In the Heart of a Fool

by William Allen White

Morty looked over his clothes to detect the stain of blood, and nodded. “Oh, just a little one. Up all night working with Folsom, but it didn’t amount to anything.”

585Grant sat beside the broken man, and taking his white hand in his big, paw-like hand:

“Morty–Morty–my dear, gentle friend; your trouble is not your body, but your soul. You read these great books, and they fascinate your mind. But they don’t grip your soul; you see these brutal injustices, and they cut your heart; but they don’t reach your will.” The strong hand felt the fluttering pressure of the pale hand in its grasp. Morty looked down, and seemed about to speak.

“Morty,” Grant resumed, “it’s your money–your soul-choking money. You’ve never had a deep, vital, will-moving conviction in your life. You haven’t needed this money. Morty, Morty,” he cried, “what you need is to get out of your dry-rot of a life; let the Holy Ghost in your soul wake up to the glory of serving. Face life barehanded, consecrate your talents–you have enough–to this man’s fight for men. Throw away your miserable back-breaking money. Give it to the poor if you feel like it; it won’t help them particularly.” He shook his head so vigorously that his vigor seemed like anger, and hammered with his claw on the iron bunk. “Money,” he cried and repeated the word, “money not earned in self-respect never helps any one. But to get rid of the damned stuff will revive you; will give you a new interest in life–will change your whole physical body, and then–if you live one hour in the big soul-bursting joy of service you will live forever. But if you die–die as you are, Morty–you’ll die forever. Come.” Grant reached out his arms to Morty and fixed his luminous eyes upon his friend, “Come, come with me,” he pleaded. “That will cure your soul–and it doesn’t matter about your body.”

Morty’s face lighted, and he smiled sympathetically; but the light faded. He dropped his gaze to the floor and sighed. Then he shook his head sadly. “It won’t work, Grant–it won’t work. I’m not built that way. It won’t work.”

His fine sensitive mouth trembled, and he drew a deep breath that ended in a hard dry cough. Then he rose, held out his hand and said:

“Now you watch out, Grant–they’ll get you yet. I tell you it’s awful–that’s the exact word–the way hate has driven this town mad.” He shook the cage door, and the 586jailer came from around a corner, and unlocked the door, and in a moment Morty was walking slowly away with his eyes on the cold steel of the cell-room floor.

When his visitor was gone, Grant Adams went back to his book. At the end of an hour he went to the slit in his cell, which served as window, and looked on a damp courtyard that gave him a narrow slice of Market Street and the Federal court house in the distance. Men and women walking in and out of the little stereoscopic view he had of the street, seemed to the prisoner people in a play, or in another world. They were remote from him. At the gestures they made, the gaits they fell into, the errands they were going upon, the spring that obviously moved them, he gazed as one who sees a dull pantomime. During the middle of the morning, as he looked, he saw Judge Van Dorn’s big, black motor car roll up to the curb before the Federal court house and unload the spare, dried-up, clothes-padded figure of the Judge, who flicked out of Grant’s eyeshot. A hundred other figures passed, and Ahab Wright, with his white side-whiskers bristling testily, came bustling across the stereopticon screen and turned to the court house and was gone. Young Joe Calvin, dismounting from his white horse, came for a second into the picture, and soon after the elder Calvin came trotting along beside Kyle Perry with his heavy-footed gait, and the two turned as the Judge had turned–evidently into the court house, where the Judge had his office.

Grant took up his book. After noon the jailer came with Henry Fenn, who, as Adams’ attorney, visited him daily. But the jailer stood by while the lawyer talked to the prisoner through the bars. Henry Fenn wore a troubled face and Grant saw at once that his friend was worried. So Grant began:

“So you’ve heard my cell-mate’s message–eh, Henry? Well, don’t worry. Tell the boys down in the Valley, whatever they do–to keep off Market Street and out of Harvey to-night.”