On a certain day the young governor—Gov. G.W. Blankenship—left the Executive Mansion and motored up to the State Penitentiary.

As the car spun him north over good roads through the crisp morning air, he took stock of himself and of his past life and of his future prospects, nor had cause for disappointment or doubt regarding any one of these three. This was a fine large world—large yet cozy—and he gave it his unqualified indorsement while he rode along.

He took the penitentiary unawares. The warden was not expecting him. Nobody was—not even the warden’s pretty, amorous little wife. Of this, his first visit to the institution since his inauguration six months before, the governor meant to make a surprise visit. An announcement sent on ahead would have meant preparations for his arrival—an official reception and a speeding-up of the machinery. His design was to see how the place looked in, as you might say, its week-day clothes.

It looked pretty good. After a painstaking inspection he was bound to conclude that, for a prison, this prison came very near to being a model prison. The management was efficient, that was plain to be seen. The discipline, so far as he might judge, was strict without being cruel.

The climax to a very satisfactory forenoon came, when the warden at the end of the tour invited him to stay for luncheon.

“It’ll just be a simple meal, Governor,” said Warden Riddle, “with nobody else there except Mrs. Riddle. But I’d mightily like to have you take pot-luck with us.”

“Well, I believe I will do just that very thing,” said Governor Blankenship, heartily. Privately he was much pleased. “That is, if I’m not putting your household out on my account?”

“Of course not,” stated Riddle. “I’ll just chase a trusty across the road to tell the missis to put a third plate on the table—that’s all that’s necessary.” He spoke with the pride of a contented husband in a well-ordered home.

“Then I’ll get in my car and go find a barber shop,” said the governor, sliding the palm of his hand across his chin. “I started up country so soon after breakfast this morning that I forgot to shave.”

“No need for you to do that,” Riddle told him. “Don’t you remember seeing the little shop over back of the main building—not the big shop where the inmates are trimmed up, the little one where the staff have their barbering done? We’ve got a lifer over there who’s a wiz’ at his trade. I’ll guarantee you’ll get as good a shave from him as you ever had in your life, Governor.”

So, escorted by the warden, Governor Blankenship recrossed the enclosure to a wing behind the infirmary. From the doorway of a small, neat shop, properly equipped and spotlessly clean, the warden addressed the lone occupant, a young man in convict gray.

“Shave this gentleman right away,” he ordered. “A good quick job.”

“Yes, sir,” replied the prisoner.

“You needn’t wait, Warden,” said the governor. “I’ll rejoin you in your office in a few minutes.”

The warden accordingly departed, the barber closing the door behind him. The governor climbed into the chair and was tilted back. A crisp cloth was tucked about his collar, warm, soft suds were applied to his face and deft fingers kneaded the soap and rubbed it in among the hair roots, then the razor began mowing with smooth, even strokes over the governor’s jowls—first one jowl, then the other. This much was done in a silence broken only by the gentle scraping sound of the steel against the bristles.

It was the convict who spoke first, thereby violating a prison rule. He had finished with his subject’s jaws; the razor hovered above the Adam’s apple.

“I know you,” he said coldly; “you’re the governor.”

“Yes,” said his Excellency, “I am.”

“Then you ought to recognize me, too,” continued the barber. “Take a look!”

Slightly startled, Governor Blankenship blinked and peered upward into a face that was bent just above his own face.

“No,” he said, “I don’t believe I remember you. Where did we ever meet before?”

“In a courtroom,” said the prisoner, “in a courtroom at ——,” he named the principal city of the state, which also was the city where the governor held his citizenship. “You prosecuted me—you sent me here.”

All at once his voice grew shaky with passion; his features, which until now he had held in a composed blank, became distorted—a twisted mask of hatred.

Sudden apprehension stirred inside the young governor. He made as though to straighten up. A strong hand pressing on his breast kept him down, though.

“Stay still!” commanded the convict. “You haven’t got a chance. I locked the door there when the head-screw left. And don’t try to yell for help, either—I can take that head of yours off your shoulders at one swipe. Stay still and listen to me.”

