"TELL ME TRULY, TOM, DID YOU DO IT?"
"Before God Almighty, Barb," he answered, "I didn't shoot George Lockwood, and I didn't even see him on the camp-ground. I wasn't in that part of the woods, and I hadn't any pistol."
"Tom, I believe you," said Barbara, sobbing on his shoulder. Wondering that her brother did not return her embrace, she looked down and saw his handcuffs, and felt, as she had not before, the horror of his situation.
Mrs. Grayson now gently pushed Barbara aside and approached Tom.
"I didn't do it, mother," said Tom; "I didn't do it."
"Of course you did n't, Tommy; I never thought you did—I just knew you couldn't do it." And she put her trembling arms about him.
Hiram had gone into the corridor from motives of delicacy.
"Couldn't you move him into the east room?" he said to the sheriff. "It's too bad to have to lie in that dungeon, without air, and in August too. And is it necessary to keep his handcuffs on?"
"Well, you see, it's the regular thing to put a man into the dungeon that's up for murder, and to put handcuffs on. The jail's rather weak, you know; and if he should escape—I'd be blamed."
Mason went into the dark room and examined the dirty, uncomfortable cot, and felt of the damp walls. Then he returned to the east room just as Tom was explaining his flight from the camp-ground.
"I saw a rush," he said, "and I went with the rest. A man was telling in the dark that George Lockwood had been shot, and that they were looking for a fellow named Grayson and were going to hang him to the first tree. I ran across the fields to our house, and by the time I got there I saw that I'd made a mistake. I ought to have come straight to Moscow. I went into the house and came out to go to Moscow and give myself up, but I met the sheriff at the gate."
"The first thing is the inquest," said Mason. "Have you thought about a lawyer?"
"There's no use of a lawyer for that," said Tom. "My fool talk about killing Lockwood is circumstantial evidence against me, and I'll certainly be held for trial—unless the real murderer should turn up. And I don't know who that can be. I've puzzled over it all night."
"You studied with Mr. Blackman, I believe," said Mason. "Couldn't you get him to defend you?"
"I don't know that I want him. He's already prejudiced against me. He wouldn't believe that I was innocent, and so he couldn't do any good."
"But you've got to have somebody," said Barbara.
"I've been over the whole list," said Tom, "and I'd rather have Abra'm than anybody else."
"Abra'm 'll do it," said Mrs. Grayson; "I kin git him to do it. He's a little beholden to me fer what I done fer him when he was little. But he's purty new to the law-business, Tommy."
"Abra'm Lincoln's rather new, but he's got a long head for managing a case, and he's honest and friendly to us. The circuit court begins over at Perrysburg to-morrow, and he'll like as not stop at the tavern here for dinner to-day. You might see him, mother."
"Tom! Tom!" The voice was a child's, and it came from the outside of the window-grating. A child's fingers were clutched upon the stones beyond the grating; and before Tom could answer, the brown head of Janet Grayson was lifted to the level of the high, square little window, and her blue eyes were peering into the obscurity of the prison.
