The Substitute Prisoner Part 18

She entered with a feeling of dread, as if the atmosphere of the place chilled and repelled her. It is always thus with persons visiting a jail for the first time. There is something sinister in the suggestions conveyed by the long, silent tiers of grated iron doors, something that strikes terror into the stoutest hearts.

A trusty carried her name to Beard and returned at the end of five minutes with the information that the prisoner was willing to see her.

As if further to rasp her refined sensibilities and shock her, she was escorted into a little side room and subjected to a thorough search at the hands of a stout, impa.s.sive matron. To Josephine Burden it seemed an unnecessary humiliation and she shrank inwardly from contact with those rough, though nimble hands.

Being unaccustomed to the peculiar etiquette of prisons, she was unable to appreciate how necessary is the precaution of searching all visitors.

Even with the exercise of the utmost care, it is impossible to prevent the smuggling of weapons and other contraband to the prisoners.

Nothing to arouse the suspicion of the matron was found on Miss Burden and she was escorted to the tier on which Beard was confined. As she pa.s.sed up the winding iron stairs and down the long corridors, catching glimpses of human faces peering anxiously through the grating of their cells, she could not help a feeling of pity for the poor wretches confined like wild animals in their iron cages.

To the ordinary curiosity seeker the spectacle is one which leaves a feeling of depression that abides with one like a frightful nightmare prolonged through the hours of wakefulness. What then must be the emotions of those, who, visiting the prison for the first time, behold one who is near and dear to them peering helplessly, with that look of mute appeal that is ever present in the eyes of unfortunate humans deprived of liberty, from behind the interposing bars of a gloomy cell?

The first flash which Josephine Burden obtained of the man she had come to visit, produced a feeling of horror not unmixed with revolt at the relentless cruelty of the steel bars through which she discerned his haggard face. Beard's form, dimly outlined against the steel door at the end of a long corridor, seemed to have gathered to itself the wan light that filtered through a narrow window at the right of the aisle, and taken on a gray, misty aspect, wraith-like and terrifying. She had come upon him abruptly, at the turn of the stairs, and for a moment she stood silent, overcome by a chaos of emotions.

If she expected the door to open she was disappointed, for the trusty simply withdrew half a dozen paces leaving the prisoner and his visitor to face each other and converse through the narrow s.p.a.ce between the bars.

"I received your note," Beard broke the embarra.s.sing silence, "and I can't tell you how much it cheered me."

She advanced nearer the door, and extending a gloved hand through the bars, permitted it to repose an instant in the prisoner's grateful palm.

"I had to come," she murmured, "although father went into a fury when I told him."

"And you came to cheer me--to tell me you believe in me?"

Something far deeper than mere grat.i.tude shone in his eyes, and was reflected in the agitated countenance of the girl.

"I came to tell you that I broke my engagement to Lester Ward," she said in quivering voice.

Cautiously Britz peered at the couple through the iron grating of his cell. He noted the tremor which pa.s.sed down Beard's form and the furtive caress which he bestowed on the visitor's hand. At the same time the girl lifted her veil, disclosing a finely molded face of flawless features, with a skin of exquisite paleness, and flashing brown eyes shaded by long, dark lashes. As she stood with fingers encircling the bars that interposed between her and Beard, her beautiful face took on a purposeful aspect, as of one suddenly possessed of a new and consuming interest in life.

The news which she had brought the prisoner cheered him perceptibly. But he regarded her as if even now he found it difficult to credit her with the courage she must have displayed in discarding the man whom she had promised to wed.

"How did it happen?" inquired Beard in a voice that betrayed his bewildered state of mind.

"You must have known, your instinct must have told you that I accepted him because of father's urging," she said. "Now that you are in trouble I don't fear to tell you that I wanted you all the time. When I read of your arrest I wanted to fly to you, to be near you, to sustain you. This morning I told father of my intention to break the engagement. And, do you know, he a.s.sented at once. But he went into a rage when I told him I was coming here, although he seemed perfectly pleased to have me break with Lester."

A person of duller intellect than Britz, from overhearing the conversation between Beard and the girl, would have discerned the romance in the lives of the couple. Had they revealed it in its most intimate detail, they could not have conveyed a better understanding of it than through the words uttered in this murky prison corridor. It was plain to Britz that Beard and Ward had been suitors for the girl's hand; that Ward's suit was successful through the favor which he found in the eyes of the girl's father. But now, when the man with whom she really was in love was in desperate straits, that love could no longer be diverted from its true channel, and, like an irresistible current that sweeps everything before it, it had carried her to the side of her endangered lover.

Materialists may find it difficult to distinguish between love and pa.s.sion--may deny to their hearts' content the existence of any line of demarcation between them. But the true lover has no doubt on the subject. Love distinguishes itself from pa.s.sion, through sacrifice.

Pa.s.sion is invariably selfish. Love never is.

Britz, recognizing instinctively the genuineness of the woman's love, pa.s.sed over its enn.o.bling aspect, to find therein a potent influence for the solution of the crime with which he was engaged. The girl had unconsciously revealed herself to him as a means to an end--that end being the discovery and punishment of the murderer of Herbert Whitmore.

