Chapter V: Part THREE: The Fruit (1)

Prison! I spent eighteen years of my life there. Only it wasn't life, nor even an existence. Without exaggeration, I think that I can justly call it hell. For while my physical body was hammering away at unyielding bars and at the bare walls which held me captive, my mind bruised as it battered itself upon its own uncertainty. By this, I do not mean to corroborate the press statements which suggest that I possess "the warped mind of a killer." I know that I am not insane; but the mark of those years can never be erased.

Unfortunately, there is no way I can find to adequately describe my suffering. But then I am reasonably certain that even the great Russian masters of tragedy--Tolstoi, Maxim Gorki, Dostoievski--would be quick to perceive the emptiness of their words in the telling of my story and would probably throw down their pens in despair. So I will say again that it was simply hell ... the hell of living with my own self and hating it; and tormenting myself with hopelessly unsolvable problems. Even the war that I had managed to survive, with its ever-present threat of pain or death, cannot be compared to the eighteen years I was imprisoned. And that, you will admit, coming from me, is saying something!

By far my favorite book since I first stumbled upon it at the age of twelve or thirteen in my father's library, is Dumas' masterpiece, _The Count of Monte Cristo_. I have read it through many, many times and have never grown tired of it. Even during my term at Sing Sing, I took it out of the prison library at least four or five different times. My cellmates, Bernie Dunbar and "Cupid" Moran, commented upon this. "Say, Pete, ain't that the one you had out last year?" I admitted that it was and persuaded Bernie to read it. "Cupid," after I had given him a brief synopsis of the plot, disgustedly refused to "waste his time with such crap." This rather surprised me. I remembered that "Cupid" was in for life. However, he assured me in no uncertain terms that the Chateau d'If was no worse than some of the "cans" he had been in; that Dantes was a fool for not having hired a smart "mouthpiece" who might have been able to "spring him on a writ"; and that he had never heard of anyone getting by with "a gag like playing dead." But Bernie liked the book very much.

And while my hair did not turn gray and I grew no long beard and I did not spend all of my leisure hours plotting an escape, I feel that I had very much in common with Edmond Dantes. Both of us had left a woman on the outside; both of us had been in love. I think, though--and in all fairness to Dumas' hero--that I suffered the more; for his girl still lived while mine was dead. Moreover, Dantes was not an alleged slayer.

How often did I thump my forehead and try to jar from it some seemingly unimportant fact which might establish either my innocence or my guilt! It would not have made much difference if a jury believed ... just as long as I did.

I had better explain why, since my sentence only called for a maximum of fifteen years, I served three in addition. These were imposed upon me for my part in a scheme to break out. Although I feverishly desired freedom--if for no other reason but to find out whether or not I had really killed Anita--I had no desire to brave the inevitable peril of getting shot. Besides, the plan as it was explained to me by Paul Comstock and "Cupid," seemed utterly foolhardy and impossible. But "Cupid" threatened to "push my face in" if I refused to do what he asked and, remembering that this cellmate of mine had been a prominent gunman in underworld circles, I reluctantly agreed to help out.

It happened that Bernie Dunbar was nearing the end of his stretch. On December 18th--I think it was in the year 1926--he was scheduled to be released. The plan was that he should purchase a speedboat, with funds "Cupid's" mother would provide, and station himself as close to the prison as possible during the week immediately following Christmas. The theory that the guards were paying little attention to the river during the cold weather seemed to assure them of an easy escape. It would prove a cold swim, but the two were determined to take a chance.

I never found out just how they planned to get out of the prison and down to the river. It seemed unfeasible, what with all the high walls, the flood-lights and the guard-towers; and I guess they didn't trust me enough to tell. When I asked "Cupid," he merely winked significantly and announced that "five hundred berries goes a long way." Hence, long having been a bookworm, I imagined stealthy slinking in the shadows of the walls, wholesale slaughter of guards with smuggled pistols equipped with silencers, and lightning, one-minute changes into prison officials' uniforms.

I was not to take part in the actual escape--for which I was inwardly thankful. My reward was to be a crafty underworld lawyer who would appeal my case gratis or pull some mysterious political strings with the Parole Board. In either case, they told me, I could not fail "to be out in no time." It occurred to me that if this was so, it was curious that Bernie, "Cupid" and Paul were in prison at all. But I was shrewd enough to keep my mouth shut. Except for Bernie--who, by the way, never purchased the boat--they are in prison yet.

However, since I was needed in the scheme, I had no choice in the matter. At a given hour, I was to faint or otherwise act very ill. If necessary, I was to thrust a finger down my throat so that I would vomit. When the guards came to remove me to the infirmary, the machine of escape was to be put into action.

"You don't need to worry none," "Cupid" laughed when I expressed the fear that there would be shooting in the cell. "Them guards what are coming are O.K. They're wise and they'll take the count like a gymnasium cowboy with a ten-spot in his glove. Just do like we told you and it'll be as smooth as silk. Yeah. Smooth as silk."

