CHAPTER XXII.
THE FIRST-BORN.
Slowly she half raised herself from the pillow, her right arm going out as if to shield the tiny bit of life beside her, her great eyes staring at the intruder; the inclination to shriek was met by the paralysis of every faculty and she could do no more than moan once in her fear. The eyes of the tall, gaunt man, upon whose face the fitful light of the candle threw weird shadows, held her motionless.
"Wha—what do you want?" she finally whispered.
"Justine, don't you—don't you know me?" he asked, hoarsely, not conscious of the question, motionless in the doorway.
"Oh, oh," she moaned, tremulously, and then her hand was stretched toward him, wonder, uncertainty, fear in her eyes.
"I am Jud—Jud; don't you know me? Don't be frightened," he went on, mechanically.
"It is a dream—oh, it is a dream," she whispered.
"No, no! I thought you were asleep. Don't look at me, Justine, don't look at me! Oh God, I cannot do it—I cannot!" He fell back against the wall. The knife clattered to the floor. Half convinced, now that she was thoroughly awake, Justine pressed her hand to her eyes, and then, suddenly with a glad cry, threw back the bed covers and sprang to the floor.
"Don't come near me," he cried, drawing back. She paused in amazement.
"What is it, Jud—what is it?" she cried. "Why are you here? What has happened?" The candle dropped from his nerveless fingers.
"Justine!" he groaned, stricken with terror in the darkness. An instant later he felt her warm arms about him and her trembling voice was pleading with him to tell her what had happened. He was next conscious of lying back in the old rocker, listlessly watching her relight the candle. It was freezing cold in the room. His lips and cheeks were warm where she had kissed them. And he had thought to touch her dear, loving lips only after they were cold in the death he was bringing.
"Tell me, Jud, dear Jud," she cried, dropping to her knees beside him, her hands clutching his shoulders. Even in the dim, uncertain light he could see how thin and wan she had grown—he could see the suffering of months. A muffled wail came from the bed and her face turned instantly in that direction. His hand fell heavily upon hers.
"Whose child is that?" he demanded, harshly. She looked up into his face with a quick, startled glance, the bewildered expression in her eyes slowly giving way to one of pain.
"Why, Jud!" she cried, shrinking back. Her honest brown eyes searched his face.
"Is it mine?" he asked, blind with suspicion.
"How could it be any one's but—Oh, Jud Sherrod! Do you mean that—that—you don't think he is—my husband, do you think that of me?" she whispered, slowly shrinking away from him.
"I—I—you did not tell me," he muttered, dazed and bewildered. "How was I to know?"
"Oh, I have loved you so long and so truly," she faltered. A sob of shame and anguish choked her as she arose and turned dizzily toward the bed. She threw herself face downward upon it, her arms across the sleeping babe, and burst out into weeping.
Startled into sanity by the violence of her grief he cast himself on his knees beside the bed.
"I was mad, crazy, Justine," he cried. She shuddered as his hands and arms touched her. "Oh, God!" he groaned. "My wife, my girl, don't shrink from me like that. I did not mean it, I did not know what I was saying. Look up, Justine, my Justine!" He seized her hand and covered it with kisses. At first she struggled to withdraw it; then suddenly abandoned it to him. Presently she pressed it against his lips, and then in an instant her face was turned toward him, the cheeks wet, the eyes swimming.
"Oh, Jud, you did not think it, I know you didn't," she choked out, and sobbed again as he lifted and clasped her to his breast. In that moment he forgot his dreadful mission, forgot the baby and the misery of everything, and she was happier than she had been in months. Once more the tender and thoughtful Jud, he drew the covers over her shivering body and tucked them in, while she smiled happily up into his wan face.
"Don't you want to see the baby, dear?" she asked, timidly, after a long time. He had seated himself on the side of the bed, his coat collar turned up about his chilled throat, his red hands clasped under his arms. "He is three months old, Jud, and you never knew. It is so strange you did not receive my letter. I could not write, though, for many weeks, I was so weak. Oh, Jud, you don't know how much I have suffered."
It was the first complaint she had ever expressed to him in all those weary, despairing months of loneliness and privation, and he covered his face with his hands. She drew them gently away, so that he might look at the baby. It was with a feeling of shame that he first saw his child. Young as it was, it bore the features of its father; there could be no doubt. He gazed upon the little face and the clenched fists, and a deep reverence came to him. Pity for the baby, the mother and himself overcame him and he dropped his head upon Justine's shoulder.
"Justine, forgive me, forgive me," he sobbed.
"There is nothing to forgive, dear. Don't cry," she said, softly. "It will all come right some day and we'll be so proud of the boy. Isn't he strong? Just feel of his little arms. And isn't he just like you? I hope he will grow up to be as good and as strong as you, Jud." He looked dumbly into her eyes, still dewy with tears, and dropped his own, lest she should sec the deceit in them. But she was not looking for deceit.
