"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.



CHAPTER SIXTEEN

AT HIS OWN DOOR

Judge Langham sat in his library before a brisk wood fire with the day's papers in a heap on the floor beside him. In repose, the one dominant expression of the judge's face was pride, an austere pride, which manifested itself even in the most casual intercourse. Yet no man in Mount Hope combined fewer intimacies with a wider confidence, and his many years of public life had but augmented the universal respect in which he was held.

Now in the ruddy light of his own hearth, but quite divorced from any sentiment or sympathy, the judge was considering the case of John North. His mind in all its operations was singularly clear and dispassionate; a judicial calm, as though born to the bench, was habitual to him. It was nothing that his acquaintance with John North dated back to the day John North first donned knee-breeches.

He shaded his face with his hand. In the long procession of evil-doers who had gone their devious ways through the swinging baize doors of his court, North stalked as the one great criminal. Unconsciously his glance fixed itself on the hand he had raised to shield his eyes from the light of the blazing logs, and it occurred to him that that hand might yet be called on to sign away a man's life.

The ringing of his door-bell caused him to start expectantly, and a moment later a maid entered to say that a man and a woman wished to see him.

"Show them in!" said the judge.

And Mr. Shrimplin with all that modesty of demeanor which one of his sensitive nature might be expected to feel in the presence of greatness, promptly insinuated himself into the room.

The little lamplighter was dressed in those respectable garments which in the Shrimplin household were adequately described as his "other suit," and as if to remove any doubt from the mind of the beholder that he had failed to prepare himself for the occasion, he wore a clean paper collar, but no tie, this latter being an adornment Mr. Shrimplin had not attempted in years. Close on Shrimplin's heels came a jaded unkempt woman in a black dress, worn and mended. On seeing her the judge's cold scrutiny somewhat relaxed.

"So it's you, Nellie?" he said, and motioned her to a chair opposite his own.

Not knowing exactly what was expected of him, Mr. Shrimplin remained standing in the middle of the room, hat in hand.

"Be seated, Shrimplin," said the judge, sensing something of the lamplighter's embarrassment in his presence and rather liking him for it.

"Thank you, Judge," replied Shrimplin, selecting a straight-backed chair in a shadowy corner of the room, on the very edge of which he humbly established himself.

"Better draw nearer the fire, Shrimplin!" advised the judge.

"Thank you, Judge, I ain't cold," rejoined Mr. Shrimplin in his best manner.

The judge turned to the woman. She had once been a servant in his household, but had quitted his employ to marry Joe Montgomery, and to become by that same act Mr. Shrimplin's sister-in-law. The judge knew that her domestic life had been filled with every known variety of trouble, since from time to time she had appealed to him for help or advice, and on more than one occasion at her urgent request he had interviewed the bibulous Joe.

"I hope you are not in trouble, Nellie," he said, not unkindly.

"Yes I am, Judge!" cried his visitor in a voice worn thin by weariness.

"It's that disgustin' Joe!" interjected Mr. Shrimplin from his corner, advancing his hooked nose from the shadows. "Don't take up the judge's time, Nellie; time's money, and money's as infrequent as a white crow."

And then suddenly and painfully conscious of his verbal forwardness, the little lamplighter sank back into the grateful gloom of his corner and was mute.

"It's my man, Judge—" said Nellie.

And the judge nodded comprehendingly.

"I don't know how me and my children are to live through the winter, I declare I don't, Judge, unless he gives me a little help!"

"And the winter ain't fairly here yet, and it's got a long belly when it does come!" said Mr. Shrimplin.

Immediately the little man was conscious of the impropriety of his language. He realized that the happy and forcefully expressed philosophy with which he sought to open Custer's mind to the practical truths of life, was a jarring note in the judge's library.

"Joe's acting scandalous, Judge, just scandalous!" said Nellie with sudden shrill energy. "That man would take the soul out of a saint with his carryings-on!"

"It seems to me there is nothing new in this," observed the judge a little impatiently. "Is he under arrest?"

"No, Judge, he ain't under arrest—" began Nellie.

"Which ain't saying he hadn't ought to be!" the little lamplighter snorted savagely. He suddenly remembered he was there to give his moral support to his sister-in-law.

"That man's got a new streak into him, Judge. I thought he'd about done everything he could do that he shouldn't, but he's broke out in a fresh spot!"

"What has he been doing, Nellie?" asked the judge, who felt that his callers had so far lacked in directness and definiteness.

"What ain't he been doing, you'd better say, Judge!" cried Nellie miserably.

"Is he abusing you or the children?"

"I don't see him from one week's end to another!"

"Am I to understand that he has deserted you?" questioned the judge.

"No, I can't say that, for he sends his clothes home for me to wash and mend."

"Ain't that the human sufferin' limit?" gasped Mr. Shrimplin.

"I suppose you wash and mend them?" And the judge smiled faintly.

"Of course," admitted Mrs. Montgomery simply.

"Does he contribute anything toward your support?" asked the judge.

The woman laughed sarcastically at this.

"It takes a barkeeper to pry Joe loose from his coin," interjected Mr. Shrimplin. "Get down to details, Nellie, and tell the judge what kind of a critter you're hitched up to."

"He told Arthur, that's my oldest boy, if I didn't stop bothering him, that he was just man enough to pay five dollars for the fun of knocking the front off my face!"

"That was a choice one to hand out to an eldest son, wasn't it, your Honor?" said the little lamplighter, tugging at his flaxen mustache.

"I just manage to keep a roof over our heads," went on Nellie, "and without any thanks to him; but he has plenty of money, and where it comes from I'd like to know, for he ain't done a lick of work in weeks!"

"Fact, Judge!" remarked Mr. Shrimplin. "I've made it my business lately to keep one eye on Joe. He spends half his time loafin' at Andy Gilmore's rooms, and the other half gettin' pickled."

"What do you wish me to do?" asked the judge, addressing himself to Mrs. Montgomery.

"I wish, Judge, that you'd send word to him that you want to see him!"

"And toss a good healthy scare into him!" added Mr. Shrimplin aggressively.

"But he might not care to respect the summons; there is no reason why he should," explained the judge.

"If he knows you want to see him, he'll come here fast enough!" said Nellie.

The judge turned to Shrimplin.

"Will you tell him this, Shrimplin, the first time you see him?"

"Won't I!" said the little lamplighter. "Certainly, Judge—certainly!" and his agile fancy had already clothed the message in verbiage that should terrify the delinquent Joe.

"Very well, then; but beyond giving him a word of advice and warning; I can do nothing."

A night or two later, as the judge, who had spent the evening at Colonel Harbison's, came to his own gate, he saw a slouching figure detach itself from the shadows near his front door and advance to meet him midway of the graveled path that led to the street. It was Joe Montgomery.

"Well, my man!" said the judge, with some little show of sternness. "I suppose you received my message?"

Montgomery uncovered his shock of red hair, while his bulk of bone and muscle actually trembled in the presence of the small but awesome figure confronting him. He might have crushed the judge with a blow of his huge fist, but no possible provocation could have induced him to lay hands on Nellie's powerful ally.

"That skunk Shrimplin says my old woman's been here," he faltered, "poisonin' your mind agin me!" A sickly grin relaxed his heavy jaws. "The Lord only knows what she expects of a man—I dunno! The more I try, the worse she gets; nothin' satisfies her!"

His breath, reeking of whisky, reached the judge.

"This is all very well, Montgomery, but I have a word or two to say to you—come into the house."

He led his disreputable visitor into the library, turned up the gas, and intrenched himself on the hearth-rug with his back to the fire. The handy-man had kept near the door leading into the hall.

"Come closer!" commanded the judge, and Montgomery, hat in hand, advanced a step. "I wish to warn you, Montgomery, that if you persist in your present course, it is certain to bring its own consequences," began the judge.

"Sure, boss!" Joe faltered abjectly.

"I understand from Nellie that you have practically deserted your family," continued the judge.

"Ain't she hateful?" cried Joe, shaking his great head.

"When she married you, she had a right to expect you would not turn out the scoundrel you are proving yourself."

"Boss, that's so," agreed Montgomery.

"This won't do!" said the judge briskly. "Nellie says she doesn't see you from one week's end to another; that you have money and yet contribute nothing toward her support nor the support of your family."

"I am willin' to go home, Judge!" said Montgomery, fingering his cap with clumsy hands. He took a step nearer the slight figure on the hearth-rug and dropped his voice to a husky half maudlin whisper. "He won't let me—see—I'm a nigger slave to him! I know I got a wife—I know I got a family, but he says—no! He says—'Joe, you damned old sot, you'll go home with a few drinks inside your freckled hide and begin to shoot off your mouth, and there'll be hell to pay for all of us!'"

"He? What are you saying—who won't let you go home?" demanded the judge.

"Andy Gilmore; he's afraid my old woman will get it out of me. I tell him I'm a married man but he says, 'No, you old soak, you stay here!'"

"What has Andy Gilmore to do with whether you go home or not?" inquired the judge.

"It's him and Marsh," said the handy-man. "They bully me till I'm that rattled—"

"Marsh—do you mean my son, Marshall?" interrupted the judge.

"Yes, boss—"

"I don't understand this!" said the judge after a moment of silence. "Why should Mr. Gilmore or my son wish to keep you away from your wife?"

