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Just And The Unjust, The

<h2>CHAPTER FIFTEEN</h2> <h3>LOVE THAT ENDURES</h3> A melancholy wind raked the bare hills which rose beyond the flats, and found its way across half the housetops in Mount Hope to the solitary window that gave light and air to John North's narrow cell. For seven long days, over the intervening housetops, he had been observing those undulating hills, gazing at them until they seemed like some great live thing continually crawling along the horizon's rim, and continually disappearing in the distance. Now he was watching their misted shapes sink deep into the twilight. North, by his counsel, had waved the usual preliminary hearing before the mayor, his case had gone at once to the grand jury, he had been indicted and his trial was set for the February term of court. Watt Harbison had warned him that he might expect only this, yet his first feeling of astonished horror remained with him. As he stood by his window he was recalling the separate events of the day. The court room had been crowded to the verge of suffocation; when he entered it a sudden hush and a mighty craning of necks had been his welcome, and he had felt his cheeks redden and pale with a sense of shame at his hapless plight. Those many pairs of eyes that were fixed on him seemed to lay bare his inmost thoughts; he had known no refuge from their pitiless insistence. In that close overheated room the vitiated air had slowly mounted to the brain; soon a third of the spectators nodded in their chairs scarcely able to keep awake; others moved restlessly with a dull sense of physical discomfort, while the law, expressing itself in archaic terms, wound its way through a labyrinth of technicalities, and reached out hungrily for his very life. He knew that he would be given every opportunity to establish his innocence, but he could not rid himself of the ugly disconcerting belief that a man hunt was on, and that he, the hunted creature, was to be driven from cover to cover while the state drew its threads of testimony about him strand by strand, until they finally reached his very throat, choking, strangling, killing! He thought of Elizabeth and was infinitely sorry. She must forget him, she must go her way and leave him to go his—or the law's. He could face the ruin of his own life, but it must stop there! He wondered what they were saying and doing at Idle Hour; he wondered what the whole free world was doing, while he stood there gazing from behind his bars at the empurpled hills in the distance. He fell to pacing the narrow limits of his room; four steps took him to the door, then he turned and four steps took him back to his starting-point, the barred window. Presently a footfall sounded in the corridor, a key was fitted in the heavy lock, and the door was opened by Brockett, the sheriff's deputy, a round-faced, jolly, little man with a shiny bald head and a closely cropped gray mustache. "You've got visitors, John!" said Brockett cheerfully, pausing in the doorway. North turned on him swiftly. "The general and Miss Herbert,—you see your friends ain't forgot you! You'll want to see them, I suppose, and you'd rather go down in the office, wouldn't you?" "I should much prefer it!" said North. His first emotion had been one of keen delight, but as he followed Brockett down the corridor the memory of what he was, and where he was, came back to him. He had no right to demand anything of love or friendship,—guilty or innocent mattered not at all! They were nearing the door now beyond which stood Elizabeth and her father, and North paused, placing a hand on the deputy's arm. The spirit of his renunciation had been strong within him, but another feeling was stronger still, he found; an ennobling pride in her devotion and trust. What a pity the finer things of life were so often the impractical! He pushed past the deputy and entered the office. Elizabeth came toward him with hands extended. Her cheeks were quite colorless but the smile that parted her lips was infinitely tender and compassionate. "You should not have come here!" North said, almost reproachfully, as his hands closed about hers. General Herbert stood gravely regarding the two, and his glance when it rested on North was troubled and uncertain. The difficulties which beset this luckless fellow were only beginning, and what would the end be? "Father!" Elizabeth had turned toward him, and he advanced with as brave a show of cordiality as he could command; but North read and understood the look of pain in his frank gray eyes. "You agree with me that she should never have come here," North said quietly. "But you couldn't refuse her!" he added, and his glance went back to Elizabeth. "Under the circumstances it was right for her to come!" said the general. But in his heart he was none too sure. "I couldn't remain away after to-day; I had been waiting for that stupid jury to act—" She ended abruptly with a little laugh that became a sob, and her father rested a large and gentle hand upon her shoulder. "There, dear, I told you all along it wouldn't do to count on any jury!" "My affairs are worth considering only as they affect you, Elizabeth!" said North. "I was thinking of you when Brockett came to tell me you were here. Won't you go away from Mount Hope? I want you to forget,—no—" for she was about to speak; "wait until I have finished;—even if I am acquitted this will always be something discreditable in the eyes of the world, it's going to follow me through life! It is going to be hard for me to bear, it will be doubly hard for you, dear. I want your father to take you away and keep you away until this thing is settled. I don't want your name linked with mine; that's why I am sorry you came