Part 30 (2/2)
”There goes Johnnie's private car, switching on the tail of her,” said Dolan, standing in the doorway.
Hendricks sent Dolan to a back room of the bank, and at seven-twenty went to the telephone. ”Give me 876, central,” he called.
”h.e.l.lo--h.e.l.lo--h.e.l.lo,” he cried nervously, ”h.e.l.lo--who is this?”
The answer came and he said, ”Oh, I didn't recognize your voice.” Then he asked in a low tone, as one who had fear in his heart: ”Do you recognize me? If you do, don't speak my name. Where is Adrian?” Then Mr. Dolan, listening in the next room, heard this: ”You say Judge Bemis phoned to him? Oh, he was to meet him at eight o'clock. How long ago did he leave?” After a moment Hendricks' answer was: ”Then he has just gone; and will not be back?” Hendricks cut impatiently into whatever answer came with: ”Molly, I must see you within the next fifteen minutes. I can't talk any more over the telephone, but I must come up.” ”Yes,” in a moment, ”I must have your decision in a matter of great importance to you--to you, Molly.” There was a short silence, then Dolan heard: ”All right, I'll be there in ten minutes.”
Then Hendricks turned from the telephone and called Dolan in. He unlocked a drawer in his desk, and began speaking to Dolan, who stood over him. Hendricks' voice was low, and he was repressing the agitation in his heart by main strength.
”Jake,” he said, talking as rapidly as he could, ”I must be unG.o.dly frank with you. It doesn't make any difference whether he is right or not, but Adrian Brownwell may be fooled into thinking he has reason to be jealous of me.” Hendricks was biting his mustache. ”He's a raging maniac of jealousy, Jake, but I'm not afraid of him--not for myself.
I can get him before he gets me, if it comes to that, but to do it I'll have to sacrifice Molly. And I won't do that. If it comes to her good name or my life--she can have my life.” They were outside now and Dolan was unhitching the horse. He knew instinctively that he was not to reply. In a moment Hendricks went on, ”Well, there is just one chance in a hundred that it may turn that way--her good name or my life--and on that chance I've written some letters here.” He reached in his coat and said, ”Now, Jake, put these letters in your pocket and if anything goes wrong with me, deliver them to the persons whose names are on the envelopes--and to no one else. I must trust everything to you, Jake,” he said.
Driving up the hill, he met Bemis coming down town. He pa.s.sed people going to the meeting in Barclay Hall. He did not greet them, but drove on. His jaw was set hard, and the muscles of his face were firm. As he neared the Culpepper home he climbed from the buggy and hitched the horse to the block in front of his own house. He hurried into the Culpepper yard, past the lilac bushes heavy with blooms, and up the broad stone steps with the white pillars looming above him. It was a quarter to eight, and at that minute Bemis was saying to Adrian Brownwell, ”All right, if you don't believe it, don't take my word for it, but go home right now and see what you find.”
Molly Brownwell met Hendricks on the threshold with trembling steps.
”Bob, what is it?” she asked. They stood in the shadow of the great white pillars, where they had parted a generation ago.
”It's this, Molly,” answered Hendricks, as he put his hand to his forehead that was throbbing with pain; ”Lige Bemis has my letter to you. Yes,” he cried as she gasped, ”the note--the very note, and to get it I must quit the waterworks fight and go to the meeting to-night and surrender. I had no right to decide that alone. It is our question, Molly. We are bound by the old life--and we must take this last stand together.”
The woman shrank from Hendricks with horror on her face, as he personified her danger. She could not reply at once, but stood staring at him in the dusk. As she stared, the feeling that she had seen it all before in a dream came over her, and the premonition that some awful thing was impending shook her to the marrow.
”Molly, we have no time to spare,” he urged. ”I must answer Bemis in ten minutes--I can do it by phone. But say what you think.”
