LITMIR.BIZ

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still being here never occurred to me, of course. I stole across to the fireplace, picked up the fender bar and pried that cupboard there in the wall open. And then the lights went on in a flash and Doctor Merton jumped at me. He had been lying down on the couch over there and had fallen asleep, I suppose. I don't know what he said. He spoke several times and I answered him. He was surprised and horror-stricken, I think—and I was beside myself. I tried then to get away and he tried to stop me and we struggled. The fender bar was still in my hand. I struck him with it across the head and he fell. Then I snatched up the cash-box, crept out of the room, went down the hall and ​cut the telephone wires on my way out—I wanted as long a start as I could get before the alarm was given, and I knew that sooner or later some one of the family, wondering why the Doctor hadn't gone up to bed, would come down to investigate and that the first thing they would do would be to telephone the town and notify the police. I went into the kitchen, snatched up my overcoat and hat from the peg, got out the back door, ran with all my might through the garden and then for the woods on the hill." Varge's voice, without perceptible change, had been gradually rising louder. The door of the parlour across the hall opposite the library had opened and closed softly, and the sound of a step, scarcely audible, muffled by the heavy carpet in the hall, had come to him. He glanced at the other two. Lee was intent on the story; Marston was tapping fretfully with his fingers on the window pane. Neither of them had noticed the sound. Varge had not paused; there had been no break in his words—but his voice in subtle warning was carrying easily to the hall without. "It all came over me then—what I'd done. There's no use telling you what I went through, the remorse and horror of it all. I didn't know how long it was then, but it must have been an hour, judging by the time I reached the town, that I fought it out with myself there in the woods. And then, well then, you know the rest; I walked—"

      The words seemed to die in Varge's throat, and slowly a grey pallor crept into his face. The door had opened enough for Varge to see who was on the other side, not far enough for either Lee or Marston to do so.

      Marston, at the click of the doorhandle, had swung ​quickly around from the window; and now both his and Lee's eyes were fixed sharply, critically on Varge—the next instant, like Varge's, they were strained on the doorway.

       It was Mrs. Merton.

      She stood there, a frail, pathetic figure in black, the sweet, patient face worn and haggard with grief—and, swaying a little, caught at the door jamb for support. Then steadying herself with an effort, she stepped into the room and shut the door.

      "Good God!" Marston muttered in dismay under his breath, and mopped helplessly at his forehead with his hand.

      She moved slowly toward Varge. Lee stepped forward as though to interpose, but she waved him away.

      "I was in the other room with him," she said dully, "and I saw you drive up. It seemed almost an answer to prayer. I have asked on my knees through the night that it might not be so, that this at least might be some horrible mistake—and I have not believed it and I will never believe it unless I hear it from your own lips"—she had stopped before Varge, and was talking to Varge, to Varge alone, with a strange concentration that seemed to make her oblivious of all else, of the others, of her surroundings even—"why, you are just like another son, Varge, and, of course, I couldn't believe it any more than I could believe it of Harold. Why, I've brought you up and taken care of you and loved you ever since you were a little boy. Don't you remember, Varge, I taught you your letters? Of course, it isn't true. It's like an answer to prayer and ​you've come to tell me so yourself, haven't you? Tell me, Varge, that it isn't true."

      A silence as of death fell upon the room. His hands tight-clasped at his sides, the skin over the knuckles as white as the marble in his face, Varge neither moved nor spoke. The veins in his temple swelled, and, throbbing, seemed to stand out like great blue welts raised from the blows of a whip-lash.

      For a moment she stared at him, standing as one numbed, robbed of all power of movement; then heavily, as though drawn back by some invisible power, she retreated from him—and her hands clasping her face, elongating it as she pressed against her cheeks, seemed to accentuate the dawning horror that was creeping into it.

      "Varge! Varge, is it true?" she cried wildly.

      Varge's hands brushed back the clustered brown hair from the forehead, damp now with beads of agony.

      "It is true," he said hoarsely.

      She was swaying now again and seemed about to fall.

      Lee reached out his hand to her and took her arm.

      "Come, Mrs. Merton," he pleaded gently. "Come; let me take you from here."

      "Wait!"—her face was colourless; her voice scarce above a whisper. "

       You

      have done this! It is true; oh, God, it is true! I did not know that such a being as you could live—that God created such monsters. Go! Go, from this house! How dared you come here—how dared they bring you here!" Her voice had risen—and distraught, almost insane with grief and outraged love, the bitter words, so foreign to the gentle, kindly lips, fell with cruel, blighting force on Varge.

      ​

      "IT IS TRUE," HE SAID HOARSELY.

      ​

      ​

      "You stand there,

       there

      , where it was done—it is too horrible! Are you here to mock me—the woman who has been your mother in everything but birth? Go, do you hear, go!—and carry with you to the hour of your death my curse upon the day that I took you into my life!

       Do not look at me like that!

      You are asking for mercy. What mercy did you give? I have no mercy. I—I think my soul—is dead—and—"

      Lee and Marston sprang together and caught her in their arms as she fell—Mrs. Merton had fainted.

      They carried her from the room, and, as they passed out of the door, Varge turned and buried his face in his hands on the mantelpiece. A man's step, descending the stairway, came to him, and Anna's steps running along the hall as well; then Lee's voice:

      "The matter can wait, Mr. Merton. Another time will do. Your mother needs your attention now."

      Presently some one touched his arm. Varge raised his head. It was Marston.

      There was a new ring, gruff and hard, in the sheriff's voice as he spoke.

      "We'll go back now," he said tersely.

      "Yes," said Varge, and followed the other quietly from the room. But that night in the darkness of his cell, alone, where none might see, he turned upon his face on the prison cot, his great shoulders shook—and he sobbed as a little soul-torn child sobs out its heart.

      ​

      CHAPTER VI COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENCE

       Table of Contents

      FOUR days had passed.

      The scene with Mrs. Merton, though a contretemps to the intention in visiting the house, had, to the district attorney's mind, at least, accomplished the object sought in a more positive manner than he had perhaps hoped for. Varge was guilty.

      To Marston it seemed less positive, and he still wavered.

      Berley Falls, ignorant of what had transpired, held doggedly to its first impressions and watched the formal, routine progress of the law—the finding of the coroner's inquest against Varge; the finding, the next morning, by the

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