Isabelle's eyes caught the headline in the paper she was opening:—
OFFICIALS OF THE ATLANTIC AND PACIFIC BEFORE THE FEDERAL GRAND JURY
JOHN S. LANE, THIRD VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE ROAD, INDICTED
Isabelle's mind suddenly woke to the present, and she began to read breathlessly: "As a result of the recent investigations by the Interstate Commerce Commission of the relation between the Atlantic and Pacific and certain coal properties, officials of that system have been examined by a special Grand Jury, and it is rumored," etc. Isabelle glanced at the date of the paper. It was a month old! Even now, perhaps, her husband was on trial or had already been tried for illegal acts in the conduct of his business, and she knew nothing about it! Another paper had the item: "This time the district attorney under direction from Washington will not be content to convict a few rate clerks or other underlings. The indictment found against one of the vice-presidents of this great corporation that has so successfully and impudently defied the law will create a profound impression upon the whole country. It is a warning to the corporation criminals that the President and his advisers are not to be frightened by calamity-howlers, and will steadfastly pursue their policy of going higher up in their effort to bring the real offenders before the courts. The coming trial before federal Judge Barstow will be followed with intense interest," etc., etc.
Isabelle rapidly uncovered the remaining newspapers, arranging them in the order of dates, and then glanced through every column in search of news about the trial, even to the editorial comments on the action of the Grand Jury. The earlier papers that had the account of the investigation by the Commission had been destroyed unread, but she inferred from what she saw that the affair rose from the complaint of independent mine-owners in Missouri and Indiana that they were discriminated against by the railroad. The federal authorities were trying to establish the fact of conspiracy on the part of the Atlantic and Pacific to control the coal business along its lines. There were hints of an "inside ring," whose operations tended to defraud both stockholders and public….
As she read the wordy columns of report and suspicion, there suddenly shot into Isabelle's mind a memory of a Sunday afternoon in Torso when she and John had ridden by Mr. Freke's mines and John had said in reply to her question, "Mr. Freke and I do business together." Mr. Freke was the president of the Pleasant Valley Coal Company,—a name that occurred often in the newspaper report, the name which had been spread across the black sheds she had seen that Sunday afternoon. Now she remembered, also, that she had had to sign certain papers for transfer of stock when John had sold something to put the money—into coal. And last of all she remembered at the very beginning of her life in Torso the face of that man in her husband's office and how he had begged for cars, and his cry, "My God! I shall go bankrupt!" Out of it all—the newspaper paragraphs, the legal terms, the editorial innuendoes, the memories—there was shaped something like a coherent picture of what this dispute really meant, and her husband's concern in it.
It was now midnight. Isabelle's mind was stung to keen apprehension. She did not know whether John was guilty of what the government was seeking to prove him guilty. She could not judge whether the government was justified in bringing suit against the railroad and its officials. There was doubtless the other side, John's side. Perhaps it was a technical crime, a formal slip, as she had been told it was in other cases where the government had prosecuted railroads. That would come out clearly at the trial, of course. But the fact that stared her in the face was that her husband was to be tried—perhaps was on trial this very day—and she did not even know it! She reached for the papers again and searched for the date of the trial of the coal cases in the federal court. It was to open the nineteenth of March—it was now the twenty-second! And the last paper to reach her was the issue of the eighteenth. The trial had already begun.
Isabelle paced the narrow breadth of her chamber. Her husband was on trial, and he had not written her. His last letters, which she had destroyed, had betrayed signs of irritation, disturbance…. Renault's charge, "The curse of our day is egotism," rang in her ears. She had been so much concerned over her own peace of mind, her own soul, that she had had no room for any perception—even for the man with whom she had lived side by side for ten years! Love or not, satisfaction or not in marriage, it must mean something to live for ten years of life with another human being, eat bread with him, sleep under the same roof with him, bear a child to him…. And there in her silent room Isabelle began to see that there was something in marriage other than emotional satisfaction, other than conventional cohabitation. "Men are given to you women to protect—the best in them!" "You live off their strength,—what do you give them? Sensuality or spirit?" Her husband was a stranger; she had given him nothing but one child.
Isabelle opened her trunks and began to pack. There was a train south from White River at eight-thirty, which connected with the New York express. Molly could follow later with the governess…. She flung the things loosely into the trunks, her mind filled with but one idea. She must get to St. Louis as soon as possible. 'John—my husband—is being tried out there for dishonest conduct in his business, and we are so far apart that he doesn't even mention it in his letters!'
At last, the packing over, she crouched by the embers and tried to warm her numb hands. This burst of decided will which had made her swiftly prepare for the journey gave out for the moment…. What should she do out there, after all? She would merely be in the way and annoy John. And with a strength that startled her came the answer, 'After all, we are man and wife; he is my husband, and he is in trouble!'