Well, it went smooth as silk. The night arrived and I played sick and the guards came and "Cupid" tried to slug them. Two minutes later, "Cupid" was removed to the prison infirmary instead of me. I was placed in solitary confinement and, since the one guard "Cupid" had managed to hit suffered a slight concussion, I was made to serve three additional years. Paul Comstock, whom "Cupid" was to have released after dispensing with the guards, was never discovered to be a part of the plot. This seemed to me to be rather unfair. I drew the conclusion that Justice was not alone blind, but stupid as well.

* * * * *

Prison, or at least the one I was in, was not very much like the movies, books and plays would have you believe. They would have you look upon it as a living death, with the idea of hoping to discourage potential criminals from embarking upon dishonest careers. This is not true. In all of my eighteen years, I saw no deliberate cruelty. True, I saw a few men handled roughly upon occasion; but in every case this treatment was merited. In Sing Sing, perhaps due to Warden Lawes' admirable innovations, no man is abused if he behaves himself, and no guard will molest a prisoner without justification. Moreover, life is made as bearable for the inmates as possible. Vocations are taught, athletics encouraged, and conditions are made as sanitary and as pleasant as yearly appropriations will permit.

Of course the absence of women companions makes men restless and unhappy. Sex preys upon the minds of the prisoners far more than the sins they are being punished for and the fact that they are no longer free men. Very often insanity results, or perversions and unclean habits are substituted for the normal act of intercourse. This, sadly, is a prevalent practice in all penal institutions and there is nothing that can be done about it. Pains are taken, of course, to segregate those men who have succumbed to various forms of sexual perversion; but it is not rare that a prisoner who begins his sentence normal, ends up quite the reverse. This, in my own humble opinion, is the greatest problem prison officials have still to face.

The desire for women is intensified by the knowledge that they are beyond reach. For myself, I make no pretence that I am of a higher moral fabric than other men. At first I thought that I would lose my mind, so violent was my need for a woman. And in my head, melodramatic as it may sound, there seemed to be a constant beating of drums, throbbing pains that grew more acute and frequent as weeks slipped by. Then, set it down as madness, Gilberte came to me. I tried to fight her memory as she emerged from the obscurity into which my idiocy had plunged her. As I lay on my hard bunk, I tried desperately to replace her vision by thinking of Anita. But Anita, I knew, was dead and during these spells I found it difficult to remember what she looked like.

So, in a semi-conscious state, I felt Gilberte's hand touch my brow and I would suddenly find myself back in France, in the hospital garden. The odor of the flower beds filled my nostrils once more, superimposed upon the fumes of antiseptics and the stench of decaying flesh. In that trance would I relive many moments and over and over would I succumb to the beauty of that one mistake we made.

In the morning when I awakened, I felt much refreshed. I no longer cared that I was in prison for I knew that the dream would come again; this became an obsession with me. But I came to dread the days; my mind was preoccupied with thoughts of Anita.

This is what makes of prison the hell I have named it. Naturally, I consider my own case the most harrowing, but it is very possible that many other convicts suffered equally--if for some other reason. For prison forces men to live with themselves and with their own dark thoughts. It removes the healing ointment of outside diversions: people, changes of scene, any number of things which might help men to forget the past. Now, you can understand why it was doubly bad in my particular case. There was also this: I could not convince myself that I had really murdered my wife, and there was no way I could uncover the truth--my innocence or my guilt--while locked up in a cell.

All through those eighteen years--from the time I went in at the age of twenty-eight, until I grew to be forty-six--I was constantly plagued by the need of knowing the truth. In the prison shop, no matter what job was assigned to me, I took no interest. No activity could provide the answer I so fervently craved. In the yard, the mess hall, the cell-block, Anita's face followed me.

My cellmate, Bernie Dunbar, tried his best to drive out my morbid thoughts. He was a very young man, two or three years my junior. His face was tanned and handsome and, even after eight years, he had not developed what the novelists are pleased to term "prison pallor." His crime was that of robbery and assault with a deadly weapon.

"It wasn't really deadly," Bernie told me, "unless you can call a blank-cartridge pistol a deadly weapon. I stuck up a drugstore. I didn't want to hurt anybody. All I wanted was dough. But when I told the fellow behind the counter to open up the safe, the damned fool started yelling for the cops. Well, what could I do? Stand there and get pinched? I conked him with the butt of the thing and he took a nose-dive."

I made the observation that such a blow might easily cause death. Being myself a druggist, I felt that I should take sides against Bernie. Consequently, when he sighed, shrugged helplessly and asked, "Well, what would _you_ have done?" I forgot that he was putting me in _his_ position and replied, "I would have shouted for the police, too." But, come to think of it, I do not believe I would have done any such thing. Always having carefully preserved my health, undoubtedly I would have opened the safe.

Bernie's method in trying to comfort me was to give detailed accounts of what awful fates awaited many of the other prisoners. He seemed well acquainted with the other inmates of the prison and, in the course of three or four years, succeeded in telling me many ghastly tales. Although he assured me that the stories were all true, I thought some of them sounded somewhat extreme and implausible.

