Mrs. Gibson, the wife of the comparatively new elder of the Sabbath Valley church was a semi-invalid. That is she wasn't able to do her own work and kept “help.” The help was a lady of ample proportions whose husband had died and whose fortunes were depleted. She consented to assist Mrs. Gibson provided she were considered one of the family, and she presented a continual front of offense so that the favored family must walk most circumspectly if they would not have her retire to her room with hurt feelings and leave them to shift for themselves.

On the morning of the trial she settled herself at her side of the breakfast table, after a number of excursions to the kitchen for things she had forgotten, the cream, the coffee, and the brown bread, of which Mr. Gibson was very fond. She was prepared to enjoy her own breakfast. Mr. Gibson generally managed to bolt his while these excursions of memory were being carried on and escape the morning news, but Mrs. Gibson, well knowing which side her bread was buttered, and not knowing where she could get another housekeeper, usually managed to sit it out.

“Well, this is a great day for Sabbath Valley,” said Mrs. Frost mournfully, spreading an ample slice of bread deep with butter, and balancing it on the uplifted fingers of one hand while she stirred the remainder of the cream into her coffee with one of the best silver spoons. She was wide and bulgy and her chair always seemed inadequate when she settled thus for nourishment.

“A great day,” she repeated sadly, taking an audible sip of her coffee.

“A great day?” repeated little Mrs. Gibson with a puzzled air, quickly recalling her abstracted thoughts.

“Yes. Nobody ever thought anybody in Sabbath Valley would ever be tried for murder!”

“Oh!” said Mrs. Gibson sharply, drawing back her chair as if she were in a hurry and rolling up her napkin quickly.

“Yes, poor Mark Carter! I remember his sweet little face and his long yellow curls and his baby smile as if it were yesterday!” narrowing her eyes and harrowing her voice, “I wonder if his poor mother knows yet.”

“I should hope not!” said Mrs. Gibson rising precipitately and wandering over to the window where hung a gilded canary cage. “Mrs. Frost, did you remember to give the canary some seed and fresh water?”

“Yes, I b'lieve so,” responded the fat lady, “But you can't keep her from knowing it always. Whatt'll you do when he's hung? Don't you think it would be easier for; her to get used to it little by little?”

“Mrs. Frost, if you were a dog would you rather have your tail cut off all at once, or little by little?” said Mrs. Gibson mischievously.

“I shouldn't like to have it cut off at all I'm quite sure,” said Mrs. Frost frostily.

“Well, perhaps Mrs. Carter might feel that way too,” said the lady bending over a rose geranium and pinching a leaf to smell.

“I don't understand you,” said Mrs. Frost from her coffee cup, “Oh, you mean that perhaps Mark may not be convicted? Why, my dear lady, there isn't a chance at all, not a chance in the world for Mark, and while I'm real sorry I can't say I'd approve. Think of how he's carried on, going with that little huzzy of a Cherry. Mrs. Harricutt says she saw him have her out riding in his automobile one day—!”

“Oh,—Mrs. Harricutt!” said Mrs. Gibson impatiently, “Mrs. Frost, let's find something pleasanter to talk about. It's a wonderful morning. The air's like wine. I wonder If I couldn't take a little walk. I mean to ask the doctor.”

“My dear woman,” said Frost patronizingly, “You can't get away from the unpleasant things in this world by just not talking about them!”

“It seems not,” said the Gibson lady patiently, and wandered out on the porch.

Down the street Marilyn lingered by her mother's chair:

“Are you—going to Economy to-day, mother?”

“Yes, dear, your father and I are both going. Did you—think you ought—wanted to—go dear?”

“Oh, I should hate it!” cried Lynn flinging out her hands with a terrible little gesture of despair, “But I wanted to go just to stand by Mark. I shall be there anyway, wherever I am, I shall see everything and feel everything in my heart I know. But in the night it came to me that some one ought to stay with Mrs. Carter!”

“Yes, dear! I had hoped you would think of that. I didn't want to mention it because I wanted you to follow your own heart's leading, but I think she needs you. If you could keep her from finding out until it was over—”

“But suppose—!”

“Yes, dear, it is possible. I've thought of that, and if it comes there will be a way I'm sure, but until it does—then suppose—”

“Yes, mother, I'll go and make her have one happy day first anyway. If any of those old vultures come around I'll play the piano or scream all the while they are there and keep them from telling her a thing!”

“I think, dear, the vultures will all be in Economy to-day.”

“All except Mrs. Frost, mother dear. She can't get away. But she can always run across the street to borrow a cup of soda.”

So Lynn knelt for a moment in her quiet room, then came down, kissed her mother and father with a face of brave serenity, and went down the maple shaded street with her silk work bag in her hand. And none too soon. As she tapped at the door of the Carter house she saw Mrs. Frost ambling purposefully out of the Gibson gate with a tea cup in her hand.

“Oh, hurry upstairs and stay there a minute till I get rid of Mrs. Frost,” Lynn whispered smiling as her hostess let her in. “I've come to spend the day with you, and she'll stay till she's told you all the news and there won't be any left for me.”