As white under the patchings of lather as the lather was—yes, whiter—Governor Blankenship lay there, rigid with a great fear, and hearkened as his tormentor went on:

“Probably you wouldn’t remember me. Why should you? I was just one of the poor stiffs you persecuted when you were district attorney, building up the record that landed you in the governor’s chair. ‘Blood Hound’ Blankenship—that’s what they called you. And how you worked to put me away! Well, you had your wish. Here I am, in for keeps. And here you are, helpless as a baby, and a sharp razor right against your neck. Feel it, don’t you? I’ll make you feel it!”

The stricken man felt it, pressing at his throat, fraying the skin, ready to slice downward into his crawling flesh. The mere touch of it seemed to paralyze his vocal cords. He strove to speak, but for the life of him—and his life was the stake, he realized that—he couldn’t get the words out.

In a terrible relentless monotone the torturer went on:

“I don’t so much blame the judge—he seemed almost sorry for me when he was hanging the sentence on me. And I don’t blame the jury, either. But you—what you said about me, the way you went at me on cross-examination, the names you called me when you were summing up! I swore then that if ever I got a chance at you I’d fix you. And now I’ve got my chance—and I’ve got you right where I want you!”

“Wait—for God’s sake, wait!” In a strangled frenzied gurgle the helpless man pumped forth the entreaty.

“Why should I wait? They don’t have capital punishment any more in this state. All they can do is pile another life term on the one I’m already doing.”

“But wait—oh, please wait! I do seem to remember you now. Maybe—maybe I was too severe. If I took your case under advisement—if I pardoned you—if-if—” He was begging so hard that he babbled.

The pressure of that deadly thing at his throat was relaxed the least bit.

“Now you’re getting reasonable,” said the lifer. “I thought the thing I wanted most in the world was to kill you. But after four years here, liberty would be pretty sweet too. There’s one thing they’ve always said about you—that you keep your word. Swear you’ll keep your trap shut about what’s happened in this shop today, and on top of that swear to me you’ll turn me out of here, and you can go!”

On these terms then the bargain was struck. The governor, having given his promise, had a good shave, twice over, with witch-hazel for a lotion, and having somewhat mastered his jumping nerves and regained his customary dignity, went home with the warden for luncheon.

From the foot of the table, little Mrs. Riddle shot covert smiles at him—and soft languishing glances. There was meaningness in her manner, in her caressing voice. Her husband talked along, suspecting nothing. He thought—if he gave it a thought—that she was flattered at having the governor at her board. As for the governor, even in his shaken state he had a secret glowing within.

As he was leaving, he remarked in a casual tone to his host:

“That pet barber of yours—Wyeth, I believe his name is. He interested me—aroused my sympathy, in fact.”

“My wife feels the same way about him,” said the warden. “But then, you know how women are. He’s young and well-mannered and she’s full of kindness for every human being.”

“Then probably she’d be pleased in case—h’m—in case I should grant him a pardon?”

Warden Riddle gave a start.

“She might,” he said, “but nobody else would. Governor, take it from me, that fellow’s bad all the way through. And the crime that landed him here—a cold-blooded, brutal murder—it was an atrocious thing, utterly unprovoked. No mitigating circumstances whatsoever, just plain butchery. Governor, as your friend I beg you, don’t be swept off your feet by any rush of misguided sentimentality for such a wretch. To turn him loose would kill you politically. You’re in line to be our next United States Senator. Already they’re saying over the country that you’re Presidential timber. There’s no telling how high or how far you’ll go if only you don’t make some fatal mistake. And this—this would be fatal. It would rouse the whole state against you. It would destroy you, not only with the party but with the people. You know what ruined your predecessor—he made too free a use of the pardoning power. Governor, if you let that man loose on society, you’re wrecked.”

That night, back at the Executive Mansion, the bachelor governor slept not a wink.