"It's just a notion of theirs," replied Montgomery with sudden drunken loyalty. "And I'll say this—money never come so easy—and stuff to drink! Andy's got it scattered all about the place; there ain't many bars in this here town stocked up like his rooms!"

The judge devoted a moment to a close scrutiny of his caller.

"You are some sort of a relative of Mr. Gilmore's, are you not?" he asked at length.

"We're cousins, boss."

"Why does he wish to keep you away from your family?" the judge spoke after another brief pause.

"It's my old woman," and Montgomery favored the judge with a drunken leer. "Suppose I was to go home full, what's to hinder her from gettin' things out of me? I'm a talker, drunk or sober, and Andy Gilmore knows it—that's what he's afraid of!"

"What have you to tell that could affect Mr. Gilmore? Do you refer to the gambling that is supposed to go on in his rooms? If so, he is at needless pains in the matter; Mr. Moxlow will take up his case as soon as the North trial is out of the way."

Montgomery started, took a forward step, and dropping his voice to an impressive whisper, said:

"Judge, what are you goin' to do with young John North?"

"I shall do nothing with John North; it is the law—society, to which he is accountable," rejoined the judge.

"Will he be sent up, do you reckon?" asked Montgomery, and his small blue eyes searched the judge's face eagerly.

"If he is convicted, he will either be sentenced to the penitentiary for a term of years or else hanged." The judge spoke without visible feeling.

The effect of his words on the handy-man was singular. A hoarse exclamation burst from his lips, and his bloated face became pale and drawn.

"You mustn't do that, boss!" he cried, spreading out his great hands in protest. "A term of years—how many's that?"

"In this particular instance it may mean the rest of his life," said the judge.

Montgomery threw up his arms in a gesture of despair.

"Don't you be too rough on him, boss!" he cried. "For life!" he repeated in a tone of horror. "But that ain't what Andy and Marsh tell me; they say his friends will see him through, that he's got the general back of him, and money—how's that, Judge?"

"They are making sport of your ignorance," said the judge, almost pityingly.

"I'm done with them!" cried Joe Montgomery with a great oath. He raised one clenched hand and brought it down in the opened palm of the other. "Andy's everlastingly lied to me; I won't help send no man up for life!"

"What do you mean?" demanded the judge, astonished at this sudden outburst, and impressed, in spite of himself, by the man's earnestness.

"Just what I say, boss! They can count me out—I'm agin 'em, I'm agin 'em every time!" And again, as if to give force to his words, he swung his heavy first around and struck the open palm of his other hand a stinging blow. "Eatin' and sleepin', I'm agin 'em! I ain't liked the look of this from the first, and now I'm down and out, and they can go to hell for all of me!"

The judge rested an elbow on the chimneypiece and regarded Montgomery curiously. He knew the man was drunk; he knew that sober he would probably have said much less than he was now saying, but he also knew that there was some powerful feeling back of his words.

"If you are involved in any questionable manner with Mr. Gilmore, I should advise you to think twice before you go further with it. Mr. Gilmore is shrewd, he has money; you are a poor man and you are an ignorant man. Your reputation is none of the best."

"Thank you, boss!" said Montgomery gratefully.

"Mr. Gilmore probably expects to use you for his own ends regardless of the consequences to you," finished the judge.

"Supposin'—" began the handy-man huskily, "supposin', boss, I was to go into court and swear to something that wasn't so; what's that?" and he bent a searching glance on the judge's face.

"Perjury," said the judge laconically.

"What's it worth to a man? I reckon it's like drinkin' and stealin', it's got so many days and costs chalked up agin it?"

"I think," said the judge quietly, "that you would better tell me what you mean. Ordinarily I should not care to mix in your concerns, but on Nellie's account—"

"God take a likin' to you, boss!" cried Montgomery. "I know I ought to have kept out of this. I told Andy Gilmore how it would be, that I hadn't the brains for it; but he was to stand back of me. And so he will—to give me a kick and a shove when he's done with me!"

He saw himself caught in that treacherous fabric Gilmore had erected for John North, whose powerful friends would get him clear. Andy and Marsh would go unscathed, too. Only Joe Montgomery would suffer—Joe Montgomery, penniless and friendless, a cur in the gutter for any decent man to kick! He passed the back of his hand across his face.

"It's a hell of a world and be damned to it!" he muttered hoarsely under his breath.

"You must make it clearer to me than this!" said the judge impatiently.

Montgomery seemed to undergo a brief but intense mental struggle, then he blurted out:

"Boss, I lied when I said it was North I seen come over old man McBride's shed that night!"

"Do you mean to tell me that you perjured yourself in the North case?" asked the judge sternly.

"Sure, I lied!" said the handy-man. "But Andy Gilmore was back of that lie; it was him told me what I was to say, and it's him that kept houndin' me, puttin' me up to say more than I ever agreed to!" He slouched nearer the judge. "Boss, I chuck up the whole business; do you understand? I want to take back all I said; I'm willin' to tell the God A'mighty's truth!"

He paused abruptly. In his excitement he had forgotten what the truth meant, what it would mean to the man before him. He was vaguely aware that in abler hands than his own, this knowledge which he possessed would have been molded into a terrible weapon, but he was impotent to use it; with every advantage his, he felt only the desperate pass in which he had placed himself. If Gilmore and Marshall Langham could juggle with John North's life, what of his own life when the judge should have become their ally!

"Me and you'll have to fix up what I got to say, boss!" he added with a cunning grin.

"Do you mean you wish to make a statement to me?" asked the judge.

The handy-man nodded. The judge hesitated.

"Perhaps we would better send for Mr. Moxlow?" he suggested.

But Montgomery shook his head vehemently.

"I got nothin' to say to that man Moxlow!" he growled with sullen determination.

"Very well, then, if you prefer to make your statement to me," and the judge turned to his desk.

"Hold on, boss, we ain't ready for that just yet!" Joe objected. He was sober enough, by this time.

"What is it you wish to tell me?"

And the judge resumed his former position on the hearth-rug.

"First you got to agree to get me out of this."

"I can agree to nothing," answered the judge quietly.

"I ain't smart, boss, but Joe Montgomery's old hide means a whole lot to Joe Montgomery! You give me your word that I'll be safe, no matter what happens!"

"I can promise you nothing," repeated the judge.

"Then what's the use of my tellin' you the truth?" demanded Montgomery.

"It has become the part of wisdom, since you have already admitted that you have perjured yourself."

"Boss, if it wasn't John North I seen in the alley that day, who was it?" and he strode close to the judge's side, dropping his voice to a whisper.

"Perhaps the whole story was a lie."

The handy-man laughed and drew himself up aggressively.

"I'm a man as can do damage—I got to be treated right, or by the Lord I'll do damage! I been badgered and hounded by Marsh and Andy Gilmore till I'm fair crazy. They got to take their hands off me and leave me loose, for I won't hang no man on their say-so! John North never done me no harm, I got nothing agin him!"

"You have admitted that your whole story of seeing John North on the night of the McBride murder is a lie," said the judge.

"Boss, there is truth enough in it to hang a man!"

"You saw a man cross McBride's sheds?"

And the judge kept his eyes fastened on the handy-man's face.

"I seen a man cross McBride's shed, boss."

"And you have sworn that that man was John North."

"I swore to a lie. Boss, we got to fix it this way: I seen a man come over the roof and drop into the alley; I swore it was John North, but I never meant to swear to that; the most I promised Andy was that I'd say I thought it looked like John North, but them infernal lawyers got after me, and the first thing I knowed I'd said it was John North!"

"Your story is absurd!" exclaimed the judge, with a show of anger.

The handy-man raised his right hand dramatically.

"It's God A'mighty's everlastin' truth!" he swore.

"Understand, I have made you no promises," said the judge, disregarding him.

"You're goin' back on me!" cried Montgomery. "Then you look out. I'm a man as can do harm if I have a mind to; don't you give me the mind, boss!"

"I shall lay this matter before Mr. Moxlow in the morning," replied the judge quietly and with apparent indifference, but covertly he was watching the effect of his words on Montgomery.

"And then they'll be after me!" cried the handy-man.

"Very likely," said the judge placidly.

Montgomery glanced about as though he half expected to see Gilmore rise up out of some shadowy corner.

"Boss, do you want to know who it was I seen come over old man McBride's shed? Do you want to know why Andy and Marsh are so set agin my goin' home to my old woman? Why they give me money? It's a pity I ain't a smarter man! I'd own 'em, both body and soul!"

"Man, you are mad!" cried the judge.

But this man who was usually austere and always unafraid, was feeling a strange terror of the debased and slouching figure before him.

"Do you reckon you're man enough to hear what I got in me to tell?" asked Montgomery, again raising his right hand high above his head as if he called on Heaven to witness the truth of what he said. "Why won't they let me go home to my old woman, boss? Why do they keep me at Andy Gilmore's—why do they give me money? Because what I'm tellin' you is all a lie, I suppose! Just because they like old Joe Montgomery and want him 'round! I don't think!" He threw back his head and laughed with rough sarcasm. "You're a smarter man than me, boss; figure it out; give a reason for it!"

But the judge, white-faced and shaken to his very soul, was silent; yet he guessed no part of the terrible truth Montgomery supposed he had made plain to him. At the most he believed Marshall was shielding Gilmore from the consequences of a crime the gambler had committed.