"You are so cold, dear," she went on, "and you look so ill and tired. Come to bed and let me get up and make some hot coffee for you. Why, Jud, it is past midnight, and it is bitterly cold outside. How did you come from Glenville?"
"I walked," he answered, wearily.
"Walked?" she cried. "Why, Jud, what is wrong? Why are you here? Has anything happened to you?" Her voice was sharp with dread.
"I am the most wretched man in the world, Justine."
"Tell me all about it, Jud; let me help you. Don't look like that! It must be all right, dear, now that we are together. All three, Jud," she went on, cheerily. "I would not even name him before you came, but I want you to call him Dudley." He felt the loving arms tighten about his neck, and there came the eager desire to confess everything and to beg her to hide from the world with him in some place where he could never be found out. The love for Celeste was deep, but it was not like this love for Justine. He must keep it. The other might go; he and Justine and the baby would go away together. But not yet. Justine must not know, after all—at least not yet.
"Everything has gone wrong, dear, and I had nothing to live for," he began, wearily; and then with a skill that surprised him he rushed through with a story that drew the deepest pity from his listener and gave him a breathing spell in which to develop a plan for the future.
"You will loathe and despise me, Justine, but I couldn't bear the thought of going into the hereafter without you," he said, after he had confessed his object in coming. "I had failed in everything and life wasn't worth living. My position is gone, I have no money and I don't seem to be able to find work. You were everything in the world to me and you were so proud of me. I just couldn't come back here and tell you that I had failed after all the chances I have had. When I opened your door to-night I had that knife in my hand. Do not be afraid, dearest; it is all over and we'll live to be happy yet. God help me, I was going to kill you while you slept, kiss you to prove to your departing soul that I loved you and that it was not hate that inspired the deed, and then, the blade, wet with your dear blood, was to find its way to my heart. Thank God, you awoke. Had it not been for that we would be lying here dead, and our boy, hidden in the bed, would have escaped my hand only to be thrown upon the world, a helpless orphan. But God has helped me to-night and He will not again forget me. With His help and your love, I will go forth again with new courage and I'll win my way."
She shuddered and thanked God alternately during his story, and when he paused after the firm declaration to win his way, she cried:
"You have been brave so long and I have been brave, too, Jud. Why should we give up the fight? I have hardly enough to eat in the house, and I have endured more than seemed just from our loving God, but I did not forget that I have you and you are everything. It has been hard, terribly hard, but I did not give up."
Then she confessed her secret, timorously at first, then eagerly, pleadingly. She told him of 'Gene Crawley's reformation, his kindness, his real nobility, expecting at the outset that Jud would be angry and displeased. But he was thinking of the future, not of the past or the present. After a moment or two of surprise and chagrin, he accepted her course in regard to Crawley as a natural condition, and, trusting her implicitly, found no fault with her action. He went so far as to credit Crawley with more manhood than he had suspected. A flood of joy enveloped her when she saw that he was reconciled; the weight of her only deception was lifted from her troubled heart.
Already he was thinking of the ordeal ahead of him: the return to Celeste, the confession of his duplicity, his plea for forgiveness and leniency, and then the life of peace and solitude with Justine and the boy. He knew that Celeste's heart would be crushed, but it was the only way back to the path of honor. Justine should never know of his marriage to Celeste; that was the one thing the honest, virtuous country girl would not forgive. He even found himself, as he always was in emergencies, impatient to have the ordeal over, to know his fate, to give torture to one that he might be happy with the other. With the arms of the real wife about his neck, he trembled with the desire to be off to the side of the deceived one, there to unmask himself, to grovel at her feet and then to fly from the world. How he could face Celeste he knew not, but he must do it. There seemed no way to lighten the blow he must deal and there seemed no escape from it. He was a bigamist, a criminal.
To leave her without an explanation would result in a tireless search, inspired by her love; the discovery of his duplicity by the police would mean conviction; even Celeste could not save him. Shrewdly he brought himself to believe that, though she could not forgive him, she would release him to avoid a scandal. He knew that he must play out to the end his role of the coward and the supplicant and the liar.
It was only after the most persistent pleading that Justine induced him to remain with her through the night and the day following. She promised to keep his visit a secret, respecting his show of humiliation, and she vouched for the silence of Mrs. Crane who slept upstairs. And so the would-be murderer and suicide slept and dreamed and plotted for twenty-four hours in the house of his victim, slinking away on the night after, with her kisses on his lips, her voice in his ears, leaving behind brave promises and the vow to come back to her and the boy without murder in his heart.