"You know that guy, Barstowe, in the death house? He chopped his mother and father to pieces with an axe. He wanted the insurance money, I guess. And to make it look like someone else had done it, he chopped off one of his own hands. He would have got away with it too, only the damned fool left his finger-prints all over the handle of the thing."

Then: "You know Middleton? He poisoned his girl only she didn't die. Was he burned up! She testified in court and he's in here for twenty years. He told me that he wouldn't have minded serving time, if he had done the job right."

Also: "You know Frank Juliano? As soon as he's finished his stretch here, they've got something else to pin on him. Say, if that boy _ever_ gets out of jail, it'll be a miracle. And you, kicking about your troubles! Why, any day they might find out you didn't knock her off and you'll get sprung. But that guy has _nothing_ to look forward to!"

One day "Cupid," who was usually silent, broke into the conversation. "Yeah? And look at me. I'm here for life. Of course that don't mean forever. I may get paroled in about fifteen or twenty years. But what the hell. I'll be sixty years old! What in Christ's name can a guy do when he's sixty?"

I pretended to sympathize with "Cupid." So did Bernie, for that matter. But in my heart I believed that the world was much better off with "Cupid" under lock and key. He was one of those habitual cases. He was possessed of an inhuman courage that was almost brutishly stupid. Bullets, police, and fellow criminals failed to impress him; for "Cupid" was not intelligent enough to be afraid. Once released, he was certain to re-embark upon his life of crime. And his record, at the time I knew him, was literally dotted with robberies, killings, kidnappings and terms in innumerable penitentiaries. You may be sure that I took pains never to get on the wrong side of this one-man crime wave.

But, despite all Bernie's efforts, I could not forget. Often at night I would have nightmares in which Anita's body would suddenly materialize before me, bloody and full of gaping wounds. Twice, in the throes of these horrible dreams, I rolled off the upper bunk, injuring myself considerably on the cement floor of the cell. Bernie, sympathetic, was gracious enough to change bunks with me, permitting me to take the coveted lower. Even after the change, the nightmares continued. The first night I occupied my new bed, I rolled off again. The fall, from less altitude, did not hurt me much, but it woke up Cupid. He hoisted himself out of bed, seized me roughly by the front of my undershirt, and dealt me a heavy blow on the point of my jaw. Although I landed on my bunk, I was unconscious for over a minute. When I came to, "Cupid" jerked me to my feet and waved his big ham of a fist under my nose.

"Spoil my night's sleep again, you little son of a bitch, and I'll pin your ears back!"

The dreams kept returning each night, but I made sure that I wouldn't fall again. I slept with one wrist caught in the framework of the bunk.

* * * * *

Anita's body was never found. Several bodies were discovered floating in the lake by the police during the years, but not one of them in any way resembled her. Obviously, without the corpse, no hint as to the identity of her slayer could be investigated; and there was no reason why any other opinion should be formed but that I had committed the crime. Accordingly, after the first year of my incarceration, my lawyer, Mr. Bristol, lost all interest in the case. No appeal was ever made in my behalf.

Incidentally, I sold my store, too. With the money I got from The Great Eastern Chain, I engaged the services of a private investigation bureau. This organization unearthed nothing whatever and, when my capital was exhausted, they had the colossal cheek to visit me in prison and inform me that they believed me guilty. This made me very angry. I would not have minded them telling me this if they could have shown some sort of proof. I was spending every cent I had in the world to find out--if only for my own satisfaction--that I was innocent; or--if only to rid myself of doubt--that I was guilty.

Late in the year 1930, Doc Turnbull paid me his last visit. It had been the old man's habit to come once each year to see me. Usually, it was during the summer--that being the only time he could get away from Ithaca. "Sure, son, it's like a vacation. I haven't a relative in the world, thank God, except Sarah. And, well, she's not exactly a relative. She's my wife. So the only one I can visit is you."

In spite of Doc's gruff dismissing of sentiment, I am sure that he thought of me as a son. Through the wire screen of the visiting-room, his homely words of wisdom did much to relieve the great weight I carried.

"Boy, you're looking through field glasses the wrong way. Know what I mean? Hell, no one ever got to first base in this old ball game by living in the past. To hell with yesterday, I say! Why, son, do you know how many men I've killed since I began practicing medicine? Practicing is right! I've been practicing for forty-three years! But does that bother me?"

"But Doc," I said, "if I only knew whether I did it or not! You know I loved Anita and...."

"I don't think you did do it, Pete. But what's the use of thinking about it? No one will ever find out about it now. Too much water has passed under the bridge. Forget it. You're serving time. It won't be long now until you'll be let out. Think of that."

"I am."

"Good. It's only seven years more ... less than that, if you skip Sundays. Why hell, it took me seven years to cure one case alone. The fellow was an alcoholic. Wouldn't let old demon rum alone. Do you know what my treatment was?"

"No."

"I kept drinking his stuff. Never left him much of anything. Gradually, he got used to less and less until...." Here, Doc commenced to chuckle. "... I had to take the cure myself."

