In the Heart of a Fool Part 22

"Well, say, Grant," returned Mr. Brotherton, pondering on the subject of the lost pen. "Sometimes I think Tom is just a little too oleaginous--a little too oleaginous," repeated Mr. Brotherton, pleased with his big word.

That June night Henry Fenn pa.s.sed from Congress Street and walked with a steady purpose manifest in his clicking heels. It was not a night's bat that guided his feet, no festive orgy, but the hard, firm footfall of a man who has been drunk a long time--terribly mean drunk. And terribly mean drunk he was. His eyes were blazing, and he mumbled as he walked.

Down Market Street he turned and strode to the corner where the Traders'

National Bank sign shone under the electrics. He looked up, saw a light burning in the office above, and suddenly changed his gait to a tip-toe.

Up the stairs he crept to a door, under which a light was gleaming. He got a firm hold of the k.n.o.b, then turned it quickly, thrust open the door and stepped quietly into the room. He grinned meanly at Tom Van Dorn who, glancing up over his shoulder from his book, saw the white face of Fenn leering at him. Van Dorn knew that this was the time when he must use all the wits he had.

"Why, h.e.l.lo--Henry--h.e.l.lo," said Van Dorn cheerfully. He coughed, in an attempt to swallow the saliva that came rus.h.i.+ng into his mouth. Fenn did not answer, but stood and then began to walk around Van Dorn's desk, eyeing him with glowing-red eyes as he walked. Van Dorn tipped back his chair easily, put his feet on the desk before him, and spoke, "Sit down, Henry--make yourself at home." He cleared his throat nervously.

"Anything gone wrong, Henry?" he asked as the man stood over him glaring at him.

"No," replied Fenn. "No, nothing's gone wrong. I've just got some exhibits here in a law suit. That's all."

He stood over Van Dorn, peering steadfastly at him. First he laid down a torn letter. Van Dorn shuddered almost imperceptibly as he recognized in the crumpled, wrenched paper his writing, but smiled suavely and said, "Well?"

"Well," croaked Fenn pa.s.sionately. "That's exhibit 'A'. I had to fight a h.e.l.l-cat for it; and this," he added as he lay down the silver-mounted pen, "this is exhibit 'B'. I found that in the porch swing this morning when I went out to get my drink hidden under the house." He cackled and Van Dorn's Adam's apple bobbed like a cork upon a wave.

"And this," cried Fenn, as he pulled a revolver, "G.o.d d.a.m.n you, is exhibit 'C'. Now, don't you budge, or I'll blow you to h.e.l.l--and," he added, "I guess I'll do it anyway."

He stood with the revolver at Van Dorn's temple--stood over his victim growling like a raging beast. His finger trembled upon the trigger, and he laughed. "So you were going to have a convenient, inexpensive lady friend, were you, Tom!" Fenn cuffed the powerless man's jaw with an open hand.

"Private snap?" he sneered. "Well, d.a.m.n your soul--here's a lady friend of mine," he poked the cold barrel harder against the trembling man's temple and cried: "Don't wiggle, don't you move." Then he went on: "Kiss her, you d.a.m.ned egg-sucking pup--when you've done flirting with this, I'm going to kill you."

He emphasized the "you," and prodded the man's face with the barrel.

"Henry," whispered Van Dorn, "Henry, for G.o.d's sake, let me talk--give me a show, won't you?"

Fenn moved the barrel of the revolver over between the man's eyes and cried pa.s.sionately: "Oh, yes, I'll give you a show, Tom--the same show you gave me."

He s.h.i.+fted the revolver suddenly and pulled the trigger; the bullet bored a hole through the book on "Anglo-Saxon Supremacy" on the desk.

Fenn drew in a deep breath. With the shot he had spilled some vial of wrath within him, though Van Dorn could not see the change that was creeping into Fenn's haggard face.

"You see she'll shoot, Tom," said Fenn.

