In those long days while Mink languished in jail, he wondered how the
world could wag on without him. He hungered with acute pangs for the
mountains; he pined for the sun and the wind. Sometimes he stood for
hours at the window, straining for a breath of air. Then the barred
aspect of the narrow scene outside of the grating maddened him, and he
would fling himself upon his bed; and it would seem to him that he could
never rise again.
He speculated upon Alethea with a virulence of rage which almost
frightened him,—whether she had heard of his arrest, how she had received
the news.
“Mighty pious, I reckon,” he sneered. “I know ez well ez ef I hed seen
her ez she be a-goin’ ’round the kentry a-tellin’ ’bout my wickedness,
an’ how she worried an’ worked with me, an’ couldn’t git me shet o’ my
evil ways.”
He thought of Elvira, too, with a certain melancholy relish of her
fancied grief. His heart had softened toward her as his grudge against
Alethea waxed hot. “_She_ tuk it powerful hard, I know. I’ll be bound it
mighty nigh killed her,—she set so much store by me. But I reckon her
folks air glad, bein’ ez they never favored me.”
It seemed to him, as he reflected on the probable sentiment of his
friends and neighbors, that he had lived in a wolfish community, ready
with cowardly cruelty to attack and mangle him since fortune had brought
him down.
“I’m carrion now; I’ll hev ter expec’ the wolves an’ buzzards,” he said
bitterly to his lawyer, as they canvassed together what witnesses they
had best summon to prove his general good character, and whom they should
challenge on the jury list. There was hardly a man of the number on whom
Mink had not played some grievous prank calculated to produce a rankling
grudge and foster prejudice. He recited these with a lugubrious gravity
incongruous enough with the subject matter, that often elicited bursts of
unwilling laughter from the perplexed counsel.
This was a bluff, florid man of forty, with a hearty, resonant voice, a
light blue eye, thick, yellow hair, which he wore cut straight across
beneath his ears, showing its density, and thrown back without parting
from his forehead. When the locks fell forward, as they often did, he
tossed them back with an impatient gesture. He had a long mustache and
beard. His lips were peculiarly red. Altogether he was a high-colored,
noisy, confident, blustering fellow, and he inspired Mink with great
faith.
“I done a better thing ’n I knowed of whenst I voted an’ electioneered so
brash fur you-uns ez floater in the legislatur’,” said Mink one day, in a
burst of hopefulness. When he had sent for the lawyer to defend him, he
had based his appeal for aid partly on his political services, and relied
on them to atone for any deficiency of fees.
“Do it again, Mink, early and often!” And the floater’s jolly laughter
rang out, jarring against the walls of the bare room, which was, however,
far more cheerful for the sound.
Mink had found in the requirements of the approaching trial, urged upon
his attention by the lawyer, a certain respite from his mental anguish.
But in the midst of the night, griefs would beset him. In his dreams the
humble, foolish individuality of the idiot boy was invested with awe,
with a deep pathos, with a terrible dignity. It seemed often that he was
awakened by the clutch of a hand to an imperative consciousness of the
crime of which he was accused, to a torturing uncertainty of his guilt
or innocence. His conscience strove in vain to reckon with him.
“Mebbe, though, the jury kin tell?” he said one morning, piteously, to
his counsel, who had come cheerily in, to find him wild-eyed and haggard.
“A jury,” said the lawyer sententiously, “is the cussedness of one man
multiplied by twelve.”
He had flung his somewhat portly bulk into a chair which creaked beneath
his weight, and he was looking at his client with calculating keenness.
He had supplemented a fair knowledge of the law with a theory of human
motives, deduced from his experience among men both as a politician
and before the courts. In their less complex expressions he was quick
to detect them. But he was devoid of intuition, of divination. His
instincts were blunt. His moral perceptions were good, but elementary.
His apprehension of crime was set forth in its entirety and in due detail
by the code of Tennessee with the consequent penalty prescribed by the
statute. He recognized no wrong unpunishable by law. The exquisite
anguish of a moral doubt, the deep, helpless, hopeless affliction
of remorse, the keen, unassuaged pangs of irreparability,—he had no
spiritual sense to take cognizance of these immaterial issues. If Mink,
escaping by his counsel’s clever use of a technicality, should ever again
think of the miller, dream of the boy weltering in the river, wake with
the sound of that weird scream in his ears, Mr. Harshaw would wonder at
him as a fool. As to the bar of conscience, how could that vague essence
assume all the functions of a court under the constitution?
And still conning his simple alphabet of the intricate language of
emotions, he interpreted the prisoner’s wan cheek and restless eyes as
the expression of fear. This induced a secret irritation and an anxiety
as to how he had best conduct the case, in view of his professional
reputation. He had besought Mink in his own interests to be frank, and
now he was perplexed by doubts of his client’s candor.