Through him, I learned what little there was to know about Ithaca. "You know that Mrs. Michaelson had another heart attack? Third one, Pete. No, nothing serious yet. And say, you ought to see what they've done to your store! More chrome plate in it than a barber-shop! Can you beat it, they sell perfume and _books_! I'm dealing at Ray Cavender's now. Hate to do it, but what can a poor doctor do when he's got some prescriptions to be filled? Those Great Eastern chumps only know how to make sandwiches and sodas. And, oh yes! Remember Leo Carpenter with the blonde moustache that thought he was a doctor? Well, he's not practicing any more, I hear. He went to Vienna shortly after his old man died, you know. Said he was going to study under some of those foreign fakers. Well, Carpenter is writing books now. Medical books. I got one but I can't figure out what it's all about! Every other word is in Latin or Greek or some such uncivilized tongue! And the footnotes! One page text, three pages footnotes! But let me see, there was something else I wanted to tell you.... Sure, I know! Jackie Mackintosh is in reform school! That kid is a regular Jesse James! He robbed three Ithaca stores last summer and a grocery in Owego. They caught him, though, and he confessed."

As he left me that last time, his parting words were: "Now don't forget that there is a future coming, Pete. Turn those old field glasses around and look ahead. You're still a young man ... compared with me! And I'm still looking ahead, you bet! There's plenty of practicing left to do before I can sit back and consider myself a perfect undertaker! Why, I expect to live to be a hundred!"

A month later I learned that he was dead.

Now, whenever I think of old Doc Turnbull, my eyes dim with tears. He was such a fine person. The two of us got along so well together that I like to think that it was only an accident of birth which prevented us from being father and son. Yes, I loved that old man; and if there is such a place as heaven, I know that he's there.

There is little more to be said about the years I spent in prison. For the most part they were dull, each day exactly like the one before, with routine blunting the memory, fortunately. Contrary to the accepted idea of scratching off the days and even the half-days on the calendar, I did no such thing. Prisoners--I think I am safe in the generalization--prefer to forget about time. Their terms seem to pass more quickly if they do not keep themselves conscious of it.

But if, because I have given so little space to my life in prison, you get the erroneous impression that I did not miss so much, remember that while I paced back and forth across twelve feet of cell, radio made its initial appearance in the American home; motion pictures were greatly improved and, at length, made to speak; and Harding, Coolidge, Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt rested their troubled heads on White House pillows. Yes, and much more than that. Came the boom times of '27 and '28, the stock-market crash and the subsequent depression. Lindbergh flew to Paris, Byrd to the Polar regions. European governments were overthrown. Women's skirts grew shorter and longer and then shorter again. Henry made a lady out of Lizzie. Buildings were erected higher than the Woolworth. Fashion decreed that even portly matrons bob their hair. Indeed, the very map of the earth changed during those eighteen years!

Prohibition gave birth to rackets, put teeth into gangdom and lined their pockets with money--before Roosevelt's administration decided to balance the budget. Dillinger played hide and seek. Hauptmann died in the Chair. Bridge became the nation's pastime. Hitler removed his corporal's chevrons. O'Neill managed to get some of his plays produced and Sinclair Lewis tapped out a book or two. Gertrude Ederle swam the Channel. Garbo demanded screen credit. Ice-boxes were made to freeze without ice, stoves to burn without gas. Dollar bills grew smaller in size as in purchasing power.

To this very day I have not seen the George Washington Bridge, the Holland Tunnel to Jersey, or been inside the Music Hall. I did manage to catch a glimpse of the towering Empire State, but only from a great distance.

One day the warden sent for me and when I came into his office he showed me his desk calendar. I saw that it was 1937 and September and a Tuesday. Then he gave me a good cigar, asked me to sit down, and talked to me for a long time.

The next morning, I walked through the prison gates a free man, rather timidly blinking my eyes at a strange world.

* * * * *

The first thing I did when I got out was to take a train for Ithaca. I was fully cognizant of the fact that I no longer had connections there. Doc Turnbull was dead and so was Mrs. Michaelson. However, there was nowhere else to go and, had I not been so determined to find out the truth of things, I really believe I would have turned about-face and begged the Warden to take me in again.

Here I was, penniless almost and without a friend, dead set on finding out about something that had happened fully eighteen years before. But, although it appeared a foolish notion and utterly pointless, I found myself irresistibly drawn to the scene of the crime. Of course I realized that if the police, lawyers and the private detectives I had hired could unearth nothing, it was vain of me to think that I might succeed where they had failed. Nevertheless, I bought my ticket for Ithaca.

There was one emotion I had which authors have described truthfully. Even after several hours, when the novelty of freedom was wearing off, I imagined that people were staring at me. It was decidedly an uncomfortable feeling and I felt very guilty. I had all I could do to assure myself that I had a right to liberty and that I was now once again as much a part of the social scheme of things as anyone else. But eyes continued to bore little holes into my back. Heads that turned, I was sure were turning to stare at me.

Then I realized that it was my clothes. My shoes were prison-made and a size too large. My hat and stiff collar were hopelessly out of date. Therefore, although the train was just pulling into the station, I decided to wait in Ossining until the next one came along. I had a little money--about forty odd dollars--and a small clothier's shop across the street beckoned to me.

