Torture (Pierson)

by Johnston McCulley

Torture

by

Walter Pierson
Author of “Sleuth of the Rail,” etc.

CHAPTER I.

Out of the Storm.

A NICE night!” exclaimed Joseph Radd, sneering a little as he spoke. “A fine night for a murder!”

He leaned back in the old, rickety chair and laughed mirthlessly. Another gust of wind came tearing across the tumbling river from the heights on the other shore, rocking the shack on its foundation, and rattling the two windows. It swept in through the cracks around the door and made the lamp flicker and almost go out.

“A fine night for a murder!” he repeated, as he got up and went to the door, trying to stuff some old newspapers into the cracks to stop the wind.

The rain seemed to be beating against all sides of the shack in solid sheets. It hammered at the old roof, and now and then a few drops seeped through and fell to the floor. We had moved the table to one corner, beneath a good spot in the roof, and now sat beside it, watching the flickering lamp. There was a fire in the old stove, but we were thankful that it was not so cold that. we were obliged to build a big one. The shack probably would have burned over our heads had we done so.

Joe Radd left the door and resumed his seat beside the table. We continued our conversation, talking in low tones despite the howling of the storm, for we were not eager, you may be sure, to have our words overheard by any one, least of all by some snooping officer of the law.

“Fishing is good!” said Joseph Radd; and he grinned at me through the uncertain light cast by the lamp.

I grinned back at him.

The shack was on the bank of the river above the city. We had rented it two months before. We had fishing gear, too, and now and then, for the sake of appearances, we were compelled to put out and fish. Occasionally we caught enough to dress and sell to one of the retail markets half a mile below, bass and carp and perch and catfish. But that was not the sort of fishing Joe Radd meant.

Perhaps we looked like honest fishermen, and certainly that was our intention. We knew the lingo of the trade, too, and some of its tricks. We lived like honest fishermen of the poorer sort, a thing that we did not like, but we found it necessary.

“Nice life!” Joe Radd said. “And we have put up at the swellest hotels in the country, and quarreled with their managers because the salad dressing wasn't to our taste. Nice life, indeed! But it is profitable, all right!”

We were beginning to find it so, for the police seldom bothered an honest fisherman, we had found. So we fished when it was necessary, for the looks of the thing, and at night we crept away from the shack and went here and there in the city and took what it pleased us to take, especially since there were few safes that were mysteries for Joseph Radd or me.

You understand, of course? We had worked in many localities, and never twice had we followed the same plan. Never had we been convicted. Only a few times had we been arrested, and then only on suspicion. Our finger prints and measurements and photographs never had been taken by men at any police headquarters.

We were doing well. Joe Radd thought so, and so did I. For years we had been together and had worked together, and with Tim Morgan. Our interests were closely allied in many ways.

Morgan lived in a cottage in the city now, posing as a salesman searching for a new position. This gave him a chance to visit the offices of large firms and gather information for us. Jessie Radd was his wife. There had been a time when I had attempted to get her to marry me, but she had preferred Morgan. Despite that, I continued to be right-hand man of Joe Radd, her brother, and tried to treat Morgan decently when we met.

He gathered valuable information for us, you see, did Tim Morgan; and he never visited the shack. Nobody knew that Mrs. Morgan was the sister of Joe Radd, or that I was acquainted with her. We communicated in certain ways, though.

“I don't like the way Tim Morgan has been acting lately,” Joe Radd said now, during. a lull in the storm. “I have an idea that he wants to get rid of us and strike out for himself. I wouldn't care—only for Jessie.”

Let me explain here that Joseph Radd worshiped his sister, and had from childhood. He had not favored her match with Tim Morgan, but had held his tongue because he thought that it meant Jessie's happiness. Joe Radd had wanted Jessie to marry me. I'll never forget the day of the wedding. Joe Radd cried like a baby after the ceremony—acted more like a mother than a brother of the bride.

“You've got her, Tim Morgan!” he had said. “And you be good to her, Tim Morgan, or you'll answer personally to me!”

He watched them like a hawk, too, for a time, but did not seem to see anything wrong. I was not sure, however. I imagined at times that things were not going right with the Morgans, and thought Jessie was too proud to say so—or else that she said nothing because she feared that Joe would hurt Morgan.

We were persons outside the law, of course, and yet we could stand together, be loyal to one another, as well as honest folk. Joe Radd and I, for instance, were as close as two men could be.

“We are friends, John Botter!” he had declared, on one occasion. “When you say that, you've said it all—we're friends!”

And now, while the storm raged, we considered the cracking of a safe in a certain office far downtown, making our plans according to the information we had received from Tim Morgan the day before. We intended to do it the following night.

“Should have been planned for to-night, John,” said Joe Radd. “We'll never have a better night for pulling off a job like that. Fine night for a murder!”

I shuddered at his reiterated phrase, though I did not know why it affected me. Certainly, neither of us intended to kill anybody, nor did we anticipate that anybody would make an attempt on either of our lives.

“The storm is getting on my nerves!” I said.

“There is some hot coffee in the pot, John. Help yourself, and then give me some,” Joe Radd replied. “We'll settle the final details of this affair, and then go to bed. We've got to get up early and fish; that will give us an excuse for going to bed early to-morrow night. Then we can get up again about midnight, and get busy.”

I poured out the coffee, pushed a cup of it across the table to him, and fetched some crackers from the box that did duty as a cupboard for us. Joe Radd always drank his coffee without either sugar or milk, but I was more fastidious. I went to the box again, and re turned with the sugar and a can of condensed cream.

“If what Tim said was right——” I began and then stopped in the middle of the sentence, for a peculiar noise had reached us through the roar of the storm. It sounded like a moan, but died away.

“Nothing!” exclaimed Joe Radd. “I heard it, too. If Tim Morgan was right, and I suppose that he took the trouble to get the correct dope, we can go ahead to-morrow night. The pay-roll money——”

Something seemed to scrape at the side of the shack. Then the wind howled again, and we could not hear the sound. But it had made us nervous.

“I wonder if the rain is undermining this palatial abode of ours?” Joe Radd said. “I'd go out and see, but this storm would drench me before I got three feet from the door. It's one devil of a night to be out, especially down here by the river!”

“It is that!” I agreed. “The storm probably will be over by morning, and to-morrow night the moon will be shining, Which will make our work all the more difficult. We should have done it to-night.”

“Why crack an empty crib?” Joe Radd questioned. “The pay-roll money will be in it to-morrow night, if Morgan gave us the correct dope. And he seldom makes a mistake.”

There came another lull in the storm, and again we heard a scraping sound on one side of the shack. Then something seemed to fall against the door.

Joe Radd sprang across the room and was quick to jerk the door open. A gust of wind rushed in, and a sheet of rain with it. The lamp was extinguished by the sudden blast, but before the light went out I had caught a glimpse of a woman's form. Joe Radd slammed the door shut again.

“Hurry with a light, John!” he called to me. “Let's see what we have here.”

I struck a match, and managed to get the lamp burning again, after having scorched my fingers on the hot chimney Then I turned around to find Joe Radd holding the woman in his arms. She had tottered forward as if completely exhausted. She was drenched, and her clothes were covered with mud.

“Over here with her, Joe!” I exclaimed, sweeping the blankets from one of the bunks. “I'll stir up the fire. She's probably been lost in the storm——”

Joe Radd started to carry her across the room toward the light; but she was not unconscious, and now she lifted her head and tried to get to her feet. I gasped, and Joe Radd cried aloud.

“Jessie! Sister!” he exclaimed.

She made an attempt to speak, but seemed to be struggling to get her breath. The light struck her face now, and I sprang forward to help Joe Radd. Then we both gasped our horror.

There was blood upon her face, that flowed from a cut beside one eye. Blood had matted her hair over one temple, and her lower lip was badly cut and swollen.

We worked like maniacs for a few minutes, getting her to the bunk and forcing her to sit on the edge of it. Joe Radd threw a warm blanket around her shoulders, and I hurried to get a pan of water. She was sobbing now, and making an effort to speak.