Montgomery, sinister and menacing, shuffled across the room and then back to the judge's side.

"You ask Marsh, boss, what it all means. I got nothin' more to say! Ask him who killed old man McBride! If he don't know, no man on this green earth does!"

The judge's face twitched convulsively, but he made no answer to this.

"Ask him!" repeated the handy-man, and swinging awkwardly on his heel went from the room without a single backward glance.

An instant later the street-door closed with a noisy bang.



CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

AN UNWILLING GUEST

Montgomery told himself he would go home; he had seen the last of the gambler and Marsh Langham, he would look out for his own skin now and they could look out for theirs. He laughed boisterously as he strode along. He had fooled them both; he, Joe Montgomery, had done this, and by a very master stroke of cunning had tied the judge's hands. But as he shuffled down the street he saw the welcoming lights of Lonigan's saloon and suddenly remembered there was good hard money in his ragged pockets. He would have just one drink and then go home to his old woman.

It was well on toward midnight when he came out on the street again, and the one drink had become many drinks; still mindful of his original purpose, however, he reeled across the Square on his way home. He had just turned into Mulberry Street when he became conscious of a brisk step on the pavement at his side, and at the same instant a heavy hand descended on his shoulder and he found himself looking into Andy Gilmore's dark face.

"Where have you been?" demanded Gilmore. "I thought I told you to stay about to-night!"

"I have been down to Lonigan's saloon," faltered Joe, his courage going from him at sight of the gambler.

"What took you there?" asked Gilmore angrily. "Don't you get enough to drink at my place?"

"Lots to drink, boss, but it's mostly too rich for my blood. I ain't used to bein' so pampered."

"Come along with me!" said Gilmore briefly.

"Where to, boss?" asked Montgomery, in feeble protest.

"You'll know presently."

"I thought I'd like to go home, maybe—" said Joe irresolutely.

"Never mind what you thought you'd like, you come with me!" insisted Gilmore.

Although the handy-man's first impulse had been that of revolt, he now followed the gambler meekly back across the Square. They entered the building at the corner of Main Street and mounted to Mr. Gilmore's rooms. The latter silently unlocked the door and motioned Montgomery to precede him into the apartment, then he followed, pausing midway of the room to turn up the gas which was burning low. Next he divested himself of his hat and coat, and going to a buffet which stood between the two heavily curtained windows that overlooked the Square, found a decanter and glasses. These he brought to the center-table, where he leisurely poured his unwilling guest a drink.

"Here, you old sot, soak this up!" he said genially.

"Boss, I want to go home to my old woman!" began the handy-man, after he had emptied his glass.

"Your old woman will keep!" retorted Gilmore shortly.

"But, boss, I got to go to her; the judge says I must! She's been there to see him; damn it, she cried and hollered and took on awful because she ain't seein' me; it was pitiful!"

"What's that?" demanded Gilmore sharply.

"It was pitiful!" repeated Montgomery, shaking his great head dolorously.

"Oh, cut that! Who have you seen?"

"Judge Langham."

"When did you see him?"

Mr. Gilmore spoke with a forced calm.

"To-night. My old woman—"

"Oh, to hell with your old woman!" shouted the gambler furiously. "Do you mean that you were at Judge Langham's to-night?"

"Yes, boss; he sent for me, see? I had to go!" explained Montgomery.

"Why did you go there without letting me know, you drunken loafer?" stormed Gilmore.

He took the handy-man by the arm and pushed him into a chair, then he stood above him, black-browed and menacing.

"Boss, don't you blame me, it was my old woman; she wants me home with the kids and her, and the judge, he says I got to go!"

"If he wants to know why I'm keeping you here, send him round to me!" said Gilmore.

"All right, I will." And Montgomery staggered to his feet.

But Gilmore pushed him back into his chair.

"What else did you talk about besides your old woman?" asked the gambler, after an oppressive silence in which Montgomery heard only the thump of his heart against his ribs.

"I told him you'd always been like a father to me—" said the handy-man, ready to weep.

"I'm obliged to you for that!" replied Gilmore with a smile of grim humor.

"He said he always knowed it," added Montgomery, misled by the smile.

"Well, what else?" questioned Gilmore.

"Why, I reckon that was about all!" said Joe, who had ventured as far afield into the realms of fancy as his drunken faculties would allow.

"You're sure about that?"

"I hope I may die—"

"And the judge says you're to go home?"

"Say, Shrimp took my old woman there, and she cried and bellered and carried on awful! She loves me, boss—the judge says I'm to go home to her to-night or he'll have me pinched. He says that you and Marsh ain't to keep me here no longer!"

His voice rose into a wail, for blind terror was laying hold of him. There was something, a look on Gilmore's handsome cruel face, he did not understand but which filled him with miserable foreboding.

"What's that, about Marsh and me keeping you here?" inquired Gilmore.

"You got to leave me loose—"

"So you told him that?"

"I had to tell him somethin'. My old woman made an awful fuss! They had to throw water on her; Shrimp took her home in an express-wagon. Hell, boss, I'm a married man—I got a family! I know what I ought to do, and I'm goin' home, the judge says I got to! Him and me talked it all over, and he's goin' to speak to Marsh about keepin' me here!"

"So you've told him we keep you here?" And the gambler glowered at him. He poured himself a drink of whisky and swallowed it at a gulp. "Well, what else did you tell him?" he asked over the rim of his glass.

"That's about all; only me and the judge understand each other," said the handy-man vaguely.

"Well, it was enough!" rejoined Gilmore. "You are sure you didn't say anything about North?"

Montgomery shook his head in vigorous denial.

"Sure?" repeated Gilmore, his glance intent and piercing. "Sure?"

A sickly pallor was overspreading the handy-man's flame-colored visage. It began at his heavy puffy jaws, and diffused itself about his cheeks. He could feel it spread.

"Sure?" said the gambler. "Sure?"

There was an awful pause. Gilmore carefully replaced his glass on the table, then he roared in a voice of thunder:

"Stand up, you hound!"

Montgomery realized that the consequences of his treachery were to be swift and terrible. He came slowly to his feet, but no sooner had he gained them than Gilmore drove his fist into his face, and he collapsed on his chair.

"Stand up!" roared Gilmore again.

And again Montgomery came erect only to be knocked back into a sitting posture, with a long gash across his jaw where the gambler's diamond ring had left its mark.

"I tell you, stand up!" cried Gilmore.

Reaching forward he seized Montgomery by the throat with his left hand and jerked him to his feet, then holding him so, he coolly battered his face with his free hand.

"For God's sake, quit, boss—you're killin' me!" cried Joe, as he vainly sought to protect his face with his arms.

But Mr. Gilmore had a primitive prejudice in favor of brute force, and the cruel blows continued until Montgomery seemed to lose power even to attempt to shield himself; his great hands hung helpless at his side and his head fell over on his shoulder. Seeing which the gambler released his victim, who, limp and quivering, dropped to the floor.

Still crazed with rage, Gilmore kicked the handy-man into a corner, and turning poured himself still another drink of whisky. If he had spoken then of what was uppermost in his mind, it would have been to complain of the rotten luck which in so ticklish a business had furnished him with fools and sots for associates. He should have known better than to have trusted drunken Joe Montgomery; he should have kept out of the whole business—

With the suddenness of revelation he realized his own predicament, but with the realization came the knowledge that he was now hopelessly involved; that he could not go back; that he must go on, or—here he threw back his shoulders as though to cast off his evil forebodings—or between the dusk of one day and the dawn of another, he might disappear from Mount Hope.

With this cheering possibility in mind, he picked up the glass of whisky beside him and emptied it at a single draught, then he put on his overcoat and hat and went from the room, locking the door behind him.

Presently the wretched heap on the floor stirred and moaned feebly, and then lay still. A little later it moaned again. Lifting his head he stared vacantly about him.

"Boss—" he began in a tone of entreaty, but realizing that he was alone he fell weakly to cursing Gilmore.

It was a good five minutes from the time he recovered consciousness until he was able to assume a sitting posture, when he rested his battered face in his hands and nursed his bruises.

"And me his cousin!" he muttered, and groaned again.

He feebly wiped his bloody hands on the legs of his trousers and by an effort staggered to his feet. His only idea was escape; and steadying himself he managed to reach the door; but the door was locked, and he flung himself down in a convenient chair and once more fell to nursing his wounds.

Fifteen or twenty minutes had passed when he heard steps in the hallway. He knew it was Gilmore returning, but the gambler was not alone; Montgomery heard him speak to his companion as a key was fitted to the lock. The door swung open and Gilmore, followed by Marshall Langham, entered the room.

"Here's the drunken hound, Marsh!" said the gambler.

"For God's sake, boss, let me out of this!" cried Montgomery, addressing himself to Langham.

"Yes, we will—like hell!" said Gilmore. "By rights we ought to take you down to the creek, knock you in the head and heave you in—eh, Marsh? That's about the size of what we ought to do!"

Langham's face was white and drawn with apprehension, yet he surveyed the ruin the gambler had wrought with something like pity.

"Why, what's happened to him, Andy?" he asked.

His companion laughed brutally.

"Oh, I punched him up some, I couldn't keep my hands off him, I only wonder I didn't kill him—"

"Let me out of this, boss—" whined the handy-man.

