It is my
affair, and it is for me to see to it."
"But he has threatened your life," cried Greeba.
"Now, love, what did I say?" said Michael Sunlocks, with uplifted
finger and a pretence at reproof. "You've fretted over this foolish
thing too long; so think no more about it, and go to your room."
She turned to obey.
"And, darling," he cried in another voice, as she was slowly going,
"that I may seem to have you with me all the same, just sing
something, and I shall hear you while I work. Will you? There!" he
cried, and laughed before she had time to answer. "See what a goose
you have made of me!"
She came back, and for reply she kissed his forehead, and he put his
lips to her lovely hand. Then, with a great lump in her throat, and
the big drops rolling from her eyes to her cheeks, she left him to
the work she sorely feared.
And being alone, and the candles lighted and the blinds drawn down,
for night had now fallen in, he sat at the table to read the mass of
letters that had gathered in his absence. There was no communication
of any kind from the Government at Copenhagen, and satisfying himself
on this point, and thinking for the fiftieth time that surely Denmark
intended, as she ought, to leave the people of world-old Iceland to
govern themselves, he turned with a sigh of relief to the strange,
bewildering, humorous, pathetic hodge-podge of petitions, complaints,
requests, demands and threats that came from every quarter of the
island itself. And while he laughed and looked grave, and muttered,
and made louder exclamations over these, as one by one they passed
under his eye, suddenly the notes of a harpsichord, followed shortly
by the sweeter notes of a sweet voice, came to him from another room,
and with the tip of his pen to his lips, he dropped back in his chair
to listen.
"My own song," he thought, and his eyelids quivered.
"Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine.
Oh, leave a kiss within the cup,
And I'll not ask for wine;
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup
I would not change for thine."
It was Greeba singing to him as he had bidden her.
"God bless her," he thought again in the silence that followed.
Ah, little did he think as he listened to her song that the eyes of
the singer were wet, and that her heart was eating itself out with
fears.
"What have I done to deserve such happiness?" he asked himself. But
just as it happens that at the moment when our passionate joy becomes
conscious of itself we find some dark misgivings creep over us of
evil about to befall, so the bounding gladsomeness of Michael
Sunlocks was followed by a chill dread that he tried to put aside
and could not.
It was at that moment that the Lagmann entered the room. He was very
tall and slight, and had a large head that drooped like daffodil. His
dress was poor, he was short-sighted, growing elderly, and silent of
manner. Nothing in his appearance or bearing would have suggested
that he had any pride of his place as Judge of the island. He was a
bookworm, a student, a scholar, and learned in the old sagas and
eddas.
"Lagmann," said Michael Sunlocks, with simple deference. "I have sent
for you on a subject of some moment to myself."
"Name it!" said the Judge.
"During my absence a man has been tried and condemned by the Bishop's
court for threatening my life," said Michael Sunlocks.
"Jason, the son of Stephen Orry and Rachel, daughter of the late
Governor-General Jorgensen," said the Judge.
"That is he, and I want you to give me an opinion respecting him,"
said Michael Sunlocks.
"Gladly," said the Judge.
"He was sent to the Sulphur Mines," said Michael Sunlocks.
"For six months, certain," said the Judge.
"Can we recall him, and have him tried afresh by the Court of the
Quarter or the High Court of Justice?" said Michael Sunlocks.
"Too late for that," said the Judge. "A higher court, if it had
condemned at all, might certainly have given him a longer punishment,
but his sentence of six months is coupled with a condition that he
shall hereafter take an oath of peace towards you. So have no fear of
him."
"I have none at all," said Michael Sunlocks, "as my next question
will show."
"What is it?" said the Judge.
"Can I pardon him?" said Michael Sunlocks.
For a moment the Lagmann was startled out of his placid manner, but
recovering his composure he answered, "Yes, a President has sovereign
powers of pardon."
"Then, Lagmann," said Michael Sunlocks, "will you see the needful
papers drawn for my signature?"
"Surely," said the Judge. "But, first, will you pardon _me_?" he
added, with a shadow of a smile.
"Say what you please, Lagmann," said Michael Sunlocks.