“What is it, Jessie? What is it, sister?” Joe Radd was asking, down on his knees before her. “What has happened? Why did you come here on such a night?”

“I thought—I'd never find you!” she gasped. “The wind—almost took my breath.”

Joe Radd poured some of the water on his handkerchief and began bathing her face.

“Did you slip and fall?” he asked. “How did your face get cut? What caused all that blood on your head? And your lip——”

She seemed to straighten, to gain sudden strength, and her eyes flashed angrily for an instant.

“Tim Morgan—did that!” she said.

And then she began sobbing wildly again, putting her hands before her face; and Joe Radd sprang to his feet beside me with murder in his eyes. I remembered his reiterated phrase: “It's a fine night for a murder!”

CHAPTER II.

Too Late.

THERE came a lull in the storm at that moment, and it was silent in the shack save for Jessie's frenzied sobbing and Joe Radd's heavy breathing. Presently the storm seemed to redouble its fury, but none of us noticed it. Joe Radd went down on his knees beside his sister again, and put an arm around her.

“Tell me!” he said.

His voice was calm enough, but I did not like the tone of it; it grated, sounded like a chisel trying to bite into cold steel. Jessie tried to cease her sobbing, and wiped her eyes, and presently she spoke.

“It began soon after we were married—his abuse,” she said. “I was too proud to say anything about it then. You don't know Tim Morgan—you men. You're fools to trust him.”

“I guess he's square enough with us,” Joe Radd said.

“But he isn't. He's been planning to quit you, Joe. The other night he pulled a trick with another man, and left you two out of it.”

That statement startled us, you may be sure. Joe Radd's eyes met mine, and then he turned away again. There are certain rules and regulations observed by those of the underworld, you know. A man does not easily cast aside his pals and pick up others. At least, he is not supposed to be working with two sets of pals at the same time.

“He had a quarrel with this fellow—who calls himself Kentucky Kline,” Jessie went on. “He is a big brute of a man. Tim Morgan always complained that you two were not hard-hearted enough at times. He—he wanted to run with one of his own kind, I suppose.”

She stopped and began sobbing once more. Joe Radd motioned for me to keep silent, and waited for her tempest of tears to be over. Then he patted her on the shoulder.

“Tell me, Jessie,” he said again.

“I don't know what it was they did, but Tim Morgan was out last night, almost until daylight, and when he came back Kentucky Kline was with him. They had lots of money and began dividing it. They were drinking heavily, too. Kentucky Kline left, growling about something, and Tim Morgan went to bed.”

“Go on,” Joe Radd urged, as she stopped and recommenced her sobbing.

“Tim was ugly when he woke, about noon,” she said. “He began drinking again, and when I asked him to stop, he abused me. I tried to find out what he and Kentucky Kline had done, but he told me that it was none of my business. Late in the afternoon, Kentucky Kline came to the house again.”

“What happened then?” Joe Radd asked.

“They quarreled once more. I couldn't understand exactly, but Kentucky Kline seemed to think that Tim Morgan had been unfair in dividing the money—swag, I suppose. Finally, Tim told Kentucky Kline to get out of the house, or he'd throw him out. Kline went away, then.

“I tried to get Tim to talk to me and tell me what he had done, and I said that it wasn't fair for him to be planning things with another man and leaving you boys out of it. I reminded him that you had picked him up when he didn't amount to anything, and had helped him along, and that Joe was my brother. He—he cursed me, then. He told me to attend to my own business, said he was about through with you boys anyway, because you were too tame.”

“And he struck you?” Joe Radd asked.

“He has struck me many times,” Jessie said, “but I always kept it from you. I was afraid that you'd get into trouble with him.”

“You tell me exactly what happened!” Joe Radd commanded.

“Well, he wanted to go out again, and I told him that it was dangerous, He had been drinking, and he always talks too much when he drinks. I told him he might say something that would set the police on his track, might mention you boys. He told me that he was going out anyway. I tried to stop him, and he threw me against the wall. I tried to cling to his arm, begging him to stay at home, and he struck me in the mouth and cut my lip. Then he struck me again and again. I don't know how many times. I ran to the door and rushed out. I couldn't go back, so ] came here.

“I didn't have any money with me, of course, and I was afraid to return and get some. The storm was terrible, and it was a long way here, hut I made it. I slipped and fell several times coming down to the river from the road.”

Jessie began sobbing again then. Joe Radd got to his feet slowly, walked to the corner of the shack, and took his cap from a nail driven in the wall there.

“Joe——” I began.

“Take care of her!” he commanded me.

Then he darted to the door. There was a rush of wind and rain that extinguished the lamp again, and I heard the door slam. Jessie cried out at that, and I made haste to strike a match and light the lamp. Joe Radd was gone.

“John!” Jessie cried, clasping me by the arm. “He'll kill Tim Morgan! I shouldn't have told Joe the truth! Stop him, John!”

“He's up to the road by this time,” I said. “I couldn't find him now.”

“Then you must go after him, John Botter. I am done with Tim Morgan, but I don't want my brother to kill him, and go to the chair for it.”

“Joe'll only beat him up——”

“Don't try to lie to me, John Botter! There never was a brother thought as much of his sister as Joe Radd does of me, and you know it. He told Tim Morgan he'd call him to account if I wasn't treated right, and you know Joe Radd will strike without thinking of the consequences!”

I knew it, all right. Joe Radd would think only of the cuts and bruises on his sister's face. He would not stop to consider whether Tim Morgan was drunk or sober. As soon as he saw Morgan, he would strike. Joe Radd had one of those terrible, deadly cold tempers. The expression of the killer had been in his face when he left the shack, and I knew it.

“I—I'd better not meddle in this, Jessie,” I said.

“But we must save Joe!” she persisted. “He'll not even try to cover his tracks. I know Joe Radd. He'll kill Tim Morgan as soon as he finds him, even if it is in front of a hundred men. He'll go to the chair—or to prison for life. And Tim Morgan isn't worth that much, John Botter. He isn't worth it!”

“But I don't know where to find him, Jessie,” I said helplessly.

“Start, John! Don't stand there like an idiot! Hurry to the cottage—Joe Radd will go there first, probably. If you get there before him, and Tim Morgan is there, you wait until Joe comes, and try to stop him. If you ever loved me, John; if you love me yet——”

She made the right appeal there, said the one thing that would force me to engage in this business, which I felt was between Tim Morgan and his wife's brother. Already, I was taking my cap and rubber coat from the nail in the corner,

“I'll be all right here, John,” she said. “I'll drink some coffee, and bathe my face. You hurry after Joe, and bring him back here as soon as you can. We must save him, John!”

She shielded the lamp by standing in front of it. I opened the door, darted out, and slammed the door behind me, making sure that the catch fell into place. The wind hurled me against the side of the shack and almost took my breath away; the rain pelted me.

I stopped for a moment to pull the collar of my coat up around my neck, and then bent my head and started up the slope away from the river, with the storm swirling around me. It was a terrible night, and when I thought of Jessie making her way through that storm, from the cottage to our shack up the river, stumbling through the mud and facing that wind and pelting rain, I wanted to throttle Tim Morgan myself.

3ut I knew that Jessie had been right. It was not proper that Joe Radd go to the electric chair and have his life snuffed out because he had removed a brute from the world. As she had said, Tim Morgan wasn't worth it. And the chair was such a terrible thing. I had talked once with a man who had been sentenced, and who had lived in the shadow of the chair until two days before the date set for his execution, to be pardoned at almost the last minute because the guilty man, hurt and dying, confessed. I had asked him, like a fool, how it felt. Never will I forget the horror in his voice and on his face as he told me.

I did not want to see my old friend, Joe Radd, face that horror. I knew that he would go to death a stoic in such a case, but I could not endure the thought of it. Jessie was right, I would have to save him, though it meant saving the life of Tim Morgan, too.