"Shut up, you!" said the gambler roughly.

He drew back his hand, but Langham caught his arm.

"Don't do that, Andy!" he said. "He isn't in any shape to stand much more of that; and what's the use, the harm's done!"

The gambler scowled on his cousin Joe with moody resentment.

"All the same I've got a good notion to finish the job!" he said.

"Let me go home, boss!" entreated Montgomery, still addressing himself to Langham. "God's sake, he pretty near killed me!"

He stood up on shaking legs.

Wretched, abject, his uneasy glance shifted first from one to the other of his patrons, who were now his judges, and for aught he knew would be his executioners as well. The gambler glared back at him with an expression of set ferocity which told him he need expect no mercy from that source; but with Langham it was different; he at least was not wantonly brutal. The sight of physical suffering always distressed him and Joe's bruised and bloody face was more than he could bear to look at.

"For two cents I'd knock him on the head!" jerked out Gilmore.

"Oh, quit, Andy; let him alone! I want to ask him a question or two," said Langham.

"You'll never know from him what he said or didn't say—you'll learn that from the judge himself," and Gilmore laughed harshly.

A minute or two passed before Langham could trust himself to speak. When he did, he turned to Montgomery to ask:

"I wish you'd tell me as nearly as you can what you said to my father?"

"I didn't go there to tell him anything, boss; he just got it out of me. What chance has a slob like me with him?"

"Got what out of you?" questioned Langham in a low voice.

"Well, he didn't get much, boss," replied Montgomery, shaking his head.

"But what did you tell him?" insisted Langham.

"I don't remember, boss, I was full, see—and maybe I said too much and then agin maybe I didn't!"

"I hope you like this, Marsh; it's the sort of thing I been up against," said Gilmore.

By way of answer Langham made a weary gesture. The horror of the situation was now a thing beyond fear.

"I'm for sending the drunken loafer to the other side of the continent," said Gilmore.

"What's the use of that?" asked Langham dully.

"Every use," rejoined Gilmore with fresh confidence. "It's enough, ain't it, that he's talked to your father; we can't take chances on his talking to any one else. There's the west-bound express; I'm for putting him on that—there's time enough. We can give him a couple of hundred dollars and that will be the end of him, for if he ever shows his face here in Mount Hope, I'll break every bone in his body. What do you say?"

"Perhaps you are right!" And Langham glanced uncertainly at the handy-man.

"Well, it's either that, or else I can knock him over the head. Perhaps you had rather do that, it's more in your line."

"Boss, you give me the money and let me go now, and I won't ever come back!" cried Montgomery eagerly. "I been lookin' for the chance to get clear of this bum town! I'll stay away, don't you lose no sleep about that; I ain't got nothin' to ever bring me back."

And on the moment Mr. Montgomery banished from his mind and heart all idea of the pure joys of domestic life. It was as if his old woman had never been. He was sure travel was what he required, and a great deal of it, and all in one direction—away from Mount Hope.

No unnecessary time was wasted on Montgomery's appearance. A wet towel in the not too gentle hands of Mr. Gilmore removed the blood stains from his face, and then he was led forth into the night,—the night which so completely swallowed up all trace of him that his old woman and her brood sought his accustomed haunts in vain. Nor was Mr. Moxlow any more successful in his efforts to discover the handy-man's whereabouts. As for Mount Hope she saw in the mysterious disappearance of the star witness only the devious activities of John North's friends.



CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

FATHER AND SON

While Mr. Gilmore was an exceedingly capable accomplice, at once resourceful, energetic, unsentimental and conscienceless, he yet combined with these solid merits, certain characteristics which rendered uninterrupted intercourse with him a horror and a shame to Marshall Langham who was daily and almost hourly paying the price the gambler had set on his silence. And what a price it was! Gilmore was his master, coarse, brutal, and fiercely exacting. How he hated him, and yet how necessary he had become; for the gambler never faltered, was never uncertain; he met each difficulty with a callous readiness which Langham knew he himself would utterly have lacked. He decided this was because Gilmore was without imagination, since in his own many fearful, doubting moments, he saw always what he had come to believe as the inevitable time when the wicked fabric they were building would collapse like a house of cards in a gale of wind, and his terrible secret would be revealed to all men.

All this while, step by step, Gilmore, without haste but without pause, was moving toward his desires. He came and went in the Langham house as if he were master there.

When Marshall had first informed Evelyn that he expected to have Mr. Gilmore in to dinner, there had been a scene, and she had threatened to appeal to the judge; but he told her fiercely that he would bring home whom he pleased, that it suited him to be decent to Andy and that was all there was to it. And apparently she soon found something to like in this strange intimate of her husband's; at least she had made no protest after the gambler's first visit to the house.

On his part Gilmore was quickly conscious of the subtle encouragement she extended him. She understood him, she saw into his soul, she divined his passion for her and she was not shocked by it. In his unholy musings he told himself that here was a woman who was dead game—and a lady, too, with all the pretty ways and refinements that were so lacking in the other women he had known.

Montgomery was some two days gone toward the West and Gilmore had dropped around ostensibly to see Marshall Langham, but in reality to make love to Marshall Langham's wife, when the judge, looking gray and old, walked in on the little group unobserved. He paused for an instant near the door.

Evelyn was seated before the piano and Gilmore was bending above her, while Marshall, with an unread book in his hands and with a half-smoked cigar between his teeth, was lounging in front of the fire. The judge's glance rested questioningly on Gilmore, but only for a moment. Then an angry flame of recognition colored his thin cheeks.

Aware now of his father's presence, Marshall tossed aside his book and quitted his chair. For two days he had been dreading this meeting, and for two days he had done what he could to avert it.

"You must have had a rather cold walk, father; let me draw a chair up close to the fire for you," he said.

Evelyn had risen to greet the judge, while the gambler turned to give him an easy nod. A smile hid itself in the shadow of his black mustache; he was feeling very sure of himself and surer still of Evelyn. The disfavor or approval of this slight man of sixty meant nothing to him.

"How do you do, sir!" said the judge with icy civility.

Had he met Gilmore on the street he would not have spoken to him. As he slowly withdrew his eyes from the gambler, he said to his son:

"Can you spare me a moment or two, Marshall?"

"Come into the library," and Marshall led the way from the room.

They walked the length of the hall in silence, Marshall a step or two in advance of the judge. He knew his father was there on no trivial errand. This visit was the result of his interview with Joe Montgomery. How much had the handy-man told him? This was the question that had been revolving in his mind for the last two days, and he was about to find an answer to it.

The father and son entered the room, each heavily preoccupied. Marshall seated himself and stared moodily into the fire. Already the judge had found a chair and his glance was fixed on the carpet at his feet. Presently looking up he asked:

"Will you be good enough to tell me what that fellow is doing here?"

"Andy?"

The single word came from Langham as with a weary acceptance of his father's anger.

"Yes, certainly—Gilmore—of whom do you imagine me to be speaking?"

"Give a dog a bad name—"

"He has earned his name. I had heard something of this but did not credit it!" said the judge.

There was another pause.

"Perhaps you will be good enough to explain how I happen to meet that fellow here?"

The judge regarded his son fixedly. There had always existed a cordial frankness in their intercourse, for though the judge was a man of few intimacies, family ties meant much to him, and these ties were now all centered in his son. He had shown infinite patience with Marshall's turbulent youth; an even greater patience with his dissipated manhood; he believed that in spite of the terrible drafts he was making on his energies, his future would not be lacking in solid and worthy achievement. In his own case the traditional vice of the Langhams had passed him by. He was grateful for this, but it had never provoked in him any spirit of self-righteousness; indeed, it had only made him the more tender in his judgment of his son's lapses.

"Marshall—" and the tone of anger had quite faded from his voice—"Marshall, what is that fellow's hold on you?"

"You would not appreciate Andy's peculiar virtues even if I were to try to describe them," said Marshall with a smile of sardonic humor.

"Do you consider him the right sort of a person to bring into your home?"

"It won't hurt him!" said Marshall.

The judge, with a look on his face that mingled astonishment and injury, sank back in his chair. He never attempted anything that even faintly suggested flippancy, and he was unappreciative of this tendency in others.

"You have not told me what this fellow's hold on you is?" he said, after a moment's silence.

"Oh, he's done me one or two good turns."

"You mean in the way of money?"

Marshall nodded.

"Are you in his debt now, may I ask?"

"No," and Marshall moved restlessly.

"Are you quite frank with me, Marshall?" asked the judge with that rare gentleness of voice and manner that only his son knew.

"Quite."

"Because it would be better to make every sacrifice and be rid of the obligation."

Another long pause followed in which there came to the ears of the two men the sound of a noisy waltz that Evelyn was playing. Again it was the judge who broke the oppressive silence.

"I came here to-night, Marshall, because there is a matter I must discuss with you. Perhaps you will tell me what you and Gilmore have done with Joe Montgomery?"

Marshall had sought to prepare himself against the time when this very question should be asked him, but the color left his cheeks.

"I don't think I know what you mean," he said slowly.

His father made an impatient gesture.

"Don't tell me that! What has become of Montgomery? Look at me! Two nights ago he came to see me; I had sent for him; I had learned from Nellie that he had practically deserted her. I learned further from the man himself that you and Gilmore were largely responsible for this."

"He was drunk, of course."

