CHAPTER XIV — THE CANKER
Cable saw Bansemer leave the house as he drove up to the curb in front. The lawyer did not look back, but turned the nearest corner as if eager to disappear from sight as quickly as possible.
Closing the door of his smoking-room behind him, David Cable dropped wearily into a chair without removing his hat or coat. His blood was running cold through his veins, his jaw was set and his eyes had the appearance of one who has been dazed by a blow. For many minutes he sat and stared at the andirons in the ember-lit grate. From time to time he swallowed painfully and his jaw twitched. Things began growing black and green before his eyes; he started up with an oath.
He was consumed by the fires of jealousy and suspicion. The doubt that had found lodging in his mind so recently now became a cruel certainty. Into his grim heart sprang the rage of the man who finds himself deceived, despised, dishonoured. He was seeing with his own eyes, no doubt, just what others had seen for months—had seen and had pitied or scorned him as the unfortunate dupe. With the thought of it he actually ground his teeth; tears of rage and mortification sprang to his eyes. He recalled his own feelings in instances where shame had fallen upon other men; he recalled his own easy indifference and the temptation to laugh at the plight of the poor devils. It had never entered his mind that some day he might be the object of like consideration in others more or less fortunate, according to THEIR friends.
By the time dinner was announced he had succeeded in restoring himself to a state of comparative calmness. He did not dress for dinner, as was his custom, nor did he stop to ask Frances Cable if she were ready to go down. He heard Jane playing the piano as he descended. She nodded to him, but did not stop and he paused near the fireplace to look at her strangely. Somewhere back in his brain there was struggling, unknown to him, the old-time thought that this child bore him no likeness whatsoever. He only knew he was crushing down the fear that evil or slander or pain might come to her, if he were rash yet just. He was wondering if he could face his wife without betraying himself.
Jane played softly, lifelessly. She, on the other hand, was wondering what Graydon would think or say, if she spoke to him of what she had seen. She wondered if he would blame her mother as she was beginning to blame his father.
"Mother won't be down to dinner," she finally said.
"Is she ill?" he asked after a moment.
"She is lying down. Margaret will take some tea up to her."
Father and daughter had but little to say to each other during the meal. Their efforts at conversation were perfunctory, commonplace, an unusual state of affairs of which neither took notice.
"You look tired, father. Has it been a hard day?"
"A rather trying one, Jane. We're having some trouble with the blizzards out West. Tying up everything that we are rushing to the Philippines."
"Is it settled that you are to be made president?"
"It looks like it." There followed a long silence. "By the way, I have good news for you. Mr. Clegg told me to-day that they are going to take Graydon into the firm. Isn't it great? Really, it is quite remarkable. You are not the only person, it seems, who thinks a lot of that boy."
"A partner? Really? Oh, isn't it glorious? I knew he could—I told him he'd be a partner before long." She waited a moment and then added: "His father was here to-day for a cup of tea." Cable caught the slightly altered tone and looked up. She was trifling with her fork, palpably preoccupied.
"I'm—I'm sorry I missed him," said he, watching her closely.
"You like him very much, don't you, father?"
"Certainly—and I'm sure your mother does." The fork shook in her fingers and then dropped upon the plate. She looked up in confusion. Cable's eyes were bent upon her intently and she had never seen so queer a light in them. Scarcely more than the fraction of a second passed before he lowered his gaze, but the mysterious telegraphy of the mind had shot the message of comprehension from one to the other. He saw with horror that the girl at least suspected the true situation. A moment later he arose abruptly and announced that he would run up to see her mother before settling down to some important work in his den.
"Graydon is coming over to-night," she said. "We'll be very quiet and try not to disturb you. Don't work too hard, daddy dear."
Upstairs Frances Cable was battling with herself in supreme despair. Confession was on her lips a dozen times, but courage failed her. When she heard his footsteps in the hallway she was ready to cry out the truth to him and end the suspense. As he opened the door to enter, the spirit of fairness turned frail and fled before the appeal of procrastination. Wait! Wait! Wait! cried the powerful weakness in her heart, and it conquered. She could not tell him then. To-morrow—the next day, yes, but not then. It was too much to demand of herself, after all.
He came in, but left a few minutes later. She was strangely unresponsive to his tender inquiries. Her thoughts were of another, was his quick conclusion as he fled from her presence before the harsh accusations could break from his eyes.
In his den once more, with the door closed, he gave himself up completely to black thoughts. He recalled his words to her, uttered years ago, half in jest and half in earnest; he had horrified her beyond expression by telling her how he would punish a wife if he were the husband she deceived. With a grim, lurid smile he remembered the penalty. He had said he would not kill; he would disfigure the woman frightfully and permit her to live as a moral example to other wives. Slitting her mouth from ear to ear or cutting off her nose—these were two of the penalties he would inflict. He now felt less brutal. He might kill, but he would not disfigure. For an hour he sat and wondered what had been the feelings of his old friend George Driscoll just before he deliberately slew his faithless wife. He remembered saying to other friends at the time that Driscoll had "done right."