Sudden realization of the circumstances seemed to come to me, and I plunged on up the wet, slippery slope toward the distant road, wondering in what direction Joe Radd had gone. I scarcely thought that he had taken the boat and attempted to go down the river, for the boat was heavy for one man to handle, and in such a wind it would be almost impossible.

Anger would give wings to his heels, I knew, and I would have to hasten if I would be before him and save him. Joe Radd would think of nothing except punishing the man who had treated his sister brutally, would not rest until he had accomplished his object.

In time, I reached the road, which was almost knee deep in mud. I tried to make my way along the side of it, close to a fence, where the walking was somewhat better, but where the wind got a clear sweep at me.

On and on I went, the lights of the city always glistening in the distance and seeming to draw no nearer. I passed nobody, saw nothing except those distant lights and a flash of lightning now and then. I was drenched already, half exhausted because of my fight against the force of the storm.

Now I was passing a cottage here and there on the outskirts of the city, and knew that I was not far from the end of a street car line. The road was better here, and I could make more rapid progress. I hurried around a curve, where a hedge cut off some of the wind, and raised my head and looked down the road. There was the arc light that marked the end of the car line; it swung backward and forward as if it would be dashed to the pavement below.

Presently, I was nearer, and I saw that there was a car waiting at the end of the line. I began running now, hoping to catch it before it started on its return trip, for they ran ten minutes apart, and every minute was precious.

I listened for the clanging of the bell, though doubting that I could hear it in the roar of the storm. On and on I ran. I reached the end of the pavement and rushed down the street in water above my ankles. I came to the end of the car, sprang upon it, stood there gasping for breath, happy that I had caught it and would not have to wait for the next.

“Little damp, ain't it?” the conductor asked me. The motorman was inside the car, too, and he looked up with quick interest as I entered.

“Bad storm,” I answered.

I was not thinking of the storm now; I was thinking that, since he was not on this car, Joe Radd must have caught the one before, and that I would be ten minutes behind him. A lot can happen in ten minutes. Men's lives have been changed in less time than that.

“Isn't it about time you're starting?” I asked the motorman, nervously.

“It is,” he replied. “We should have started about forty-five minutes ago, to tell the truth. But the storm has smashed things.”

“You're fooling me!” I cried. “Your lights are burning——”

“Oh, we've got power, but things are smashed farther down, and we've got orders to stay here until told to start, and to report by phone every ten minutes. Line's blocked somewhere, and they don't want any more cars piling up down in the city.”

“I'm in a hurry!” I gasped.

“And you're out of luck,” added the conductor, grinning. “We may be able to pull out in half an hour or so.”

Half an hour or so! And every second Joe Radd, perhaps, was drawing nearer the deed that would stamp him with the brand of Cain. I ran to the door of the car and opened it.

“Going to hoof it?” the motorman cried. “You'll drown, you simp!”

I did not waste time replying to him. I closed the door, vaulted into the rushing water in the street, found the sidewalk, and hurried down it. It was useless, I knew, to expect to find a taxicab in that part of the city, doubly useless to telephone for one and wait until it made the trip against the storm, even if I found a chauffeur who would attempt it.

So I stumbled onward, happy in the knowledge that Joe Radd had not been able to catch a trolley car, either. Perhaps I could overtake him—perhaps could get to the cottage first, and be in time.

I traveled mechanically, my mind dealing with hosts of things as I grew fatigued. Did you ever notice how your mind will race when you are walking a long distance, plodding along minute after minute, mile after mile? I think, looking back at it now, that it was this condition that made possible what happened afterward. I have had physicians tell me as much.

After a time I left the main avenue and cut across town toward the district where Tim Morgan had rented the furnished cottage. The wind had gone down a little, and the rain was not falling in such torrents, so that I was able to make better progress.

I reached the proper street and turned into it, happy in the knowledge that I had only six blocks more to go. Despite my exhausted condition, I ran those last few blocks, that is, I stumbled along and imagined that I was running. I had not seen Joe Radd; I began to fear that he had beaten me to the house.

And then I saw the cottage revealed by a flash of lightning. It was in the middle of the block, and there was no other near it. I ran across the lawn, and stopped at the corner of the building. There was no light shining through the windows.

I used some caution now. I went around to the rear, intending to listen and ascertain whether Joe Radd was there talking to Tim Morgan, or whether they were fighting. I only wanted to be sure of the scene before I broke in upon it.

There was not the slightest sound coming from the cottage. I came to the rear door, stepped close to it. Another flash of lightning showed me that the door was open, and that the rain was driving into the kitchen.

My heart almost ceased beating when I discovered that.

“Tim!” I called guardedly. “Joe Radd! This is John!”

No voice answered mine. I stepped inside and closed the door. I struck a match and looked around the kitchen. There was nothing unusual to be seen.

A small lamp was on a shelf there, and I lighted it, held it above my head, and opened the door that led into the little living room and dining room combined.

Tim Morgan was stretched on the floor. Blood had been flowing from a wound in his breast. A long, sharp knife that belonged to the kitchen was on the floor beside the body, its blade and handle smeared with blood.

I had come too late.

CHAPTER III.

In the Torture Chamber.

FOR a moment, I stood there horrified, trying to realize what had happened and all that it meant. Then thoughts of Joe Radd and Jessie came to me. Tim Morgan deserved to die, I told myself, but the law would not deal leniently with his murderer because of that. Perhaps Joe Radd would be saved from the electric chair, if some good criminal lawyer showed a susceptible jury that he had punished the man who had treated his sister cruelly. But I knew Joe Radd; he was not the sort of man to endure life imprisonment. He would die within five years.

It flashed through my mind that Jessie had sent me to prevent this crime, and that I had failed to do so. Therefore it was my duty to do as much as I could to save Joe Radd.

We never visited the cottage. There was no reason to believe that anybody knew Jessie was Joe Radd's sister, that we were connected in any way. If the police did not find that out, the crime would remain a mystery, provided that we could keep Jessie out of the way.

There were many possibilities. Joe Radd might be caught and convicted and punished, or if the police found Jessie and learned how Tim Morgan had treated her, they might even accuse her of having murdered her husband.

I wondered whether there was anything around the house that would connect Jessie with Joe Radd. The first horror had passed now, and I was moved to action. I dashed into the bedroom and opened drawers there, searching for notes, letters, scraps of paper that might prove damaging. I found nothing, and hurried into a sort of den at the front of the house.

There was a desk in a corner, and I opened it and began tumbling papers out, glancing at them, but finding nothing except meaningless memoranda in Tim Morgan's handwriting. So I rushed back to the living room again.

Once more I glanced down at Tim Morgan's body. I knelt beside it for a moment and picked up the knife, to make sure that it did come from the kitchen and was not one belonging to Joe Radd, which might be traced and so condemn him.

A step sounded behind me. I sprang to my feet and whirled to face the kitchen door. Two men were there, a policeman in uniform and another who, I knew instantly, was a detective. The latter held a revolver and was covering me.

“Put 'em up!” he commanded. “Caught you right, have we?”

I sensed immediately the meaning of his words, and terror gripped me.

“I—I didn't do this!” I screeched.

The policeman drew his revolver and covered me now, while the detective returned his weapon to its holster and stepped toward me. He was a giant of a man with a brutal face. He had been pointed out to me some weeks before as the bloodhound of the force. His name was Simpson.

“Thought it wouldn't be necessary to make a quick get-away, did you?” Simpson sneered. “Thought nobody would hear the row because of the storm, did you? Um! Murder and robbery, eh? House ransacked!”

I didn't do it!” I screeched again. “I was passing, heard a call for help——”

“You couldn't hear a cry as far as the street in this storm!” he told me.

“But I did! There was a lull in the storm——”

“And you answered the cry for help?” Simpson asked incredulously.

“Yes. I found this man on the floor——”

“How did you get in?”

“The back door was open,” I said.

“How did you happen to go round to the back door?” he demanded.

