As he turned away from the simple vision a figure stole down the alley, furtively looking this way and that, and slipped like a shadow close to the bright kitchen window, peering in, a white anxious face, with a cap drawn low over the eyes, and a reckless set to the expensive coat worn desperately hunched above crouching shoulders.
If Charles Van Rensselaer had lingered just a second longer at the window he might have seen that stealing figure, might have—!
But he turned sharply at the servant’s call and went down to play the polished host, to entertain his unwelcome guests with witty sarcasm and sharp repartee, to give the lie to his heart sorrow, and one more proof to the world that he belonged to a great and old family and bore a name that meant riches and fame and honor wherever he went.
III
When Murray Van Rensselaer slid out from the hospital door into the night he had no fixed idea of where he was going or what he was going to do. His main thought was to get away.
It had been years since he had had to walk anywhere, much less run. There had always been the car. But the car was in atoms and he dared not take a taxi. His feet, so long unused for real work, were nimble enough in dancing, and in all sorts of sports; but now when necessity was upon him, somehow they seemed to fail him. They lagged when he would hasten forward. It seemed to him he crawled.
The blocks ahead of him looked miles away. When he accomplished another corner and rounded it into the next street he felt a great achievement, yet shrank from the new street lest he meet some acquaintance. It was borne in upon him with letters of fire writ with a pen of iron in his soul that he was a murderer, and he must escape from justice. Therefore his unwilling feet were carrying him through the night whither he wist not, whither he would not. It came to him suddenly that he despised himself for fleeing this way, but that he knew his own soul, and that it was not in him to stand and face a murder trial. He could not bear the scorn in his beautiful mother’s face, the bitterness in his father’s eyes. He shrank from the jeers or pity of his companions, from the gentle, sad eyes of Bessie’s mother, from the memory of Bessie’s white face. He could not face a court and a jury, nor fight to save his life. He could not bear the horror of the punishment that would be meted out to him. Even though money might make the penalty light, yet never again could he face the world and be proud of his old family name and carry life with others with a high hand because he was Murray Van Rensselaer; because he had a right to be deferred to, and to rule others, because he had been born into a good and honorable and revered family. He had severed connection with that family! He had smirched the name he bore! He had ruined himself for life! He was a murderer!
These thoughts pursued him through the night as he hurried onward, not knowing whither he went.
Cars shot by him in the street. Twice he ducked away because a familiar face looked out at him from some passing vehicle. Like a dart the thought went through him that he could go their way no longer, be in their world no more. He must always shy away from the face of man. He would never be free again! He had lost everything! The brand of Cain was upon him! Who was Cain? Where had he heard that phrase, “the brand of Cain”?
And then he came within the shadow of his own home.