|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 2
"What are you going to do?" repeated Conniston.
Keith's face aged even as the dying Englishman stared at him. "I
suppose--I'll go back," he said heavily.
"You mean to Coronation Gulf? You'll return to that stinking mess of
Eskimo igloos? If you do, you'll go mad!"
"I expect to," said Keith. "But it's the only thing left. You know
that. You of all men must know how they've hunted me. If I went south--"
It was Conniston's turn to nod his head, slowly and thoughtfully. "Yes,
of course," he agreed. "They're hunting you hard, and you're giving 'em
a bully chase. But they'll get you, even up there. And I'm--sorry."
Their hands unclasped. Conniston filled his pipe and lighted it. Keith
noticed that he held the lighted taper without a tremor. The nerve of
the man was magnificent.
"I'm sorry," he said again. "I--like you. Do you know, Keith, I wish
we'd been born brothers and you hadn't killed a man. That night I
slipped the ring-dogs on you I felt almost like a devil. I wouldn't say
it if it wasn't for this bally lung. But what's the use of keeping it
back now? It doesn't seem fair to keep a man up in that place for three
years, running from hole to hole like a rat, and then take him down for
a hanging. I know it isn't fair in your case. I feel it. I don't mean
to be inquisitive, old chap, but I'm not believing Departmental 'facts'
any more. I'd make a topping good wager you're not the sort they make
you out. And so I'd like to know--just why--you killed Judge Kirkstone?"
Keith's two fists knotted in the center of the table. Conniston saw his
blue eyes darken for an instant with a savage fire. In that moment
there came a strange silence over the cabin, and in that silence the
incessant and maddening yapping of the little white foxes rose shrilly
over the distant booming and rumbling of the ice.
II
"Why did I kill Judge Kirkstone?" Keith repeated the words slowly.
His clenched hands relaxed, but his eyes held the steady glow of fire.
"What do the Departmental 'facts' tell you, Conniston?"
"That you murdered him in cold blood, and that the honor of the Service
is at stake until you are hung."
"There's a lot in the view-point, isn't there? What if I said I didn't
kill Judge Kirkstone?"
Conniston leaned forward a little too eagerly. The deadly paroxysm
shook his frame again, and when it was over his breath came pantingly,
as if hissing through a sieve. "My God, not Sunday--or Saturday," he
breathed. "Keith, it's coming TOMORROW!"
"No, no, not then," said Keith, choking back something that rose in his
throat. "You'd better lie down again."
Conniston gathered new strength. "And die like a rabbit? No, thank you,
old chap! I'm after facts, and you can't lie to a dying man. Did you
kill Judge Kirkstone?"
"I--don't--know," replied Keith slowly, looking steadily into the
other's eyes. "I think so, and yet I am not positive. I went to his
home that night with the determination to wring justice from him or
kill him. I wish you could look at it all with my eyes, Conniston. You
could if you had known my father. You see, my mother died when I was a
little chap, and my father and I grew up together, chums. I don't
believe I ever thought of him as just simply a father. Fathers are
common. He was more than that. From the time I was ten years old we
were inseparable. I guess I was twenty before he told me of the deadly
feud that existed between him and Kirkstone, and it never troubled me
much--because I didn't think anything would ever come of it--until
Kirkstone got him. Then I realized that all through the years the old
rattlesnake had been watching for his chance. It was a frame-up from
beginning to end, and my father stepped into the trap. Even then he
thought that his political enemies, and not Kirkstone, were at the
bottom of it. We soon discovered the truth. My father got ten years. He
was innocent. And the only man on earth who could prove his innocence
was Kirkstone, the man who was gloating like a Shylock over his pound
of flesh. Conniston, if you had known these things and had been in my
shoes, what would you have done?"
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|