Kitabı oku: «Tinman», sayfa 6

CHAPTER VI
I Leave the World

Although in my uneasy slumbers I killed Gavin Hockley a hundred times at least – saw him lying at my feet, and realized clearly what I had done – I cannot say that such hauntings filled me with any horror in my waking moments. The thing had been done, and I had the savage certainty that it had been done well. Almost it seemed to me that I had gone before the woman I loved, and cleared the path for her – striking out of my way and hers the noxious thing that had menaced her. That was well done, and the path was clear; what else could matter?

It would be idle to suggest that I did not think about my fate. So many days in which to live, and with each morning one the less; so many times to look upon the faces of those who guarded me; so many meals to be got through; that was all. Then would come that last dreadful morning when they would wake me; when I would get, perhaps, a glimpse of the sunshine for which I longed, and would hear the passing bell; then – "to hang by the neck until you are dead."

In the time that was left me I travelled many, many miles. I seemed to see myself in a sort of perspective, narrowing down to the years that I could first remember, when I had been a child. I saw myself a happy boy at school; remembered the names of other happy boys, who would read of my fate, and shudder at what I had done; for I had been regarded as a gentle, amiable creature at school; I do not think I had ever even fought a boyish battle. They would talk about me – would say: "Why, I knew this chap at school!" and so would gain some temporary notoriety from the knowledge.

I remembered again a happy year or two in an old-fashioned German town; thought with tears of loyal brave friendships formed then – friendships that were never to be broken this side the grave. How we had mapped out then all we were to do – this man a writer, and this other a painter, and this stronger one a soldier! And then I fell to wondering in what obscure place within the prison they would bury me – for my bones to be found afterwards – long, long afterwards; when perhaps they might recall how young I was, and how brutal my crime.

I think they were all sorry for me; I know that they were gentler with me than with other prisoners. Once or twice the man who had prepared my defence came to see me; it seemed that they were preparing a great petition, to save me if possible from the gallows. I protested against that; it was not what I wanted. No living death for me, herded with criminals for the rest of my days; let me walk out as bravely as I could, and face the penalty. I protested strongly against the suggestion that I should be given any other fate than that I had earned. Nor would I in any way give them help for the framing of their petition; they had heard the evidence, and it was true – and what more did they want?

They plagued me to such an extent that at last I refused to see the man at all; but still I understood that the petition went on, and was being signed widely everywhere. I was so young – and, God help me! – so good-looking, they told me – that there was every reason for the hysterical outpourings of sympathy; had I been old and hardened, never a word would have been said.

The good chaplain I listened to – hearing the simple comforting words that I had heard many and many a time in the old days at school. It seemed strange that I should hear them now, in this place, where I was shut away until the time came for them to kill me! My life had been clean and wholesome – there was nothing very heavy that I had to carry before my God, save that slaying of a fellow-man. And it seemed more than possible that God would understand.

The long days dragged themselves out, until there were but three left. I was in a mood to wish that they might hurry the business on; I had begun dreadfully to count the days, and then the hours; and there was a torture in that. I would have welcomed any man who came suddenly into my cell, and announced that then and there I must walk out to die; it was the knowledge that I must wait – must hear the clock in a distant church tower lopping off my life by inches, even in the still watches of the night; that was the terror of it. In mercy they might have stopped that clock – might have tried to cheat me a little as to the progress of the days; but that was all a part of my punishment.

And now I come to a strange thing that happened to me in that place of torture – a strange thing, sent for my comfort. You are to understand that two men watched me night and day, and their watches were relieved at regular intervals. I, who had so little to occupy my attention, came to watch for the changes, and for the new faces that greeted me when the time for changes came round. The men were good fellows, despite their occupation; I put it on record here that they were considerate and even courteous to me; I read a deep pity for me and my fate in the eyes of more than one of them.

