“Martin,” he asked, “will you try to locate my father? Call the club, and if he isn’t there, try our home. If you get him, give him an idea of what had happened, and ask him to come to me.”
“I’ll do all that I can,” Teddy assured him, and hurried out to the telephone.
He was fortunate in locating Hugh Benton at the Club, catching him just as he was leaving for home. In a very few moments, he gave him a brief outline of the tragic affair.
“I—I’ll be over at once,” said the father in a choked voice. The catastrophe stunned him. He could barely make himself understood, but he added, as assurance for Howard: “I’m going to try to reach my attorney and have him go with me.”
But it was an old and broken man who hung up the telephone and clung to the table for support as he swayed, fighting for courage to carry him through the ordeal he was called on to face—fighting for immediate strength to telephone the man on whom he must rely for present aid.
Howard was pacing nervously up and down, when his father and John Hammond, the celebrated attorney, arrived at the scene of the tragedy. He went to his father manfully.
“I’m terribly sorry, Dad, to have caused this trouble,” he apologized, “but I—I couldn’t help it. The revolver was discharged accidentally. He—he was a coward to the end—he couldn’t even—fight fair.”
“Tell me the entire thing, Howard; just what brought you here, and how it happened.” Mr. Hammond said quietly.
Howard told it all as clearly as he could remember. Once or twice the lawyer interrupted him to ask a question, or to have him make some point a little more definite. At the conclusion, he turned to Hugh.
“This looks like a simple case of self-defense, Benton,” he said, and his tone and off-hand manner gave rising hope to father and son. “The boy came here to protect his sister’s good name—a fight ensued, Druid pulled his revolver—there are witnesses enough here to attest that,” looking about at the sadly morose lot who so short a time before had been merry-makers. “The boy secured possession of it—it was discharged accidentally, or at the worst, discharged in self-defense.”