here, that's why you must never come here again." "You mustn't ask me to go away from Mount Hope, John!" said Elizabeth. "I am ready and willing to face the future with you; I was never more willing than now!" "You don't understand, Elizabeth!" said North. "We are just at the beginning. The trial, and all that, is still before us—long days of agony—" "And you would send me away when you will most need me!" she said, with gentle reproach. "I wish to spare you—" "But wherever I am, it will be the same!" "No, no,—you must forget—!" "If I can't,—what then?" she asked, looking up into his face. "I want you to try!" he urged. She shook her head. "Dear, I have lived through all this; I have asked myself if I really cared so much that nothing counted against the little comfort I might be to you; so much that the thought of what I am to you would outweigh every other consideration, and I am sure of myself. If I were not, I should probably wish to escape from it all. I am as much afraid of public opinion as any one, and as easily hurt, but my love has carried me beyond the point where such things matter!" "My dear! My dear! I am not worthy of such love." "You must let me be the judge of that." "Suppose the verdict is—guilty?" he asked. "No,—no, it will never be that!" But the color left her cheeks. "I don't suppose it will be," agreed North hastily. It was a cruel thing to force this doubt on her. "You won't send me away, John?" she entreated. "If I were to leave Mount Hope now it would break my heart! I—we—my father and I, wish every one to know that our confidence in you is unshaken." North turned to the general with a look of inquiry, of appeal. Something very like a sigh escaped the older man's lips, but he squared his shoulders manfully for the burdens they must bear. He said quietly: "Let us consider a phase of the situation that Elizabeth and I have been discussing this afternoon. Watt Harbison is no doubt doing all he can for you; but he was at Idle Hour last night, and said he would, himself, urge on you the retention of some experienced criminal lawyer. He suggested Ex-judge Belknap; I approve of this suggestion—" But North shook his head. "Oh, yes, John, it must be Judge Belknap!" cried Elizabeth. "Watt says it must be, and father agrees with him!" "But I haven't the money, dear. His retainer would probably swallow up all I have left." "Leave Belknap to me, North!" interposed the general. North's face reddened. "You are very kind, and I—I appreciate it all,—but don't you see I can't do that?" he faltered. "Don't be foolish, John. You must reconsider this determination; as a matter of fact I have taken the liberty of communicating with Belknap by wire; he will reach Mount Hope in the morning. We are vitally concerned, North, and you must accept help—money—whatever is necessary!" The expression on North's face softened, and tears stood in his eyes. "I knew you would prove reasonable," continued the general, and he glanced at Elizabeth. She was everything to him. He could have wished that North was almost any one else than North; and in spite of himself this feeling gave its color to their interview, something of his wonted frankness was lacking. It was his unconscious protest. "Very well, then, I will see Judge Belknap, and some day—when I can—" said North, still struggling with his emotion and his pride. "Oh, don't speak of that!" exclaimed General Herbert hastily. "This miserable business could not have happened at a worse time for me!" said the young fellow with bitterness. "Don't say that, John!" pleaded Elizabeth. "For your friends—" "You and your father, you mean!" interrupted North. "It is hard enough to think of you here alone, without—" Her voice faltered, and this time her eyes filled with tears. "I'll not object again, Elizabeth; that you should suffer is much the worst part of the whole affair!" Brockett had entered the room and General Herbert had drawn him aside. "I am coming every day, John!" said Elizabeth. "Will your father agree to that?" asked North. "Yes, can't you see how good and kind he is!" "Indeed I can, it is far beyond what I should be in his place, I'm afraid." "It has been so horrible,—such nights of agony—" she whispered. "I know, dear,—I know!" he said tenderly. "They are not looking for other clues and yet the man who killed poor old man McBride may be somewhere in Mount Hope at this very minute!" "Until I am proved innocent, I suppose they see nothing to do," said North. "But, John, you are not afraid of the outcome?" And she rested a hand on his arm. "No, I don't suppose I really am,—I shall be able to clear myself, of course; the law doesn't often punish innocent men, and I am innocent." He spoke with quiet confidence, and her face became radiant with the hope that was in his words. "You have taken to yourself more than your share of my evil fortunes, Elizabeth, dear—I shall be a poor sort of a fellow if my gratitude does not last to the end of my days!" said North. The general had shaken hands with the deputy and now crossed the room to Elizabeth and North. "We shall have to say good night, North. Can we do anything before we go?" he asked. "We will come again to-morrow, John,—won't we, father?" said Elizabeth, as she gave North her hands. "And Judge Belknap will be here in the morning!" She spoke with fresh courage and looked her lover straight in the eyes. Then she turned to the general. North watched them as they passed out into the night, and even after the door had closed on them he stood where she had left him. It was only when the little deputy spoke that he roused himself from his reverie. "Well, John, are you ready now?" "Yes," said North. <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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