"He had been drinking—yes—"

"Doesn't that explain his remarkable statement? What reason could Andy or any one have for wishing to keep him from his wife?" asked Marshall who had recovered his accustomed steadiness.

"He was ready with an answer for that question when I asked it. Do you wish to know what that answer was?" said the judge.

Marshall did not trust himself to speak; he felt the judge's eyes on him and could not meet them. He saw himself cowering there in his chair with his guilt stamped large on every feature. His throat was dry and his lips were parched, he did not know whether he could speak. His shoulders drooped and his chin rested on his breast. What was the use—was it worth the struggle? Suppose Montgomery, in spite of his promises, came back to Mount Hope, suppose Gilmore's iron nerve failed him!

"You don't answer me, Marshall," said the judge.

"I don't understand you—" evaded Marshall.

"From my soul I wish I could believe you!" exclaimed his father. "If it's not debt, what is the nature of your discreditable connection with Gilmore?"

Marshall glanced up quickly; he seemed to breathe again; perhaps after all Montgomery had said less than he supposed him to have said!

"I have already told you that I owe Gilmore nothing!"

"I should be glad to think it, but I warn you to stand clear of him and his concerns, for I am going to investigate the truth of Montgomery's story," declared the judge.

"What did he tell you?" Marshall spoke with an effort.

"That his evidence in the North case was false, that it was inspired by Gilmore."

Marshall passed a shaking hand across his face.

"Nonsense!" he said.

"His story will be worth looking into. He stood for the truth of what he said in part, he insisted that he saw a man cross McBride's shed on the night of the murder and drop into the alley, and the man was not John North. He seemed unwilling that North, through any instrumentality of his, should suffer for a crime of which he was innocent; his feeling on this point was unfeigned and unmistakable."

There was silence again, while the two men stared at each other. From the parlor the jarring sound of the music reached them, inconceivably out of harmony with the seriousness of their mood.

"I have wished to take no action in the matter of Montgomery's disappearance until I saw you, Marshall," said the judge. "I have been sick with this thing! Now I am going to lay such facts as I have before Moxlow."

Marshall stared moodily into the fire. He told himself that the prosecuting attorney would be in great luck if he got anything out of Gilmore.

"I purpose to suggest to Moxlow a fresh line of investigation where this important witness is concerned, and Mr. Gilmore as the man most likely to clear up the mystery surrounding his disappearance from Mount Hope. We may not be able to get anything very tangible out of him in the way of information, but I imagine we may cause him some little anxiety and annoyance. You can't afford to be mixed up in this affair, and I warn you again to stand clear of Gilmore! If there is any truth in Montgomery's statement it can only have the most sinister significance, for I don't need to tell you that some powerful motive must be back of Gilmore's activity. If North was not responsible for McBride's death, where do the indications all point? Who more likely to commit such a crime than a social outcast—a man plying an illegal trade in defiance of the laws?"

"Hush! For God's sake speak lower!" cried Marshall, giving way to an uncontrollable emotion of terror.

Racked and shaken, he stared about him as if he feared another presence in the room. The judge leaned forward and rested a thin hand on his son's knee.

"Marshall, what do you know of Gilmore's connection with this matter?"

"I want him let alone! To lay such stress on Montgomery's drunken talk is absurd!"

The judge's lips met in a determined line.

"I scarcely expected to hear that from you! I am not likely, as you know, to be influenced in the discharge of my duty by any private consideration."

He quitted his chair and stood erect, his figure drawn to its fullest height.

"Wait—I didn't mean that," protested Marshall.

The judge resumed his chair.

"What did you mean?" he asked.

"What's the use of throwing Moxlow off on a fresh scent?"

"That's a very remarkable point of view!" said the judge, with a mirthless laugh.

In the utter selfishness that his fear had engendered, it seemed a monstrous thing to Langham that any one should wish to clear North, in whose conviction lay his own salvation. More than this, he had every reason to hate North, and if he were hanged it would be but a roundabout meting out of justice for that hideous wrong he had done him, the shame of which was ever present. He saw one other thing clearly, the necessity that Gilmore should be left alone; for the very moment the gambler felt the judge was moving against him, that moment would come his fierce demands that he be called off—that Marshall quiet him, no matter how.

"Have you been near North since his arrest?" asked the judge, apparently speaking at random.

"No," said Marshall.

"May I ask if you are offended because of his choice of counsel?"

"That has nothing to do with it!" said the younger man, moving impatiently in his chair.

"I do not like your attitude in this matter, Marshall; I like it as little as I understand it. But I have given my warning. Keep clear of that fellow Gilmore, do not involve yourself in his fortunes, or the result may prove disastrous to you!"

"I want him let alone!" said Marshall doggedly, speaking with desperate resolution.

"Why?" asked the judge.

"Because it is better for all concerned; you—you don't know what you're meddling with—"

He quitted his chair and fell to pacing to and fro. His father's glance, uncertain and uneasy, followed him as he crossed and recrossed the room.

"I find I can not agree with you, Marshall!" said the judge at length. "I do not like hints, and unless you can deal with me with greater frankness than you have yet done, there is not much use in prolonging this discussion."

"As you like, then," replied Marshall, wheeling on him with sudden recklessness. "I want to tell you just this—you'll not hurt Gilmore, but—"

Words failed him, and his voice died away on his white and twitching lips into an inarticulate murmur.

He struggled vainly to recover the mastery of himself, but his fear, now the growth of his many days and nights of torture, would not let him finish what he had started to say.

"Very good, I don't want to hurt anybody, but I do want to find that man, whoever he is, that you and Gilmore are shielding; the man Joe Montgomery saw cross those sheds the night of the murder; I am going to bend my every energy to learning who that man is, and when I have discovered his identity—"

"You'll want to see him in North's place, will you?" asked Marshall. The words came from him in a hoarse whisper and his arm was extended threateningly toward his father. "You're sure about that? You can't conceive of the possibility that you'd be glad not to know? You want to have John North out of his cell and this other man there in his place; you want to face him day after day in the court room—you're sure?" His shaking arm continued to menace the judge. "Well, you don't need to find Montgomery, and you don't need to hound Gilmore; I can tell you more than they can—"

His bloodshot eyes, fixed and staring, seemed starting from their sockets.

"The facts you want to know are hidden here!" He struck his hand savagely against his breast and lurched half-way across the room, then he swung about and once more faced the judge. "Why haven't you had the wisdom to keep out of this,—or have you expected to find some one it would be easier to pronounce sentence on than North? Did you think it would be Gilmore?"

He scowled down on his father. It was appalling and unnatural, after all his frightful suffering, his fear, and his remorse which never left him, that his safety should be jeopardized by his own father! He had only asked that the law be left to deal with John North, who, he believed, had so wronged him that no death he could die would atone for the injury he had done.

Slowly but inexorably the full significance of Marshall's words dawned on the judge. He had risen from his chair dumb and terror-stricken. For a moment they stood without speech, each staring into the other's face. Presently the judge stole to Marshall's side.

"Tell me that I misunderstand you!" he whispered in entreaty, resting a tremulous hand on his son's arm.

But the latter was bitterly resentful. His father had forced this confession, from him, he had given him no choice!

"Why should I tell you that now?" he asked, as he roughly shook off his father's hand.

"Tell me I misunderstand you!" repeated the judge, in a tone of abject entreaty.

"It's too late!" said Marshall, his voice a mere whisper between parched lips. He tossed up his arms in a gesture that betokened his utter weariness of soul. "My God, how I've suffered!" he said chokingly, and his eyes were wet with the sudden anguish of self-pity.

"Marshall!"

The judge spoke in protest of his words. Marshall turned abruptly from him and crossed the room. The spirit of his fierce resentment was dying within him, for, after all, what did it signify how his father learned his secret!

From the parlor there still came the strains of light music; these and Marshall's echoing tread as he strode to and fro, filled in the ghastly silence that succeeded. Then at length he paused before his father, and once more they looked deep into each other's eyes, and the little space between was for both as an open grave filled with dead things—hopes, ambitions, future days and months and years—days and months and years when they should be for ever mindful of his crime! For henceforth they were to dwell in the chill of this direful shadow that would tower above all the concerns of life whether great or small; that would add despair to every sorrow, and take the very soul and substance from every joy.

The judge dropped into his chair, but his wavering glance still searched his son's face for some sign that should tell him, not what he already knew but what he hoped might be,—that Marshall was either drunk or crazed; but he only saw there the reflection of his own terror. He buried his head in his hands and bitter age-worn sobs shook his bent shoulders. After a moment of sullen waiting for him to recover, Marshall approached and touched him on the arm.

"Father—" he whispered gently.

The judge glanced up.

"It's a lie, Marshall!"

But Marshall only stared at him until the judge again covered his face with his hands.

When he glanced up a few moments later, he found himself alone. Marshall had stolen from the room.



CHAPTER NINETEEN

SHRIMPLIN TO THE RESCUE

Beyond the flats and the railroad tracks and over across the new high, iron bridge, was a low-lying region much affected by the drivers of dump-carts, whose activity was visibly attested by the cinders, the ashes, the tin cans, the staved-in barrels and the lidless boxes that everywhere met the eye.

