Part 68 (1/2)

Cronk made no response; only stooped over and gathered a few slender whittlings, and stacked them up among the others. There was an intense, biting silence, until the governor spoke again.

”Nineteen years ago, when I lived in Syracuse, there came to me an opportunity to convict a man of theft. Then I was young and happy; I knew nothing of deep misery, or of--deep love.” The hesitation on his last words brought a shake from the squatter's shoulders. ”This man, as I have said, was a thief, admitted his crime to me; but, at the time of his conviction, he pleaded with me that he might go home for a little while to see his wife, who was ill. But of course I had no authority to do that.”

A dark shade flashed over Cronk's face, followed by one of awful suffering.

”Yep, ye had,” he repeated parrot-like; ”ye might have let him go.”

”But I couldn't,” proceeded the governor, ”and the man was taken away to prison without one glance at the woman who was praying to see him. For she loved him more--than he did her.”

”That's a lie!” burst from Cronk's dry puckered lips.

”I repeat, she loved him well,” insisted Vandecar; ”for every breath she took was one of love for him.”

In the hush that followed his broken sentence, Lon moved one big foot outward, then drew it back.

”Afterward--I mean a few hours after the man was taken away--I began to think of him and his agony--over the woman, and I went out to find her.

She was in a little hut down by the ca.n.a.l,--an ill-furnished, one-room shanty,--but the woman was so sweet, so little, yet so ill, that I thought only of her.”

A dripping sweat broke from every pore in Lon's body, and drops of water rolled down his dark face. He groped about for another stick of wood, as if blind.

”She was too young, too small, Lon Cronk, for the cross she had to bear.”

Lon threw up his head.

”Jesus! what a blisterin' memory!” he said.

His throat almost smothered the words. Ann began to sob; but Katherine stood like a stone image, staring at the squatter.

The governor's low voice went on again:

”She was sicker than any woman I'd ever seen before, and when I was there her little baby was born. I held her hands until she died. I remember every message she sent you, Cronk. She told me to tell you how much she loved you, and how the thought of your goodness to her and your love would go down with her to the grave. If I could have saved her for you, I should have done so; but she had to go. Then I wrote and asked you if I should care for her body.”

An evil look overspread the squatter's face. The misty tears cleared, and he began to sc.r.a.pe again at the wood. He flashed a murderous look upward.

”Ye could have left her dead in the hut, as long as yer killed her!”

said he.

Not heeding the interruption, Vandecar went on:

”But you sent me no word, and, because I was sorry, and because--”

The knife slipped from Lon's stiffened fingers, and a long groan fell from his lips.

”I didn't get no word from ye!” he burst out. ”I didn't know nothin'

till they told me she were dead.” The man's head dropped down on his chest.

Relentlessly Vandecar spoke again:

”Because I could not give you to her when she wanted you, and because she had suffered so, I took her body and placed it in our family plot. I went to the prison to tell you this, so that you could go to her grave whenever you wished; but you had escaped the night before I arrived there, and I never a.s.sociated you with my great loss.”