Mrs. Carter, greatly delighted with Lynn's company, hurried obediently up the stairs and Lynn met the interloper, supplied her with the cup of salt she had come for this time, said Mrs. Carter was upstairs making the beds and she wouldn't bother her to come down,—beds, mind you, as if Mark was at home of course—and Mrs. Frost went back across the street puzzled and baffled and resolved to come back later for an egg after that forward young daughter of the minister was gone.

Lynn locked the front door and ran up stairs. She tolled her hostess up to the attic to show her some ancient gowns and poke bonnets that she hadn't seen since she was a little girl in which she and Mark used to dress up and play history stories.

Half the morning she kept her up there looking at garments long folded away, whose wearers had slept in the church yard many years; trinkets of other days, quaint old pictures, photographs and daguerreotypes, and a beautiful curl of Mark's—:

“Marilyn, I'm going to give that to you,” the mother said as she saw the shining thing lying in the girl's hand, “There's no one living to care for it after I'm gone, and you will keep it I know till you're sure there's no one would want it I—mean—!”

“I understand what you mean,” said Marilyn, “I will keep it and love it—for you—and for him. And if there is ever anybody else that—deserves it—why I'll give it to them—!” Then they both laughed to hide the tears behind the unspoken thoughts, and the mother added a little stubbed shoe and a sheer muslin cap, all delicate embroidery and hemstitching:

“They go together,” she said simply, and Lynn wrapped them all carefully in a bit of tissue paper and laid them in her silk bag. As she turned away she held it close to her heart while the mother closed the shutters. She shuddered to think of the place where Mark was sitting now, being tried for his life. Her heart flew over the road, entered the court and stood close by his side, with her hand on his shoulder, and then slipped it in his. She wondered if he knew that she was praying, praying, praying for him and standing by him, taking the burden of what would have been his mother's grief if she had known, as well as the heavy burden of her own sorrow.

The air of the court room was heavy for the place was crowded. Almost everybody from Sabbath Valley that could come was there, for a great many people loved Mark Carter, and this seemed a time when somehow they must stand by him. People came that liked him and some that did not like him, but more that liked him and kept hoping against hope that he would not be indicted.

The hum of voices suddenly ceased as the prisoner was led in and a breath of awe passed over the place. For until that minute no one was quite sure that Mark Carter would appear. It had been rumored again and again that he had run away. Yet here he was, walking tall and straight, his fine head held high as had been his wont. “For all the world like he walked when he was usher at Mary Anne's wedding, whispered Mrs. Hulse, from Unity.”

The minister and his wife kept their eyes down after the first glimpse of the white face. It seemed a desecration to look at a face that had suffered as that one had. Yet the expression upon it now was more as if it had been set for a certain purpose for this day, and did not mean to change whatever came. A hopeless, sad, persist look, yet strong withal and with a hint of something fine and high behind it.

He did not look around as he sat down, merely nodded to a few close to him whom he recognized. A number, pressed close as he passed, and touched him, as if they would impress upon him their loyalty, and it was noticeable that these were mostly of a humble class, working men, boys, and a few old women, people to whom he had been kind.

Mrs. Severn wrote a little note and sent it up to him, with the message, “Lynn is with your mother.” Just that. No name signed. But his eyes sought hers at once and seemed to light, and soon, without any apparent movement on his part a card came back to her bearing the words: “I thank you,” But he did not look that way again all day it seemed. His bearing was quiet, sad, aloof, one might almost have said disinterested.

Mark's lawyer was one whom he had picked out of the gutter and literally forced to stop drinking and get back on his job. He was a man of fine mind and deep gratitude, and was having a frantic time with his client, for Mark simply wouldn't talk:

“I wasn't there, I was on Stark mountain, I am, not guilty,” he persisted, “and that is all I have to say.”

“But my dear friend, don't you realize that mere statements unadorned and uncorroborated won't get you anywhere in court?”

“All right, don't try to defend me then. Let the thing go as it will. That is all I have to say.” And from this decision no one had been able to shake him. His lawyer was nearly crazy. He had raked the county for witnesses. He had dug into the annals of that night in every possible direction. He had unearthed things that it seemed no living being would have thought of, and yet he had not found the one thing of which he was in search, positive evidence that Mark Carter had been elsewhere and otherwise employed at the time of the shooting.

“Don't bother so much about it Tony,” said Mark once when they were talking it over, or the lawyer was talking it over and Mark was listening. “It doesn't matter. Nothing matters any more!” and his voice was weary as if all hope had vanished from him.

Anthony Drew looked at him in despair:

“Sometimes I almost think you want to die,” he said. “Do you think I shall let you go when you pulled me back from worse than death? No, Mark, old man, we're going to pull you through somehow, though I don't know how. If I were a praying man I'd say that this was the time to pray. Mark, what's become of that kid you used to think so much of, that was always tagging after you? Billy,—was that his name?”

A wan smile flitted across Mark's face, and a stiff little drawing of the old twinkle about eyes and lips:

“I think he'll turn up some time.”