I saw that I was getting into a trap.

“The light was at the back,” I explained. “I just went round to the back and came in.”

“In the first place, if the door was open, the wind would have blown the lamp out,” Simpson said. “In the second place, you're lying. The house was dark until a few minutes ago. The woman down at the corner came here to see if she could borrow some milk. Her baby was sick and she couldn't get through the storm to get some downtown. She heard men quarreling, knew they were fighting, heard a cry of murder. She ran back and called the police and then aroused a neighbor. They watched the house until we came. They say the light went out, and that after a time it burned again.”

“I don't know anything about that!” I protested. “I heard the cry and came in—the light was burning then. I didn't have anything to do with it. I was just going to send for the police——”

“The place is ransacked!” Simpson said.

“I found it that way!” I declared.

I knew it was the only thing to say. Thank Heaven, there was nothing in my pockets that had been taken from the desk drawers! I was thinking only of saving Joe Radd, of saving Jessie.

“Don't lie any more!” Simpson told me. “We watched you through the window—saw you go through that desk! Murder and robbery—that's what it is!”

“I didn't do it!”

“Then who did?' Simpson demanded. “Who are you? Where do you live? What were you doing in this part of town? If you're innocent, talk and prove it!”

Do you see my predicament? How could I reply? Could I say that I was a fisherman and tell where I lived? Could I have Simpson or some other detective going there, finding Jessie, learning Morgan was her husband and had beaten her, that Joe Radd was her brother? Wouldn't that put them on Joe Radd's trail?

“Well?” Simpson asked.

“I had nothing to do with this!” I declared again. “And that's all that I'll say.”

“Oh, we can make you talk, all right!” Simpson declared, grinning evilly at me. “Don't think that we can't. Hold out your wrists!”

There seemed nothing else to do. The handcuffs were snapped on them, and I was taken from the house. A police automobile was waiting in front. They forced me to get into it, and we started downtown through the driving rain and howling wind. Policemen were left behind to take the names of witnesses, guard the house, and watch the remains of Tim Morgan until the coroner or his assistant had made an investigation and ordered the body removed.

Simpson did not speak a word during that journey. I was glad for that, because I wanted to think. Some of those neighbors would know that Morgan had a wife. The police would search for her, wonder what had become of her. I hoped that Joe Radd would keep Jessie out of sight, that he would take her and leave the city at once. They would have a difficult time, I imagined, hanging the crime on me.

Then I thought of the other side of it. It would hurt my own case if I did not tell where I lived and what I did for a living. I could not hope to get free by refusing information about myself—an innocent man does not do that. My predicament was not a minor one after all.

I'd have the night to think it over, I reflected. I'd let the horror of the thing die away and then I'd try to analyze the situation and decide on a way out of trouble. I'd stretch myself on the bunk in my cell, compose myself, get my brain working

“Here we are!” Simpson said.

They took me from the automobile and into the police station. I stood to one side, my manacled hands before me, and said nothing as they booked me on suspicion of murder and attempted robbery. When they asked my name, and the usual questions, I merely glared at them and refused to answer.

The jailer came forward, and he and his assistant searched me. They found nothing except a few dollars in change, a knife, a handkerchief, some tobacco. Now I would be taken to a cell, I supposed, and left until morning.

But Simpson whispered something to the jailer, and he and his assistant conducted me through a long corridor, and to a medium-sized room in the rear. I was somewhat surprised at this. The room had two windows, and outside the windows were networks of steel bars. There was but one door. In the middle of the room was a long table, with four chairs beside it.

Simpson unlocked the handcuffs and removed them. He did not speak a word to me, but he whispered to the jailer. He motioned for me to sit down in the chair at the end of the table, and I did so.

The door opened again, and three other men came in. Two of them, I could tell at a glance, were detectives. The other was a little man, younger than the rest, and he carried a notebook and half a dozen pencils with fine points.

Then I knew. I was going to be put through the third degree. I was in the torture chamber.

I had heard a lot about the third degree. I knew the results officers got, knew how innocent men, unable to endure the refined torture any longer, confessed guilt.

In my case, confession would mean the electric chair. I would have to fight to control my mind and tongue. If I confessed a crime I had not committed, the chair waited for me. If I told the truth, the chair waited for Joe Radd. Can you understand the situation in which I found myself. I feared that third degree. I was afraid they would force me to say things, that they would keep me awake, torture me in a thousand ways, another man taking me in hand when one grew exhausted. I would have to guard my tongue well. I dared not think of the present, for fear I say something that would betray Joe Radd or condemn me.

My long walk through the storm had numbed my brain to a certain extent, and the horror I had seen at the cottage had added to it. I knew that there was but one thing I could do with safety—refuse to talk at all.

And, when the torture got to the point where I could endure it no longer—what then?

Like a flash, it came to me. I would force my brain to deal with other things. These men could shriek at me, pound the table, hurl accusations at me. My body would be there, but my mind would be far away.

I would think of the past, compel my brain to dwell in the past entirely. I would not think of Joe Radd, of Jessie, of Tim Morgan. I would not think of the murder and the charge against me. And, if I did not think of any of these things, no third degree in the world could make me speak of them, and we would all be safe.

Physicians have told me since that I hypnotized myself, in a manner of speaking. I cannot explain it, of course. I can only set it down here as it happened, show what the outcome was for the lot of us.

Simpson and the others sat down. The shades were lifted at the windows, so that the light from the arc at the corner came through and struck my face. There was a cluster of incandescent lights above the long table, and Simpson got up and turned them so that they glared full upon me, while the others were in the shadows. The stenographer had a little light of his own that glowed on his notebook, but did not reach farther.

I glanced quickly around the room, at Simpson, at the other officers, at the stenographer and his little light. I blinked my eyes in the glare. Fools that these detectives were! The bright lights only aided me in my purpose.

Detective Simpson cleared his throat as if to speak—but he did not speak. They all sat still, like so many statutes, and I could not even hear their breathing. The rain beat against the windows and the wind howled—that was ail.

I knew, then. My first ordeal was to be that of the “great silence.” I had heard of it. I had heard men tell what it meant, how that silence grew on one—especially one in the consciousness of guilt—until he begged for mercy, begged that his tormentors speak to him until, to break that horrible silence, he shrieked himself—shrieked his guilt for all the world to hear.

I looked straight at Detective Simpson and grinned to show him that I understood. Then I raised my eyes a trifle, fixed them upon the glaring incandescent lights, and began to think!

My eyes pained, narrowed, became fixed. The cluster of lights became a blur, and in the middle of this blur there appeared a bright spot that gradually grew larger.

This room at the police station, Simpson, the other detectives, the stenographer waiting to take down every word that I spoke, the knowledge of Tim Morgan's murder, of Joe Radd, of Jessie—all seemed to fade away.

I saw nothing except that bright spot, which seemed to extend until it surrounded me, enveloped me, and drew me into its midst. There were myriad flashes of color, every hue of the spectrum. And then a conglomeration of peculiar and grotesque monsters appeared, flashed across my vision before I could identify them, before my brain could register their form and nature. My head began throbbing, my eyes seemed to be closing.

Then there was darkness for an instant, and after that the bright light again. Now the meaningless form and the flashes of color had resolved themselves into a sane whole.

I could understand the vision now!

CHAPTER IV.

Into the Past.

I WAS a boy of nineteen again. My mother was dead, and I lived in a large house with my father and two indifferent servants. My father was a traveling salesman, and was away from home the greater part of the time, sometimes for months at a stretch. The servants had interests of their own; as long as they fed me and prepared a bed for me to use, they did their duty. They had not been engaged to supervise my comings and goings, or to dictate regarding my companions of that impressionable stage of my development.

And so I fell in with a crowd of boys about my own age, and our companionship did not make for sterling manhood. We had arranged a sort of club-room in a barn, and there we read sensational newspapers and planned courageous deeds that we did not carry out. We used to hang around the pool rooms a great deal, and thought it manlike to let our cigarettes hang from the corners of our mouths, and to wear our caps tilted over one ear, to indulge in flaming neckties and to ogle women.