"Yes? And what can I do for you, sir?"

"I want almost everything."

"Ah! The works?"

"The works."

"Come this way."

And half an hour later I emerged, my appearance altered. Though the forty dollars represented all the money I possessed in the world, I had spent sixteen of it. Anything was better than being stared at.

* * * * *

Coming back to my home town after so long an absence brought a mist to my eyes. I thought of Odysseus in Homer's epic, returning to Ithaca and Penelope. I remembered the poem well because we had been forced to study it at Ithaca High. Well, I was returning to Ithaca, all right; but I had done no wandering, certainly; and there was no Penelope weaving and waiting for me. That death shroud had been finished years and years ago.

There weren't many changes in the station, I noticed as I stepped from the coach. There was a fresh coat of paint on the long row of wooden freight warehouses; and the bricks of the waiting-room had lately been sandblasted; but that was all.

I walked up State Street toward the center of town. Ithaca had grown. On many blocks which, in my time, had been devoted to homes, were stores. Of course, many of the older markets and shops were familiar to me, but State Street, as a whole, was disappointing.

Ahead of me stretched the main thoroughfare, bordered on either side by restaurants, two motion-picture palaces and department stores. Only when it curved sharply up the hill toward the Cornell campus, was it familiar. There, scattered beyond the few garage buildings, were houses I knew. People I had once known lived in them.... But no. Probably not any more. More likely they had retreated before the expanding business area to the still lovely portions over-looking the lake.

As I neared the corner where my store had been, I felt a stranger, excommunicated, forgotten. The faces milling around me, going in and out of the markets, were strange faces, and somehow I imagined that they looked at me aggressively. I went along, half-expecting at any moment that someone would recognize me and call out my name. But no one did.

It was then that I clumsily stumbled over a little boy who was squatting at the curb, rolling some toy or other near the edge of the sidewalk. I picked him up, made certain that he was unhurt, and assisted him in dusting off his sailor suit.

"You owe me a soda!" the child shrilled pompously. "You knocked me down and now you'll have to treat me, mister."

I patted him on the head and started to walk away. The little fellow followed me closely. "Pay up or go to jail," he declared.

"All right," I said quickly. "Come along."

I took him by the hand and continued toward the store. Its metamorphosis was complete. The front of the building was a solid mass of show-window, in which were neatly arranged books, perfumery, tobacco-humidors, soap and cameras. Placards announced "special" luncheons, sales on toilet articles and giant malted milks. In one corner of the window, unobtrusively printed on a little cardboard cut in the shape of a mortar and pestle, were the words: "Prescriptions Filled By Experts." A huge neon sign above the show-window kept spelling out:

THE GREAT EASTERN
DRUG COMPANY

"You can get swell ones in here for a dime, mister," the little fellow told me as he drew me up to the expensive black and silver soda fountain. "I'll take a frosted chocolate," he commanded the youth in the neat white jacket who came to wait on us. "And don't be stingy with the whipped cream!"

The clerk grinned and then turned to me. "And what will you have, sir?"

"Me? Oh, I don't care for anything, thanks." As the young man started away, glass in hand, I called him back. "Is there anyone here who can tell me where I'd be likely to find a party named Tom Murphy?"

"You mean Mr. Murphy, our store manager? You'll find him at the prescription counter in the back. The crippled gentleman with the dark moustache."

I followed his finger and immediately recognized my former assistant. This _was_ a stroke of luck. It had been a long-shot, my asking for him. I had had no idea he worked there.

"Here's the money for the soda," I told my diminutive companion. "I've got to see someone." I slid a quarter along the counter and made my way to the back of the store. I heard the child's words of thanks, muffled by his noisy sipping at a soda straw.

Tom Murphy did not look up as I approached. He was busy checking over some figures on a sheet of wrapping paper. The only radical change in his appearance was the moustache which, obviously, he had cultivated to lend him a professional air. He looked much older, naturally. When he had worked for me he had been only seventeen. That would make him thirty-five.

"Hello, Tom," I said quietly.

Slowly Murphy lifted his eyes from the paper to a level with mine. He frowned a little and I could tell that he did not know who I was. "You are acquainted with me?"

I laughed. "Tell me you don't know!"

"Can't say I do. But your voice sounds...." He stopped suddenly and leaned forward to inspect me more closely. Recognition dawned and the pencil dropped from his fingers. "Why ... why ... Mr. Thatcher! I ... I...."

I am positive that it was fear I read in his eyes although I can't imagine why he should have been afraid. We had always been the best of friends. Maybe he felt as though he were standing face to face with some ghost; but more likely he suddenly remembered what it was I was supposed to have done. Murder is a terrible crime and the people who commit it are not looked upon as human beings--no matter how much their action might have been justified. The taking of a life--unless it be during wartime, making the deed not only legal but noble as well--is an action which at once destroys both friendships and hates. People neither love nor hate murderers. They don't even feel sorry for them. They treat them much like Murphy treated me that day in the store. Like a freak.

