XIX
ALANSON BLACK
"You began it, as women begin most things, without thought and a dueweighing of consequences. And now you propose to drop it in the samefreakish manner. Isn't that it?"
Deborah Scoville lifted her eyes in manifest distress and fixed themdeprecatingly upon her interrogator. She did not like his tone which wasdry and suspiciously sarcastic, and she did not like his attitude whichwas formal and totally devoid of all sympathy. Instinctively she pushedher veil still further from her features as she deprecatingly replied:
"You are but echoing your sex in criticising mine as impulsive. And youare quite within your rights in doing this. Women are impulsive; theyare even freakish. But it is given to one now and then to recognise thisfact and acknowledge it. I hope I am of this number; I hope that I havethe judgment to see when I have committed a mistake and to stop shortbefore I make myself ridiculous."
The lawyer smiled,--a tight-lipped, acrid sort of smile whichnevertheless expressed as much admiration as he ever allowed himself toshow.
"Judgment, eh?" he echoed. "You stop because your judgment tells youthat you were on the point of making a fool of yourself? No otherreason, eh?"
"Is not that the best which can be given a hard-headed, clear-eyedlawyer like yourself? Would you have me go on, with no real evidence toback my claims; rouse up this town to reconsider his case when I havenothing to talk about but my husband's oath and a shadow I cannotverify?"
"Then Miss Weeks' neighbourliness failed in point? She was not asinteresting as you had a right to expect from my recommendation?"
"Miss Weeks is a very chatty and agreeable woman, but she cannot tellwhat she does not know."
Mr. Black smiled. The woman delighted him. The admiration which he hadhitherto felt for her person and for the character which could sodevelop through misery and reproach as to make her in twelve shortyears, the exponent of all that was most attractive and bewitching inwoman, seemed likely to extend to her mind. Sagacious, eh? and cautious,eh? He was hardly prepared for such perfection, and let the transientlighting up of his features speak for him till he was ready to say:
"You find the judge very agreeable, now that you know him better?"
"Yes, Mr. Black. But what has that got to do with the point at issue?"
And SHE smiled, but not just in his manner nor with quite as littleeffect.
"Much," he growled. "It might make it easier for you to reconcileyourself to the existing order of things."
"I am reconciled to them simply from necessity," was her gentleresponse. "Nothing is more precious to me than Reuther's happiness. Ishould but endanger it further by raising false hopes. That is why Ihave come to cry halt."
"Madam, I commend your decision. It is that of a wise and consideratewoman. Your child's happiness is, of course, of paramount importance toyou. But why should you characterise your hopes as false, just whenthere seems to be some justification for them."
Her eyes widened, and she regarded him with a simulation of surprisewhich interested without imposing upon him.
"I do not understand you," said she. "Have YOU come upon some clew? HaveYOU heard something which I have not?"
The smile with which he seasoned his reply was of a very differentnature from that which he had previously bestowed upon her. It preparedher, possibly, for the shock of his words:
"I hardly think so," said he. "If I do not mistake, we have been therecipients of the same communications."
She started to her feet, but sat again instantly. "Pray explainyourself," she urged. "Who has been writing to you? And what have theywritten?" she added, presuming a little upon her fascinations as a womanto win an honest response.
"Must I speak first?"
If it was a tilt, it was between even forces.
"It would be gentlemanly in you to do so."
"But I am not of a gentlemanly temper."
"I deal with no other," said she; but with what a glance and in what atone!
A man may hold out long--and if a lawyer and a bachelor more than long,but there is a point at which he succumbs. Mr. Black had reached thatpoint. Smoothing his brow and allowing a more kindly expression to creepinto his regard, he took two or three crushed and folded papers from adrawer beside him and, holding them, none too plainly in sight, remarkedvery quietly, but with legal firmness:
"Do not let us play about the bush any longer. You have announced yourintention of making no further attempt to discover the man who in youreyes merited the doom accorded to John Scoville. Your only reason forthis--if you are the woman I think you--lies in your fear of givingfurther opportunity to the misguided rancour of an irresponsible writerof anonymous epistles. Am I not right, madam?"
Beaten, beaten by a direct assault, because she possessed theweaknesses, as well as the pluck, of a woman. She could control thelanguage of her lips, but not their quivering; she could meet his eyewith steady assurance but she could not keep the pallor from her cheeksor subdue the evidences of her heart's turmoil. Her pitiful glanceacknowledged her defeat, which she already saw mirrored in his eyes.