This night of black shadows—he did not sleep at all—was really the beginning of the end. He forgot the presidency that was to be handed out to him; he forgot everything but the horrid canker that gnawed into his heart and brain.
Day and night he writhed in silent agony, a prey to the savage jealousy that grew and grew until it absorbed all other emotions. Scandal, divorce, dishonour, murder swept before the mind of this man who had been of the people and who could not condone. The people kill.
For a week he waited and watched and suffered. What he knew of men told him that they do not devote themselves to the wives of others with honourable motives behind them. He convinced himself that he knew the world; he had seen so much of it. The man aged years in that single week of jealousy and suspense. His face went haggard, his eyes took on a strange gleam, his manner was that of a man in grave trouble.
Day after day this piteous, frenzied man who swayed thousands with his hand stooped to deal with the smallest movements of one man and one woman. Despite his most intense desire to drive himself into other and higher channels, he found himself skulking and spying and conniving with but one low end in view.
He employed every acute sense in the effort to justify his suspicions. Time and again he went home at unusual hours, fearing all the while that he might incur the pain of finding Bansemer there. He even visited the man in his office, always rejoicing in the fact that he found him there at the time. He watched the mail in the morning; he planned to go out of nights and then hurried home deliberately but unexpectedly. Through it all he said no word to Frances Cable or Jane. He asked no questions, but he was being beaten down by apprehensions all the while.
His wife's manner convinced him that all was not well with her. She avoided being alone with him, keeping close to her room; he detected a hundred pretexts by which she managed to escape his simplest advances.
At last, overwrought by the strain, he began to resort to cunning—this man who was big enough to have gone from the engine cab to the president's office. It required hours of struggle with his fairer, nobler nature to bring himself low enough to do trickery, but the natal influence mastered. He despised himself for the trick, but he WOULD KNOW THE TRUTH.
The late afternoon mail one day brought to Mrs. Cable a brief letter, typewritten both inside and out. David Cable saw her open and read the missive and he saw her trembling hand go to her throat and then to her temple. Her back was towards him. He could not see her face until she turned, a full minute later. Then it was calm and undisturbed, but her eyes were brilliant. He ground his teeth and tore upstairs without a word. David Cable had stooped low enough to write this letter and he was paying for it.
He knew the contents far better than she knew them. The letter purported to be an urgent appeal from James Bansemer, asking her to meet him at eight o'clock that night. It said: "I must see you to-night. Leave your home at 8:00 o'clock for a short call on Mrs. W—, just around the corner. I will meet you across the Drive, near the sea wall. It is quite dark there. J."
David Cable did not know that earlier in the afternoon James Bansemer had called her up by 'phone to say that he intended to speak to his son the following day, unless word came to him from her; nor, could he have possibly known that she was now determined to tell the whole story to her husband and to trust to his mercy. He only knew that he had written the letter and that he had told her of his intention to go downtown immediately after dinner.
CHAPTER XV — THE TRAGEDY AT THE SEA WALL
The dark, muffled figure of a man leaned against a section of the old wall that edged the lake—the figure of a man who prayed with all his soul that his vigil might be in vain. If she came, all was over.
He was not armed. He had thrown his revolver away a week before. His only desire now was to learn the extent of her duplicity. If she obeyed the call of the letter then there could be no doubt that she was coming at the call of the lover. His hands twitched and he shivered as if with a dreadful chill. His heart was shouting a warning to her, but his head was urging her to come and have done with it all.
He was there early—long before the hour named in the decoy. His eyes never left the sidewalk that ran past his own home, but a short distance from the Drive. They stared without blinking across that dark border, through the circle of light from the arc lamp and far into the shadows of blackness beyond. It was very dark where he stood. The lake had battered through the sea wall for many rods at this particular point and no one ventured out beyond the bridle path for fear of slipping down into the cavities that had been washed out by the waves. His station was on the edge of the piles of stone and cement that had been tossed up to await the pleasure of the park commissioners.
For a while, he tried to take Jane's future into consideration, but it was impossible to substitute anything before his own wrongs. David Cable was not the kind of man who would go on living with a faithless wife for the sake of appearances. He was not an apologist. Time and circumstance and the power of true love would adjust the affair of Jane and Graydon Bansemer. This was HIS affair. Time could not adjust it for him.
At last he saw a woman's figure hurrying down the street. The wild, eager hope that the light from the electric lamp would prove it to be other than that of his wife was quickly dispelled. His worst fears were true, His Frances—his wife of more than a score of years, his pretty sweetheart through all those days, was false to him! As he fell back against the wall something seemed to snap in his breast; a groan of misery arose to his lips.
With eyes which saw red with rage and anguish, he watched the hesitating approach of the woman. She stopped at the corner and looked up and down the Drive, peering intently into the dark shadows by the lake. The sky was overcast; no stars peeped through its blackness. With uncertain, halting steps she crossed the boulevard, still glancing about as if in search of someone. He moved forward unconsciously, almost blindly, and she caught a glimpse of his tall, dark figure. He was not unlike Bansemer in height and carriage. As she drew near, his legs trembled and tears of despair flooded his eyes.