It required only a few moments’ reflection to assure himself that he had
best assume, for the purposes of defense, the guilt of the prisoner until
proved innocent. As he placed both hands on his knees he pursed up his
lips confidentially, and with a quick sidelong glance he said,—
“We’ve got some time, though, before we have to face ’em, Mink. We’re
entitled to one continuance, on account of the inflamed state of public
sentiment.”
The brooding, abstracted look passed suddenly from Mink’s face, leaving
it more recognizable with its wonted bright intentness.
“Air ye ’lowin’ ye’d put off the trial furder ’n the day be set fur, Mr.
Harshaw?” he asked, with the accents of dismay. “Fur Gawd’s sake, don’t
let ’em do that. I wouldn’t bide hyar, all shet up”—his eyes turned from
wall to wall with the baffled eagerness of a caged beast—“I wouldn’t bide
hyar a day longer ’n I’m ’bleeged ter, not ter git shet o’ damnation.
Lord A’mighty, don’t go a-shovin’ the day off; hurry it up, ef ye kin. I
want ter kem ter trial an’ git back ter the mountings. I feel ez ef I be
bound ter go.”
The lawyer still looked at him with his keen sidelong glances.
“The jury stands ’twixt you and the mountains, Mink. Mightn’t get out,
after all’s said and done.”
Mink looked at him with a sudden alarm in his dilated eyes, as if the
contingency had been all undreamed of.
“They’ll be bound ter let me out,” he declared. “I ain’t feared o’ the
jury.”
“If you don’t know what you did yourself, you can’t expect them to be
much smarter in finding it out,” reasoned the lawyer.
“I ain’t done nuthin’ ter keep me jailed this hyar way,” said Mink,
hardily. “I feel it in my bones I’ll git out. I never try them bars,”
nodding at the window, “but what I looks fur ’em ter break in my hand.”
“See here,” said the lawyer, sternly, “you let ‘them bars’ alone; you
ain’t going ter do yourself any good breaking jail.”
He looked down meditatively at his feet, and stamped one of them that his
trousers might slip further down over his boot-leg, which deported itself
assertively and obtrusively, as if it were in the habit of being worn on
the outside.
“I don’t know,” he said reflectively, “if you want to be tried speedily,
but what it’s best, anyhow. We won’t have Averill to preside; he’s
incompetent in a number of civil cases, and Jim Gwinnan will hold court.
He’s a”—he pursed up his red lips again, and looked about with an air
intimating a high degree of contempt; Mink hung upon his words with an
oppressive sense of helplessness and eagerness, that now and then found
vent in an unconscious long-drawn sigh—“well, he’s a selfish, ambitious
sort of fellow, and he’s found out it’s mighty popular to make a blow
about cleaning up the docket, and avoiding the law’s delays, and trotting
the lawyers right through. He’ll hold court till twelve o’clock at night,
and he just opposes, tooth and nail, every motion for delay. I reckon
he’d make it look as if we were afraid to come to trial, if we wanted a
continuance; so it’s just as well, if you feel ready, for we mightn’t get
it, after all.”
Mink experienced a new fear. “Ain’t he a mighty bad kind of a jedge ter
hev?” he faltered, quaking before the mental vision of the man who held
his fate in the hollow of his hand.
“No,” said Harshaw musingly, “he ain’t a bad judge for us for this
reason,—though he’s mighty apt to lean to public opinion, he’s a sound
lawyer, and he’s mighty careful about his rulings. He don’t get reversed
by the S’preme Court. That’s what he sits on the bench for: not to
administer justice,—he don’t think about justice once a week,—but to
be affirmed by the S’preme Court. He’s more particular than Averill in
little things, and he won’t let the attorney-general walk over him, like
Averill does,—sorter spunky.”
“I hev seen the ’torney-gineral,—hearn him speak wunst. They ’lowed he
war a fine speaker,” submitted Mink, anxious concerning the untried,
unmeasured forces about to be arrayed against him.
“Mighty fine,” said Harshaw, derisively. “Got a beautiful voice—for
calling hogs!”
He laughed and rose. “Oh, bless my soul, I plumb forgot!” he exclaimed.
“There’s a girl out here wanting to see you. Don’t know but what she may
be your sweetheart;” he winked jocosely. “Perkins said she might come in
if you want to see her. Looks like she’s walked about forty mile,—plumb
beat out.”
Mink was flattered. Instantly he thought of Elvira, and he remembered the
journey with his offering of the raccoon that fateful night.
