The Wild Olive. Basil King

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ any man's mind," he muttered, after a long pause, "when it's as transparent as yours. No one had any doubt as to your convictions—after your charge."

      "That has nothing to do with it. If I charged in your favor, it was because I wanted you to have the benefit of every possible plea. When those pleas were found insufficient by a jury of your peers—"

      Ford emitted a sound that might have been a laugh, had there been mirth in it.

      "A jury of my peers! A lot of thick-headed country tradesmen, prejudiced against me from the start because I'd sometimes kicked up a row in their town! They weren't my peers any more than they were yours!"

      "The law assumes all men to be equal—"

      "Just as it assumes all men to be intelligent—only they're not. The law is a very fine theory. The chief thing to be, said against it is that five times out of ten it leaves human nature out of account. I'm condemned to death, not because I killed a man, but because you lawyers won't admit that your theory doesn't work."

      He began to speak more easily, with the energy born of his desperate situation and his sense of wrong. He sat up straighter; the air of dejection with which he had sunk to the chair slipped from him; his gray eyes, of the kind called "honest," shot out glances of protest. The elder man found himself once more struggling against the wave of sympathy which at times in the court-room had been almost too strong for him. He was forced to intrench himself mentally within the system he served before bracing himself to reply.

      "I can't keep you from having your opinion—"

      "Nor can I save you from having yours. Look at me, judge!" He was bolt upright now, throwing his arms wide with a gesture in which there was more appeal than indignation "Look at me! I'm a strong, healthy-bodied, healthy-minded fellow of twenty-four; but I'm drenched to the skin, I'm half naked, I'm nearly dead with hunger, I'm an outlaw for life—and you're responsible for it all."

      It was Wayne's turn for protest, and though he winced, he spoke sharply.

      "I had my duty to perform—"

      "Good God, man, don't sit there and call that thing your duty! You're something more than a wheel in a machine. You were a human being before you were a judge. With your convictions you should have come down from the bench and washed your hands of the whole affair. The very action would have given me a chance—"

      "You mustn't speak like that to my husband," Mrs. Wayne broke in, indignantly, from the doorway. "If you only knew what he has suffered on your account—"

      "Is it anything like what I've suffered on his?"

      "I dare say it's worse. He has scarcely slept or eaten since he knew he would have to pass that dreadful sen—"

      "Come! come!" Wayne exclaimed, in the impatient tone of a man who puts an end to a useless discussion. "We can't spend time on this subject any longer. I'm not on my defence—"

      "You are on your defence," Ford declared, instantly. "Even your wife puts you there. We're not in a courtroom as we were this morning. Circumstantial evidence means nothing to us in this isolated house, where you're no longer the judge, as I'm no longer the prisoner. We're just two naked human beings, stripped of everything but their inborn rights—and I claim mine."

      "Well—what are they?"

      "They're simple enough. I claim the right to have something to eat, and to go my way without being molested—or betrayed. You'll admit I'm not asking much."

      "You may have the food," Mrs. Wayne said, in a tone not without compassion. "I'll go and get it."

      For a minute or two there was no sound but that of her cough, as she sped down a passage. Before speaking, Wayne passed his hand across his brow as though in an effort to clear his mental vision.

      "No; you don't seem to be asking much. But, as a matter of fact, you're demanding my pledge to my country. I undertook to administer its laws—"

      Ford sprang up.

      "You've done it," he cried, "and I'm the result! You've administered the law right up to its hilt, and your duty as a judge is performed. Surely you're free now to think of yourself as a man and to treat me as one."

      "I might do that, and still think you a man dangerous to leave at large."

      "But do you?"

      "That's my affair. Whatever your opinion of the courts that have judged your case, I must accept their verdict."

      "In your official capacity—yes; but not here, as host to the poor dog who comes under your roof for shelter. My rights are sacred. Even the wild Arab—"

      He paused abruptly. Over Wayne's shoulder, through the window still open to the terrace, he saw a figure cross the darkness. Could his pursuers be waiting outside for their chance to spring on him? A perceptible fraction of a second went by before he told himself he must have been mistaken.

      "Even the wild Arab would think them so," he concluded, his glance shifting rapidly between the judge and the window open behind him.

      "But I'm not a wild Arab," Wayne replied. "My first duty is toward my country and its organized society."

      "I don't think so. Your first duty is toward the man you know you've sentenced wrongly. Fate has shown you an unusual mercy in giving you a chance to help him."

      "I can be sorry for the sentence and yet feel that I could not have acted otherwise."

      "Then what are you going to do now?"

      "What would you expect me to do but hand you back to justice?"

      "How?"

      There was a suggestion of physical disdain in the tone of the laconic question, as well as in the look he fixed on the neat, middle-aged man doing his best to be cool and collected Wayne glanced over his shoulder toward the telephone on the wall. Norrie Ford understood and spoke quickly:

      "Yes; you could ring up the police at Greenport, but I could strangle you before you crossed the floor."

      "So you could; but would you? If you did, should you be any better off? Should you be as well off as you are now? As it is, there is a possibility of a miscarriage of justice, of which one day you may get the benefit. There would be no such possibility then. You would be tracked down within forty-eight hours."

      "Oh, you needn't argue; I've no intention—" Once more he paused. The same shadow had flitted across the dark space outside, this time with a distinct flutter of a white dress. He could only think it was some one getting help together; and while he went on to finish his sentence in words, all his subconscious faculties were at work, seeking an escape from the trap in which he was taken.

      "I've no intention of doing violence unless I'm driven to it—"

      "But if you are driven to it—?"

      "I've a right to defend myself. Organized society, as you call it, has put me where it has no further claim upon me. I must fight against it single-handed—and I'll do it. I shall spare neither man nor woman—nor woman"—he raised his voice so as to be heard outside—"who stands in my way."

      He threw back his head and looked defiantly out СКАЧАТЬ