A savage desire to grasp her by the throat and hurl her into the waters beyond the break came over him with irresistible power. Then came the pitiable collapse which conquered the murderous impulses and left him weak and broken for the moment. With a sob he turned and leaned upon the wall, his back to her, his face buried in his tense arms—crushed, despised, dishonoured! Kill her? The horror of it swept his brain clear for an instant. Kill his pretty Frances? Kill Jane's mother? How could he think of it?
It was a long time before the wretched man knew that she was standing close behind him and was speaking to him. The sound of her voice came through the noise of his pounding heart as if it were far away and gentle. But what was it that she was saying? Her voice was angry, suppressed, condemning.
"You may take it or refuse it, just as you please," were the first words his turbulent senses distinguished. "I can pay no more than that for your silence. The other is impossible. I will not discuss it again with you." She paused as if waiting for him to respond.
"To-night I shall tell my husband everything—the whole story. I cannot endure the suspense any longer. I will not live in fear of you another hour. My only reason for coming out here to-night is to plead with you to spare your son and Jane. I am not asking anything for myself. It would break Jane's heart if Graydon should refuse to marry her. You must have a heart somewhere in that—" But the words became jumbled in the ears of her listener. From time to time his mind grasped such sentences as these, paralysing in their bitterness: "I have the letters of adoption.... David will not believe what you say.... He loves me and he loves Jane.... I am willing to pay all that I have to keep it from Graydon and Jane.... But I intend to tell my husband. I will not deceive him any longer.... He will understand even though he should hate me for it. He will love Jane although she is not his own child."
David Cable seemed frozen to the spot. His brain was clearing; he was grasping the full importance of every sentence that rushed from her impassioned lips. The last appalling words fell like the blow of a club in the hands of a powerful man. He was dazed, stunned, senseless. It seemed to him that his breath had ceased to come and that his whole body had turned to stone. His wide staring eyes saw nothing ahead of him.
"Well, what have you to say?" she was demanding. "Why have you asked me to come out here? You have my final answer. What have you to say? Are you going to tell Graydon that Jane is not our child? I must know."
"Not our child?" came from the palsied lips of David Cable, so low and lifeless that the sound was lost in the swish of the water below. The intermittent red signal in the lighthouse far out in the lake blinked back at him, but to him it was a steady, vivid glare.
"Do you hear me? I have lied to my husband for the last time!" There was almost a tone of victory in the voice, now. "Do you hear me? You don't dare! David will not believe you—he will believe my—"
A terrible oath choked back the hopeful words in the woman's throat. Murder had come back into the man's heart.
"You lie!"
"David!"
"Yes, it's David! Liar! Whose child is she? Tell me?"
"David! David! For God's sake, hear me! There was no wrong, I swear it!"
"She's not my child and there's no wrong!" The sardonic laugh that followed was that of a raging maniac. "You've fooled me, you fiend! You devil!"
At that word and with one look at her husband's terribly distorted features, Frances Cable shrank back with a single terrified cry, turned from him and fled madly for her life. With the spring of the wild beast, Cable rushed after her, cursing her with every breath. In a few yards he had almost reached her, his hands outstretched to grasp her neck. But, at that instant, the frightened woman's strength suddenly gave way; her knees received the fall of the limp body. For a second she seemed huddled in a posture of prayer, then toppled over, slipped easily forward through a fissure in the wall and plunged headforemost into the chugging waters below.
In the lives even of the best of men there are moments when the human instincts are annihilated and supplanted by those of the beast. Likewise, have there been instances in which the bravest have been tried in the furnace and found wanting, while conversely, the supposedly cowards have proved to be heroes. Therefore, since no two situations can occur at a different time and yet have precisely similar conditions, it behooves us to forbear judging, lest we be judged, and to approach the following incident in this man's career as if we ourselves dwelt under a covering of glass.
From the time of his marriage up to this moment no man could have fought better the bitter struggle of life than David Cable; yet, now, in this hour—his hour of travail and temptation, he piteously succumbed. Cowardice, the most despicable of all emotions, held him in her grasp.
He sank exhausted against the wall, his eyes fixed upon the black hole through which his wife had disappeared; then, the stony glare changed suddenly to a look of realisation—horrible, stupefying. He crept to the edge and peered intently into the water, not six feet below, his eyes starting from his head.
Black, sobbing water, darkness impenetrable! The instinctive fear of apprehension caused him to look in every direction for possible eye-witnesses. Every drop of blood in his body seemed turned to ice with horror. Down there in that black, chill water lay the body of his wife, the woman he had loved through all these trying years, and he her murderer!
Terrified, trembling, panting, he tried to force himself into the water with the vague hope of saving her, after all; but even as he looked wildly about for help, a shout ready to spring from his dry throat, the natural dread of the accused facing his accuser took possession of him. Fear, abject fear, held him in grasp; he could not shout.