"It is possible that you do not yet know the nature of the evidence
given at the trial," said the Judge.
"I think I do," said Michael Sunlocks.
"That this man claims to be your half-brother?"
"He _is_ my brother."
"That he thinks you have stood in his place?"
"I _have_ stood in his place."
"That he is jealous of you, and in his madness has vowed to slay
you?"
"His jealousy is natural, and his vow I do not dread."
The cold-mannered Lagmann paused a moment, wiped his short-sighted
eyes with his red print handkerchief, and then said in a husky voice,
"This is very noble of you. I'll go at once for the document."
He had only just gone from the room when Greeba returned to it. She
had tried too long to conquer her agitation and could not, and now
with wide eyes and a look of fear in them she hastened back to her
husband the moment the Lagmann had left him.
"Michael," she cried, "what has the Lagmann gone for?"
"For a form of pardon," he answered.
"Pardon for that man?" she asked.
"Even so," he said, "and I have promised to sign it."
"Oh, Michael, my love--my dear, kind Michael!" she cried, in a
pitiful voice of entreaty, "don't do it, don't I pray of you--don't
bring that man back."
"Why, Greeba, what is this?" said Michael Sunlocks. "What is it
troubles my little woman?"
"Dear Michael," she cried once more, "for your own sake think again
before you sign that pardon."
"Ah, I see," said he, "my darling has been all unstrung by this ugly
business. Yes, and now I remember what they told me down at Smoky
Point. It was my love herself that gave the poor lad up to justice.
That was very brave of my darling; for her husband, bless her dear
heart, was before all the world to her. Ah, yes, I know that all her
love is mine, her love is first and last with her as with all warm
natures. But she must not fear for me. No, she must not worry, but go
back, like a dear soul, and leave this matter to me."
"Michael, my dear, noble Michael, I have something to say; will you
not hear me?"
"No, no, no," he answered.
"Not for a moment? I have set my heart on telling you."
"Not for one little moment. But if you have set your heart on
anything else, then, my darling, just think of it double, whatever it
is, and it is yours already."
"But why may I not speak of this pardon?"
"Because, though I have never yet set eyes upon this poor man I know
more about him than my darling can ever know, and because it is
natural that her sweet little heart, that is as brave as a lion for
herself but as timid as a fawn for me, should exaggerate my peril. So
now, no more words about it, but go, go."
She was about to obey when the maid came to say that dinner was
ready. And then with a little shout of joy Michael Sunlocks threw
down his papers, encircled his arm about Greeba's waist, and drew her
along laughing, with her smiles fighting their way through her tears.
During the dinner he talked constantly of the dangers and trials and
amusing mischances of his voyage, laughing at them all now they were
over, and laughing at Greeba, too, for the woeful face with which she
heard of them. And when they rose from the table he called on her for
another song, and she sat at the harpsichord and sang, though
something was swelling in her throat and often her heart was in her
mouth. But he recked nothing of this, and only laughed when her sweet
voice failed her, and filled up the breaks with his own rich tones.
In the midst of the singing the maid came in and said something which
Michael Sunlocks did not catch, for it was drowned to his ear by the
gladsome uproar that he himself was making; but Greeba heard it and
stopped playing, and presently the Lagmann entered the room.
"A good thing is no worse for being done betimes," said the Judge,
"so here is the pardon ready to your hand for signature."
And with that he handed a paper to Michael Sunlocks, who said with
cheer, "You're right, Lagmann, you're right; and my wife will give
you a glass of wine while I write you my name."
"A cup of coffee, if you are taking it," said the Judge, with a bow
to Greeba, who saw nothing of it, for her eyes were following her
husband.
"Michael," she said, "I beseech you not to sign that paper. Only
give way to me this once; I have never asked you before, and I will
never ask you again. I am in earnest, Michael dear, and if you will
not yield to me for your own sake, yield to me for mine."
"How is this? How grave we are!" said Michael Sunlocks, pausing with
pen in hand.
"I know I have no right to meddle in such matters, but, dear Michael,
don't sign that pardon--don't bring that man back. I beseech you, I
beg of you."
