Then he went over to the cabinet and took out a pack of letters, old, yellow, tied with a faded ribbon, and, selecting one at random, sat down in his chair to read it through. “Dear Heart,” it ran at the beginning, and at the end “I am unutterably lonely, and I love you.” Yes, he recalled the circumstances of its writing well. Then he replaced it with the others and laid them all gently on the fire. They should not be pleasant reading for the marshal.
He had come down into the world, with his heart shredded and every shred aching like a nerve, and from that day he had flown the black flag of piracy. Among all the buccaneers of the street, the hand of none had been heavier, and the brain of none had been keener than his own. From that day every man who had passed up a prisoner on to the deck of his galleon, had walked the plank. The muscles of his face grew tense with the thought.
Somewhere in the house a clock struck ten. Carper arose and walked backward and forward across the room. The spirit of fierce resistance was beginning to awaken. He would not be stripped like a weakling. He would fight, fight—but how? It was hopeless to dream of raising the money. That plan had been discarded long ago. Vain vaporing! There was no way remaining but Brutus's way—the road out into the vastness of eternity was open! The exit was easy. Why should he lag back? Surely he must go later on. For years the world had been a good place to get out of—for seven years.
The man opened a drawer at the bottom of the book-case and took out a weapon—an ancient duelling pistol of his grandfather. He carried the weapon to the table, wiped it carefully, and began to load it. When he had finished, he went over to close the door. On the threshold lay one of the evening papers of the city. Carper picked it up and brought it with him to the light. The headlines caught his attention. It was the story of a great bank defaulter who had gone free by reason of some defect in the law shrewdly pointed out by a lawyer, Randolph Mason.
He remembered the man as a remarkable legal misanthrope. He had heard of him in the Federal courts. Somewhere he had this man's address, jotted down one morning when the administrator of an estate walked out of the Federal court a confessed gigantic thief, but, by this man's counsel, beyond the reach of the law.
Carper looked through one of the files on his table—yes, here was the residence number. The man leaned over and rested his arm on the mantel-shelf. One might not do ill to go; there was time ample. One could come back to the thing of steel later on.
Carper turned suddenly, put on his coat and hat, and passed out into the street, closing the door and locking it carefully behind him. Then he called a cab, gave the number to the driver, and leaned back heavily against the cushion.