A man was running across the drive towards him—a long loping figure that covered the ground rapidly. With a last horrified look in the water, David Cable, craven for the moment, turned and fled through the night along the broken sea wall—fled aimlessly, his eyes unseeing, his feet possessed of wings. He knew not whither he ran, only that he was an assassin fleeing from the horrors behind.
Over the narrow strip of ground sped the long, eager figure that had darted from the shadow of the homes across the street. In hoarse, raucous tones he shouted after the fleeing man:
"Stop! Wait! Halt!"
He dashed up to the spot where he had seen two figures but a moment before, the full horror of what had happened striking him for the first time. The man was Elias Droom, and he had been an eye-witness to the dim, indistinct tragedy at the sea wall.
His presence is easily explained. He knew of Bansemer's telephone message to Mrs. Cable, together with his threat to expose her on the following morning. It was only natural that she should make a final plea—-that night, of course. The old clerk realised the danger of an encounter between his employer and his victim at a time so intense as this. He could not know that Bansemer would visit the Cable home that evening, but he suspected that such would be the case. It was his duty to prevent the meeting, if possible.
Bansemer would go too far, argued the old man; he must be stopped. That is why he lurked in the neighbourhood to turn Bansemer back before he could enter the home of David Cable.
He saw Mrs. Cable leave the house and go towards the lake. Following some distance behind he saw her cross the Drive and make her way to the sea wall. Slinking along in the shadow of the buildings, cursing his luck and Bansemer jointly, he saw the two forms come together out there by the lake.
"Too late, curse him for a fool," Droom had muttered to himself. "He ought to know this is bad business just now. She's come out to meet him, too. Worse. It's my duty to look out for him as long as he employs me. I'm doing my best and I can't help it if he betrays himself. I'd like to see him—but I can't go back on him while I'm taking money from him. Look at that!"
He chuckled softly as he saw the two figures approach each other. For all that he knew they might be contemplating a fond and loving embrace, and he was not undeceived until he saw one of the figures separate itself, run from the other and go plunging to the earth. As he started up in surprise, the other figure leaned forward and then straightened itself quickly. Droom did not hesitate. He dashed across the street, conscious that something dreadful had happened. His instant thought was that Bansemer had lost his temper and had struck the woman down.
The flight of the man was proof positive. He called him to stop, certain that it was Bansemer. The runner turned his face towards him for a moment. The light from the street may have deceived Elias Droom's eyes, but the face of the assailant was not that of James Bansemer. Droom stopped short and looked after the man, paralysed with amazement. Then he gave a snorting laugh at his own stupidity; of course, it was Bansemer. Who else could it be?
Arriving at the spot where he had last seen the couple, he was amazed to find no one there. He realised, with horror, that the woman must have been struck down; had fallen or had been thrown into the lake.
The gaunt old clerk groaned bitterly as he threw himself upon the wall and peered over into the water. He listened for the cries and struggles of the woman. Gradually his eyes solved the situation. He saw the row of piles beyond the break in the sea wall and the swishing pool inside. Every incoming wave sent a flood of water between the sturdy posts and into the cut of the wall.
Without a moment's hesitation he dropped into this seething prison, confident that the woman's body could be found there. A single glance had shown him that he could crawl upward through the break to safety and he knew that the water below was not dangerously deep.
A minute later he was scrambling out of this angry, icy water, up through the fissure, bearing in his long arms the inert form of Frances Cable. He had found her half-submerged in the pool, every sweep of the waves through the sieve-like posts covering her completely.
He dropped the body on the ground after reaching the level and took a quick shuddering glance about. Two men had stopped on the opposite of the Drive. He hesitated a second and then shouted to them. They stood stockstill in alarm. Before they could respond to his second shout, Elias Droom was tearing the woman's watch from her belt and the rings from her fingers. His strong, nervous hands found the necklace that she wore and it broke beneath their sudden jerk. Cunningly he tossed the necklace upon the ground and trampled it with his heel. The watch and rings went flying across the wall and far out into the lake.
"This woman has been slugged!" he shouted. He did not know how much of the tragedy these men had witnessed. Boldness was his cue for the moment; stealth could follow later. "She's been in the water. I'm afraid it's murder. The man who did it went that way. Yell for the police!"
If the assailant was James Bansemer, Droom was doing his duty by him. If it was another, he was doing his duty by society.
CHAPTER XVI — HOURS OF TERROR
Droom's intentions were clear. It was not a tender heart nor was it chivalry which prompted him to do the deed of valour just described. He had started out to do his duty by James Bansemer because he was in his hire; and he felt it still his duty to cover the tracks of his master as best he could. He knew that he was jeopardising his own safety; the obstinate cunning of his nature insisted that the man he had watched was Bansemer, although his brief glimpse of the fugitive's face discouraged that belief.