Holding the smoking revolver to the man's head, Fenn reached for a chair and sat down. His rage was ebbing, and his mind was clear. He withdrew the weapon a few inches, and cried:

"Don't you budge an inch."

His hand was limp and shaking, but Van Dorn could not see it. "Tom, Tom," he cried. "G.o.d help me--help me." He repeated twice the word "me,"

then he went on:

"For being what I am--only what I am--" he emphasized the "I."

"For giving in to your devil as I give into mine--for falling as I have fallen--on another road--I was going to kill you."

The revolver slipped from his hands. He picked it up by the barrel. He rose crying in a weak voice,

"Oh, Tom, Tom, Tom," Van Dorn was lifting up in his chair, "Tom, Tom, G.o.d help us both poor, h.e.l.l-cursed men," sobbed Fenn, and then with a fearful blow he brought the weapon down and struck the white, false forehead that gleamed beneath Fenn's wet face.

He stood watching the man shudder and close his eyes, watching the blood seep out along a crooked seam, then gush over the face and fine, black hair and silken mustache. A b.l.o.o.d.y flood streamed there while he watched. Then Fenn wiped dry the b.u.t.t of his revolver. He felt of the gash in the forehead, and found that the bone was not crushed. He was sober, and an unnatural calm was upon his brain. He could feel the tears in his eyes. He stood looking at the face of the unconscious man a long, dreadful minute as one who pities rather than hates a foe. Then he stepped to the telephone, called Dr. Nesbit, glanced at the fountain pen and the crumpled letter, burst into a spasm of weeping, and tiptoed out of the room.

CHAPTER XXI

IN WHICH WE SEE A FAT LITTLE RASCAL ON THE RACK

A year and a month and a day, an exceedingly hot day, after Judge Thomas Van Dorn had fallen upon the stair leading to his office and had cut that gash in his forehead which left the white thread of a scar upon his high, broad brow, Judge Van Dorn sat in chambers in his office in the court house, hearing an unimportant matter. Because the day was hot, the Judge wore a gray silk coat, without a vest, and because the matter was unimportant, no newspaper reporters were called in. The matter in hand was highly informal. The Judge, tilted back in his easy chair, toyed with his silken mustache, while counsel for defendant, standing by the desk before which the Judge's chair was swinging, handled the papers representing the defendant's answer, to the plaintiff's pleadings. The plaintiff herself, dressed in rather higher sleeves than would have been thought possible to put upon a human form and make them stand erect, with a rather larger hat than one would have said might be carried by a single human neck without bowing it; the plaintiff above mentioned was rattling the court's paper knife.

Plaintiff's counsel, a callow youth from the law offices of Joseph Calvin, to be exact, Joseph Calvin, Jr., sat meekly on the edge of a small chair in the corner and being a chip of the old block, had little to say. The court and said hereinbefore described plaintiff talked freely between whiles as the counsel for said defendant, Henry Fenn, ran over his papers, looking for particular phrases, statements or exhibits which he desired to present to the court.

It appeared from the desultory reading of the papers by the attorney for the said defendant, Henry Fenn, that he had no desire to impose upon the plaintiff, as above described, any hards.h.i.+ps in the matter and that the agreement reached by counsel as to the disposition of the joint property should be carried out as indicated in the answer submitted to the court--see folio No. 3. Though counsel for defendant smilingly told the court that if the counsel were Henry Fenn, he should not give up property worth at least five thousand dollars in consideration of the cause of action being made cruelty and inhuman treatment rather than drunkenness, but, as counsel explained and as the court agreed when a man gets to going by the booze route he hasn't much sense--referring, of course, to said defendant, Henry Fenn, not present in person.

When counsel for the said defendant had finished, and had put all his papers upon the desk in front of the court, the court reached into his desk, and handed the counsel for defendant a cigar, which with proper apologies to the hereinabove and before described plaintiff, counsel lighted, and said:

"That's certainly a good one."

