He would have made some sort of rude approach once more. But now even the tardy chivalry of these men of Spring Valley came back to them. Two or three stepped in between him and Aurora Lane. "Here, you," said the voice of one, "that'll do! Quit it now."

Aurora Lane did not have time to thank her rescuers. The painful situation was relieved suddenly. Just as they were turning at the corner of the public square there hurried up a man, an oldish man, untidy even in his Sunday garb, half running toward the group which now he saw approaching.

"h.e.l.lo, Pa," exclaimed the half-wit, and laughed long and loud. "I didn't come home," said he. "I'm--I'm out!"

The sad face of Ephraim Adamson was seen by all, as he pushed in among them and took his son by the arm. They walked away briskly now together, Johnnie looking back over his shoulder.

But now, to the surprise of all--to her own surprise as well, so sudden was her resolve--Aurora Lane hurried after these two.

"Mr. Adamson," said she, "wait, don't whip him--I'm not angry--I understand."

Adamson halted for just a moment. "He's been away all day," said he, his face showing no resentment of her presence. "I didn't know they let him out last night--he didn't come home. I began looking for him as soon as I knew he was out--I thought he might be hiding in the fields--he does sometimes. He always runs away whenever he gets a chance. I'm sorry if he's done wrong--has he been bad to you?"

"I understand everything," said Aurora Lane. Many heard her say that.

"Don't mind. Tomorrow, will you both be in town?--I might talk to you."

"No, Ma'am," said Adamson briefly. "He can't come any more. I may be here. What do you want of me--after what I've said--after what I've done to you? And here you come and bring him back to me."

His own face showed whitish blue in the flicker of the great arc light.

"Ma'am," he went on again, "there's a lot about you--you're some woman after all. Where have you been--at church?"

"Yes," said Aurora Lane, "I was at church."

"I ain't been there in years," said Eph Adamson sadly.

"Neither have I," rejoined Aurora Lane, "twenty years, I think--perhaps more."

He gazed at her now out of his old, bleared, sad eyes. "I wouldn't of been here now but for what's happened," said he. "Already I was sad--and I was drunk before I was. And I was--well, I felt like I was a rebel, that was all, yesterday. That boy of yours looked so fine, I couldn't stand it. Look at mine! I done wrong, Ma'am. I said what I had no right to say. I'm sorry, clean through--with all my heart I'm sorry for what I done yesterday."

She made no answer to him, and he went on. "It seems like some folks was sort of born under a cloud, don't it? I'm one of them, I reckon. All this has been my fault. I'm sorry as I can be. Can't you forgive me, Miss Lane, can't you forgive me any?"

"You didn't hear the anthem," said Aurora Lane, "because you were not in church. It said 'Whosoever.' It said 'All ye.'"

"In some ways," said Eph Adamson slowly--they had been for some time quite apart from the others, walking on slowly--"it seems like you and me was living our lives pretty much alike, don't it, Miss Lane? It's funny, ain't it--we hadn't either of us been to church--not in twenty years!"

None the less, as of old, these others pa.s.sed by upon the other side, and left unattended those whose wounds were grievous.

At the corner of her street Aurora Lane paused. "Good-by, Mr. Adamson,"

said she. "Good night. I don't want to be unjust to anyone. I'm going to try not to blame you--I'd like to forgive all the world if I could. I'm in great trouble now."

He broke out in a sullen rage. "Forgive? Do that if you can," said he.

"I can't. Maybe a woman can--but forgiving ain't in my line. Well, I'd give anything I could in the world if I hadn't said what I did yesterday right there on the public square. All this has come out of that--this whole trouble. You're different from what I thought. You're a good woman. I take off my hat to you."

"I take off my hat to you," mowed the idiot also, imitating what he saw and heard.... "May I see you home--may I see you home tonight? I'm--I'm out--I was out all last night. They can't pitch on us. Whip any man in Jackson County. Good night--good night, Ma'am. I'm sorry--I'm sorry, too."

