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At eight o'clock Everett handed Katherine into the carriage and gloomily took his place beside her. They were late at the theater by several minutes, when he brushed aside the curtain and ushered Miss Vandecar into the Governor's box. Mrs. Vandecar was seated in the far corner, her attention directed upon the play.
Take back yer brat, and keep yer boy and God forgive me!" So tender was his last petition, that it seemed but a breath whispered into the infinite listening ear of the God above. Katherine, like Fledra, had lapsed into unconsciousness. "She's fainted!" cried Ann. "Oh, Katherine, poor, pretty little Katherine!" "Help her, Ann!" urged Vandecar. "Do something for her!"
"But I couldn't," proceeded the governor, "and the man was taken away to prison without one glance at the woman who was praying to see him. For she loved him more than he did her." "That's a lie!" burst from Cronk's dry puckered lips. "I repeat, she loved him well," insisted Vandecar; "for every breath she took was one of love for him."
He looked back, and, encountering Vandecar's eyes, made appeal to him. "Cronk," the governor said, "do you believe that I am your friend?" The squatter flung about, facing the other. "Yep," he answered slowly, "I know ye be my friend. If ye'll let me walk with my hand in yer'n, I'll go." He said it simply, as a child to a parent. He held out his crooked fingers, and Vandecar seized them.
And I telled the state's lawyer, Floyd Vandecar, this; I says, 'Vandecar, ye be a good man, I be a thief, and ye caught me square, ye did. My little Midge be sick like women is sick sometimes, and she wants me, like every woman wants her man jest then, an' if ye'll let me see her, to stay a bit, I'll go up for twice my time. But he jest laughed till "
You won't be offended, will you, Ann, when I say that until this moment I have never approved of your having him? But I've seldom seen such a face, and he was he was praying, poor baby! Poor, little tormented boy! I wish that he had been awake, or that his sister were here I want to see her, too." "Yes, you should see her. She is very sweet," replied Ann so gravely that Mrs. Vandecar wept again.
Screech Owl hung over him many minutes in a breathless silence; but when Vandecar came in Everett, too, was dead. Then, at last, Scraggy moved toward the door, and, with the same wild cry that had haunted the settlement for so many years, sprang out into the night. From her hiding place in the gulch, Scraggy saw Vandecar and the rest mount the hill.
"The woman camed and camed and haunted me, till my mind were almost gone, and I allers seed the little kid's dead face ag'in' her, and allers she seemed to tell me to haggle the life outen yer kids; and haggle I did, till they runned away, and then I went after 'em, and Flea " Vandecar stopped the speaker with a wave of the hand.
The last words were uttered with such emotional decision that Everett's first real fear rose within him. With difficulty he held back a torrent of words by which he might exonerate himself. Instead, he said: "Some day, Shellington, you'll apologize to me for your implied accusation. You have taken " "Pardon me," Horace interrupted, "but I must ask you to leave. I'm going to Governor Vandecar."
Gathering strength to speak, Katherine sobbed: "Father, Father, I never knew of you until today I didn't know, I didn't know!" In her agony she did not notice the fierce eyes melt with tenderness; but Vandecar saw it with a tumultuous heart. He was waiting to claim the little figure on the floor, that he might take her back to her mother.
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