"This is very strange," said Michael Sunlocks.
"It is also very simple," said the Judge, bringing his red
handkerchief up to his dim eyes again.
"What!" said Michael Sunlocks. "Greeba, you do not know this
man--this Jason?"
Greeba hesitated a moment, and glanced at the Lagmann.
"You don't know him?" repeated Michael Sunlocks.
She was sorely tempted, and she fell. "For my husband's sake," she
thought, and then with a prayer for pardon she lifted her head and
said falteringly, "No, no--why no, of course not."
Michael Sunlocks was satisfied. "'Why no, of course not,'" he echoed,
laughing a little, and then he dipped his quill in the ink-horn.
"But I beseech you again, do not bring that man back," she cried.
There was a painful pause, and, to cover it, the Lagmann said, "Your
husband is a brave-hearted man, who does not know the name of fear."
And then Michael Sunlocks said, "I will ask your pardon, Lagmann,
while I step into the next room with my wife. I have something to
tell her. Come, Greeba, come. I'll leave the document with you for
the present, Lagmann," he added over his shoulder as he passed out.
Greeba walked beside him with downcast eyes, like a guilty thing
condemned.
"Now, love," he said, when they were alone, "it is sweet and
beautiful of you to think so much of me, but there is something that
you do not know, and I ought to tell you. Maybe I hinted at it in my
letter, but there has never been a chance to explain. Have you heard
that this Jason is my brother?"
"Yes," said Greeba, faintly.
"It is true," said Michael Sunlocks. "And you know that when I first
came to Iceland it was not to join the Latin school, but on an errand
of mercy?"
"Yes," said Greeba.
"Well, the first of my duties was to find Jason's mother, and the
next, was to find Jason himself."
"Jason!" cried Greeba.
"Yes, it was my father who sent me, for they had suffered much
through his great fault, God forgive him! and I was to succor them in
their distress. You know what followed?"
"Yes," said Greeba, softly.
"I came too late for the mother; the good woman was in her grave. I
could not light upon her son, and lent an ear to the idle story that
he was dead also. My search ceased, my zeal flagged, and, putting
aside the solemn promise I made my father, I went on with my own
affairs. But I never believed that he was dead, and I felt I should
live to meet with him yet."
"Oh! oh!" cried Greeba.
"And many a time since my conscience has reproached me with a mission
unfulfilled; and, awakening from many a dream of the hour and the
place wherein I pledged my word to him that died trusting me, loving
me, doting on me--heaven pity him, bad man though he was--as never a
son was loved by a father before, it has not appeased me to say to
myself, 'Michael, while you are here, given up to your ambitions, he
is there amid the perils and hardships of the sea, and he is your
brother, and the only kinsman left to you in the wide world.'"
Greeba was sobbing by this time.
"And now, my darling, you know all, and why I wish to sign this
pardon. Could I ever know a moment's happiness with my brother
slaving like a beast at yonder mines? What if he is jealous of me,
and if his jealousy had driven him to madness! There is a sense in
which he is right. But, whether right or wrong, mad or sane, he shall
not be punished for my sake. So, dearest love, my darling, dry your
beautiful eyes, and let me ease my conscience the only way I may, for
I have no fear, and my wife must have none."
"Sunlocks," said Greeba, "you have made me ashamed. I am no fit wife
for a man like you. I am too little-hearted. Oh, why did I ever come?
Why? Why?" And she wept as if her heart would break. He comforted her
with tender protests, enfolding her in his arms and caressing her
lovely head.
"Tell me," he whispered, "nay, there, hide your face in my breast.
There, there, tell me now--tell me all."
"Sunlocks," she said, drawing back, "I have lied to you."
"Lied?"
"When I told you I had not known Jason I told you what was false."
"Then you have known him?"
"Yes, I knew him in the Isle of Man."
"The Isle of Man?"
"He lived there nearly five years."
"All the time he was away?"
"Yes, he landed the night you sailed. You crossed him on the sea."
"Greeba, why did he go there? Yet how should you know?"
"I do know, Michael--it was to fulfil his vow--his vow that the old
priest spoke of in court--his wicked vow of vengeance."