Each of us had a little money, the most of it given by indulgent fathers. Of course, we never worked. We always intended to go to work, when the proper job presented itself, but, in the meantime, we could get along without labor.

Our expenses increased, and there were some of us who found that our fathers would not increase allowances. Then there came a night at the “club” when one of the boys suggested that it ought to be easy enough for courageous chaps to get money without working hard for it. For instance, there was an old factory at the edge of the town, and in it was a quantity of brass and copper. Any junkman would pay a good price for the metal.

Four of us raided the place the following night, and stripped it of what brass and copper we could carry away. We hid the stuff in a little ravine at the edge of the town, and night after night we took more, until we had quite a load.

One of the boys had a pony, and we borrowed a light wagon, and on another night we loaded the stuff and drove to the nearest city. There we found a junk man who did not ask too many questions. We divided quite a sum among us.

That was the start. A boy named Richard Starl had been leader in the adventure, and I had been a sort of second in command. The other boys seemed to look up to us, in a way. After this exploit Dick Starl and I avoided them for we planned other things and did not want to divide proceeds more than once.

Our funds were getting low again, and the allowances our fathers gave us seemed very small. Dick Starl wanted a suit that would cost fifteen dollars more than his father would foot the bill for. I wanted several things. And so we planned.

“I've got it, John!” Dick Starl told me, one night as we walked down the street together after an evening at the club.

“What is it?” I asked.

“You know old Hanson?”

“The miser?” I asked.

“That's what folks call him. You know where he lives—in that little shack at the end of town. John, he keeps all his money out there in the shack, and he must have quite a roll by this time.”

“You are thinking of robbing him?” I asked.

“Why not?” asked Dick Star. “Its not like robbing a decent sort of man. Old Hanson is no good. I snooped around the shack one night last week and watched him counting his money. Then he put out the light, and I couldn't see where he stowed it. But it's in the shack.”

“How can we get it, if we don't know where it is?” I asked.

“You talk like a fool!” said Dick Starl. “We'll make him dig it up. We'll dress in some old clothes down in the ravine, and make masks out of handkerchiefs. You've got a revolver, haven't you? Well, we'll go to his shack when he is alone, at night, and hold him up. I guess he'll dig up the money soon enough if we threaten to kill him.”

“If he recognizes us——” I began.

“How can he? We'll even disguise our voices. After we get the money, we can bind and gag him, hurry back to the ravine, change to our regular clothes, hide the others, and go back to town. We'll put the money away some place where it'll be safe, and spend it a little at a time, so nobody will get suspicious.”

The plan sounded good enough, but I hesitated. Raiding a vacant factory building and carrying away metal was one thing, and holding up a human being was quite another. But I let Dick Starl have his way with me, of course.

We made our arrangements, and finally the night came. We met at the edge of the town, after having arranged for what we called our alibis, and went to the ravine to change our clothes. In ten minutes, we were dressed like tramps.

“It's too early yet,” said Dick Starl.

So we waited in a little ravine, smoking a great deal and saying little. I began to feel afraid and said as much, but Dick Starl laughed at me.

“Come on,” he said after a time.

I had an old revolver in my pocket, for I was to threaten Hanson with it. We went to the end of the ravine, and hurried through the darkness to the miser's cabin. Some distance from it we stopped to listen. Hanson had a lamp burning, though it was almost eleven o'clock now.

We went forward and crouched beneath a window, and Dick Starl raised himself and peered in. Old Hanson was sitting beside his table reading a newspaper, Dick Starl whispered to me. He led the way to the door.

He kicked the door open, and we sprang inside.

“Hands up!” cried Dick Starl.

At the same instant, I stepped forward into the light and covered Hanson with the revolver. I did not expect to have to shoot, but that morning I had cleaned and oiled the old weapon, and filled it with cartridges; it seemed to give me a sense of security.

Dick Starl kicked the door shut as Hanson whirled around and got out of his chair, whimpering, raising his gnarled hands above his head.

“Don't make a move, or say a word!” Dick Starl warned him.

I could see that the old man was terrified. We did not present a pleasant sight in our dirty clothes, with slouch hats pulled down low over our brows, and black handkerchiefs over our faces. I was trembling, but I managed to keep him covered with the revolver and watch him closely.

Dick Starl picked up the newspaper and fastened it across the one little window, so that nobody could see in if they happened to pass that way. And then he turned around to face old Hanson.

“Dig out your money!” he commanded.

Hanson began whimpering again. “I'm a poor man, gentlemen. I haven't any money. I have scarcely enough to eat these hard times——”

“Silence!” commanded Dick Starl. “And don't tell any more lies, or it will be the worse for you. We know you've got money here in this shack. Out with it! We haven't any time to lose. We're desperate men!”

I suppose Dick had read that sort of speech somewhere; it didn't seem to me to ring true. I noticed a peculiar glitter in old Hanson's eyes, too.

“I have only a few dollars, gentlemen,” he said. “If you take that, I'll starve. I just get an odd job to do now and then, and not much for doing it.”

“Stop lying!” Dick shouted. “You work all the time, and howl for top prices, and seldom spend a cent. You're an old miser. I happen to know you got five dollars to-day for garden work, and you overcharged a widow to get it.”

“Ah! So you gentlemen live in the town!” old Hanson said.

I knew that Dick Starl made a mistake, and he knew it, too. But he tried to rectify it.

“No, we don't live in town!” he declared. “But we've heard all about you. Get that money now!”

“It's only a few dollars——

“Want us to shoot you?” Dick interrupted. “We wouldn't hesitate a minute. We could shoot you, and find the money ourselves. Dig it up, and save your precious skin! Quick!”

He took a couple of steps toward old Hanson, who seemed to cringe in sudden fear.

“This is a penitentiary offense, gentlemen,” he said in his thin voice.

“We ain't worrying about that,” Dick told him. “Dig up that coin and do it in a hurry!”

“You won't get any good out of stolen money,” Hanson said. “It'll be a curse to you! Please spare me some of it, gentlemen.”

“Get it—get it all!” Dick Starl commanded.

Old Hanson whimpered again, and then turned around and went to a corner of the cabin. He raised one of the boards in the floor there, and knelt and reached down, and brought out a small sack. He shuffled to the table again and put the sack upon it.

“Be merciful, gentlemen,” he whined. “I am an old man, and that is all the money I have in the world. I'll starve if you take the whole of it. I'm not able to work any more—not much. Soon I'll not be able to work at all.”

“Shut up!” said Dick Starl.

He went to the table, opened the sack, and poured out about twenty-five silver dollars. I was eager to be gone from the old cabin. I had a premonition that trouble was coming, but I tried to tell myself that it was only nervousness.

“Get the rest!” Dick Starl was saying. “Don't try to make us think that this is all you have.”

“I swear to you, gentlemen——”

“And get it quick!” Dick leaned toward him, threatening him. I took a step nearer the table, too, the revolver still held ready before me.

“This will kill me, gentlemen,” Hanson whined. “I'll be penniless in my old age. I've worked and sweated to learn every dollar——”

“Will you get it?” Dick Starl thundered.

Old Hanson seemed to shiver. For an instant, he looked straight at me. Then he whined again, like a kicked cur, and turned once more toward the corner of the cabin.

Again he knelt beside the aperture, and his hand went down into it. He seemed to be groping for something.

“Hurry!” Dick warned.

Old Hanson started to get up. Then he suddenly whirled around with a cry, and we saw that he held an old pistol in his hand.

“I know you, boys! I know you!” he screeched.

At the same instant, he fired his weapon. He was old and trembling, and I doubt whether he took aim. Smoke filled the room, and the bullet buried itself in the wall. Dick Starl sprang toward the door, and in that instant, the revolver I held exploded.