”Why--why--why--Bob--let me think,” she whispered, as one trying to speak in a dream, and that also seemed familiar to her. ”It's typhoid for my poor who died like sheep last year,” she cried, ”or my good name and yours, is it, Bob? Is it, Bob?” she repeated.
He put his hand to his forehead again in the old way she remembered so well--to temples that were covered with thin gray hair--and answered, ”Yes, Molly, that's our price.”
Those were the last words that she seemed to have heard before; after that the dialogue was all new to her. She was silent a few agonized seconds and then said, ”I know what you think, Bob; you are for my poor; you are brave.” He did not answer, fearing to turn the balance.
As she sank into a porch chair a rustling breeze moved the lilac plumes and brought their perfume to her. From down the avenue came the whir of wheels and the hurrying click of a horse's hoofs. At length she rose, and said tremulously: ”I stand with you, Bob. May G.o.d make the blow as light as He can.”
They did not notice that a buggy had drawn up on the asphalt in front of the house. Hendricks put out his hand and cried, ”Oh, Molly--Molly--Molly--” and she took it in both of hers and pressed it to her lips, and as Adrian Brownwell pa.s.sed the lilac thicket in the gathering darkness that is what he saw. Hendricks was halfway down the veranda steps before he was aware that Brownwell was running up the walk at them, pistol in hand, like one mad. Before the man could fire, Hendricks was upon him, and had Brownwell's two hands gripped tightly in one of his, holding them high in the air. The little man struggled.
”Don't scream--for G.o.d's sake, don't scream,” cried Hendricks to the woman in a suppressed voice. Then he commanded her harshly, ”Go in the house--quick--Molly--quick.”
She ran as though hypnotized by the force of the suggestion. Hendricks had his free hand over Brownwell's mouth and around his neck. The little old man was kicking and wriggling, but Hendricks held him. ”Not here, you fool, not here. Can't you see it would ruin her, you fool?
Not here.” He carried and dragged Brownwell across the gra.s.s through the shrubbery and into the Hendricks yard. No one was pa.s.sing, and the night had fallen. ”Now,” said Hendricks, as he backed against a pine tree, still holding Brownwell, ”I shall let you go if you'll promise to listen to me just a minute until I tell you the whole truth. Molly is innocent, man--absolutely innocent, and I'll show you if you'll talk for a moment. Will you promise, man?”
Brownwell nodded his a.s.sent; Hendricks looked at him steadily for a second and then said, ”All right,” and set the little man on his feet.
The glare of madness came into Brownwell's eyes, and as he turned he came at Hendricks with his pistol drawn. An instant later there was a shot. Brownwell saw the amazement flash into Hendricks' eyes, and then Hendricks sank gently to the foot of the pine tree.
And Molly Brownwell, with the paralysis of terror still upon her, heard the shot and then heard footsteps running across the gra.s.s. A moment later her husband, empty-handed, chattering, s.h.i.+vering, and white, stumbled into the room. Rage had been conquered by fear. For an agonized second the man and woman stared at one another, speechless--then the wife cried:--
”Oh--oh--why--why--Adrian,” and her voice was thick with fear.--
The man was a-tremble--hands, limbs, body--and his mad eyes seemed to shrink from the woman's gaze. ”Oh, G.o.d--G.o.d--oh, G.o.d--” he panted, and fell upon his face across the sofa. They heard a hurrying step running toward the Hendricks house, there came a frightened, choked cry of ”Help!” repeated twice, another and another sound of pattering feet came, and five minutes after the quaking man had entered the door the whole neighbourhood seemed to be alive with running figures hurrying silently through the gloom. The thud of feet and the pounding of her heart, and the whimpering of the little man who lay, face down, on the sofa, were the only sounds in her ears. She started to go with the crowd. But Adrian screamed to her to stay.
”Oh,” he cried, ”he sank so softly--he sank so softly--he sank so softly! Oh, G.o.d, oh, G.o.d--he sank so softly!”
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