"On my father?"
"On your father and on you."
"God in heaven!" cried Michael Sunlocks, with great awe. "And that
very night my father was saved from his own son by death."
"It was he who saved your father from the sea."
"Wait," said Michael Sunlocks; "did you know of this vow before you
accused him of an attempt upon me?"
Greeba caught her breath, and answered, "Yes."
"Did you know of it while you were still in the Isle of Man?"
"Yes," she answered again, more faintly.
"Did he tell you?"
"Yes, and he bound me by a promise never to speak of it, but I could
not keep it from my own husband."
"That's strange," said Michael Sunlocks, with a look of pain. "To
share a secret like that with you was very strange," he added.
Greeba was flurried, and said again, too bewildered to see which way
her words were tending, "And he gave me his promise in return to put
aside his sinful purpose."
"That's still stranger," said Michael Sunlocks. "Greeba," he added,
in another tone, "why should you say you did not know Jason?"
"Because the Lagmann was with us."
"But why, my girl? Why?"
"Lest evil rumors might dishonor my husband."
"But where was the dishonor to me in my wife knowing this poor lad,
Greeba?"
At that she hesitated a moment, and then in a tone of gentle reproof
she said, nestling close to him and caressing his sleeve, "Michael,
why do you ask such questions?"
But he did not turn aside for that, but looked searchingly into her
face, and said, "He was nothing to you, was he?"
She hesitated again, and then tried to laugh, "Why, what should he be
to me?" she said.
He did not flinch, but repeated, "He was nothing to you then?"
"Nobody save my husband has ever been anything to me," she said, with
a caress.
"He was nothing to you--no?"
"No," she answered, throwing back her head.
Just then the English maid came to say that the six big Englishmen
who had been there before were in the kitchen again, and asking to
see her master, not her mistress, this time. In an instant Greeba's
little burst of disdain was spent, and she was all humility and
entreaty.
"Don't go to them," she cried. "Don't listen to them."
"Who are they?" he asked.
"My brothers. I have not had time to tell you, but I will tell you
now."
She put her arms about his neck as if to hold him.
"What have they come for?"
"To tell you some falsehood, and so revenge themselves on me. I know
it, I feel it. Ah, a woman's instinct is sure. But, dear Michael, you
will not receive them. Refuse, and I will tell you such a story. And
you will laugh----"
"Let me go, Greeba," he said, unloosing the grip of her tightening
arms, and the next moment he was gone from the room. Then all the
spirit of the woman arose in Greeba, and, throwing aside her vague
fears, she resolved, as only a woman could, in the cruel hour when a
dear heart seemed to be slipping away from her, that, come what
would, she should hold to her husband at all hazards, and that
whatever her brothers might say against her, let it be true or false,
if it threatened to separate her from him, she must deny it. What
matter about the truth? Her love was before everything. And who was
to disprove her word? Jason alone could do so, and his tongue was
sealed forever in a silence as deep as the grave's.
Michael Sunlocks went out of the room like a man in a dream: an ugly
dream, a dream of darkening terrors undefined. He came back to it
like one who has awakened to find that his dream has come true.
Within one hour his face seemed to have grown old. He stooped, he
stumbled on the floor, his limbs shook under him, he was a broken and
sorrowful man. At sight of him Greeba could scarcely restrain an
impulse to scream. She ran to him, and cried, "Michael, husband, what
have they told you?"
At first he looked stupidly into her quivering face, and then
glancing down at a paper he held in one hand he made an effort to
conceal it behind him. She was too quick for him, and cried, "What is
it? Show it me."
"It's nothing," he said; "nothing, love, nothing----"
"What have they told you?" she said again, "tell me--tell me."
"They say that you loved Jason," he answered with a great effort.
"It's a lie," she cried stoutly.
"They say that you were to marry him."
She tried to answer as stoutly as before, "And that's a lie, too,"
but the words stuck in her throat.
"Oh! God," he cried, and turned away from her.
There was a stove in the room, and he stepped up to it, opened the
iron door, and thrust the paper into the crackling fire.