It had come to that night when there were but three days left. I had eaten my meal, and had got into my bed; I liked that time best, because of the stillness, and because I liked to feel, poor doomed mortal that I was, that all the great city slept quietly about me, with every man and woman in it each with their separate trouble and their separate grief. I lay a thing apart, condemned to die; and there was in my mind the curious feeling then that it was strange that the needs of the world were such that a fellow-man had been able to say that I should die, and that other fellow-men were appointed to watch me that I did not escape, and that yet another fellow-man had the dreadful task of killing me, just as I had killed Gavin Hockley. Lying on my bed in my cell I thought of all that, and watched the men who were seated silently near me. And then I fell asleep, quite peacefully; and in that sleep I dreamed a dream.

The end wall of my cell was down, and it seemed as though I looked out beyond it over green fields, on to a place I knew. It was just as though one sat in some strange theatre, and saw through where the wall had gone to some scene beyond. At either side of the stage of that theatre, as it were, sat the motionless warders; the auditorium was my cell. And then I thought that I got up from my bed, and passed straight between them, and out to the freedom of the woods and the fields; leaving them motionless, and even looking behind for a moment, and seeing the empty bed there in which I had so recently lain.

I think I knew then, unconsciously, that I must go back to that cell, and that the vision would fade; I am certain that I thought that. But for the moment I was free; I had passed into some strange country, and yet a country I knew. Then, just as in the fairy tales, I seemed to turn a corner, and found myself suddenly in the wood in which I had met Barbara. And it was the most natural thing in the world that she should come towards me out of the wood, smiling, as I had seen her smile before.

It was only when I reached her, and held her hands, and looked into her eyes, that I realized in my dream that she knew what had happened; there were tears in the dear eyes I loved.

"You are sorry for me?" I said, holding her hands. We seemed to be quite alone in the wood, and the sun was shining, just as it had shone on that day I met her first.

"I don't know what to say to you," she replied. "Of course I understand everything about it, and why you did it; I need not ask you about that. It was done for my sake – but oh, the pity of it!"

I remember telling her in my dream that I was quite happy and quite satisfied; I remember impressing upon her that I was not afraid. And then it seemed that we talked of other things, quite as though this death that menaced me had been brushed aside, and could not happen. And when the time came that we seemed to know with certainty that my freedom was done, she put her hands on my shoulders, and looked in my eyes, and spoke words that I remembered distinctly when I woke.

"I want you to understand that I am travelling night and day, and alone, to come to you, Charlie. I have been with my husband in a strange place abroad, where I have heard no news; the dreadful news of you only reached me an hour ago. I am stopping for nothing; my eyes see only one thing – the prison where you lie. I will reach you – God willing – before they kill you."

She kissed my lips; and with the kissing I woke, and looked about me. The warders still sat grim and motionless; one of them, as I stirred, turned and asked if I wanted anything. I thanked him, and said I wanted nothing; and I closed my eyes, and tried again to sleep. But sleep would not come to me, and I thought only of Barbara in the wood, and of what she had said —

"I will reach you – God willing – before they kill you!"

If she came now she must undo all that I had given my life to do; she must spoil my sacrifice. If she reached me before I died, I must begin the fight again, strenuously denying what I knew she would say. I began to tremble at the thought of that; almost I made up my mind that if she reached England in time I would not see her. And yet I repented of that; because I knew that if I refused to see her, she would tell her story to those most interested, and I should be powerless to stop her. I spent the rest of that long night lying awake there, staring at the ceiling of my cell, and wondering what I should do.

With the coming of the day I began to realize that I did not know how near she might be in that race with Death. At any moment she might be here, within my prison; and I might find myself face to face with her and her pleading. For I knew that if once I looked into her eyes, and held her hands, it was all up with me; I must speak the truth. More than that, in the dream I had had of her she had declared that she knew the truth already.

The night of that day came, and once again I found myself in my cell, gradually falling to sleep. And once again the end wall disappeared, and I passed out between the warders into the wood wherein I had met her. The vision was exactly the same as on the previous night; only now it seemed to me that she looked at me more anxiously, and that there was a strange wistfulness in her voice when she said the words: "I will reach you – God willing – before they kill you!"