“She hev got dark hair an’ eyes, an’ air toler’ble leetle ter be growed
up?” he asked. The remark was in the form of a question, but it was
uttered with the conviction of certainty.
“Lord, no! Sandy hair, big brown eyes, and tall, and”—
He paused, for Mink had risen suddenly.
“Ye go tell her,” he said, passionately, pointing at the door,—“go
straight an’ tell her ter keep in mind what I said bout’n the harnt on
Thunderhead, an’ how I ’lowed she favored him; ef she can’t kill, she
sp’iles yer chance.”
“Why, look here, Mink,” remonstrated the lawyer.
“Go ’long an’ tell her!” cried Mink, imperatively. “Tell her I want her
ter cl’ar out from hyar. Tell her I can’t breathe ef she’s nigh.” He
clutched at his throat, tearing open his collar with both hands. “’Twar
her ez brung me hyar. ’Twar her ez got me locked an’ barred up. An’ now I
don’t want ter see her no mo’ ez long ez I live. Gin her that word from
me,—an’ the Herder on Thunderhead what she favors.”
The lawyer, with a gesture of expostulation, left the cell, appreciating
that it was an unpleasant job to tell the travel-stained apparition at
the door that her journey was in vain.
She was sitting upon the doorstep, in the sunshine, her brown bonnet
hanging half off her golden head; her homespun dress seemed dark upon the
rough gray stone. She watched absently, with her serious brown eyes, the
gauzy wings of a blue-bottle that droned slumberously by. She held with
idle hands the yellow blossoms of the golden-rod that she had plucked by
the way. There was no passing in the street, hardly a sound; so still she
sat that a lizard, basking in the sun, did not scruple to run across her
motionless feet. She had taken off her coarse shoes to ease them after
her long walk, for they were swollen and bruised.
She looked up with a start when the lawyer stood in the door. “No, sis,”
he said in a debonair fashion, glancing about the street. “Mink ain’t in
a good humor to-day, and you can’t see him.”
She cast up to him her haggard eyes, full of appeal, of fear, of woe. He
had no intention of stabbing her with the cruel words of the message.
“You can’t see him to-day; some other day.” He waved his hand with a
promissory gesture, and was turning away.
She sprang up with a cry. “They hendered him! They wouldn’t let him!” she
said, with quivering lips.
“Yes, yes. They hindered him,” he kindly prevaricated.
Her eyes were suddenly all on fire. As he caught their gleam he
hesitated, looking at her. Her cheeks were flushed. Her teeth were set.
She raised her clenched hand.
“He lied ter me, that thar jailer. He ’lowed I mought see Reuben. He
lied! he lied! I’ll—I’ll”—She dropped her threatening hand. “Lord! Lord!
what kin I do!”
“Look here, girl,” said the lawyer, alarmed at the idea of an indignant
demonstration on the part of any of his client’s friends. “’Tain’t the
jailer’s fault. Mink said he wouldn’t see you.”
She stood as if stunned for a moment. Then, her confidence in Mink
rebounding, “I don’t b’lieve ye!” she said, bluntly.
“Well, then, maybe you will when I tell you that he told me to ask you to
clear out, and to remind you of the ‘harnt’ on Thunderhead that he said
you favored.”
She shrank back as if he had struck her. He eyed her indignantly. “I
reckon you’ll believe me now. Well, begone. We’ve had enough of you.”
He turned and walked off briskly. He heard the court-house bell jangling
out its summons, for the chancery court was in session, and he quickened
his pace. He gave a start of irritation when he became aware that she was
following him. He turned and faced her.
“What do you want?” he said, abruptly.
“I want ter tell ye su’thin’,” she gasped. She leaned forward as if to
touch his arm. He moved suddenly back, and she almost fell. She showed no
anger, but came a faltering pace nearer, with the same imploring gesture.
“I mus’ tell ye suthin’ ’bout Reuben, soon ez I git my breath,—suthin’
ye’d never b’lieve.”
Perhaps it was an unreasoning anger which possessed him, but he was late,
and she had cast the lie in his teeth, and somehow her presence irked
him, and he vaguely sought to forecast what she had to say.
“No, you won’t, for I ain’t going to listen. You just take yourself off,
and stay at home if you know how, and satisfy yourself with the harm you
have done already. You’d better put out, and so I tell you.”
He turned once more and strode away rapidly. He heard a faint cry
behind him, and, for a time, pursuing steps. He quickened his own. In
fact, he presently ran lightly,—marvelously lightly for a man of his
bulk,—laughing within himself the while at the absurdity and incongruity
of the episode, should it be noticed by any one in the sleepy streets.
After a little he looked over his shoulder, half in relenting, half in
curiosity.
She was not following him. She was limping back toward her shoes, that
lay on the steps of the jail.