The gaunt clerk kept his chin well covered with his great muffler; the broad collar of his ulster was turned up about his face. The rapid plan that dashed into his mind comprehended but two things: the effort to restore life to Frances Cable and the hope of escaping without being recognised. He felt that she had not been in the water long enough to drown; every hope depended upon the force of the blow that he imagined had been delivered.
Chilled to the bone, his teeth chattering like castanets, the old man was stooping over the inanimate form on the ground when the two men came up. In answer to their startled questions, he merely said that he had seen the struggle from across the street, but had been too late to prevent the tragedy.
"We must get her into one of these houses quick," he grunted. "Take hold of her, you. And YOU over there hurry and ring a doorbell. Get inside and 'phone for a doctor—a doctor first and then the police. We may be able to save her life."
The first of the rich men's homes denied them admission. The man of the house said he would not "stand for the notoriety." Droom, supporting the head of the wet, icy figure, made a remark which the man was never to forget. At the second house they were admitted.
In an instant all was confusion. A card game was broken up and guests of the house assisted their host and hostess in doing all manner of unnecessary things. Droom gave the commands which sooner or later resolved themselves into excited, wrathy demands upon the telephone operator, calls for a certain near-by doctor, calls for the police, calls for stimulants, maids, hot water bottles—everything.
"She's been robbed," said one of the men. "Her rings have been torn off. Look at the blood!"
"She's well-dressed, too," said another. "Say, her face looks familiar—-"
To the amazement of everyone, the lips of the woman parted and a gasping, choking sound issued from between them, a slight shudder swept over her frame.
"She's alive!" exclaimed Droom. "Get these wet clothes off of her—quick!"
The men stood grouped in the hallway while the women tore the wet garments from the reviving victim and prepared a warm bed for her. Elias Droom was edging towards the door, bent on escape, when the awed, chattering voice of the young fellow who had assisted in carrying her to the house arrested him. A great sense of relief crept over him as he listened to the young man's story; his eyes blinked with satisfaction. He was forgetting his own remark of a minute ago that he was freezing and must get into some dry clothes at once. The young man was saying:
"It happened right out there by the sea wall—where the big break is. Harry and I were coming up the Drive and I called attention to a man running south along the wall. Just then, this gentleman ran over from this side of the street and, a minute or two later, we saw him jump into the break over there. Suicide, I thought, but he wasn't a minute coming up. There was the woman! He'd pulled her out! By thunder, it was the bravest thing I ever saw! He—-"
And then it was that everybody began to shower praise upon the man who only had tried to do his duty by the one who hired him to do ugly, not gallant, deeds.
"Did you watch which way the robber ran?" demanded Droom eagerly.
"Lost him in the dark. He ran like fury. You must have scared him off," said the second young man. "I wish we could have seen his face. Did you see it?"
"Not distinctly," answered Droom. "He struck me as being a slim young fellow, that's all." Of one thing he was assured: the evidence of these two men would prove that he had acted as a valiant protector and not as a thug—a fear which had not left his mind until now. They had seen the fleeing assailant, but there was only one person who could identify him. That person was Frances Cable, the victim. If it was not James Bansemer, then who could it have been?
The door opened and an agitated young woman came out.
"It is Mrs. Cable," she cried in trembling tones.
The physician arrived at that moment, and a few minutes later came an officer who had been hailed from the doorway. While the policeman was listening to the voluble young eye-witnesses, Droom stood aloof, puzzling himself vainly in the effort to solve an inside mystery. He had been ready, a few minutes before, to curse himself for pulling the woman out of the water, but now, as the belief grew stronger within him that her assailant was not James Bansemer, his viewpoint changed. If such was the case, there would be no need to fear Mrs. Cable's story if she revived sufficiently to tell it. On the other hand, if it was Bansemer, he had rescued her to an ill purpose. He was conscious finally that someone was speaking to him.
"What do you know of this?" demanded the policeman. Droom repeated his brief story. "What is your name and where do you live?"
"My name is Elias Droom and I live over in Wells Street."
"Could you identify the man?"
"I don't think so."
"What were you doing over in this part of town?"
"Walking up to see the skaters on the park lagoon. But what's that get to do with it? You'd better be out looking for the thief instead of wasting time on me here," snarled Droom. The officer gasped and there is no telling what might have happened, if the captain and a swarm of bluecoats had not appeared on the scene at that moment. Two minutes later they were off scouring the lake front in search of the mysterious hold-up man. Two plain-clothes men remained to question the witnesses and to inspect the neighbourhood in which the crime was committed.
Word came from the inner room that Mrs. Cable was regaining consciousness.
"Does—can she throw any light on the affair?" asked Elias Droom.
"She has uttered no word except her husband's name. I think she is still calling upon him for help, poor thing," said the young woman who bore the news.
"Cable ought to be notified," said one of the men.
"Don't do it over the 'phone," said Droom quickly. "I'm going past his house. I'll stop in and tell him. Let me out, officer; I must get out of these wet garments. I'm an old man, you know."