I smiled disarmingly. "That's right, Tom. I guess I've changed a lot. I'm getting on in years, you know. But can I have a word with you?"

His lips trembled a little. "But ... but I thought that.... When did...?"

"This morning, Tom. I've finished down there."

"Come on into the back room."

I knew that he was reluctant to leave the front of the store. Maybe he was afraid to be alone with me, I don't know. If this were happening to me now instead of a few weeks ago, I wouldn't be at all surprised. Seeing the crude pictures of myself in the newspapers, I suppose I _do_ look "haunted." But I vigorously deny the press insinuations that I have a criminal face, merciless eyes and an unmistakable brutish skull formation. The prison experts all agreed that I look somewhat weak with my oval-shaped head and pointed chin.

The thing I wanted to find out from Murphy was if there remained anyone in town who had known Anita. I explained to him that I was trying to find out more about the whole affair. Murphy puckered his brows in thought. "Let me see, George Garrett!"

"Garrett? Never heard of him."

"Oh, yes. That's right. He moved here right after...." He stopped in embarrassment. "Say, Mr. Thatcher, I hope you know that I never wanted to testify against you at the trial. They made me do it. I...."

"I know, Tom. You couldn't help it," I said.

"And I never really believed you did it," he went on, trying to appear convinced. "I always thought she committed suicide. But maybe you'd rather not talk about it, eh?"

"No, that's all right. I want to talk about it. I suppose everyone in town thought I was guilty, didn't they? Things looked kind of bad, I'll admit."

"No, we never believed it, Mr. Thatcher. Honest we didn't. Even Cavender who used to be across the street said you got a raw deal. And you know how Cavender was. Even Leo Carpenter said you were innocent...."

"Carpenter?" I echoed. "When did you see him? I thought he went to Vienna."

"Oh, he was at the trial. Didn't you know?"

"No," I muttered. "I didn't."

"Well, maybe he was only there that one day. He left for abroad shortly after. He's writing books now, you know. Lives in New York six months a year and in Vienna the rest of the time. Doctor Fraser--you don't know him--says that his surgical data is very valuable."

"I heard he was writing books," I said.

"Funny you didn't know he was at the trial. I saw him right after they brought in the verdict."

To this day, I don't know why I pursued the subject. Something drove me on--a curiosity maybe, a desire to discover just what attitude a man would take whose former sweetheart has been allegedly slain by his rival. "What did Leo have to say?"

"He looked angry as the devil. He was cursing, as I remember. I heard him say to someone who was with him that he was positive they were convicting an innocent man."

"He said that?" I asked in disbelief. Although the doctor and I had never been anything but friendly to one another, it seemed strange that he should adopt that attitude after I had stolen his girl. There was something fishy about it.

"Is that all?"

Murphy scratched his head. "Yes, I guess so. The fellow who was with him tried to comfort him, I recollect. He said that you'd never see the inside of a jail; that your lawyer was sure to appeal and the decision would be reversed. The man said, 'Of course, if they find the body ... in that case it might be different.' Leo was getting into his car then. He said something that sounded like: 'They'll never find the body' and drove off, leaving the man standing there. That's all I know Mr. Thatcher."

"Thanks a lot."

"Can I do anything more for you? You know that if I can be of some...."

"No, I guess that's about all. Goodbye, Tom."

"Going to be around town again?"

"No, I guess not. But who knows?" We walked back into the store proper. I shook hands with Murphy and noticed that his hand was cold and his grip limp.

Before I left Ithaca on the evening train for New York, I strolled around to my little house ... or what used to be my house. From a distance it still looked the same as I had left it; but when I reached the gate to the front yard I felt my heart sink. There was a noticeable sag to the roof as though the supporting beams had been allowed to rot away. The paint on both the picket fence and on the house itself had peeled off, leaving bare, ugly patches. And it was unoccupied. A chipped enamel sign informed the passerby that the property was for sale or rent and that information regarding it could be obtained by telephoning the Mervin Real Estate Company.

It had been my thought to enter the place, asking permission of the owner in the event that someone was living in it. I would have liked to explore the house in hopes of stirring from my fading memory some dormant fact which had escaped notice. Then too, I would have welcomed an hour in the garden down by the lake.

But looking at it a moment longer, I suddenly felt sick. My store, like some fickle child, no longer knew its parent. My house, my wife, my friends were all gone, breaking the last connecting link with the town of my birth.

I withdrew the hand I had reached out to unfasten the gate. I turned back toward the station.

* * * * *

I will not mention where I got the gun because the pawnbroker who sold it to me was breaking the law and I don't want anyone to get into trouble on my account. My purpose in purchasing the pistol, I need hardly say, was to take yet one more life: my own.

There are some of you who hold that suicide takes a great deal of courage and some to whom it appears a very cowardly act. I am not in a position to argue the point. I merely tell you that I no longer cared to live and the sooner I ceased living the better I would like it.

