Part 58 (1/2)

”Am I too late--is it over--have they convicted him?” he asked.

”Yes, it's over,” nodded the judge, studying Morgan's face narrowly.

”Merciful heavens!” said Morgan, springing to his feet, looking around for his coat and hat. ”We must stop this thing before it's too late, Judge--I tell you we must stop it! Isn't there some way--have they convicted Joe?”

”Sit down, Morgan, and calm yourself. Hold your feet out to the blaze and dry them,” the judge admonished, kindly.

”What's happened?” asked Morgan, wildly, not heeding the command.

”You shall hear it all in time,” promised the judge. ”Sit down here and tell me what you've been doing all these weeks. Where have you been?”

”Judge, I've been over in Saint Joe selling books,” said Morgan, ”and I'll tell you the truth, Judge, I never intended to come back here.” He turned and faced the judge, leaning forward earnestly, his face white.

He lowered his voice to a hoa.r.s.e whisper. ”But I had to come back--I was sent back by--by a voice!”

”Just so,” nodded Judge Maxwell.

”You may think it's a pipe-dream, Judge, but it ain't. It's the solemn truth, if I ever told it in my life. I intended to let Joe Newbolt go on and carry what he'd picked up, and then when he was out of the way in the pen, or worse, maybe, I intended to hunt Ollie up and marry her. I didn't want that business that Joe Newbolt's been keeping back let out on her, don't you see, Judge? It concerns her and me, Judge; it ain't the kind of a story a man's folks would want told around about his wife, you understand?”

The judge nodded.

”All right,” said Morgan, wiping his forehead, which was beaded with sweat, ”Last night along about ten o'clock I was in my room reading the account in the paper of how Joe had refused on the stand yesterday to tell anything, and how a young woman had stood up in the court-room and backed him up and encouraged him in his stand. I was reading along comfortable and all right, when I seemed to hear somebody call me by my name.

”I tell you I seemed to hear it, for there wasn't a soul in that room but myself, Judge. But that voice seemed to sound as close to my ear as if it come out of a telephone. And it was a woman's voice, too, believe me or not, Judge!”

”Yes?” said the judge, encouragingly, still studying Morgan's face, curiously.

”Yes, sir. She repeated my name, 'Curtis Morgan,' just that way. And then that voice seemed to say to me, 'Come to Shelbyville; start now, start now!'

”Say, I got out of my chair, all in a cold sweat, for I thought it was a call, and I was slated to pa.s.s in my checks right there. I looked under everything, back of everything in that room, and opened the door and took a dive down the hall, thinkin' maybe some swift guy was tryin' to put one over. n.o.body there. As empty, Judge, I tell you, as the pa'm of my hand! But it's no stall about that voice. I heard it, as plain as I ever heard my mother call me, or the teacher speak to me in school.

”I stood there holding onto the back of my chair, my legs as weak under me as if I'd stayed in swimmin' too long. I didn't think anything about going to Shelbyville, or anywhere else, but h.e.l.l, I guess, for a minute or two. I tell you, Judge, I thought it was a call!”

Morgan was sweating again in the recollection of that terrible experience. He wiped his face, and looked around the room, listened as the rain splashed against the window, and the wind bent the branches of the great trees beside the wall.

”Well?” said Judge Maxwell, leaning forward in his turn, waiting for Morgan's next word.

”I tell you, Judge, I kept hearing that thing in my ear that way, every little while, till I threw some things in my grip and started for the depot. There wasn't any train out last night that'd fetch me within fifty miles of here. I went back to my room and went to bed. But it didn't let up on me. Off and on, all night, just about the time I'd doze off a little, I'd seem to hear that voice. I went to the depot this morning, and caught the eight o'clock train out. I'd 'a' made it in here at two this afternoon if it hadn't been for a washout between here and the junction that put the trains on this branch out of service.

”I took a rig and I started to drive over. I got caught in the rain and lost the road. I've been miles out of my way, and used up three horses, but I was bound to come. And I'm here to take my medicine.”

”I see,” said the judge. ”Well, Morgan, I think it was the voice of conscience that you heard, but you're no more to blame than any of us, I suppose, because you failed to recognize it. Few of us pay enough attention to it to let it bother us that way.”

”Believe me or not, it wasn't any pipe-dream!” said Morgan, so earnestly that the flippancy of his slangy speech did not seem out of place. ”It was a woman's voice, but it wasn't the voice of any woman in this world!”

”It's a strange experience,” said the judge.

”You can call it that!” shuddered Morgan, expressive of the inadequacy of the words. ”Anyhow, I don't want to hear it again, and I'm here to take my medicine, and go to the pen if I've got to, Judge.”

Judge Maxwell put out his hand, impatiently.