Was ever a man strung between the horns of a worse dilemma? Warden Riddle had been right. To open the prison doors for so infamous a creature as Wyeth was, would be damnation for all his ambitions. And Governor Blankenship was as ambitious as he was godly. And probably no more godly man ever lived. On the other hand, he had given his pledge to Wyeth.

There was this about Governor Blankenship: he had been named for the father of his country—that man who could not tell a lie. And, wittingly, Governor Blankenship had never in all his blameless life told a lie either. To keep the faith with himself and the world, to wear truth like a badge shining upon his breast, had from boyhood been his dearest ideal. Off that course he never intentionally had departed. With him it was more than a code of ethics and more than a creed of personal conduct—it was the holiest of religions. He unreservedly believed that one guilty falsehood—just one—would consign his soul to the bottommost pit of perdition forever. Here was a real Sir Galahad, a perfect knight of perfect honor.

Through days and weeks he walked between two invisible but ever-present mentors. One of them, whose name was Expediency, constantly tempted him.

“You passed your word under duress and in mortal fear,” Expediency whispered in his ear. “Let that man rot in his cell. ’Tis his just desert.”

But the other counselor, called Conscience, as repeatedly said to him: “You never told a lie. Can you tell one now?”

In such grievous plight, he received a secret message, sent by underground from Wyeth.

“I’m getting impatient,” was Wyeth’s word. “Are you, or are you not, going to come clean?”

This enhanced his desperation. From sleeplessness, from gnawing worry he lost flesh. People about him said the noble young governor was not like himself any more. They predicted a breakdown unless he was cured of what hidden cause it was which distressed him.

One morning he rose, haggard and red-eyed, from the bed upon which since midnight he had tossed and rolled. He had made his decision. Selfishness had won. He would break his promise to Wyeth. But since he must go to eternal Hell for a lie, he would go there for another and a sweeter reason.

Until now, his romantic dealings with little Mrs. Riddle had been mild and harmless, if clandestinely conducted. He had not philandered with her; he merely had flirted. On his side it had been an innocent flirtation—an agreeable diversion. But he knew the lady’s mind—knew she was weak and willing, where he had been strong and straightforward.

So be it then. For a crown to his other and lesser iniquity he would corrupt the wife of his devoted friend.

For the first time in a month he had zest for his breakfast. Conscience was so thoroughly drugged she seemed as though dead.

From the table he went to the long-distance telephone. He would call her up and arrange for an assignation. There was considerable delay in establishing the connection—a buzzing over the wire, a confusion of vague sounds. Finally his ringing was answered by a strange voice.

“I wish to speak with Mrs. Riddle,” he said.

There was a little pause. Then, in a fumbling, evasive fashion the voice made reply.

“She’s not here. She’s—she’s out.”

It occurred to the governor that he might as well tell the warden he had abandoned the idea of pardoning the barber.

“Then I’d like to talk with Mr. Riddle,” he said.

“He’s—he’s not here either. Who is this, please?”

In his double disappointment the governor forgot the possible need for caution. “This,” he said, “is Governor Blankenship.”

“Oh!” The voice became warmer. “Is that you, Governor? I’ve been trying for an hour to get you on your private line. This is Warden Riddle’s brother at the ’phone—you know, Henry Riddle? They got me up at daylight when this—this terrible thing was discovered, and I’ve been here ever since, doing what I could.”

“What terrible thing do you mean?”

“Haven’t you heard the news? Why, sir, the worst man in the penitentiary got away last night—Wyeth, the desperado. He—he had help. That’s why the warden’s away, why I’m in charge. My poor brother’s out with the posse trying to get trace of the scoundrel. I guess he’ll shoot him if he finds him.”

“But why is Mrs. Riddle absent at such a time?”

“Governor, that’s the worst part of it. She was the one that helped that devil to escape. And she—she went with him!”

To the end of his days Governor G.W. Blankenship was known as the man who never told a lie. When he died they carved something to that general effect upon his tombstone.