Taking it for an answer, he said gently enough:
"That we may understand each other at once, I will mention the personwho has been made the subject of these attacks. He--"
"Don't speak the name," she prayed, leaning forward and laying hergloved hand upon his sleeve. "It is not necessary. The whole thing is anoutrage."
"Of course," he echoed, with some of his natural brusqueness, "and therankest folly. But to some follies we have to pay attention, and I fearthat we shall have to pay attention to this one if only for yourdaughter Reuther's sake. You cannot wish her to become the butt of thesescandalous attempts?"
"No, no." The words escaped her before she realised that in theirutterance she had given up irretrievably her secret.
"You consider them scandalous?"
"Most scandalous," she emphatically returned, with a vivacity andseeming candour such as he had seldom seen equalled even on thewitness-stand.
His admiration was quite evident. It did not prevent him, however, fromasking quite abruptly:
"In what shape and by what means did this communication reach you?"
"I found it lying on the walk between the gates."
"The same by which Judge Ostrander leaves the house?"
"Yes," came in faint reply.
"I see that you share my fears. If one such scrap can be thrown over thefence, why shouldn't another be? Men who indulge themselves in writinganonymous accusations seldom limit themselves to one effusion. I willstake my word that the judge has found more than one on his lawn."
She could not have responded if she would; her mouth was dry, her tonguehalf paralysed. What was coming? The glint in the lawyer's eyeforewarned her that something scarcely in consonance with her hopes andwishes might be expected.
"The judge has seen and read these barefaced insinuations against hisson and has not turned this whole town topsy-turvy! What are we to thinkof that? A lion does not stop to meditate; HE SPRINGS. And ArchibaldOstrander has the nature of a lion. There is nothing of the fox or evenof the tiger in HIM. Mrs. Scoville, this is a very serious matter. I donot wonder that you are a trifle overwhelmed by the results of yourill-considered investigations."
"Does the town know? Has the thing become a scandal--a byword? MissWeeks gave no proof of ever having heard one word of this dreadfulnot-to-be-foreseen business."
"That is good news. You relieve me. Perhaps it is not a general topic asyet." Then shortly and with lawyer-like directness, "Show me the letterwhich has disturbed all your plans."
"I haven't it here."
"You didn't bring it?"
"No, Mr. Black. Why should I? I had no premonition that I should ever beinduced to show it to any one, least of all to you."
"Look over these. Do they look at all familiar?"
She glanced down at the crumpled sheets and half-sheets he had spreadout before her. They were similar in appearance to the one she
hadpicked up on the judge's grounds but the language was more forcible, aswitness these:
When a man is trusted to defend another on trial for his life, he's supposed to know his business. How came John Scoville to hang, without a thought being given to the man who hated A. Etheridge like poison? I could name a certain chap who more than once in the old days boasted that he'd like to kill the fellow. And it wasn't Scoville or any one of his low-down stamp either.
A high and mighty name shouldn't shield a man who sent a poor, unfriended wretch to his death in order to save his own bacon.
"Horrible!" murmured Deborah, drawing back in terror of her own emotion."It's the work of some implacable enemy taking advantage of thesituation I have created. Mr. Black, this man must be found and made tosee that no one will believe, not even Scoville's widow--"
"There! you needn't go any further with that," admonished the lawyer. "Iwill manage him. But first we must make sure to rightly locate thisenemy of the Ostranders. You do detect some resemblance between thiswriting and the specimen you have at home?"
"They are very much alike."
"You believe one person wrote them?"
"I do."
"Have you any idea who this person is?"
"No; why should I?"
"No suspicion?"
"Not the least in the world."
"I ask because of this," he explained, picking out another letter andsmilingly holding it out towards her.
She read it with flushed cheeks.
Listen to the lady. You can't listen to any one nicer. What she wants she can get. There's a witness you never saw or heard of.
A witness they had never heard of! What witness? Scarcely could she lifther eyes from the paper. Yet there was a possibility, of course, thatthis statement was a lie.
"Stuff, isn't it?" muttered the lawyer. "Never mind, we'll soon havehold of the writer." His face had taken on a much more serious aspect,and she could no longer complain of his indifference or even of hissarcasm.
