“He must have met with a change, or else he was always better than I supposed, and had now and then a good streak in him,” she said.
“He had a great many,” Paul rejoined, and then asked if Elithe had seen the paper in which she was said to have been engaged to Jack.
He had read it with a feeling of indignation and torn the article in shreds, wondering if Elithe would see it and what effect it would have upon her. She had seen it. Your best friend is very apt to bring you an uncomplimentary notice of your book or an unkind criticism on yourself, and one of her best friends had shown her this, with the result of a two days headache and darker rings around her eyes. This Miss Hansford told Paul, who, though he knew the story was false, felt so relieved by Elithe’s reception of it that he took a third little pie and ate it without seeming to know that he was doing so. There was but one left, and this he put aside as if for future use, knowing it would please Miss Hansford.
It was nearly time for her to go, and as she tied her bonnet-strings, she said, “Wouldn’t you like me to pray with you?”
She had seen a Prayer Book on a table by his bed and knew there was a good deal in it concerning the Visitation of Prisoners, but Paul’s was an exceptional case, and she was glad when he answered readily, “I wish you would, for if ever a poor wretch needed prayer, I do.”
Falling upon her knees and putting her hands on Paul’s head she prayed earnestly that if there were a God in Heaven he would make it right. She did not say “find the man who killed Jack.” She felt she had him in her grasp, but he was to clear Paul somehow, and make him free again.
Through the window came the words “You bet he will.” Tom was there and stayed there that night until the dawn was breaking and his clothes were wet with the heavy dew. As the day of the trial drew near he was oftener at the jail, speaking comfort to Paul, telling him that the best talent in the State was engaged for the defence and hinting that if that failed he knew a sure way out of it. Paul could not help feeling hopeful after Tom had been with him, and still his sky was very dark and made darker by Clarice’s continual silence and refusal to visit him.
Her first excitement was over, but she took refuge behind nervous prostration as a reason for receiving no one except Mrs. Ralston and a few of her most intimate friends. When those last tried to comfort her she would turn from them almost angrily and say, “Don’t speak to me of happiness, as if it could ever be mine again. Think of all I was anticipating; all the preparations made for nothing. Do you think I can ever forget that I was to have been a bride, and now I am in black for my brother killed, and Paul, who was to have been my husband, is in prison for killing him?”
It was very sad for the girl. The wedding, with all its attendant grandeur, given up,—her bridal trousseau, for which so much had been expended, useless,—herself in black, and worse than all, a growing belief that the shooting had not been wholly accidental; that there had been a quarrel, provoked most likely by Jack, who had paid the penalty with his life. Why Paul did not tell the truth she could not guess. It would go easier with him if he confessed, but in either case it was all over between them. Her mother had counseled silence in this respect and she was keeping silent except so far as actions were concerned. These were eloquent as words and told Mrs. Ralston the real state of her mind. She could not, however, report this to Paul, who asked every day for Clarice and if she were not yet able to come and see him.
“She is very weak and nervous, and the excitement would make her worse,” his mother told him.