The probable solution had come to Droom like a flash. As he hurried up the street his mind was full of the theory. He scarcely could wait for the door of David Cable's house to be opened in response to his vigorous ringing. The maid announced that Mr. and Mrs. Cable were out. It was enough for Droom. He put the puzzle together in that instant. David Cable's face was the one he had seen; not James Bansemer's. The maid set up a hysterical shrieking when he bluntly told her of the mishap to her mistress, but he did not wait to answer questions. He was off to find James Bansemer. The volcano he had been watching so long was about to burst, and he knew it.
Forgetting his wet garments, he entered a drug store and telephoned to Bansemer's home. His employer answered the call so readily that Droom knew he had not been far from the instrument that evening. There was a note of disappointment in his voice when Droom's hoarse tones replied to his polite: "Hello!"
"I'll be over in half an hour," said Droom. "Very important business. Is Graydon there?"
"He's just gone to Cable's. Someone telephoned for him a minute or so ago. What's wrong? Do you know?"
"I'll be there in fifteen minutes," was all that Droom would say.
Elias' memory could not carry him back to the time when he had hired a cab. A cab was one of the luxuries he had not cultivated. One can only imagine his surprise, then, when he found himself hailing a passing hansom; and greater the surprise he must have felt when he clambered in and ordered the driver to go in a gallop to a certain place in Wells Street. Ten minutes later he was attired in dry, warm clothes and in the cab again, bound for Bansemer's home. What he said to James Bansemer on that memorable occasion need not be repeated. It is only necessary to say that his host was bitterly impressed and willing to admit that the developments might prove serious. They could only speculate as to what had transpired between David Cable and his wife out there by the sea wall, but it was enough for them to know that a crisis was at hand.
"We'll see what the morning papers say about the affair," said Bansemer, uneasy and cold.
The morning papers were full of the sensational robbery, the prominence of the victim and the viciousness of the attack. Elias Droom read the accounts eagerly as he breakfasted in the dingy little restaurant near his home, bright and early. He grinned appreciably over the share of glory that fell to him; and he actually cackled over the new developments in the great mystery.
He had observed with relief that the name of James Bansemer was not mentioned. The reports from the bedside of the robber's victim were most optimistic. She was delirious from the effects of the shock, but no serious results were expected. The great headlines on the first page of the paper he was reading set his mind temporarily at rest. There was no suggestion of truth in them.
The reader of this narrative, who knows the true facts in the case, is doubtless more interested in the movements and emotions of David Cable than in the surmises of others. It would be difficult, for a certainty, to ask one to put himself in Cable's place and to experience the sensations of that unhappy man as he fled along the dark shore of the lake. Perhaps much will be taken on faith if the writer simply says that the fugitive finally slunk from the weeds and refuse of what was then called "The District of Lake Michigan"—"Streeterville," in local parlance—to find himself panting and terror-struck in the bleak east end of Chicago Avenue. It was not until then that he secured control of his nerves and resorted to the stealth and cunning of the real criminal.
From that time until he stood shivering and white with dogged intention in a theatre foyer, bent upon establishing an alibi, his movements are scarcely worth the details. Between the acts he saw a dozen men whom he knew and he took drinks with several of them. His tremendous will power carried him through the ordeal in a way that could not have fallen to the good fortunes of the ordinary lawbreaker.
Every second of the time his thoughts were of the thing which was being buffeted by the icy waters of the lake. Where was that thing now? How far out into the lake had it been carried?
His body was covered with the cold perspiration of dread and horror. His soul was moaning; his whole being was aghast with the awfulness of the deed; he could have shrieked aloud in his madness. How he lived through the hour in that theatre he never could have told, nor could he believe that he was sitting there with all those frightful thoughts piling themselves upon him. Other people laughed and shouted with happiness; he stared and wept in his heart, and shivered and cringed and groaned within himself.
He had killed her! She had been true to him, and yet, he had taken her life—the life she had given him! He gave no thought to Jane, no thought to Bansemer; he thought only of himself as the slayer.
Would her body be recovered? What would be his excuse, what his punishment? The gallows? A thousand horrors ran riot in his brain, a thousand tremors with each.
But why dwell upon the feelings of this miserable wretch? Why say more of his terror, his misery, his remorse? He held himself in the seat until the middle of the last act of the play. At last, unable to restrain himself longer, he arose and almost ran from the theatre. That instinct which no slayer can control or explain, was overpowering him; it was the instinct which attracts the murderer to the spot where his crime was committed. No man can describe or define this resistless impulse, and yet all criminology records it, clear and unmistakable. It is no less than a form of curiosity. Driven by this irresistible force, David Cable, with bravado that cost him dearly, worked his uninterrupted way to the scene of his crime. By trolley car to Chicago Avenue and, then, like a homeless dog scenting his way fearfully, to a corner not far from the break in the wall.