On the verge of this waste, which civilization had builded and shaped with its discarded odds and ends, were the meager beginnings of a poor suburb. Here an enterprising landlord had erected a solitary row of slab-sided dwellings of a uniform ugliness; and had given to each a single coat of yellow paint of such exceeding thinness, that it was possible to determine by the whiter daubs of putty showing through, just where every nail had been driven.

Only the very poorest or the most shiftless of Mount Hope's population found a refuge in this quarter. The Montgomerys being strictly eligible, it was but natural that Joe should have taken up his abode here on the day the first of the eight houses had been finished. Joe was burdened by no troublesome convictions touching the advantages of a gravelly soil or a southern exposure, and the word sanitation had it been spoken in his presence would have conveyed no meaning to his mind. He had never heard of germs, and he had as little prejudice concerning stagnant water as he had predilection for clear water. He knew in a general way that all water was wet, but further than this he gave the element no thought.

Thus it came about that his was the very oldest family seated in this delectable spot. The young Montgomerys could with perfect propriety claim precedence at all the stagnant pools that offered superior advantages as yielding a rich harvest of tadpoles. While the mature intelligence might have considered these miniature lakes as highly undesirable, the young Montgomerys were not unmindful of their blessings. As babies, clothed in shapeless garments, they launched upon the green slime their tiny fleet of chips, and, grown a little older, it was here they waded in the happy summer days. The very dump-carts came and went like perpetual argosies, bringing riches—discarded furniture and cast-off clothing—to their very door.

In merciful defiance of those hidden perils that lurk where sanitation and hygiene are unpractised sciences, Joe's numerous family throve and multiplied. The baby carriage which had held his firstborn,—Arthur, now aged fourteen,—was still in use, the luster of its paint much dimmed and its upholstery but a memory. It had trundled a succession of little Montgomerys among the cinder piles; indeed, it was almost a feature of the landscape, for Joe's family was his chiefest contribution to the wealth of his country.

There had been periods varying from a few days to a few weeks when the Montgomerys were sole tenants of that row of slab-sided houses; their poverty being a fixed condition, they were merely sometimes poorer. No transient gleam of a larger prosperity had ever illuminated the horizon of their lives, and they had never been tempted to move to other parts of the town where the ground and the rents were higher.

Residents of this locality, not being burdened with any means of locomotion beyond their own legs, usually came and went by way of the high iron bridge; their legal right of way however was by a neglected thoroughfare that had ambitiously set out to be a street, but having failed of its intention, presently dwindled to a pleasant country road which not far beyond crossed the river by the old wooden bridge below the depot.

It was the iron bridge which Mrs. Montgomery, escorted by the daring Shrimplin, had crossed that fateful night of her interview with Judge Langham, and it was toward it that her glance was turned for many days after in the hope that she might see Joe's bulk of bone and muscle as he slouched in the direction of the home and family he had so wanted only forsaken. But a veil of mystery obscured every fact that bore on the handy-man's disappearance; no eye penetrated it, no hand lifted it.

Soon after Montgomery's disappearance his deserted wife fell upon evil times indeed. In spite of her bravest efforts the rent fell hopelessly in arrears. For a time her pride kept her away from the Shrimplins, who might have helped her. To go to the little lamplighter's was to hear bitter truths about her husband; Mr. Shrimplin's denunciations were especially fierce and scathing, for here he felt that righteousness was all on his side and that in abusing the absconding Joe he was performing a moral act.

But at last Nellie's fortunes reached a crisis. An obdurate landlord set her few poor belongings in the gutter. Even in the most prosperous days their roof-tree had flourished but precariously and now it was down and level with the dust; seeing which Mrs. Montgomery placed her youngest in the ancient vehicle which had trundled all that generation of Montgomerys, drew her apron before her eyes and wept. But quickly rallying to the need for immediate action she swallowed her pride and sent Arthur in quest of his uncle, who was well fitted by sobriety, industry and thrift, to cope with such a crisis.

Mr. Shrimplin's only weaknesses were such as spring from an eager childlike vanity, and a nature as shy as a fawn's of whatever held even a suggestion of danger. To Custer he could brag of crimes he had never committed, but an unpaid butcher's bill would have robbed him of his sleep; also he wore a very tender heart in his narrow chest, though he did his best to hide it by assuming a bold and hardy air and by garnishing his conversation with what he counted the very flower of a brutal worldly cynicism.

Thus it was that when Arthur had found his uncle and had stated his case, Mr. Shrimplin instantly summoned to his aid all his redoubtable powers of speech and fell to cursing the recreant husband and father. Having eased himself in this manner, and not wishing Arthur to be entirely unmindful of his vast superiority, he called the boy's attention to the undeniable fact that he, Shrimplin, could have been kicked out of doors and Joe Montgomery would not have lifted a hand to save him. Yet all this while the little lamplighter, with the boy at his heels, was moving rapidly across the flats.

From the town end of the bridge, youthful eyes had descried his coming and the word was quickly passed that the uncle of all the little Montgomerys was approaching, presumably with philanthropic intent. This rumor instantly stimulated an interest on the part of the adult population, an interest which had somewhat languished owing to the incapacity of human nature to sustain an emotional climax for any considerable length of time. Untidy women and idle-looking men with the rust of inaction consuming them, quickly appeared on the scene, and when the little lamplighter descended from the railway tracks it was to be greeted with something like an ovation at the hands of his sister-in-law's neighbors.

His ears caught the murmur of approval that passed from lip to lip and out of the very tail of his bleached eyes he noted the expression of satisfaction that was on every face. Even the previously obdurate landlord met him with words of apology and conciliation. It was a happy moment for Mr. Shrimplin, but not by so much as the flicker of an eyelash did he betray that this was so. He had considered himself such a public character since the night of the McBride murder that he now deemed it incumbent to preserve a stoic manner; the admiration of his fellows could win nothing from the sternness of his nature, so he ignored the neighbors, while he was barely civil to the landlord. The big roll of bills which, with something of a flourish, he produced from the pocket of his greasy overalls, settled the rent, and the neighbors noted with bated breath that the size of this roll was not perceptibly diminished by the transaction.

Presently Mr. Shrimplin found himself standing alone with Nellie; the landlord had departed with his money, while the neighbors, having devoted the greater part of the day to a sympathetic interest in Mrs. Montgomery's fortunes, now had leisure for their own affairs.

"Why didn't you send for me sooner?" demanded the little man with some asperity. "No sense in having your things put out like this when you only got to put them back again!"

"If Joe was only here this would never have happened!" said Mrs. Montgomery, giving way to copious tears.

But Mr. Shrimplin seemed not so sure of this. The settling of the handy-man's difficulties had been one of the few extravagances he had permitted himself. His glance now fell on the small occupant of the decrepit baby carriage, and he gave a start of astonishment.

"Lord!" he ejaculated, pointing to the child. "You don't mean to tell me that's yours, too?"

"Three weeks next Sunday," said Mrs. Montgomery.

"Another one,—well, I don't wonder you've kept still about it! What's the use of bringing children into the world when you can't half take care of 'em?"

"I didn't keep still about it,—only I had so much to worry me!" said Nellie, with a shadowy sort of resentment at the little lamplighter's words and manner.

"It's a nice-looking baby!" admitted Mr. Shrimplin, relenting.

"It's a boy, see—he's got his father's eyes and nose—"

"I don't know about the eyes, but the nose is a durn sight whiter than Joe's! Maybe, though, when it's Joe's age it will use the same brand of paint."

"What you got it in for Joe for? He never done nothing to you!" said Joe's wife, with palpable offense.

"He ought to be stood up and lammed over the head with a club!" observed Mr. Shrimplin, with considerable acrimony of tone. "You'd have thought that being a witness would have made a man out of Joe if anything would,—and how does he act? Why, he lights out; he gets to be good for something beside soaking up whisky and spoiling his insides, and he skips the town; now if that ain't a devil of a way for him to act, I'd like to know what you call it!"

"He was a good man—" declared Mrs. Montgomery with conviction. "A good man, but unfortunate!"

"Well, if he suits you, Nellie—"

"He does!"

"I'm glad of it," retorted Mr. Shrimplin, taking a chew of tobacco. "For I don't reckon he'd ever suit any one else!"

"You and none of my family never liked Joe!" said Mrs. Montgomery.

"Well, why should we?" demanded Mr. Shrimplin impatiently.

"Your wife,—my own sister, too,—said he should never darken her door, and he was that proud he never did! You couldn't have dragged him there!" said Mrs. Montgomery, and the ready tears dimmed her eyes.

"And you couldn't have dragged him away quick enough if he had a-come! Now don't you get tearful over Joe, you can't call him no prodigal; his veal's tough old beef by this time! But I never had nothing in particular against him more than I thought he ought to be kicked clean off the face of the earth!" said Mr. Shrimplin, rolling his drooping flaxen mustache fiercely between his stubby thumb and its neighboring forefinger.

Such personal relations as the little lamplighter had sustained with the handy-man had invariably been of the most friendly and pacific description. Esteeming Joe a gentleman of uncertain habits, and of criminal instincts that might at any moment be translated into vigorous action, Mr. Shrimplin had always been at much pains to placate him. In the heat of the moment, however, all this was forgotten, and Mr. Shrimplin's love of decency and rectitude promptly asserted itself.

"It's easy enough to pick flaws in a popular good-looking man like Joe!" said Mrs. Montgomery, with whom time and absence had been at work, also, and to such an extent that the first dim glint of a halo was beginning to fix itself about the curly red head of her delinquent spouse.