"What is that you are burning?" she cried. And in another moment,
before he knew what she was doing, she had run to the stove, pulled
back with her bare hands the hot door that he was closing with the
tongs, thrust her arm into the fire, and brought out the paper. It
was in flames, and she rolled it in her palms until little but its
charred remains lay in her scorched fingers. But she saw what it had
been--her own abandoned letter to Red Jason. Then, slowly looking up,
she turned back to her husband, pale, a fearful chill creeping over
her, and he had thrown himself down on a chair by the table and
hidden his face in his arms.
It was a pitiful and moving sight. To see that man, so full of hope
and love and simple happy trust a little hour ago, lie there with
bent head and buried eyes, and hands clasped together convulsively,
because the idol he had set up for himself lay broken before him,
because the love wherein he lived lay dead; and to see that woman, so
beautiful, and in heart so true, though dogged by the malice of evil
chance, though weak as a true woman may be, stand over him with
whitening lips and not a word to utter--to see this was to say, "What
devil of hell weaves the web of circumstance in this world of God?"
Then, with a cry of love and pain in one, she flung herself on her
knees beside him, and enfolded him in her arms. "Michael," she said,
"my love, my darling, my dear kind husband, forgive me, and let me
confess everything. It is true that I was to have married Jason, but
it is not true that I loved him. I esteemed him, for he is of a
manly, noble soul, and after the departure of my father and the death
of my mother, and amid the cruelties of my brothers and your own
long, long silence, I thought to reward him for his great fidelity.
But I loved you, you only, only you, dear Michael, and when your
letter reached me at last I asked him to release me that I might come
to you, and he did so, and I came. This is the truth, dear Michael,
as sure as we shall meet before God some day."
Michael Sunlocks lifted his face and said, "Why did you not tell me
this long ago, Greeba, and not now when it is dragged from you?"
She did not answer him, for to be met with such a question after a
plea so abject, stung her to the quick. "Do you not believe I've told
you the truth?" she asked.
"God knows; I know not what to believe," he answered.
"Do you rather trust my brothers, who have deceived you?" she said.
"So, heaven help me! has my wife, whom I have loved so dear."
At that she drew herself up. "Michael," she said, "what lie have
these men told you? Don't keep it from me. What have I done?"
"Married me, while loving him," he answered. "That's enough for me,
God pity me!"
"Do you believe that?" she said.
"Your concealments, your deceptions, your subterfuges all prove it,"
he said. "Oh, it is killing me, for it is the truth."
"So you believe that?" she said.
"If I had not written you would now be Jason's wife," he said. "And
by this light I see his imprisonment. It was you who accused him of a
design upon my life. Why? Because you knew what he had confessed to
you. For your own ends you used his oath against him, knowing he
could not deny it. And what was your purpose? To put him away. Why?
Because he was pursuing you for deserting him. But you made his vow
your excuse, and the brave lad said nothing. No, not a word; and yet
he might have dishonored you before them all. And when I wished to
sign his pardon you tried to prevent me. Was that for my sake? No,
but yours. Was it my life you thought to protect? No, but your own
secret."
Thus, in the agony of his tortured heart, the hot hard words came
from him in a torrent, but before the flood of them was spent, Greeba
stepped up to him with flashing eyes, and all the wrath in her heart
that comes of outraged love, and cried,
"It is false. It is false, I say. Send for him and he himself will
deny it. I can trust him, for he is of a noble soul. Yes, he is a man
indeed. I challenge you to send for him. Let him come here. Bring him
before me, and he shall judge between us."
"No," said Michael Sunlocks, "I will not send for him. For what _you_
have done _he_ shall suffer."
Then there was a knock at the door, and after a pause the Lagmann
entered, with his stoop and uncertain glance. "Excuse me," he said,
"will you sign the pardon now, or leave it until the morning?"
"I will not sign it at all," said Michael Sunlocks. But at the next
moment he cried: "Wait! after all it is not the man's fault, and he
shall not suffer." With that he took the paper out of the law-man's
hand and signed it hurriedly. "Here," he said, "see that the man is
set free immediately."
The Lagmann looked at both of them out of his nearsighted eyes,
coughed slightly, and left the room without a word more.