I suppose that I must have pulled the trigger, but I cannot remember doing so. Through the billows of smoke I saw old Hanson drop his pistol, clutch at his breast, and fall. I screeched with fear, whirled around, and darted through the door at Dick Starl's heels.

We ran like madmen, away from the cabin and toward the ravine. We tore off the old clothes and tossed them aside, and put on our own things. We were too frightened to speak to each other at first. We did not think of the money then, did not even realize that Dick had dropped the sack that held the silver dollars.

“You killed him!' Dick whispered hoarsely, as we finished dressing.

“They'll hang us!”

Horror came to me then, a feeling of helplessness. I saw myself on the scaffold, felt the rope around my neck. I think I shrieked again, but I am not sure. I know that Dick Starl said something about getting away, and then ran from me in the darkness.

To get away—that was the thing to do. I had a couple of dollars in my pocket. I had no home ties; my father and I were not comrades. I forgot Dick Starl, forgot everything except the desire to escape.

Through the brush I plunged, and finally came to the railroad. I followed it for some distance, until I reached a water tank where all the freights stopped.

There, crouching behind a pile of ties, I waited until a train came along, and managed to get an empty car without being seen. The train started toward the south.

All night I rode, and the following day I remained hidden while the car stood on a siding. I did not leave it to get anything to eat. That night the car was put onto another train. In time it reached the outskirts of the city, and I dropped off.

I made my way to the poorer part of town, entered a cheap restaurant, and ate like a hungry wolf. I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror back of the counter—my face was white and held an expression of fear. That wouldn't do, I told myself. I would attract attention.

As soon as I had finished eating, I rushed from the restaurant and hurried toward the railroad yards again. My only object was to get as far from the scene of my crime as possible.

I hid behind a shed, watching the switchman making up a train. When it was ready to start, I darted forward.

Then somebody grasped me by the arm, shook me, whirled me around.

“I want you!” he exclaimed.

I saw that it was a policeman who had seized me. I tried to pull away from him, but his hold on my arm tightened.

“I want you!”

“I didn't kill him! I tell you I didn't kill him!” I shrieked. “No—no! I didn't kill him!”

 

“I didn't kill him!”

It was my own voice. I was shrieking with all my might. Detective Simpson had me by the arm and was shaking me.

“Come out of it!” he commanded. “If you didn't kill him, talk and tell us who you are!”

The bright blur faded away, and I saw only the third degree chamber, Simpson, the other detectives, the stenographer, the cluster of incandescent lights.

Were they conquering me? Had they fought me, brought me back from the past? Was my mind weakening? Was I about to say something that would condemn me, or point the way to Joe Radd and Jessie?

CHAPTER V.

Becoming a Criminal.

ONE of them held a glass of water to my lips, and I drank thankfully. The perspiration was standing out on my face, my hands. I seemed to be gasping for breath.

“Out with it!” Simpson thundered. “Tell the truth!”

I realized then that the “great silence” had failed, that I had passed through the ordeal. They had not forced me to speak by that method. What would they attempt now?

“I didn't kill him—that's all!” I declared.

“Who are you? Where do you live? What were you doing in that part of town?”

Simpson volleyed the questions at me. I could not answer them, of course, for my answers would point the way to Joe Radd and I knew it would avail me nothing to give a false name and address. They would know within a short time that I had lied, and that would make things look blacker for me.

Simpson drew a chair up in front of me and sat down. He bent forward until his face was within a foot of mine, and his eyes glared into mine. He had will, did Simpson—but so did I. It was to be a battle between us. If he could conquer my mind, force me to speak, all would be lost. Either I would lie and condemn myself, or I would tell the truth and send Joe Radd to prison or the electric chair. Jessie never would forgive that; and I still loved Jessie.

I turned my eyes away from Simpson's, glanced over his head, and focused my gaze once more on that cluster of incandescents. I tried to force my mind back into the past again, for only by doing that, I felt, could I conquer Simpson, his brutal personality, his commanding brain. Already his voice came to me as if from a distance.

“If you're innocent, tell the truth!” he commanded. “What were you doing in that cottage? Why did you ransack that desk and the dresser drawers? Why did you tell us lies——”

 

“I want you!” the policeman was saying. “You're trying to sneak a ride on that freight, and it won't go! Understand?”

He started to lead me back toward the light on the nearest corner, so as to inspect me better, I supposed. I went along with him quietly enough, for I was badly frightened. Then it flashed through my mind that he had said nothing of the murder of old Hanson, that he had merely picked me up on a charge of vagrancy.

If I was taken to jail, I'd probably remain there for a few days, since I had no money with which to pay a fine. On the other hand, the magistrate might only order me to quit town. But there was danger in going to jail. Suppose the alarm had been sent out, my description furnished? They'd have me, wouldn't they?

We came to the end of a fence that ran around the railroad yards, and as we reached it, I jerked away from the policeman and ran like the wind toward the nearest track and darted behind a string of cars. Behind me came the officer, but more slowly. He shouted and he fired one shot in my direction, but I ran from track to track, losing him in the maze of freight cars there. I doubled back and caught the freight train as it was pulling out and sprang into an empty car.

The train rattled over the switches and bumped its way toward the yard limits. Then fear came to me that it would be stopped at some switch tower, that the policeman would think I had caught the train, and would telephone ahead in an effort to have me caught.

So I tumbled from the car and left the railroad tracks, making my way into the poorer section of the city again. I'd remain there for some time, I thought, and then try to get out of town in some other manner.

I walked the streets for a while, dodging policeman when I saw them, and keeping away from other pedestrians. Morning came. I bought a newspaper from a boy on a corner and began turning the pages eagerly as I walked along.

Soon I found that for which I had been looking. The account stated that old Hanson had been found dead on the floor of his cabin. A pistol was clutched in his hand, and he had fired one shot that had struck the wall. There was another bullet in the framework of his shack. The police believed that this second bullet was from some one else's weapon. Hanson evidently had been the victim of an attempted robbery, the newspaper said, but had frightened the thieves away. He had died of heart disease, due to the excitement of the moment.

I gasped as I read that. So I had not shot him, after all. But I was a fugitive, just the same. For the article went on to say that the local officers were looking for two boys of criminal tendencies who lived in the town, and both of whom were missing.

1 had not realized before that I was a boy of criminal tendencies. I had not dreamed of the nature of the road along which I had allowed myself to drift; but I saw it all now. I tossed the paper away and laughed lightly.

“Well, then I'll be a criminal,” I told myself.

I ate some breakfast, and then walked to the edge of the city, and begged a ride on a truck going to a small town to the south. There I caught a freight train and journeyed to another large city. I begged food when I could, saving the few cents that remained to me.

My destination reached, I made no effort to get work, although I probably could have done so easily enough. I had decided to follow the path of least resistance, to get a living without working for it. Since I had criminal tendencies I would exercise them.

In a section of the city inhabited by questionable characters, I rented a cheap room, the wise landlord granting me credit for a week. Then I mingled with the people of the underworld in resorts they frequented and learned many things. Thus I made the acquaintance of Lefty Williams.

Lefty was a burglar of a sort and, at that time, he had no companion in crime, his pal having been sent to prison for a year because of an attack he had made upon a personal enemy, which had almost resulted in the latter's death. Lefty Williams was far from being well educated, but he could read other men. He seemed to take a liking to me instantly and drew my story from me. He was much older than I, and I talked freely, sensing that I could do so without danger to myself.

He lent me some money, with which I paid the landlord and purchased food. Meanwhile, I was looking around and wondering how to go into a life of crime. I was afraid to enter a house and ransack it, or to hold up a man at the point of a pistol. I scarcely knew which way to turn. I realized that I did not know the tricks of the trade I had elected to follow. If anybody tells you that a life of crime is easy, do not believe it. The successful criminal has a trade to learn, the same as a mechanic.

Then Lefty Williams, having studied me enough to satisfy himself, proposed that I be his associate. I accepted gladly, and the following night, after listening to a lecture by him that took hours, I went to work.

