The Price. Lynde Francis

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СКАЧАТЬ you? I have been hoping you wouldn't," was the quick rejoinder. Then: "Will you tell me at what time you joined the crew of the Belle Julie?"

      The question did not surprise him, nor did he attempt to evade it.

      "Between twelve and one o'clock, the day before yesterday."

      "Will you tell me where you were at eleven o'clock that day?"

      "Yes, if you ask me."

      "I do ask you."

      "I was in a certain business building in New Orleans, as near to you as I am now. Is that sufficiently definite?"

      "It is. I thought perhaps—I had hoped—Oh, for goodness' sake, why did you do it?" she burst out, no longer able to fence with the weapons of indirectness.

      He answered her frankly.

      "It was the old story of one man's over-plenty and another man's need. Have you ever known what it means to go hungry for sheer poverty's sake?—but, of course, you haven't."

      "No," she admitted.

      "Well, I have; I was hungry that morning; very hungry. I know this doesn't excuse the thing—to you. But perhaps it may help to explain it."

      "I think I can understand—a little. But surely——"

      He stopped her with a quick little gesture.

      "I know what you are going to say: that I should have been willing to work, or even to beg, rather than steal. I was willing to work; I was not willing to beg. I know it is all wrong from your point of view; but I should be sorry to have you think that I did what I believed to be wrong."

      "Surely you must know it is wrong?"

      "Pardon me, but I can't admit that. If I could, you would be relieved of what is doubtless a very painful duty. I should surrender myself at once."

      "But think of it; if you are right, every one else must be wrong!"

      "No; not quite every one. But that is a very large question, and we needn't go into it. I confess that my method was unconventional; a little more summary than that of the usurers and the strictly legal robbers, but quite as defensible. For they rob the poor and the helpless, while I merely dispossessed one rich corporation of a portion of its exactions from the many."

      "Then you are not sorry? I saw you yesterday afternoon and hoped you were."

      He laughed unpleasantly. "I was sorry, then, and I am now; for the same reason. I have lost the money."

      "Lost it?" she gasped, "How?"

      "I had hidden it, and I suppose some one else has found it. It is all right, so far as the ownership is concerned; but I am still self-centred enough to be chagrined about it."

      "But that is nothing!" she protested, with sharp regret in her voice; "now you can never return it!"

      "I didn't intend to," he assured her, gravely. "I did have some notion of redistributing it fairly among those who need it most; but that was all."

      "But you must have returned it in the end. You could never have been content to keep it."

      "Do you think so?" he rejoined. "I think I could have been quite content to keep it. But that is past; it is gone, and I couldn't return it if I wanted to."

      "No," she acquiesced; "and that makes it all the harder."

      "For you to do what you must do? But you mustn't think of that. I shouldn't have made restitution in any event. Let me tell you what I did. I had a weapon, as you have read. I tied it up with the money in a handkerchief. There was always the chance of their catching me, and I had made up my mind that my last free act would be to drop the bundle into the river. So you see you need not hesitate on that score."

      "Then you know what it is that I must do?"

      "Assuredly. I knew it yesterday, when I saw that you had recognized me. It was very merciful in you to reprieve me, even for a few hours; but you will pardon me if I say it was wrong?"

      "Wrong!" she burst out. "Is it generous to say that to me? Are you so indifferent yourself that you think every one else is indifferent, too?"

      He smiled under cover of the darkness, and the joy of finding that his ideal was not going to be shattered was much greater than any thought of the price he must pay to preserve it. When she paused, he had his answer ready.

      "I know you are not indifferent; you couldn't be. But you must be true to yourself, at whatever cost. Will you go to Captain Mayfield now?"

      She hesitated.

      "I thought of doing that, at first," she began, postponing to a more convenient season the unnerving reflection that she was actually discussing the ways and means of it with him. "It seemed to be the simplest thing to do. But then I saw what would happen; that I should be obliged——"

      Again he stopped her with a gesture.

      "I understand. We must guard against that at all hazards. You must not be dragged into it, you know, even remotely."

      "How can you think of such things at such a time?" she queried.

      "I should be unworthy to stand here talking to you if I didn't think of them. But since you can't go to Captain Mayfield, what will you do? What had you thought of doing?"

      "I wrote a letter to—to Mr. Galbraith," she confessed.

      "And you have not sent it?"

      "No. If I had, I shouldn't have spoken to you."

      "To be sure. I suppose you signed the letter?"

      "Certainly."

      "That was a mistake. You must rewrite it, leaving out your name, and send it. All you need to say is that the man who robbed the Bayou State Security is escaping on the Belle Julie; that he is disguised as a deck-hand, and that his name on the steamer's books is John Wesley Gavitt. That will be amply sufficient."

      "But that isn't your name," she asserted.

      "No; but that doesn't matter. It is the name that will find me."

      She was silent for a moment. Then: "Why mustn't I sign it? They will pay no attention to an anonymous letter. And, besides, it seems so—so cowardly."

      "They will telegraph to every river landing ahead of us within an hour after your letter reaches New Orleans; you needn't doubt that. And the suppression of your name isn't cowardly; it is merely a justifiable bit of self-protection. It is your duty to give the alarm; but when you have done that, your responsibility ceases. There are plenty of people who can identify me if I am taken back to New Orleans. You don't want to be summoned as a witness, and you needn't be."

      She saw the direct, man-like wisdom of all this, and was quick to appreciate his delicate tact in effacing the question of the reward without even referring to it. But his stoicism was almost appalling.

      "It СКАЧАТЬ