But I did not sit down and brood like some twentieth century Hamlet. I did not over-dramatize my plight. I only realized that I was unhappy, broke, without friends or family, and with nothing whatever to look forward to but continued mental depression. I had read that ex-convicts find it extremely difficult to find positions and, although I was a registered pharmacist, I had no references to show a prospective employer.

So what else was there for me to do?

If I'd been young, I would no doubt have tried to hold on. When I was twenty, life was precious and I thoroughly enjoyed being alive. But remember that upon my release from prison I had just passed my forty-sixth birthday. You will recall the day, for that was the night of the Hindenburg disaster.

I had given considerable thought to the subject of a suitable agent which would bring about my end. I did not want to suffer if I could possibly avoid it. I suppose that I could easily have managed to obtain some sort of poison but I ruled this out immediately. Only a physician or an apothecary can appreciate how terrible a death by poison can be. Of course there are any number of mythical concoctions which the writers of detective stories profess will result in instantaneous death. Well, maybe I'm wrong, but if such poisons exist or at least are stocked in drugstores, I have never handled any. The poisonous substances I have come into contact with in my work all entail a minimum of several minutes of intense pain while the drug stops the heart or eats away the organs of the body.

So I chose a gun.

I decided this while sitting in my tiny hotel room, just off Times Square. Looking around at the bare, cracked walls, the peeling plaster and the single, dirty window, it struck me that this was as fitting a room for a suicide as one would be able to find. Still, I would be unable to use it. Since I would, of necessity, have to procure a pistol, I would hardly have enough money left to stay there another night. I would have to die in the park, or in some alleyway.

It was while I sat in that room, pondering the problem of where I might be able to get hold of a gun, that someone knocked on my door. I opened it and a girl stepped in, closing the door behind her. I gaped at her.

"Hello," she smiled.

"Hello," I answered her. "You must have the wrong room." I saw that she was well dressed and with a supple figure; her face, while not pretty, was pleasant and carefully made-up. "This is Room 264, you know."

"I know," she laughed, revealing white, though slightly crooked teeth. "Well? Aren't you going to ask me to come in?"

"You're in already," I observed. Then, for the first time in months, I felt the need of her--the need of any woman. Usually, in prison, this would sweep over me only once in a great while. It would last less than a week and then it would pass on, leaving me enervated. But now my fingers yearned for the feel of her and my knees grew unsteady. "Will you smoke a cigarette?" I asked, trying to keep my voice even.

She accepted one. My hand shook a little as I held the match. Puffing away, she sat down on the bed, close to my chair. I could smell her perfume and the faint female odor of her clothes. My head swam.

Of course I knew that she was a prostitute. Her presence in my room was merely an effort to solicit trade. But she was a woman. Mentally, I counted up my money. No, there would not be enough for this. The remaining few dollars would barely buy me a gun. I balanced the gun against the woman. I chose the gun.

"I like you," she murmured after a moment of silence. "But that, as Shakespeare says, is not the question. Do you like me?"

"I'm ... I'm broke," I stammered.

Her face fell a little. "Well, I didn't expect to find Rockefeller in here, you know. I don't ask much...."

"I'm sorry. I haven't a penny to spare. I won't have this room tomorrow," I confessed.

The girl rose from the bed abruptly and started for the door. In desperation, I got to it first and put my back to it. "Please don't go," I begged. "If you only knew how much I want you to stay!"

"Sorry, buddy. I'm no charity worker. You've got to lay it on the line."

"Listen," I whispered hoarsely. "Don't you see? I haven't had ... haven't had a woman in eighteen years!"

She looked at me skeptically for a second; then a curiosity came into her eyes. "What were you, mister?" she asked. "Priest, prisoner or pauper?"

I told her.

"I've got a brother in stir. All right. I'm a sap for falling for your baloney. But make it fast."

"Thanks," I groaned, taking her into my arms.

"Hurry up."

* * * * *

In the morning I looked up Doctor Carpenter in the telephone directory. I located a CARPENTER L. MD with an East 70th street address and I called the number to ask the party's first name. It was Leo all right but he wasn't at home. The girl--informing me that she was the doctor's secretary--instructed me to call again at three o'clock. When she asked me to please leave my name, I hung up. I was afraid that Carpenter might not want to see me.

Thoroughly worn out, I walked along Eighth Avenue looking for a pawn shop. Two places, when I entered and asked to see a revolver, demanded that I produce my police permit; but in the third, the old fellow beckoned to me to follow him to the rear. He sold me an old .38 Colt automatic for six dollars and threw in a box of fifty cartridges to boot.

"Now remember, mister, I never sold you that gun, see? You never saw me before in all your life."

"I never saw you before in all my life," I assured him. "And thanks loads. I won't forget it in a hurry."

The old fellow threw up his hands. "Forget it! Forget it! Never mind remembering!"

Emerging from the shop with the pistol in my pocket, I found that I still had four hours to kill before the doctor would be in. I wanted to see him before I took the fatal plunge because there was ever so faint a chance that he might know something which would throw light onto Anita's death. Tom Murphy was not a person either to imagine or to exaggerate. If he was telling the truth, there might be some reason why Carpenter insisted that I was innocent. His remark, "They'll never find the body," might have meant no more than a disdainful opinion of the police.... But it was worth trying.