Lefty Williams had explained that I was to be the lookout at first, and he instructed me well in my duties. He intended robbing a house in the better part of the city, and at midnight that night we left the lodging house and went through back streets and alleys until we were away from the lower end of the town.

There we separated, each going to the rendezvous by his own way. I was very careful not to let a policeman see me. I avoided pedestrians and walked the entire distance. Lefty had already arrived when I reached the spot.

He did not chide me for being late; he told me that it was better to be slow and safe. The dashing fellows always got into trouble, he explained.

I took up my station outside the house, in such a position that I could watch front and rear. Williams entered through a window. He remained inside for more than half an hour, and I was greatly relieved when he emerged. He had a bag filled with loot.

“Get back home!” he advised me.

I did not know what he intended doing with the stuff. I knew that it would be dangerous for him to carry that bag through the streets, for the first suspicious policeman would stop him, and Lefty had told me that he had a prison record. He was not ready yet, I supposed, to reveal all his methods to me.

I went home as swiftly as I could and got into bed. I did not see Lefty Williams again until the following evening, and then he gave me forty dollars.

“Your share,” he said. “The silver wasn't as good as I thought it would be.”

I had a suspicion that he had not divided the proceeds squarely, but I was glad to get the forty dollars. I was nothing more than a student, I told myself, and could not expect too much.

During the next two months I helped Lefty Williams several times, and he always gave me some money afterward. I began to get acquainted with others of the underworld, too. By this time, I felt that I was truly launched on my career as a criminal. I scarcely ever thought of my father, and never considered writing him a letter and telling him where I was and what I was doing.

“We're going to pull off something good, youngster,” Lefty Williams told me one afternoon. “This ought to net you a couple of hundred for your share.”

He explained the contemplated crime to me. He was going to rob a safe in a private residence on the night following, having learned in some peculiar fashion that there were valuable jewels in it, and considerable cash, too.

We left the lower end of town separately the next night, and met about midnight at the corner of a little park in the fashionable residence district. We approached the house slowly, alert, constantly on guard. Lefty was to enter a French window on the veranda. He wanted me to go inside with him, and stand just inside the window, watching from there, and holding myself in readiness to help him if any of the servants caused trouble.

It was not difficult to effect an entrance, and then Lefty Williams went on through the hall, and I remained just inside the window, holding it almost closed, looking out, listening, ready to give warning of danger.

But this time the danger came from within. The safe was wired; Lefty had anticipated that, and fixed the wires so that no alarm would be flashed to police headquarters. But he did not know that it was wired doubly.

The secondary alarm system was an interior one. It did not cause a racket when it worked, but it flashed a warning to the master of the house and the servants' quarters, and rang a bell in the garage, over which the two chauffeurs slept.

Lefty had been gone some ten minutes when I thought I heard a door open somewhere. I slipped to the hall entrance, but heard no other sound, and so went back to the window.

Suddenly, the lights were snapped on in the hall, there was a chorus of shouts, a shot, a cry of pain! It was Lefty Williams who gave vent to the agonized exclamation.

At the same instant, the chauffeurs ran up on the veranda and stormed into the living room through the window we had opened, both of them armed and ready for action. I knew that Lefty Williams was either shot or captured, and it was for me to save myself if possible.

I knocked one of them aside and sprang for the open window. A revolver roared, a bullet whistled past my head, but I got out unharmed. One of the men gave chase, calling upon me to stop, saying that he would fire. He did, but I was not touched.

I was off the veranda, now, and speeding across the lawn toward the side street. Huge trees cast friendly shadows and kept the corner light from revealing me. But the chauffeur who followed was a determined man.

I carried no weapon, for Lefty Williams would not allow it, and I realized that the man behind was gaining on me, that he would see me when I crossed the street, would shoot, and perhaps get me. I came to a giant maple tree, darted behind it, and waited for him. As he passed, I sprang at him. Locked in each other's arms, we fell to the ground and began fighting. I knocked the revolver from his hand, but it flew away in the darkness, and I could not find it. My opponent was giving me plenty of trouble. He was older than I, and stronger. It was not an easy battle.

Then I realized that he had drawn a knife from his pocket and, in some manner, had managed to open it. Fear of death came to me, then. I fought like a maniac to get the weapon. I hurled him to one side, got on top, fought and kicked and tried to break his grip on the knife handle.

It fell from his grasp, and we struggled to get possession of it. My fingers reached out, I grasped it, lifted it, struck——

Something warm gushed upon my face as he twisted to get on top of me again. It ran into my eyes and mouth, seemed to choke me——

 

“Give him some more!”

The voice seemed to come from a distance, and it was the voice of Detective Simpson. The bright blur died away again. I realized that once more they had conquered, had brought me back from the past. There was no blood on my face, in my eyes and mouth, It was water they had thrown upon me.

CHAPTER VI.

The Torture Ends.

MORE lukewarm water was thrown into my face. I gasped, sputtered, almost strangled. Simpson stood just in front of me, his eyes glaring into mine, his cruel lips curled into a sneer.

“Now you come out of your trance and talk, or we'll use harsher methods!” he said to me. “I've had about enough of this foolishness.”

“I didn't kill him—didn't kill him!” I cried.

“If you're innocent, you'll stop staring at the ceiling like a fool, and tell us all about yourself.”

That was the thing I could not do, of course. To tell about myself would be to put them on Joe Radd's trail.

Simpson sat down in front of me again, bent forward, and shook his finger in my face.

“Who are you?” he demanded. “Where do you live?”

I glanced over his head and at one of the windows. Dawn was breaking. I had been dwelling in the past longer than I had supposed. I wondered where Joe Radd was, and what he was doing, whether he had had sense enough to take Jessie and go away.

“Answer me!” Simpson roared.

I felt the strength of the man, felt the force of his compelling mind. Under any other circumstances, I would have admired him. But I had to fight him now. I tried to put thoughts of Joe Radd and Jessie out of my mind. I looked at the cluster of incandescents again, gulped as if I was about to speak.

“Answer me!” Simpson roared once more.

I felt myself slipping from the present. Once more I focused my gaze on the bright lights, and the vision returned.

 

I was fighting with the chauffeur. He groaned and rolled to one side. I sprang up, threw away the knife, and ran. I managed to get to my room far downtown, and there I washed the blood from my face and hands and clothes, and went to bed. Thank Heaven, I had arranged a good alibi for that night!

Sleep was out of the question that night. I remained in bed until about nine o'clock in the morning, and then I dressed and left the building, ate breakfast in the usual little restaurant, and bought the early edition of my favorite evening paper, one that paid particular attention to crime and anything sensational.

The story of the robbery was on the front page. It described how the alarm had worked, and said that the servants had surprised a man before the safe, that he had showed fight, and that the butler had shot him. He had died instantly, the report said. The police had identified him as Lefty Williams, who had served several prison terms for burglary.

So Lefty Williams was dead! I read on. The story told of how another man had given battle to a chauffeur, and had stabbed him with his own knife, but that the wound was not serious. I was glad of that, yet I realized that I was guilty of murderous assault, and there were persons who knew that I had been working with Lefty Williams. Suppose one of them happened to be a stool pigeon?

I did not return to the lodging house. I had money in my pocket, so I engaged an automobile and drove to a little town twenty miles away. There took a train for a city in the West. I didn't feel safe until I had reached my destination and had lived there quietly for a month or so.

Then my funds began to get low, of course, and I was compelled to resort to crime again. I never thought of honest labor as a means of livelihood. I was a criminal; that was my trade.

One night I was caught in a saloon brawl and was arrested with several others. A kind judge gave me some advice before he released me on a suspended sentence.

“Young man, you are on the wrong road,” he said. “Get a job, and keep it. The criminal lives in continual fear. He takes his life in his own hands almost every day. His first sentence stamps him as a convict, and every honest man is against him. As a pure business proposition, it does not pay to follow a life of crime.”