"And a whole lot of good them good looks of his has done you, Nellie," rejoined Mr. Shrimplin, with a little cackle of mirth.

"He never even seen his youngest!" said Mrs. Montgomery, giving completely away to tears at this moving thought of the handy-man's deprivation.

"I reckon he could even stand that," observed Mr. Shrimplin unfeelingly. "I bet he never knowed 'em apart."

"Why he was just wrapped up in them and me,—just wrapped up!" cried Mrs. Montgomery.

"Well, he had a blame curious way of showing it; no one would ever have suspected it of him!" said Mr. Shrimplin.

"I guess this wouldn't have happened if his own folks had had more faith in Joe, that's what wore on him,—I seen it wear on him!" declared Mrs. Montgomery, in a tone of melancholy conviction.

"In the main I'm a truthful man, Nellie,—I wish to be anyhow; and I'll tell you honest I was never able to see much in Joe aside from his good looks, which I know he had, now that you call them to mind. No,—I think a coat of tar and feathers would be about the thing for Joe; he's the sort of bird to wear that kind of plumage. My opinion is that you've seen the last of him; no sense in your thinking otherwise, because you're just leaving yourself open to disappointment!"

Yet Mr. Shrimplin remained to reinstate Mrs. Montgomery in her home. It was his expert hands that set up the cracked and rusted kitchen stove, and arranged the scanty and battered furniture in the several rooms. Nor was he satisfied to do merely this, for he presently despatched Arthur into town after an excellent assortment of groceries. All the while, however, he neglected no opportunity to elaborate for Nellie's benefit his opinions concerning the handy-man's utter worthlessness. At length this good Samaritan paused from his labors, and regaling himself with a fresh chew of tobacco and a parting gibe at Joe, set briskly off for his own home.

The street lamps demanded his immediate attention, and it was not until his day's work was finished that he found opportunity to tell Mrs. Shrimplin of these straits to which Nellie had been reduced. He concluded by reiterating his opinion that her sister had seen the last of Joe.

"I don't know why you say that!" was Mrs. Shrimplin's unexpected rejoinder.

"Ain't I got mighty good reason to say it?" asked her husband. "Don't you know, and ain't every one always said Joe was just too low to live? I'd like to know if it wasn't you said he should never set his foot inside your door?"

"I might say it again, and then I mightn't," rejoined Mrs. Shrimplin, with aggravating composure.

Two days later when the Shrimplins were at breakfast Mrs. Montgomery walked in on them. Her face was streaked with the traces of recent tears, but there was the light of happy vindication in her eyes, and a soiled and crumpled letter in her hand.

"Mercy, Nellie!" exclaimed her sister. "What's the matter now?"

"Matter? Why, I'm so happy I just don't know what to do! I've heard from my Joe!"

Mrs. Shrimplin rested her hands on her hips and surveyed Nellie with eyes that seemed to hold pity and contempt in about equal proportion.

"You've heard from Joe! Well, if he was my husband he'd have heard from me long ago!" she said.

And it occurred to Mr. Shrimplin that his wife was wonderfully consistent in her inconsistencies.

"Well, and what have you got against Joe?" demanded Mrs. Montgomery with ready anger.

"She ain't got nothing new, Nellie!" said Mr. Shrimplin, desirous of preserving the peace.

"Well, she's mighty quick to misjudge him! Look!" and she drew from the envelope she held in her hand a dirty greenback. "He's sent me twenty dollars—my man has! Does that look like he'd forgotten me or his children?" protested Nellie, in a voice of happy triumph.

"I'll bet it's counterfeit; I'd go slow on trying to pass it," said Mr. Shrimplin when he had somewhat recovered from the shock of the sudden announcement.

It was plain that Nellie had never thought of any such possibility as this, for the light died out of her eyes.

"How can I find out whether it's good or not?" she faltered.

"Let me look at it!" said Mr. Shrimplin.

Mrs. Montgomery placed the bill in his hands. Her face was keen and pinched with anxiety as she awaited the little man's verdict.

"It's genu-ine all right," he at length admitted grudgingly.

"I knew it was!" cried Nellie, her miserable suspicions put at rest.

"Well, you'd better spend it quick and get some good of it before old Joe comes back and wants the change!" advised Mr. Shrimplin.

"What does he say?" questioned Mrs. Shrimplin.

"He don't say a word, there was nothing but the bill."

"Well, maybe it wasn't Joe sent it after all!" said the little lamplighter.

"The writing on the envelope's his, I'd know it anywhere. I guess he couldn't trust himself to write; but he'll come back, my man will! Maybe he's on his way now!" exclaimed Nellie.

"Ain't there no postmark?" asked Mrs. Shrimplin.

"Why, I never thought to look!"

But Nellie's face fell when she did look.

"It was mailed at Denver!" she said, in an awe-struck voice.

Her man seemed at the very ends of the earth, and his return became a doubtful thing.

"Well, I wouldn't talk about this to the police or anybody; they ain't been able to find Joe, and I wouldn't be the one to tell them where he's at!" advised Mr. Shrimplin.

"They've stopped coming to the house," said Nellie.

But she looked inquiringly at Mr. Shrimplin. Where the police were concerned she had faith in his masculine understanding; Joe had always seemed to know a great deal about the police, she remembered.

"I reckon old Joe had his own reasons for skipping out, and they must have looked good to him. No, I can't see that you are bound to help the police; the police ain't helped you." And Mr. Shrimplin returned to the scrutiny of the bill in his hand.

That was the profound mystery. No one knew better than he that Joe was not given to such prodigal generosity; neither were twenty-dollar bills frequent with him.



CHAPTER TWENTY

THE CAT AND THE MOUSE

Mr. Gilmore, having yielded once again to temptation, found himself at Marshall Langham's door. He asked for the lawyer, but was informed he was not at home, a fact of which Mr. Gilmore was perfectly well aware, since he had parted from him not twenty minutes before at the court-house steps. Mrs. Langham was at home, however, and at this welcome information the gambler, smiling, strode into the hall.

From the parlor, Evelyn heard his voice. She had found him amusing in the first days of their acquaintance, and possibly she might again find him diverting, but this afternoon he had chosen ill for his call. She was quite sure she detested him. For the first time she measured him by standards of which he could know nothing, and found no good thing in him. What had Marsh meant when he forced this most undesirable acquaintance on her!

"You wanted to see Marsh?" she asked, as she gave him her hand.

"That will keep," said Gilmore cheerfully. "May I stay?" he added.

"If you wish," she answered indifferently.

She felt a sense of shame at his presence there. Everything about her seemed to sink to his level, which was a very low level, she was sure. These afternoon calls were a recent feature of their intimacy. Before Gilmore came, she had been thinking for the hundredth time of John North—the man she had once loved and now hated, but in whose honor she had such confidence that she knew he would face death rather than compromise her. In spite of the fact that he had scorned her, had thrown her aside for another, she had had on his account many a soul-rending struggle with her conscience, with her better self. She knew that a word from her, and his prison doors would open to a free world. Time and again this word had trembled on her lips unuttered. She knew also that it was not hate of North that kept her silent. It was an intangible, unformed, unthoughtout fear of what might follow after. North, she knew, was innocent; who then was guilty? She closed her eyes and shut her lips. That North would ultimately clear himself she never seriously doubted, and yet the burden of her secret was intolerable. In her present mood, she was accessible to every passing influence, and to-day it was Gilmore's fate to find her both penitent and rebellious, but he could not know this, he only knew that she was quieter than usual.

He seated himself at her side, and his eyes, eager and animated, fed on her beauty. He had come to the belief that only the lightest barriers stood between himself and Evelyn Langham, and it was a question in his mind of just how much he would be willing to sacrifice for her sake. He boasted nothing in the way of position or reputation, and no act of his could possibly add to the disfavor in which he was already held; but to leave Mount Hope meant certain definite financial losses; this had served as a check on his ardor, for where money was concerned Gilmore was cautious. But his passion was coming to be the supreme thing in his life; a fortunate chance had placed him where he now stood in relation to her, and chance again, as unkind as it had been kind, might separate them. The set of Gilmore's heavy jaws became tense with this thought and with the ruthless strength of his purpose. He would shake down one sensation for Mount Hope before he got away,—and he would not go alone.

"I suppose you were at the trial to-day?" Evelyn said.

"Yes, I was there for a little while this afternoon," he answered. "It's rather tame yet, they're still fussing over the jury."

"How is Jack bearing it?" she asked.

Her question seemed to depress Gilmore.

"Why do you care about how he takes it? I don't suppose he sees any fun in it,—he didn't look to me as if he did," he said slowly.

"But how did he seem to you?"

"Oh, he's got nerve enough, if that's what you mean!"

"Poor Jack!" she murmured softly.

"If you're curious, why don't you go take a look at poor Jack? He'll be there all right for the next few weeks," said the gambler, watching her narrowly.

"I'm afraid Marsh might object."

At this Gilmore threw back his head and laughed.

"Excuse me!" he said; and in explanation of his sudden mirth, he added: "The idea of your trotting out Marsh to me!"

"I'm not trotting him out to you,—as you call it," Evelyn said quietly, but her small foot tapped the floor. She intended presently to rid herself of Gilmore for all time.

