The Crime and the Criminal Part 77

"Make it."

"There are two things I've had to live for. Just two. No more. You've robbed me of them both. My girl, and the heart which I reckoned to have one day for mine."

"If, as I presume, this time it is Mrs. Carruth to whom you are referring, I do protest with all my heart that you are welcome to her heart, Mr. Haines."

"It's not your consent I should be asking. No. It's hers. I've asked for it. In vain. I reckon that with nothing to live for living isn't worth it. I've another gun in here." Mr. Haines produced a second revolver from one of his tail pockets. Mr. Townsend smiled. "What are you laughing at, young man?"

"You must forgive me. You reminded me for a moment of a pirate king of whom I used to read in my boyish days, whose habit it was to carry an a.r.s.enal about with him wherever he might go."

"Laugh on. One of these guns is for you, the other gun's for me. We are going to shoot each other."

"Excuse me, we are not."

"I say we are." Mr. Townsend slightly shrugged his shoulders. The gesture seemed to anger Mr. Haines. He went still closer to him. "You are going to put the muzzle of one gun to my forehead, and I'm going to put the muzzle of the other gun to yours, and we're going to fire together on the word."

"I beg ten thousand pardons for being constrained to contradict you, but--we are not."

"I say we are." Again the only response was a movement of Mr.

Townsend's shoulders. "Take hold of the gun."

Mr. Haines endeavoured to thrust one of the revolvers into Mr.

Townsend's hand.

"Not I."

"Take hold of the gun!"

Mr. Haines, on Mr. Townsend's betraying an inclination to remove himself from too near neighbourhood, caught him by the shoulder.

"Remove your hand, sir. I have no objection to your shooting me. But to your touching me while I am still alive I have."

"You hearken to what I say, young man. Take hold of this gun!"

Mr. Haines endeavoured to subject Mr. Townsend to what, in the nursery, is called a shaking.

"If you attempt to do that again, Mr. Haines, I shall be under the disagreeable necessity of knocking you down--before the shooting."

Mr. Haines attempted to do it again. Mr. Townsend tried to knock Mr.

Haines down. Mr. Haines was not to be easily felled. Bursting into sudden pa.s.sion, he seized Mr. Townsend by both shoulders. His two "guns" fell, unnoticed, to the ground. With commendable promptness Mr.

Townsend returned the compliment which had been accorded him by clutching Mr. Haines. They clenched, struggled, and together fell to the floor.

On the floor they continued to discuss to the best of their ability the side issue which Mr. Haines had raised.

So engrossed were they with their own proceedings that they failed to notice the sudden opening of the door, followed by the unannounced entrance into the room of four or five men. One of them moved quickly to where the two combatants were contending on the floor. He placed his hand on Mr. Townsend's shoulder.

"You are my prisoner, Mr. Townsend. I arrest you on the charge of murder."

The sound of Mr. Holman's voice--for Matthew Holman was the speaker--did produce a diversion of the interest. The two men ceased to struggle. Then, being suffered to do so by Mr. Haines, Mr. Townsend rose to his feet. As he did so, some one who had come into the room with the police broke into laughter as he pointed at him with his finger. It was Mr. Pendarvon.

"Yes, officer, that's your man. That's Townsend, the Three Bridges murderer."

Mr. Pendarvon's merriment seemed out of place. He had cause to exchange it for something else a moment afterwards.

Mr. Townsend turned to Mr. Holman.

"As this person says, I am the man you want. And----" He paused; before they had a notion of what it was he intended to do, rushing forward, he had caught Mr. Pendarvon in his arms and borne him completely from his feet. "You are just the man I want."

Mr. Townsend's movements were so rapid that, before they could do anything to stop him, he had carried his victim right across the room, and, brushing aside the curtains, with a tremendous splintering of gla.s.s, had crashed with him through the closed windows into the night beyond.

"All right," cried Mr. Holman, as, too late to check his progress, the constables rushed after him. "There are some of the other chaps out there. They'll have him."

From Mr. Holman's point of view it proved to be all right. The drop from the window was only six or seven feet. By the time Mr. Holman had reached it Mr. Townsend was already again in the hands of the police.

The detective shouted his instructions through the shattered pane.

"Put the handcuffs on him."

A voice replied from below--

"They are on him. He has almost killed this other man."

Mr. Townsend was heard speaking with a most p.r.o.nounced drawl.

"Almost! Not quite! That's a pity. Still, 'twill serve. Officer, will you allow me to use my handkerchief; my mouth is bleeding?"

He succeeded, in spite of his handcuffed wrists, in withdrawing a handkerchief from an inner pocket of his coat. He pressed it, for a moment, to his lips. When he removed it, he tossed something into the air.

"Done you!" he cried. "Hurrah!"

There was an exclamation from the officer who was in charge of him.

"He has taken something. I can smell it."

"Yes," said Mr. Townsend, "I have taken leave." There was a small commotion. Mr. Townsend, reeling, would have fallen to the ground had he not been supported by the sergeant's arms. The man leaned over him to smell his breath. He, probably, was something of a chemist.

"Hydrocyanic acid!" he exclaimed. "He is dead."

CHAPTER XLII.

HAND IN HAND.

Mrs. Tennant had obtained permission to see her husband in prison once before he was hung to say good-bye. She was starting upon the errand now--alone.

She had resolved to go alone. She had battled out the question with herself, upon her knees, in prayer, and it seemed to her that, of many alternatives, she had not chosen the worst. She would have with her neither his mother, nor hers, nor any of their kith and kin. The horror of the memory of that parting should be hers alone.

Nor would she take their little child, their Minna. That was for the child's sake. The father might, perhaps, be glad to see, once more, his darling, even though it was through iron bars. But the child must be considered. The picture of that last parting might, and probably would, be impinged upon the retina of the child's brain, never to be obliterated. It might haunt her through the years, colour the whole of her life.