Strangely enough, I had no thought of stopping her in my dream; I seemed only anxious to look into her eyes, and to hold her hands, and to snatch from that dear contact what comfort I could for the time yet left me on earth. Exactly as on the previous occasion the dream faded again; and I was in my cell, with the patient warders watching, and with the faint murmur of the waking city outside. And now I began to wonder if after all the dream had only been born of my own thoughts and desires – began to hope, even with a sense of disappointment, that perhaps after all she was far away with her young husband, and would only know of my fate long afterwards.

The next night the same thing happened; save that on this occasion I wandered the wood forlornly enough, and could not find her. I remember that I seemed to walk about the sunlit place, calling her name, and hearing nothing; that I thought more than once that I saw her disappearing in the distance, and ran on, crying to her, and finding no one. When I awoke, for the first time since my sentence I found my pillow wet with tears.

One more day and night of life. And now I began violently to long for her; to feel the bitter injustice of dying here in this place without seeing her. With one moment I would pray earnestly that she might not arrive in time; in the next would be faint with longing to hold her hands and hear her voice. It is safe to say that I never lost sight of that girlish figure; I thought of nothing else. The voice of the good chaplain went by me like a thing unheard; if I listened at all, it was to hear him saying over and over again: "Barbara!" – "Barbara!" – "Barbara!" – over and over again as in a sort of chant.

It was growing late in the afternoon, and I was seated on the side of my bed, with my face buried in my hands, thinking. Even then I did not think of the near approach of death; I only longed insanely, now that my hour was coming, to live a little longer, that I might see her. I must have fallen into a sort of stupor; for I know it seemed to me the prison wall was down again, and that once again I had stepped out into the blessed sunlight of the free woods; when I felt a hand laid on my shoulder, and, looking up, saw one of the officials. He said something to me that I did not understand, and I got dazedly to my feet; looking past him, I saw Barbara, with her hands stretched out to me. And she was all in black.

At first I remember that I laughed, and looked stupidly from one to the other of the men about me. Then, at a sign from the man who had spoken, they fell back, and went to the further end of the cell. And I was quite suddenly in her arms.

The beautiful thing about it all was that she was so brave and so strong – braver and stronger than I was. I remember that she comforted me as she might have comforted a child – called me, again and again, her dear, dear boy; whispered again and again that they should not kill me. I was content just to hold her, and to listen to her voice; I thought of nothing else, save of the hopelessness of it all; for I felt that I was wiser than she was, and that I knew the thing to be inevitable. I don't know what power she had exercised, or in what strenuous fashion she had set to work to gain this last interview with me; I only remember with gratitude that they left us alone, and that we sat side by side on the low bed, and talked in whispers. We were both so young that perhaps they relaxed the rules a little, and felt that it did not matter.

"I was far away – abroad – and I had no news," she began.

"Yes, I know," I replied. "And you travelled night and day since then to reach me."

"How did you know that?" she demanded quickly. And then I told her of the dreams I had had, and how I had met her in the wood, and how I had known from her own lips that she was coming to me.

She looked at me strangely, passing one hand over her forehead, as though by that mechanical action to clear her mind. "That is very wonderful, Charlie," she said, when I had told her the words she had used. "I said to myself, over and over again, while the slow trains crawled across the countries, and the slow ship ploughed across the sea – I said again and again those words to myself: 'I will reach you – God willing – before they kill you!' That is very wonderful."

"Nothing is wonderful with us," I replied, with a quick laugh that made the men turn and look at me curiously.

"When I heard what had happened, I scarcely knew at first what to do; and then I knew that I must come back – that I must see you, even if everything else proved hopeless. Lucas would have stopped me; he said it was no affair of mine, and that I must not – should not mix myself up in it. So I got away at night, and came straight to you; it was the least that I could do. Now you are to tell me everything that has happened – everything!"

"You will have heard already, Barbara dear, all that has happened – and why I killed him. It was a quarrel – a matter of money."

She looked at me with a world of understanding in her eyes. "That is what you have told every one; it is not what you can tell me," she said. "Think, dear" – she laid her hand on my arm, and her lips were quivering, although she spoke bravely enough – "you are to die to-morrow; by the love there is between us, you must not let me believe that you killed a man for such a thing as that. Unless you would kill my soul for ever."

"I can tell you nothing else," I replied as steadily as I could. "Perhaps I was not, after all, half so good as you in your love for me believed."