His legs trembled and his eyes grew wide with dread. The swish of the water came to his ears and he stood still for many minutes, listening for a cry for help from off the shore, but none came; and again skulking alongside the houses of his friends, he covered the blocks that lay between him and the magnetic rift in the wall. Near the corner, he stopped with a start of alarm.
The figure of a man could be seen standing like a statue on the very spot where he had seen her disappear. While he stood there, his heart scarcely beating, the solitary figure was joined by two others. Cable shrank back into the dense shadows. Like a flash it occurred to him that they were searching for the body. A shriek of agony arose to his lips; but he checked it.
Far off on one of the crosstown streets a newsboy was calling an extra—hoarse, unintelligible shouts that froze his blood. He bent his ear to catch the far-away words of the boy: "All about de Nor' Side murder!" He cringed and shook under the raucous shout. He knew what it meant.
A policeman suddenly turned the corner and came toward him. The first impulse was to fly; the next was to stand and deliver himself. The resolution came with shocking unexpectedness. He would give himself up! He would admit that he had killed his wife! The words of anguish were on his lips when the policeman spoke.
"Is it you, Mr. Cable? How is she, sir?"
Cable did not hear the man, for, as he opened his lips to cry out his own guilt, a thought formed in his brain that almost staggered him with its cunning savagery. Why not let the penalty fall on James Bansemer? She had gone out to meet him! If she had not destroyed the note, it would hang James Bansemer, and James Bansemer was worse than a murderer. But even as this remarkable thought rushed into his brain, the last words of the officer began to drive it out.
"Is she going to pull through, sir?" was the next question—and he caught it vaguely.
"Pull through?" he mumbled inarticulately. He leaned against a great stone rail suddenly. Everything was leaping before his eyes.
"Good Lord, Mr. Cable—I—I forgot. Don't you know about it?" gasped the officer.
"Know what?" asked Cable, completely dazed.
"Go home at once, sir. I didn't mean to—oh, hurry, sir. Don't be worried. They say she'll be all right. Sure! She's been hurt a little, sir."
"My daughter?" demanded Cable, as keen as a razor in an instant. His heart was trying to jump from his body.
"Your wife, sir. Nothin' serious, sir. She was held up along here somewhere and robbed. They're sure to get the villain. She—-"
But Cable was off like a deer for his home, racing as though on air.
Nothing else mattered now. She was alive! He could have her with him again to love as he never had loved her before.
CHAPTER XVII — DAVID CABLE'S DEBTS
Two days passed before David Cable was permitted to see his wife. During those trying hours he lived an age of agony in suspense. She had been removed to her home late on the night of the "hold-up," as the newspapers felt justified in calling it. He did not go to his office the next day—nor the next—but haunted her door, sleepless, nervous, held close by dread. A dozen times, at least, he sought admittance to her room, but was always turned away, cursing the doctor and the nurses for their interference.
His worst fear, however, was that his wife would not forgive him. Not the dread of exposure, nor his own shame or remorse—not even the punishment that the law might inflict, could be compared to the fear of what might be her life-long hatred. He grew to feel that the doctor, the nurses, the servants looked upon him with strange, unfriendly though respectful eyes. In his heart he believed that his wife had cursed him in their presence, laying bare his part in the unhappy transaction.
At last the suspense became unbearable. He had noticed a slight change in Jane's manner and at once attributed it to something his wife had said, for Jane had been allowed in the sick-room. The discovery that she was not his child had not as yet struck deep into his understanding. In a vague sort of way he realised that she was different, now that he knew, but it was impossible for him to consider her in any other light than that of the years gone by. The time would come when the full realisation would cut into his heart more deeply than now, but at present a calamity of his own making was forcing all other troubles into the background. His greatest desire was to reach his wife's side, to know the worst that could come of his suit for forgiveness.
The evening of the second day he swore that he would see her—and alone. They admitted him and he entered trembling in every nerve. She was lying, white and haggard, in her bed, her back toward him. He paused for an instant and was certain that he saw her shudder violently. It was significant. She feared and loathed him.
"Is it you, David?" he heard her ask weakly. "At last! Oh, I was afraid that something had happened to you! That—-"
He threw himself on his knees beside the bed and wept with all the pent-up bitterness and misery that was in him—and still he was afraid to speak to her. Not a word left his lips until he felt her hand in his hair—a tender, timid hand. It was then that he began pouring forth his cry for forgiveness. With a groan, he checked her own appeal for mercy.
"We can talk about Jane another time, not now," he cried. "I must know that you forgive me—I don't care for anything—nothing else in the world."
When the nurse came in a few minutes later, he was sitting upon the edge of the bed holding her hands in his. Their faces were radiant.
"Please stay out," he said, almost gruffly.
"For just a little while," his wife added gently. The nurse hesitated a moment and then left the room.
Frances Cable told him Jane's history so far as it was known to her. He listened dully.
"She will never know her true parents," said she in the end.
"No, I suppose not," said he, looking out of the window.