But as the court was writing upon the back of one of the papers, the court did not respond for a moment, but finally said absently, "Yes,--glad you think so; George Brotherton imports them for me."

And went on writing. Still writing the court said without looking up, "I don't know of anything else."

And the counsel for defendant said he didn't either and putting on his hat, smiling at the plaintiff aforesaid, counsel for said defendant Henry Fenn departed, and after a minute the court ceased writing, folded and blotted the back of the paper, handed it to young Joe Calvin, sitting meekly on the edge of the chair, saying: "Here Joey, take this to the clerk and file it," and Joey got up from the edge of the chair and vanished, closing the door behind him.

"Well?" said the plaintiff.

"Well?" echoed the court.

"Well," reiterated the plaintiff, gazing into the eyes of the court with somewhat more eagerness than the law requires under statute therefore made and provided.

"So it's all over," she continued, and added: "My part."

She rose--this plaintiff hereinbefore mentioned, came to the desk, stood over him a moment, and said softly, much more softly than the code prescribes, "Tom--I hope yours won't be any harder."

Whereupon the court, then and there being as herein above set forth, did with premeditation, and much show of emotion look up into the eyes of said plaintiff, said eyes being tear-dimmed and extraordinarily beautiful as to their coloring to-wit: brown, as to their expression to-wit: sad and full of love, and furthermore the court did with deliberation and after for a moment while he held the heavy bejeweled hand of said plaintiff above mentioned, and did press said hand to his lips and then did draw the said plaintiff closer and whisper:

"G.o.d--G.o.d, Margaret, so do I hope so--so do I."

And perhaps the court for a second thought of a little blue-eyed, fair-haired girl and a gentle woman who lived for him alone in all the world, and perhaps not; for this being a legal paper may set down only such matters as are of evidence. But it is witnessed and may be certified to that the court did drop his eyes for a second or two, that the white thread of a scar upon the forehead of the court did redden for a moment while he held the heavy bejewelled hand of plaintiff, hereinbefore mentioned, and that he did draw a deep breath, and did look out of the window, set high up in the court house, and that he did see the elm trees covering a home which, despite all his perfidy and neglect was full of love for him--love that needed no high sleeves nor great plumy hats, nor twinkling silver bangles, nor jangling gold chatelaines, to make it beautiful. But let us make it of record and set it down here, in this instrument that the court rose, looked into the great brown eyes and the fair face, and seeing the rich, shameless mouth and blazing color upon the features, did then and there fall down in his heart and wors.h.i.+p that mask, and did take the hand that he held in both of his and standing before the woman did cry in a deep voice, full of agony:

"For G.o.d's sake, Margaret, let me come to you now--soon." And she--the plaintiff in this action gazed at the man who had been the court, but who now was man, and replied:

"Only when you may honestly--legally, Tom--it's best for both of us."

They walked to the door. The court pressed a b.u.t.ton as she left, smiling, and when a man appeared with a note book the court said: "I have something to dictate," and the next day young Joseph Calvin handed the following news item to the _Harvey Times_ and to the _South Harvey Derrick_.

"A divorce was granted to-day by Judge Thomas Van Dorn of the district court in chambers to Mrs. Margaret Muller Fenn, from Henry Fenn. Charges of cruel and inhuman treatment filed by the attorneys for Mrs. Fenn were not met by Mr. Fenn and the court granted the decree and it was made absolute. It is understood that a satisfactory settlement of the joint property has been made. Mrs. Fenn will continue to hold the position she has held during the year past as chief clerk in the office of the superintendent of the Harvey Improvement Company. Mr. Fenn is former county attorney and is now engaged in the insurance business, having sold his real estate business to Joseph Calvin this morning."

And thus the decree of divorce between Henry Fenn and Margaret, his wife, whom G.o.d had joined together, was made absolute, and further deponent sayeth not.