"You will give me another opportunity of talking with you on thismatter," pursued he. "If you do not come here, you may expect to see meat Judge Ostrander's. I do not quite like the position into which youhave been thrown by these absurd insinuations from some unknown personwho may be thinking to do you a service, but who you must feel is veryfar from being your friend. It may even lead to your losing the homewhich has been so fortunately opened for you. If this occurs, you maycount on my friendship, Mrs. Scoville. I may have failed you once, but Iwill not fail you twice."
Surprised, almost touched, she held out her hand, with a cordial THANKYOU, in which emotion struggled with her desire to preserve anappearance of complete confidence in Judge Ostrander, and incidentallyin his son. Then, being on her feet by this time, she turned to go,anxious to escape further embarrassment from a perspicacity she nolonger possessed the courage to meet.
The lawyer appeared to acquiesce in the movement of departure. But whenhe saw her about to vanish through the door, some impulse ofcompunction, as real as it was surprising, led him to call her back andseat her once more in the chair she had so lately left.
"I cannot let you go," said he, "until you understand that theseinsinuations from a self-called witness would not be worth our attentionif there were not a few facts to give colour to his wild claims. OliverOstrander WAS in that ravine connecting with Dark Hollow, very near thetime of the onslaught on Mr. Etheridge; and he certainly hated the manand wanted him out of the way. The whole town knows that, with oneexception. You know that exception?"
"I think so," she acceded, taking a fresh grip upon her emotions.
"That this was anything more than a coincidence has never beenquestioned. He was not even summoned as a witness. With the judge's highreputation in mind I do not think a single person could have been foundin those days to suggest any possible connection between this boy and acrime so obviously premeditated. But people's minds change with time andevents, and Oliver Ostrander's name uttered in this connection to-daywould not occasion the same shock to the community as it would have donethen. You understand me, Mrs. Scoville?"
"You allude to the unexplained separation between himself and father,and not to any failure on his part to sustain the reputation of hisfamily?"
"Oh, he has made a good position for himself, and earned universalconsideration. But that doesn't weigh against the prejudices of people,roused by such eccentricities as have distinguished the conduct of thesetwo men."
"Alas!" she murmured, frightened to the soul for the first time, both byhis manner and his words.
"You know and I know," he went on with a grimness possibly suggested byhis subject, "that no mere whim lies back of such a preposterousseclusion as that of Judge Ostrander behind his double fence. Sons donot cut loose from fathers or fathers from sons without good cause. Youcan see, then, that the peculiarities of their mutual history form but apoor foundation for any light refutation of this scandal, should itreach the public mind. Judge Ostrander knows this, and you know that heknows this; hence your distress. Have I not read your mind, madam?"
"No one can read my mind any more than they can read Judge Ostrander's,"she avowed in a last desperate attempt to preserve her secret. "You maythink you have done so, but what assurance can you have of the fact?"
"You are strong in their defence," said he, "and you will need to be ifthe matter ever comes up. The shadows from Dark Hollow reach far, andengulf all they fall upon."
"Mr. Black"--she had re-risen the better to face him--"you wantsomething from me--a promise, or a condition."
"No," said he, "this is my affair only as it affects you. I simplywished to warn you of what you might have to face; and what JudgeOstrander will have to face (here I drop the lawyer and speak only as aman) if he is not ready to give a more consistent explanation of thecurious facts I have mentioned."
"I cannot warn him, Mr. Black."
"You? Of course not. Nobody can warn him; possibly no one should warnhim. But I have warned YOU; and now, as a last word, let us hope that nowarning is necessary and that we shall soon see the last of thesecalumniating letters and everything readjusted once more on a firm andnatural basis. Judge Ostrander's action in reopening his house in themanner and for the purpose he has, has predisposed many in his favour.It may, before we know it, make the past almost forgotten."
"Meanwhile you will make an attempt to discover the author of theseanonymous attacks?"
"To save YOU from annoyance."
Obliged to make acknowledgment of the courtesy if not kindness promptingthese words, Mrs. Scoville expressed her gratitude and took farewell ina way which did not seem to be at all displeasing to the crusty lawyer;but when she found herself once more in the streets, her anxiety andsuspense took on a new phase. What was at the bottom of Mr. Black'scontradictory assertions? Sympathy with her, as he would have herbelieve, or a secret feeling of animosity towards the man he openlyprofessed to admire?