"You understand, don't you, David, dear," she said feebly; "how I dreaded to have you learn the truth after all these years, and above all, how I hoped that Jane might never know. I tried every means in my power to buy James Bansemer's silence. It was not money that he wanted, it was..." she buried her head shamefully in her arms; after a moment, she went on: "He professes to love his son, but his is the love an animal gives the offspring it would destroy. And yet Graydon worships him."
"Are you quite sure that Graydon is as unsuspecting as you think?"
"In regard to his father?"
"In regard to Jane."
"Oh, I'm sure of it. He is not a party to his father's schemes. If James Bansemer has not already told Graydon, he never will. It is not his plan to do so; his only object has been to browbeat me into submission. David, it will all come out right in the end, won't it? You'll forgive me?"
"Yes, dear; but this man," and David Cable shook with emotion as he spoke, "will have to answer to me. There will be no more to fear," he said reassuringly; "I'll crush him as I would a snake."
"David, you must not—-"
"Don't worry," he broke in; "I'll attend to him and see that no harm comes to anyone else. That man has no business among honest people."
"But, David, I was not honest with you," she confessed.
"That was a long time ago, and she's as much mine as she is yours. So, what's the odds now? It's a facer, I'll admit, but it can't be helped." It was thus that the man whose anger, only a few hours before had led him almost to crime, now readily absolved her of any blame.
"Poor child, poor child!" she moaned; "it will break her heart. She is so proud and so happy."
"Yes, she's proud. There is good blood in her. I don't wonder now that I used to think she was such a marvel. She's—she's not just the same sort of stock that we are, take it as you will."
"She never must know the truth, David."
"She's bound to find it out, dear. We'd better tell her. It will be easier for her. Bansemer's fangs must be made harmless forever. He shan't bother her. She'd better hear the story from us and not from him."
"But Graydon? She'll lose him, David."
"I'm not so sure of it. She's worthy of any man's love and we must know that Graydon loves her. I'll trust to that. But, first of all, we must put it beyond the power of James Bansemer to injure her in any shape or form. Then, when I go after him—Graydon or no Graydon—he'll know that there is such a place as hell."
"Be rational, David. Let us take our time and think well, dear. I can't bear the thought of the story that will go out concerning me—how I deceived you about Jane for years and years. What will people think of me? What will they say?" she almost wailed.
"Frances," said he, his voice tense and earnest, "that is between you and me. I intend to say to the world, if occasion demands, that I have known from the first that Jane was not our child. That will be—-"
"Oh, David, you CAN'T say that," she cried joyously.
"I shall say it, dear old partner. I shall say that you took her from the asylum with my consent. There is only James Bansemer to call me a liar, and he will not dare!"
"That old man Droom, David—his clerk. The man who saved me—he knows."
"He is in the boat with his master. He DID save you, though. I'll spare him much for that. And I have more to fear from him than you think. Frances, I am sure he saw me night before last down there at the sea wall. He knows—I am morally certain—that you were not attacked by a robber."
"But, David, I WAS robbed. My rings and my pendant were taken by someone. If Droom was the first man at my side—after you—then he must have taken them."
"I can't charge him with the theft," groaned Cable. "He saved your life and he might ruin mine. I would give anything I have to know just how much he saw of the affair. I can't account for his presence there. It seems like fate."
"It is impossible for him to accuse you, David."
"It is not impossible, I'm afraid. He may have seen me plainly."
"But I have described my assailant to the police. You do not answer the description in any particular."
In the next ten minutes the nurse came in twice to caution him against overtaxing her nerves, politely hinting that he should depart at once. There was no medicine, no nursing, no care that could have done her so much good as this hour with her husband.
"It hurt me more than I can tell you, David, when I saw that you were jealous of him. I could see it growing in you day after day, and yet I could not find the courage to make everything clear to you. Oh, how could you have suspected me of that?"
"Because I am a man and because I love you enough to care what becomes of you. I was wrong, I am happy to confess. Forgive me, dear. I can't tell you how terrible the last month has been to me. I can't tell you of the bitter thoughts I have had, nor the vicious deeds I have planned. I was almost insane. I was not accountable. I have much to pay to you in the rest of the years that I live; I have much to pay to my own conscience; and I also owe something to James Bansemer. I shall try to pay all these different debts in the coin that they call for."
"We owe something, you and I, to Jane," said she, as he arose to leave the room.
"A confession and more love than ever, Frances. I love her with all my heart. When you are stronger, we will tell her that she is not our child. We have loved her so long and so well that she can't ask for better proof of our devotion. That terrible thing at the sea wall must remain our secret, dear. To-morrow I shall begin pulling James Bansemer's fangs."
He found Graydon downstairs with Jane. A sharp look into the young man's eyes convinced him that his questions concerning Mrs. Cable and the latest news concerning the efforts to take the bandit were sincere. Cable held his hand for a long time; the firm, warm grasp was that of an honest man. As he stepped out into the night for a short walk over town he wondered, with a great pain in his heart, if Graydon Bansemer would turn from Jane when he heard the truth concerning her.