I don't think that I would have considered suicide had I in some way managed to solve the question that had been worrying my mind for so many years. Even if I had discovered myself guilty. For if I _had_ murdered Anita, it must have been done in a moment of insanity, during which time I could not hold myself responsible for the deed. I loved my wife. I had had nothing whatever to gain by her death. I had not insured her life. I told the insurance agents who had called this to my attention that, in the event of Anita's death, no amount of money could possibly compensate me for her loss.

I spent the next three hours in a movie, trying my utmost to stay awake. I no longer had enough for a hotel room, having given all but a dollar of the money remaining for the gun. Although sleep would have been welcome to me after the adventure of the night before, I reasoned that if I dozed off, I might not awaken in time to see the doctor. If I missed him at his home, it would mean a night of wandering the streets, of dozing in subways or sleeping in the park. Hence, I stayed awake by prodding myself each time my head drooped forward onto my chest. Also, I am afraid that I made a nuisance of myself by asking someone next to me the time every now and then.

Doctor Carpenter had an apartment in a neat, two-family brownstone house between Park and Lexington. Entering the tiny vestibule on the ground floor, I saw his name on a little white card under a brass bell. I rang and in a few seconds, a uniformed maid ushered me into a foyer.

"Is Doctor Carpenter at home?"

"Is he expecting you?"

I admitted that he was not.

"Then it won't be possible for the doctor to see you today. He's very busy in the study and left word that he was not to be disturbed. Why don't you telephone him tomorrow morning and make an appointment?" The maid was young and smiled pleasantly.

"But I'm a personal friend of the doctor's. I've.... I've just come in from out of town and...."

"Oh, I see. Well, in that case, if you'll give me your name, I'll take it in to...." She interrupted herself suddenly and bowed to someone over my shoulder. I turned and saw a woman entering the front door. "Good afternoon, Mrs. Carpenter. The man called about the rugs. I told him to call later."

The woman was veiled so that as she brushed past me, I could not see her face. "Thank you, Lily. Is the doctor in the study?"

"Yes, he is, Mrs. Carpenter. Mr. Miller just left."

The woman opened the door at the far end of the living-room and went inside. As in a trance, I moved after her. In my ears I could hear Lily's voice call sharply: "You can't go in there!" but I did not stop. The floor of the living-room was waxed and slippery and one of the smaller scatter rugs shot out under my feet. I recovered my balance and, as I was opening the door of the study, I felt the maid's arm touch my sleeve. I shook it off and entered the room.

Doctor Carpenter was seated at a large desk near a French door that led out into a sort of garden or yard. He had his arm about the waist of the woman who stood beside his chair. For a moment, as the sunlight glared in my eyes, I could not make out anything more than the two silhouettes. Then ... I knew.

Both of them looked up as the door clicked shut behind me. They had been talking; now they fell silent. The doctor slowly rose to his feet and Anita--for I was sure it was she--started back and stifled a little cry of fear.

"Mr. and Mrs. Carpenter," I said.

Just then the maid opened the door and looked toward the doctor for instructions. I saw him hesitate. I knew, of course, that he did not wish to be left with me and he opened his mouth to say something. Then he closed it and his shoulders sagged perceptibly. In this attitude, he looked old and I noticed that his hair was iron-gray.

"It's all right, Lily. We don't want to be disturbed." The doctor's voice sounded hollow and dry. He seemed to be choking, almost.

"But the man about the rugs. What will I tell him when he calls?"

"Tell him ... tell him anything. And if anyone comes, have them wait outside."

"Yes, doctor."

As the maid closed the door behind her, I looked over at Anita. Somehow I couldn't get used to the idea that she was really there. It was like seeing a ghost in broad daylight. But it was the spectre who was afraid. Through her veil I could see wide, terror-stricken eyes.

* * * * *

I suppose that this story I am telling is disappointing because I am incapable of detailing or classifying my emotions. I do not think that this is my fault so much as it is the fault of the emotions. During the tense portions of my life they were never clearly defined and often I experienced many freakish feelings: combinations of two or three emotions at once. So far, I have given you only bare facts and left you to imagine the gamut I have run. Sorrow, fear, love and morbidity have all played important parts in my life. But--whether you choose to accept this statement or not--although I have often been very angry, I can't remember ever having hated anyone. And as I stood there in the study, looking across the room at the two by the desk, I did not nurse any hatred.

Of course I know that it sounds a bit thick. I certainly had every reason to hate them both, and the much-publicized fact that my pocket contained a loaded revolver seems to indicate that I went to the doctor's home prepared to commit a murder. Truthfully, I did not. The revolver, as I have already explained, was intended only for myself.

Well, if the doctor and Anita looked frightened and ashamed, I must have looked bewildered. Try to picture it for yourselves. Here was my wife ... alive! For the past eighteen years I had been mourning her loss. I had over-taxed my mind in attempting to pierce the heavy cloak of mystery which had surrounded her death.