The lawyer eyed him keenly:

“Mark, I believe you've got something up your sleeve. I believe that kid knows something and you won't let him tell. Where is he?”

“I don't know, Tony” and Mark looked at him straight with clear eyes, and the lawyer knew he was telling the truth.

Just at the last day Anthony Drew found out about the session meeting. But from Mark he got no further statement than the first one. Mark would not talk. An ordinary lawyer, one that had not been saved himself, would have given up the defense as hopeless. Anthony simply wouldn't let Mark go undefended. If there were no evidence he would make some somehow, and so he worked hoping against hope up to the very last minute. He stood now, tall, anxious, a fine face, though showing the marks of wreck behind him, dark hair silvered at the edges, fine deep lines about his eyes and brows, looking over the assembled throng with nervous hurrying eyes. At last he seemed to find what he wanted and came quickly down to where the minister sat in an obscure corner, whispering a few words with him. They went out together for a few minutes and when they came back the minister was grave and thoughtful. He himself had scoured the country round about quietly for Billy, and he was deeply puzzled. He had promised to tell what he knew.

The business of the day went forward in the usual way with all the red tape, the cool formalities, as if some trifling matter were at stake, and those who loved Mark sat with aching hearts and waited. The Severns in their corner sat for the most part with bended heads and praying hearts. The witnesses for the prosecution were most of them companions of the dead man, those who had drank and caroused with him, frequenters of the Blue Duck, and they were herded together, an evil looking crowd, but with erect heads and defiant attitude, the air of having donned unaccustomed garments of righteousness for the occasion, and making a great deal of it because for once every one must see that they were in the right. They were fairly loud mouthed in their boasting about it.

There was the little old wizened up fellow that had been sitting with the drinks outside the booth the night Billy telephoned. There were the serving men who had waited on Mark and Cherry. There was the proprietor of the Blue Duck himself, who testified that Mark had often been there with Cherry, though always early in the evening. Once he had caught him outside the window looking in at the dancers as late as two o'clock at night, the same window from which the shot was fired that brought Dolph to his death. They testified that Mark had been seen with Cherry much of late driving in his car, and that she had often been in deep converse as if having a hot argument about something.

The feeling was tense in the court room. Tears were in many eyes, hopeless tears in the eyes of those who had loved the boy for years.

But the grilling order marched on, and witness after witness came, adding another and another little touch to the gradually rising structure that would shut Mark Carter away from the world that loved him and that he loved forever.

Cherry was called, a flaunting bit of a child with bobbed golden hair and the air of a bold young seraph, her white face bravely painted, her cherry lips cherrier even than the cherry for which she had been named. She wore a silk coat reaching to the bottom of her frock, which was shorter than the shortest, and daring little high-heeled many strapped shoes with a myriad of bright buckles. Her hat was an insolent affair of cherry red. She made a blinding bit of color in the dreary court room. She appeared half frightened, half defiant. Her sharp little face seemed to have lost its round curves and childlike sweetness. She testified that she had been with Mark on the night of the shooting, but that he had taken her home early and she had seen no more of him that night. She admitted that she had returned later to the Blue Duck Tavern with Dolph and had danced late and eaten supper with him afterwards, and that it was while they were eating that the shot was fired and Dolph fell over on the table. No, she didn't see any face at the window. She had covered her face with her hands and screamed. She guessed she fainted. Questioned further she admitted that she had had an argument with Mark earlier in the evening, but she “didn't remember what it was about.” They often argued. Yes, Dolph was jealous of Mark and tried to stop her going with him. Yes, Mark had tried to stop her going with Dolph too, but he never acted jealous—On and on through the sorry little details of Cherry's career. The court room vultures receiving it avidly, the more refined part of the company with distaste and disgust. Mark sat with stern white face looking straight at Cherry all the time she was on the stand as if he dared her to say other than the truth. When she happened to look that way she gave a giggling little shudder and half turned her shoulder away, avoiding his eyes. But when she was done she had said nothing against Mark, and nothing to clear him either.

The sharp unscrupulous lawyer who acted for the prosecution had secured some fellows “of the baser sort” who testified that they had seen Mark Carter buying a gun, that they had seen him creep softly to the window, peer into the room, and take aim. They had been on their way home, had seen Mark steal along in a very suspicious manner and had followed him to find out what it meant. There were three of them; fellows whom Mark had refused to play against on a County team because they were what is called “dirty” players. There had been hot words between Mark and them once when one of them had kicked a man in the face with spiked shoes who was just about to make a goal. Mark had succeeded in winning the umpire to his point of view and the others had lost their game and incidentally some money, and they had a grudge against him. Moreover there was money in this testimony for The Blue Duck Tavern could not afford to have its habitues in the public eye, and preferred to place the blame on a man who belonged more to the conservative crowd. The Blue Duck had never quite approved of Mark, because though he came and went he never drank, and he sometimes prevented others from doing so. This was unprofitable to them. So matters stood when the noon-hour came and court adjourned for lunch.

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