"No!" I thundered. "A thousand times no!"
"Then plead guilty. My sister, who is a very resourceful and self-possessed girl, turned in the fire alarm as the quickest way to end our little difficulty, and she is in New York this morning, believing that you and I walked out. But it was I who notified the policeman of my discovering a firebug at work in my deserted home. You have given a wrong name, and she will not be interested in the little noise your trial will make—unless, I suppose, you arouse that interest."
He got up to call the warden, and I was upon him as the words left his lips. But I did not harm him much; I had not the time. I dropped him at the muzzle of the warden's pistol, and cooled down at my leisure.
I did not plead guilty; I remained doggedly silent, however, and not even the efforts of the lawyer appointed to defend me availed to mitigate my sentence. I had been caught red-handed, had made a furious assault upon the kindly disposed tenant of the house I had fired, and this, indicating a deep, dark vengeance based upon some real or fancied wrong, brought me the swift, harsh decree of Jersey justice—five years in the Trenton penitentiary. And so not even notifying my captain, I sank out of sight as completely as though I had signed for a voyage and sailed.
Five years behind the bars will alter the character—yes, even the soul—of any man living. And I do not claim that mine was changed for the better. I began that five years with the faint hope that, somehow, Grace Morton would learn of my plight and devise means to free me. Then, as this hope left me with the passing of the months, a dull, apathetic inertia took possession of me, and I worked, ate, and slept as mechanically as an animal. Then came the meridian of my imprisonment, when two years and a half had expired, and I could look forward to release. With this prospect in view my mind woke to a keener activity than it had ever known under the spur of ambition; for that ambition was based upon a love for a girl that was now eclipsed by a hatred for her brother. I looked forward to freedom, not that I might win that girl, but that I might find that man—somewhere, and alone.
As for Grace Morton, the doubt often came to my mind as to whether I ever had loved her. I had really known her only as a prattling child; I had met her once, as a woman, and in the fervor of my sudden emotion had embraced and kissed her. Was that love? Was her acquiescence the sign of a mental invitation, or only the acceptance of a matter of course? Was the sister of such a brother worth loving?
Yet these unsettled doubts invariably crystallized unto the hope that she would so prove herself, and with this hope in mind my plans for vengeance never embraced the killing of my enemy, only the meeting with him, alone in some secluded place, where I could use my superior strength and skill and thrash him within an inch of his life.
In one way my imprisonment had refined me, or rather, worn off the rough spots acquired at sea. Good behavior had brought no commutation of my five years' sentence, but it had brought me light tasks instead of hard ones, and one of these was the care of the prison library, which gave me communion with many good books.
So I emerged at last with none of the working sailor about me except in my mind, and none of the prisoner except the cropped hair and cell pallor. These last I got rid of in a short coasting voyage before the mast, and then, with my chest, money, and discharges replevined from the Philadelphia boarding master who had faithfully cared for them, I visited my old home. Here I learned that my imprisonment was not known and that George Morton and his sister were traveling in Europe for the shattered health of the former. Then, with the unregenerate hope that soon it would be given me to shatter that health still further, I went back to my battle of life, for in love, war, or work a man must live.
Luck was with me from the start. I signed before the mast and filled a sick second mate's place before the ship had reached the line. And at Hongkong found my old captain, who had a first mate's berth vacant, and was glad to get me back without asking questions. A few questions to him, however, brought out the reason of this delicacy.