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Page 25
The man stopped suddenly, and turned with a puzzled look toward where
his wife sat, for she had dropped her head on the table in front of
her, and he had heard her sobbing.
"And what I want to ask of you, sir, is to let me have two years out
of jail to show her how I feel about it. I ask you not to send me back
for life, sir. Give me just two years--two years of my life while I
have some strength left to work for her as she worked for me. I only
want to show her how I care for her _now_. I had the chance, and
I wouldn't take it; and now, sir, I want to show her that I know and
understand--now, when it's too late. It's all I've thought of when I
was in jail, to be able to see her sitting in her own kitchen with her
hands folded, and me working and sweating in the fields for
her--working till every bone ached, trying to make it up to her.
"And I can't!" the man cried, suddenly, losing the control he had
forced upon himself, and tossing his hands up above his head, and with
his eyes fixed hopelessly on the bowed head below him. "I can't! It's
too late. It's too late!"
He turned and faced the crowd and the District Attorney defiantly.
"I'm not crying for the men I killed. They're dead. I can't bring them
back. But she's not dead, and I treated her worse than I treated them.
_She_ never harmed me, nor got in my way, nor angered me. And now,
when I want to do what I can for her in the little time that's left,
_he_ tells you I'm a 'relic of the past,' that civilization's too good
for me, that you must bury me until it's time to bury me for good.
Just when I've got something I _must_ live for, something I've got to
do. Don't you believe me? Don't you understand?"
He turned again toward the Judge, and beat the rail before him
impotently with his wasted hand. "Don't send me back for life!" he
cried. "Give me a few years to work for her--two years, one year--to
show her what I feel here, what I never felt for her before. Look at
her, gentlemen. Look how worn she is and poorly, and look at her
hands, and you men must feel how I feel. I don't ask you for myself. I
don't want to go free on my own account. I am asking it for that
woman--yes, and for myself, too. I am playing to 'get back,'
gentlemen. I've lost what I had, and I want to get back; and," he
cried, querulously, "the game keeps going against me. It's only a few
years' freedom I want. Send me back for thirty years, but not for
life. My God! Judge, don't bury me alive, as that man asked you to.
I'm _not_ civilized, maybe; ways _have_ changed. You are not
the man I knew; you are all strangers to me. But I could learn. I
wouldn't bother you in the old way. I only want to live with her. I
won't harm the rest of you. Give me this last chance. Let me prove
that what I'm saying is true."
The man stopped and stood, opening and shutting his hands upon the
rail, and searching with desperate eagerness from face to face, as one
who has staked all he has watches the wheel spinning his fortune away.
The gentlemen of the jury sat quite motionless, looking straight ahead
at the blinding sun, which came through the high, uncurtained windows
opposite. Outside, the wind banged the shutters against the wall, and
whistled up the street and round the tin corners of the building, but
inside the room was very silent. The Mexicans at the door, who could
not understand, looked curiously at the faces of the men around them,
and made sure that they had missed something of much importance. For a
moment no one moved, until there was a sudden stir around the District
Attorney's table, and the men stepped aside and let the woman pass
them and throw herself against the prisoner's box. The prisoner bent
his tall gaunt figure over the rail, and as the woman pressed his one
hand against her face, touched her shoulders with the other awkwardly.
"There, now," he whispered, soothingly, "don't you take on so. Now you
know how I feel, it's all right; don't take on."
Judge Truax looked at the paper on his desk for some seconds, and
raised his head, coughing as he did so. "It lies--" Judge Truax began,
and then stopped, and began again, in a more certain tone: "It lies at
the discretion of this Court to sentence the prisoner to a term of
imprisonment for two years, or for an indefinite period, or for life.
Owing to--On account of certain circumstances which were--have
arisen--this sentence is suspended. This court stands adjourned."
As he finished he sprang out of his chair impulsively, and with a
quick authoritative nod to the young District Attorney, came quickly
down the steps of the platform. Young Harvey met him at the foot with
wide-open eyes.
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