CHAPTER XVIII

AT THE COUNTY JAIL

Neither Judge Henderson nor his ward attended church services this Sunday evening, the former because of a certain physical reaction which disposed him to slumber, the latter because she had other plans of her own. The great white house, with its wide flanking grounds, where Judge Henderson had so long lived in somewhat solitary state, was now lighted up from top to bottom; but presently a light in an upper window vanished.

Anne Oglesby tiptoed down the stair side by side with the housekeeper.

She cast a glance of inquiry into the front parlor, where, p.r.o.ne upon a large couch, was Judge Henderson--rendering audible tribute to Morpheus.

"He's violating the town ordinance about the m.u.f.fler cut-out," said Anne smilingly to the housekeeper. "Oh, don't wake him--I'll be back presently--tell him."

She hurried through the yard and down the street toward the central part of the town. The streets about the square now were well-nigh deserted, since most folk were in the churches. Her own destination was a square or two beyond the courthouse, where stood another brick building of public interest; in short, the county jail.

It was the duty of the sheriff to care for the tenants of his jail, and he made his own home in a part of the brick building which served in that capacity--a small building with iron grates on the lower windows, arranged at about the height of a man's eyes as he would stand within on the cement floor of a cell, so that he might look out just above the greensward, his face visible to any who pa.s.sed by. Many a boy had thus gazed with horror on the unshaven face of some ruffian who begged him for tobacco, or some tramp who had trifled too long with the patience of the community, usually so generous with its alms. Many a school child could show you the very place where the woman who killed her children was confined before they took her away--could point out the very window where she stood looking and weeping and wringing her hands--"Just like this"--as any child would tell you.

And some day perhaps children would point out this very window where now stood looking out, motionless--"Not saying a word to n.o.body"--the "man who killed the city marshal." Don Lane was standing at his grated window and looking out when Anne Oglesby crossed the gra.s.s plot and came up the brick sidewalk, fenced in by chains supported on little iron posts, which led to the jail's iron-bound door.

His heart gave a great leap. He saw her. She was coming to him--the one faithful, his beloved! Not even Miss Julia--not even his mother--had come, but here was Anne!

But at the next instant he stepped back from the window, hoping that she would not gain admission. Shame, deep and unspeakable, additional shame, twofold shame, compa.s.sed him as soon as he reflected. The bitterest of all was the fact that he must yield her up forever. He must tell her why. And now she had come--to see him in a cell! It was here that he must break his heart, and hers.

Sheriff Cowles opened the door when Anne Oglesby rang the bell. He stood for a moment looking out into the twilight.

"Who is it?" he asked. Then he recognized the girl whom he had brought down town from the railway station in his car that morning. Anne Oglesby was not a person easily to be forgotten.

"You know who I am, Mr. Cowles," said she--"I am Miss Oglesby, Judge Henderson's ward. I'm--I am respectable."

"Yes," said Cowles, "I know that, but why are you here?"

"Because I'd not be respectable if I were not here," she said quietly.

"You probably know."

"Does the Judge know you have come?"

"No, he wouldn't have let me come if he had known. I want to see him--that young man, you know." Her own color was high by this time.

The sheriff hesitated. "Well," said he, "I don't want to do anything that isn't right, anything that isn't fair. I reckon I know how you feel."

"We're engaged to be married," said Anne Oglesby simply, and looked him directly in the face. "That gives me some rights, doesn't it?"

"In one way, maybe, but no legal rights," replied the sheriff, who was much perplexed, but who could not escape the compelling fact of Anne Oglesby's presence, the compelling charm of Anne Oglesby herself. "He's not really committed as yet, of course, only bound over by the coroner's jury; but the grand jury meets tomorrow, and they'll indict him sure.

You know that. I can't take any chances of his getting away. I have to be sure."

"Your wife may come with me," said Anne Oglesby. "It's my right to talk to him a little while, don't you think? I'm not going to try to get him out. He hasn't had anyone to help him--he hasn't had any legal counsel."

"Who'd he send for, anyway?" asked the sheriff. "He's a sort of a waif, isn't he--her boy? I suppose you've heard about him fighting here around town yesterday?"

"I don't know why he fought, but I know that if he did he had cause. I hope he fought well."