HIS LAST CASE
Slowly the bruised and cut lips moved. Faintly came from the maimed throat a hoarse whisper.
"I—did—it! I know this is the end. I'll confess everything!"
Before his death, which followed soon after he had been taken from the swirling waters, Langford Larch made a complete confession, telling how he had killed Mrs. Darcy.
Swiftly went the news to the jail, and later to the courthouse, whence, after a conference between the grave judge and a somewhat disappointed, though perhaps gladly so, prosecutor of the pleas, James Darcy walked forth a free man, honorably discharged from the custody of the court, the indictment against him for murder quashed.
Amy Mason was the first to greet her lover when he stepped away from the bench of the judge, before which he stood to hear himself cleared of the charge.
"Oh, Jimmie boy! I'm so glad!" and her eyes beamed.
"And so am I, Amy. If you knew what I have gone through—"
"As if I didn't know, Jimmie boy! The colonel told me some of it."'
"Did he? Isn't he a trump? Where is he now?"