"Yes, but I was afraid you were going to."

"You mustn't speak to me as you do; I have done nothing to give you the privilege."

Gilmore did not seem at all abashed at this reproof.

"If you want to go to the trial I'll take you, and I'll agree to make it all right with Marsh afterward; what do you say?" he asked.

Evelyn smiled brightly, but she did not explain to him the utter impossibility of their appearing in public together either at the North trial or anywhere else for the matter of that; there were bounds set even to her reckless disregard of what Mount Hope held to be right and proper.

"Oh, no, you're very kind, but I don't think I should care to see poor Jack now."

She gave a little shiver of horror as if at the mere idea. This was for the gambler, but her real feeling was far deeper than he, suspicious as he was, could possibly know.

"Why do you 'poor Jack' him to me?" said Gilmore sullenly.

Evelyn opened her fine eyes in apparent astonishment.

"He is one of my oldest friends. I have known him all my life!" she said.

"Well, one's friends should keep out of the sort of trouble he's made for himself," observed Gilmore in surly tones.

"Yes,—perhaps—" answered Evelyn absently.

"Look here, I don't want to talk to you about North anyhow; can't we hit on some other topic?" asked Gilmore.

It maddened him even to think of the part the accused man had played in her life.

"Why have you and Marsh turned against him?" she asked.

The gambler considered for an instant.

"Do you really want to know? Well, you see he wasn't square; that does a man up quicker than anything else."

"I don't believe it!" she cried.

"It's so,—ask Marsh; we found him to be an all-right crook; then's when we quit him," he said, nodding and smiling grimly.

There was something in his manner which warned her that his real meaning was intentionally obscured. She remembered that Marsh had once boasted of having proof that she was in North's rooms the afternoon of the murder and it flashed across her mind that if any one really knew of her presence there it was Gilmore himself. She studied him furtively, and she observed that his black waxed mustache shaded a pair of lips that wore a mirthless smile, and what had at first been no more than an undefined suspicion grew into a certainty. Gilmore shifted uneasily in his chair. He felt that since their last meeting he had lost ground with her.

"What's the matter,—why do you keep me at arm's length; what have I done, anyhow?" he asked impatiently.

"Do I keep you at arm's length? Well, perhaps you need to be kept there," she said.

"You should know what brings me here,—why it is I can't keep away—"

"How should I know, unless you tell me?" she said softly.

Gilmore bent toward her, his eyes lustrous with suppressed feeling.

"Isn't that another of your little jokes, Evelyn? Do you really want me to tell you?"

"I am dying with curiosity!"

Voice and manner seemed to encourage, and the gambler felt his heart leap within him.

"Well, I guess it's principally to see you!" he muttered, but his lips quivered with emotion.

She laughed.

"Just see how mistaken one may be, Andy; I thought all along it was Marsh!"

At her use of his Christian name his heavy face became radiant. His purposes were usually allied to an admirable directness of speech that never left one long in doubt as to his full meaning.

"Look here, aren't you about sick of Marsh?" he asked. "How long are you going to stand for this sort of thing? You have a right to expect something better than he has to offer you!"

She met the glance of his burning black eyes with undisturbed serenity, but a cruel smile had come again to the corners of her mouth. She was preparing to settle her score with Gilmore in a fashion he would not soon forget. One of her hands rested on the arm of her chair, and the gambler's ringed fingers closed about it; but apparently she was unaware of this; at least she did not seek to withdraw it.

"By God, you're pretty!" he cried.

"What do you mean?" she asked quietly.

"Mean,—don't you know that I love you? Have I got to make it plain that I care for you,—that you are everything to me?" he asked, bending toward her.

"So you care a great deal about me, do you, Andy?" she asked slowly.

"I like to hear you call me that!" he said with a deep breath.

"What is it, Andy—what do you want?" she continued.

"You—you!" he said hoarsely; his face was white, he had come to the end of long days of hope and doubt; he had battered down every obstacle that stood in his path and he was telling her of his love, nor did she seem unwilling to hear him. "You are the whole thing to me! I have loved you always—ever since I first saw you! Tell me you'll quit this place with me—I swear I'll make you happy—"

His face was very close to hers, and guessing his purpose she snatched away her hand. Then she laughed.

As the sound of her merriment fell on Gilmore's startled ears, there swiftly came to him the consciousness that something was wrong.

"You and your love-making are very funny, Mr. Gilmore; but there is one thing you don't seem to understand. There is such a thing as taste in selection even when it has ceased to be a matter of morals. I don't like you, Mr. Gilmore. You amused me, but you are merely tiresome now."

She spoke with deliberate contempt, and his face turned white and then scarlet, as if under the sting of a lash.

"If you were a man—" he began, infuriated by the insolence of her speech.

"If I were a man I should be quite able to take care of myself. Understand, I am seeing you for the last time—"

"Yes, by God, you are!" he cried.

His face was ashen. He had come to his feet, shaken and uncertain. It was as if each word of hers had been a stab.

"I am glad we can agree so perfectly on that point. Will you kindly close the hail door as you go out?"

She turned from him and took up a book from the table at her elbow. Gilmore moved toward the door, but paused irresolutely. His first feeling of furious rage was now tempered by a sense of coming loss. This was to be the end; he was never to see her again! He swung about on his heel. She was already turning the leaves of her book, apparently oblivious of his presence.

"Am I to believe you—" he faltered.

She looked up and her eyes met his. There was nothing in her glance to indicate that she comprehended the depth of his suffering.

"Yes," she said, with a drawing in of her full lips.

"When I leave you—if you really mean that—it will be to leave Mount Hope!" said he appealingly.

The savage vigor that was normally his had deserted him, his very pride was gone; a sudden mistrust of himself was humbling him; he felt wretchedly out of place; he was even dimly conscious of his own baseness while he was for the moment blinded to the cruelty of her conduct. Under his breath he cursed himself. By his too great haste, by a too great frankness he had fooled away his chances with her.

"That is more than I dared hope," Evelyn rejoined composedly.

"If I've offended you—" began Gilmore.

"Your presence offends me," she interrupted and looked past him to the door.

"You don't mean what you say—Evelyn—" he said earnestly.

"My cook might have been flattered by your proposal; but why you should have thought I would be, is utterly incomprehensible."

Gilmore's face became livid on the instant. A storm of abuse rushed to his lips but he held himself in check. Then without a word or a glance he passed from the room.



CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE HOUSE OF CARDS

The long day had been devoted to the choosing of the twelve men who should say whether John North was innocent or guilty, but at last court adjourned and Marshall Langham, pushing through the crowd that was emptying itself into the street, turned away in the direction of his home.

For no single instant during the day had he been able to take his eyes from his father's face. He had heard almost nothing of what was said, it was only when the coldly impersonal tones of the judge's voice reached him out of, what was to him silence, that he was stung to a full comprehension of what was going on about him. The faces of the crowd had blended until they were as indistinguishable as the face of humanity itself. For him there had been but the one tragic presence in that dingy room; and now—as the dull gray winter twilight enveloped him,—wherever he turned his eyes, on the snow-covered pavement, in the bare branches of the trees,—there he saw, endlessly repeated, the white drawn face of his father.

His capacity for endurance seemed to measure itself against the slow days. A week—two weeks—and the trial would end, but how? If the verdict was guilty, North's friends would still continue their fight for his life. He must sustain himself beyond what he felt to be the utmost limit of his powers; and always, day after day, there would be that face with its sunken eyes and bloodless lips, to summon him into its presence.

He found himself at his own door, and paused uncertainly. He passed a tremulous hand before his eyes. Was he sure of Gilmore,—was he sure of Evelyn, who must know that North was innocent? The thought of her roused in him all his bitter sense of hurt and injury. North had trampled on his confidence and friendship! The lines of his face grew hard. This was to be his revenge,—his by every right, and his fears should rob him of no part of it!

He pushed open the door and entered the unlighted hail, then with a grumbled oath because of the darkness, passed on into the sitting-room. Except for such light as a bed of soft coal in the grate gave out, the room was clothed in uncertainty. He stumbled against a chair and swore again savagely. He was answered by a soft laugh, and then he saw Evelyn seated in the big arm-chair at one side of the fireplace.

"Did you hurt yourself, Marsh?" she asked.

Langham growled an unintelligible reply and dropped heavily into a chair. He brought with him the fumes of whisky and stale tobacco, and as these reached her across the intervening space Evelyn made a little grimace in the half light.

"I declare, Marsh, you are hardly fit to enter a respectable house!" she said.

In spite of his doubt of her, they were not on the worst of terms, there were still times when he resumed his old role of the lover, when he held her drifting fancy in something of the potent spell he had once been able to weave about her. Whatever their life together, it was far from commonplace, with its poverty and extravagance, its quarrelings and its reconciliations, while back of it all, deep-rooted in the very dregs of existence, was his passionate love. Even his brutal indifference was but one of the many phases of his love; it was a manifestation of his revolt against his sense of dependence, a dependence which made it possible for him to love where his faith was destroyed and his trust gone absolutely. Evelyn was vaguely conscious of this and she was not sure but that she required just such a life as theirs had become, but that she would have been infinitely bored with a man far more worth while than Marshall Langham. From his seat by the fire Langham scowled across at her, but the scowl was lost in the darkness.