Had Beard been an experienced criminal, he would have known that no walls have more ears, nor more delicately attuned ears, than prison walls. And that knowledge would have inspired a suspicion of the very bars against which he pressed his fevered face. But being without previous jail experience, he said in a voice as distinctly audible to Britz as if he had been talking directly to the detective,--

"Then you don't believe for a single instant the terrible accusation they have lodged against me?"

"No one who knows you can possibly believe it," she answered in a tone of conviction.

"Dearest," he said, adopting a confidential air, "I could leave this prison to-morrow were I so inclined. They haven't the least particle of evidence against me--they cannot have. Were I to force the issue they could not make out a case sufficient to justify my being held for the grand jury. I am staying here because I want to, because it is best that they should direct their efforts toward trying to prove me the murderer."

Britz, in the darkness of his cell, indulged in an amused smile. So this man was endeavoring to draw the fire of the police in order to save the guilty person! Here was a pretty drama of cross-purposes. Had Beard been sufficiently shrewd to see through the purpose of his detention, he would have submitted to his imprisonment with less complacency.

"You mean that you are offering yourself as a target in order to shield the guilty person?" she inquired incredulously.

"Precisely."

"But why?" she demanded.

"Because I conceive it to be Mr. Whitmore's wish."

"Mr. Whitmore!" exclaimed she, obviously puzzled. "You mean he asked you to?"

"No," acknowledged he. "But I know what must have been in his mind when he died. I know what he would have done, had he lived to do it. Dearest, I shouldn't have hesitated to sacrifice my own life for him. I was more like a son to him than a secretary. And had I been with him when he died, I know he would have imposed silence on me."

"Then the men in his office--they know the murderer and he asked them not to tell?" An expression of astonishment overspread her face.

"No," he answered. "They don't know. They've told the truth."

"Horace,"--her voice grew persuasive--"Horace, you mustn't think of yourself alone now. I can't bear to think of you imprisoned in this place. For my sake you must leave it and clear yourself of this accusation."

He shook his head sadly.

"If you knew all the circ.u.mstances you'd approve my course."

"But I don't know them--and it's torturing me." For the first time her features showed the anguish she was suffering. He saw and was moved.

"Listen!" His eyes searched the corridor and the adjoining cells. Seeing no one but the indifferent trusty who was too far away to overhear, Beard continued: "Mr. Whitmore loved Mrs. Collins, as you already know.

Were scandal to break over her head--if I did not sacrifice myself to prevent it--it would be the vilest ingrat.i.tude to an employer whose memory I venerate."

"Then you are protecting Mrs. Collins?" Her frame throbbed with the conflict of agonized emotions. "Mrs. Collins!" she repeated, as if afraid that he had misunderstood.

"Yes," he answered resignedly. "I know I am doing precisely what Mr.

Whitmore would have asked, me to do. And now, dear, please don't press me farther. I can't tell you more--not at this time. When all this shall have been forgotten, when Mr. Whitmore's death ceases to occupy the public and the police, then I'll tell you everything."

When two hearts charged with love begin to exchange confidences, it is impossible to foretell what revelations will be forthcoming. And the chances are that had Beard been allowed sufficient time, he would have unburdened himself of the heavy load that was pressing on his heart. But unfortunately for Britz, the hour for exercising the prisoners confined on the tier had arrived, and a deputy warden cut short the interview between Beard and Miss Burden. She was escorted to the street, while Beard joined the other inmates for a half hour of exercise and fresh air in the courtyard.

With Beard's intimation of Mrs. Collins's complicity in the murder reiterating itself in his mind, Britz left the Tombs and proceeded toward the Federal Building. The detective had seen, had interviewed Mrs. Collins. It was impossible to reconcile her artless, engaging personality with an impulse so base as to lead to murder.

Besides, Beard's remarks were open to more than one interpretation. It was entirely possible that he was endeavoring to shield her name from the befouling suspicion of having yielded to Whitmore, a suspicion which the general public would be quick to convert into an unalterable belief, once it learned that she had transferred her love from her husband to the slain merchant. Should the murderer be discovered and brought to trial the dissensions in the Collins household would be paraded unsparingly in the public press. Innocent as the relations between Whitmore and Mrs. Collins were, they would take on a guilty aspect in the eyes of a world that is ever ready to discern its own debasing impulses reflected in the conduct of one who has been regarded hitherto as unstained.

Reviewing all the circ.u.mstances of the case, Britz concluded that Beard's statement was not to be accepted as an intimation of Mrs.

Collins's guilt. For, had he not accused Collins in even stronger terms in the very presence of his murdered employer?

It was not to be forgotten, too, that a favorite dodge of guilty persons is to adopt the pose of a martyr. And, in lieu of an adequate defense, to create a favorable doubt by insinuating that they are accepting punishment in order to shield a woman. When artfully worked, this deceit may always be relied upon to create undeserved sympathy.

Were there nothing else to absolve Mrs. Collins from the suspicion that she was responsible for Whitmore's death, the absence of motive would have proclaimed her innocence. She loved him. She was ready to discard her husband for him. She and her brother were looking to him to save them from financial ruin. No, she had nothing to gain and everything to lose by the merchant's death.