When I was outside the courtroom, I sneered at the judge and his words. That night I met Joe Radd.

We took to each other at once, and he introduced me to his sister, Jessie. Joe Radd was about my own age, but had more experience as a burglar. We turned several tricks together, and then left the city and went to another. We had several narrow escapes, but never were caught.

So the years passed. We became firm friends, and I grew to love Jessie Radd. Later we met Tim Morgan and took him in with us. All went well for a time, and then I realized that Tim Morgan was in love with Jessie, also.

They were married, and Joe Radd and I loafed while they had a honeymoon of two weeks. When they returned, we celebrated by blowing a safe in an office building and getting away with something like four thousand dollars.

We went to another city, then, and finally to another, continuing our career of crime.

 

“I'll give you just one more minute to answer!”

It was Simpson's voice. I saw him again, sitting in front of me. Was he to conquer me after all?

The perspiration sprang out on my forehead again. I realized that I had been thinking of Joe Radd and Jessie. Had I spoken? Had I said something that would put Simpson on the trail?

I would have to fight to keep from thinking of them, I told myself. I must force myself to think of something else. I must gain time.

“I didn't kill him!” I shrieked.

“You've told us that before,” Simpson sneered. “And yet you sit there like a dummy and refuse to answer questions.”

He grasped me by the shoulders and shook me violently.

“Speak!” he commanded. “Tell us all about yourself. Tell us all that you know!”

He twisted one of my arms, and I bit my lip to keep from crying out because of the pain. That pain aided me in my intention, too. It was broad daylight outside now, but they had not turned off the cluster of incandescents yet. And so I focused my gaze upon them again, looking over Simpson's head.

 

“As a business proposition, young man, crime doesn't pay!” said the judge. “Think it over!”

I never gave the statement a thought. It had paid me to date, hadn't it? I had been forced to leave home, but what did that amount to? My father was not like a real father to me. In reality I had no home.

I wished that Lefty Williams had lived. We would have turned some great tricks together.

 

What was this? Oh, yes! A crowd watching an automobile race, thousands jammed into the great grand stands, more thousands jostling one another along the course, the big cars whirling by in a rush of dust and smoke, flags flying.

I never had played that part of a dip. It takes skill to pick pockets with safety, and nobody had taught me. Directly in front of me was a jovial fat man who seemed to be the life of the party of which he was a member. He shouted himself purple in the face every time a certain car flashed past. The end of the long race was drawing near. The people were excited.

I crowded forward until I was just behind the fat man. I brushed against him, and he did not notice it. I could feel a fat wallet in his hip pocket.

There were cars within a short distance of one another, each on its last lap. The men and women in that crowd thought of nothing except the winning of the race. I squeezed forward again, dropped my right hand, and got the wallet just as the winner flashed past the flag.

The crowd began to break and crowd upon the track, despite the cries of the guards that there were more cars coming. I went in the opposite direction, you may be sure. When I was at a safe distance, I extracted the money and tossed the wallet away. My little adventure had netted me more than a hundred dollars, and it had been ridiculously easy.

 

And what was this? I saw myself now, and it was in the future. My hair was almost white. I seemed to be in a courtroom that was filled with people. The judge was on the bench, and a jury was just filing in. Then I realized that I was the defendant.

“Guilty of murder in the first degree,” I heard the foreman of the jury report.

Then a night and a day in a cell, and another night, and then I was in court again, and the judge had a black cap on his head. He was sentencing me to death in the electric chair.

“Crime doesn't pay!”

The great, gray prison, and murderers' row!

I knew agony then. The deathwatch sat before the door, never taking his eyes off me. I had a tiny calendar and watched the days pass.

“To-morrow morning,” the guard said, late one afternoon.

I was beside myself with fear—fear of death, of the unknown, of the black chair with its straps and electrodes. I did not sleep that night. They brought me breakfast, but I could not eat. The prison chaplain came to me, and I refused to listen to him.

Then the death warrant was read. The prison barber already had shaved my head where the death-dealing electrode was to rest, and the legs of my trousers had been slit. They were ready to take me along the corridor, through the little green door—the door through which a man never passes except the one way.

Was it possible that a living, breathing man could be rendered lifeless clay in a flash of time? Would death mean pain, agony worse than the anticipation of it? How could I endure it? How could I live in that fear long enough to be strapped into the chair?

The march began. My feet seemed to drag. I tottered, and the chaplain supported me. I saw the little green door open before me, and passed through it.

There was the chair! There was the railing, the small group of witnesses behind I it. There was Detective Simpson, an inscrutable expression on his flabby face.

There were Joe Radd and Jessie!

I almost collapsed. It seemed that there was some reason why I should not recognize Joe Radd and his sister.

“I don't know them!” I shrieked. “I never saw them before!”

 

I was still shrieking.

“I don't know them——”

Had Simpson conquered? Had I spoken while my mind was wandering?

For I saw the third degree chamber again, and the electric lights had been turned off. Simpson and the others were there—yes, and Joe Radd and Jessie!

They stood before me! Had I betrayed them?

“Take it easy, old man!” Simpson was saying. “Here—drink this water!”

“I don't know those people——”

“That's all right! We understand! We're done with you, old man! They have come to take you away with them.”

Simpson's voice was kind, and I could not understand that. I drank the water and started to protest again, but he cut me short. The other detectives were leaving the room, and the stenographer was following them. So their work was done. I must have spoken.

Joe Radd came across the room and helped me to my feet. Jessie stood at my other side.

“Come along, John!” Joe Radd said, pressing my arm to warn me to keep silent.

Bewildered, I followed him toward the door, Jessie clinging to my other arm. Simpson, smiling, ushered us into the corridor.

“I like to see a man loyal,” he said to me. “And you certainly did stick it out, old man. I never saw the like. Good-by, Botter, and keep out of trouble!”

Joe Radd had a taxicab waiting. When we were in it and driving toward the northern end of town, he explained.

“You beat me to Morgan's cottage, John,” he said. “When I got there, the police were on the job. I mixed in the crowd, and saw them take you away, so I hurried back to Jessie. You see, we thought that you had killed him, that you got there first and remembered how he had beaten Jessie. You loved her, of course—so we thought it natural. We intended to keep quiet——”

“And I was keeping quiet because I was afraid they would get you, Joe,” I said. “I thought you had done for Morgan. If you didn't who did?”

“Kentucky Kline—the fellow he had been mixing with. He went back to the cottage and saw Morgan beating Jessie. He saw Jessie run away, and then he went in and quarreled with Morgan again and finally stabbed him. He got away, but started drinking, and a detective overheard him say something about his crime. He broke down and confessed as soon as he was arrested and questioned.”

“But——” I began.

“Wait, John,” Jessie interrupted. “The best of it is, they do not think you are anything but an honest fisherman. Kentucky Kline had heard Tim say that my brother was a fisherman and lived in a shack down by the river at the end of town, but Kentucky Kline did not know that you and Joe were crooks. So the police came and got us, and they have the whole story now—they think.”

“Yes, they believe we are what we pretend to be,” Joe Radd put in. “They know that you used to love Jessie, and that I started from the shack to see Morgan. Simpson thinks you went after me—as you did—and thought that I had killed Morgan, and were keeping silent because you didn't want to see me go to the chair. That is what he meant when he spoke of your being loyal.”

“I've—well, I've been through an ordeal,” I said. “You're my friend for always, Joe. I still love Jessie, and will marry her some day if she will have me. But things have to change.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“They think I am an honest fisherman, and I'm going to be just that from now on, Joe Radd. We have money—we could open a fish market and buy some launches and go into the business right. You must turn honest with me, Joe, or our paths lie apart.”

Jessie crept closer to me, and a smile flashed over her brother's face.

“Then our paths will lie together,” he said. “We'll look for a market site to-morrow.”

We did—and found it. We are prosperous now, and Jessie is my wife. We are all happy, and the feeling of honesty and security is worth more than all the stolen gold in the world. My night of torture is responsible for all that.