“Certainly; I have gone into that,” the governor replied. “All the papers remain in the office of the prosecuting attorney, and I have examined them carefully. Now, if Avery had been able to throw suspicion on some one else you’d think he’d have done so. And if there had been a third person at the bungalow that night you’d imagine that Avery would have said so; it’s not in human nature for one man to take the blame for another’s crime, and yet we do hear of such things, and I have read novels and seen plays built upon that idea. But here is Avery with fifteen years more to serve, and, if he’s been bearing the burden and suffering the penalty of another’s sin, I must say that he’s taking it all in an amazing spirit of self-sacrifice.”
“Of course,” said Fullerton, “Reynolds may have had an enemy who followed him there and lay in wait for him. Or Avery may have connived at the crime without being really the assailant. That is conceivable.”
“We’ll change the subject for a moment,” said the governor, “and return to our muttons later.”
He spoke in a low tone to Burgess, who looked at his watch and answered audibly:
“We have half an hour more.”
The governor nodded and, with a whimsical smile, began turning over the tablets.
“These pads were placed before you for a purpose which I will now explain. I apologize for taking advantage of you, but you will pardon me, I’m sure, when I tell you my reason. I’ve dipped into psychology lately with a view to learning something of the mind’s eccentricities. We all do things constantly without conscious effort, as you know; we perform acts automatically without the slightest idea that we are doing them. At meetings of our State boards I’ve noticed that nobody ever uses the pads that are always provided except to scribble on. Many people have that habit of scribbling on anything that’s handy. Hotel keepers knowing this, provide pads of paper ostensibly for memoranda that guests may want to make while at the telephone, but really to keep them from defacing the wall. Left alone with pencil and paper, most of us will scribble something or draw meaningless figures.
“Sometimes it’s indicative of a deliberate turn of mind; again it’s sheer nervousness. After I had discussed this with a well-known psychologist I began watching myself and found that I made a succession of figure eights looped together in a certain way—I’ve been doing it here!
“And now,” he went on with a chuckle, “you gentlemen have been indulging this same propensity as you listened to me. I find on one pad the word Napoleon written twenty times with a lot of flourishes; another has traced a dozen profiles of a man with a bulbous nose: it is the same gentleman, I find, who honored me by drawing me with a triple chin—for which I thank him. And here’s what looks like a dog kennel repeated down the sheet. Still another has sketched the American flag all over the page. If the patriotic gentleman who drew the flag will make himself known, I should like to ask him whether he’s conscious of having done that before?”
“I’m guilty, governor,” Fullerton responded. “I believe it is a habit of mine. I’ve caught myself doing it scores of times.”