"You will at least not lie to me," she pleaded. "Tell me at least one thing: was there no talk about me between you?"

I did not answer, but my eyes must have done that for me; she went on, with a little quick note of triumph in her voice. "Ah – I begin to understand. He slandered me – said something of me that your love would not allow?"

"Barbara," I broke in hoarsely, "whatever has happened has been done by me of my own free will, and I must pay the penalty. As I hope to meet my God, and as I hope I may be understood then, I beg you will ask me nothing more. I pay with my life; don't take my victory from me."

"Then I was right," she exclaimed quickly. "I seemed to know it from the first. He met me in the wood that day, just as your guardian had done; he had met me before at my father's house. I was afraid of him, as I was afraid of no one else; I could read, as only a woman can read, what was stamped all over him. Oh – my dear – my dear" – she had sunk suddenly to her knees in that dreary place beside the bed on which I sat – "he was not worth it!"

"Let one thing be clear between us – and it is a dying man who speaks," I said, holding her face between my hands, and looking down into her eyes – "you must be silent. No word of this must ever pass your lips, for your own sake – for the sake of every one. The time is coming when you will remember me only as some one who lived, far back in the years, and who loved and worshipped you; and you will keep what is our secret."

"I can't do that; it would shame me for ever," she whispered. "I must speak; I must make them understand."

"If you go out of this place, leaving with me a certainty that you will speak, you kill me doubly," I said earnestly. "Think what it means to me; nothing you can do or say now will save me; that is not in our hands. Let me die, believing that I helped you and saved you, and I die a happy man. Go out and spread your story, and tell the truth, and I die shamed in my own sight, leaving you shamed behind me. Because the lie I tried to kill will spring alive again, to be babbled by a hundred tongues."

"But if I do this – if I promise silence – is there nothing I can do – nothing I can say?" she whispered brokenly.

"There is nothing you can do," I replied solemnly. "Think of this: that in the years that are coming it may happen, in God's own good time, that some child you love may stand in need of a friend who will strike as I struck – fight as I fought – for her honour. It may happen, long after I am dead, and forgotten by all but you, that some such an one may spring up, to do again more perfectly what I did – springing from the dead ashes of my past to work out the pitiful story I began. Remember that – and don't stop me in what I try to do."

I did not know then the full meaning of what I said; all that was to come upon me later. I did not then understand how strangely prophetic my words were, nor how strangely that prophecy was to be fulfilled. For the moment I had succeeded in my purpose; she promised me solemnly that she would keep silence.

Of our farewell I will not speak; she whispered to me words too sacred to be written here. Then, as it seemed, the prison wall went down, and she faded out into the world; the prison wall came up again, and shut me in. But it shut in a stronger and a better man.

I had no further vision of her; my prison had shut me in permanently, and I dreamed of her no more, save in my waking thoughts. I did not sleep that night; I remember that I lay there quietly, with my hands clasped under my head, looking up at the ceiling, and thinking about her; seeing her going on through the long years to come, living her quiet life, and carrying me always in her secret remembrance. That was good; that was very good. Many a man has died with a less blessed thought than that in his mind at the end.

But I was not to die in that sense, after all. Quite early in the morning – that morning on which I had set my mind steadily as the one that meant the end for me – the governor came to my cell, and announced to me that I was reprieved. I was totally unprepared for it; at first I could not understand what he meant. But he told me that on account of my youth the death sentence had been commuted to penal servitude for life.

On account of my youth! I laughed aloud when he said that, because the irony of the thing was so great and so bitter. I was to be shut away for the rest of my natural life – in a living death worse than any I had anticipated. I remember that I prayed him almost wildly to disregard the order – to set it aside – to declare that it had arrived too late; and I know that he seemed surprised that I, so young, should long so ardently for death.

So I passed out of the cell from which I had thought to pass only on one last journey, and went away to the place where I was to serve my sentence. And the only thing that troubled me – the only thing about which I thought at all in that new change of events – was what Barbara would think or do when she knew. For myself I did not care; I had died before, at that moment when the wall of the prison had seemed to go down, and Barbara had gone out of my life.