Chapter V: Part 5

Indeed, Judge Tompkins guessed wholly wrong. The jury--so far as could be ascertained by any proper legal means--had no immediate intention of agreeing at all. Nine o’clock came,--and nine-thirty,--with still no word from them. At ten or thereabouts a vigorous rapping on the door of the jury room caused the hearts of those spectators who still lingered in the court house to thump loudly,--but it was only a call for ice water. At ten-thirty the sheriff reported absolute silence--evidently a deadlock. At eleven all was still quiet along the Potomac. The judge, surprised and impatient at what seemed to indicate the possibility of a miscarriage of justice, directed Sheriff Higgins to inquire if there was a likelihood of an agreement, to which the foreman merely returned the laconic answer that as yet they had not reached a verdict. Five hours had now elapsed since the twelve good and true men had received their instructions and retired to deliberate.

“Mr. Tutt,” said Judge Tompkins, “I will wait here until eleven-thirty and, if there is no word from the jury by that time, I shall return to the Phoenix House and go to bed.”

But at eleven-thirty no word had come and the sheriff reported that there was no sound whatever inside the jury room. All argument had ceased. He couldn’t hear a durn thing. He reckoned they’d gone to sleep for the night.

“It’s incredible!” declared his honor. “A perfectly plain case! What do you suppose is making the trouble?”

“You kin search me, jedge!” said the sheriff. “Now you just go acrost to bed and if anything happens I’ll hustle right over.”

A couple of dozen hangers-on still remained after the judge had left the court room, whose electric brilliants were only slightly dimmed by the incense from as many virulent cigars. Betting was now even on the result, with the odds three to two on an ultimate disagreement. Evidently for some unknown reason the alibi had gone bad. Mr. Tutt, sitting on the topmost step of the court house entrance felt a surreptitious poke in the back and perceived that the sheriff was beckoning mysteriously to him. Arising with ostentatious indifference the lawyer followed the official to the rear of the building, where after making sure that they were unobserved Higgins unlocked a small door opening upon a flight of back stairs.

“Got suthin’ I want to show ye!” he muttered with an elaborate facial contortion designed to register mischievous humor. Mr. Tutt responded with a similar grimace and the two cautiously tiptoed up the stairs to the topmost landing where the sheriff unlocked another door, and after lighting a candle tip produced from his trousers pocket conducted the lawyer into the blackness of what was evidently the court house attic.

“Duck yer head!” he warned, “if ye don’t want to crack yer skull!”

“Where are you going?” asked Mr. Tutt, although he did not in the least care.

“Never you mind!” retorted his guide.

Then after he had felt his way sixty feet or so across the timbers the sheriff stopped and blew out the candle.

“We’re right over the jury room,” he whispered.

The attic was hot, dusty, close, and full of cobwebs, suggestive of man-eating spiders, but enthused with the spirit of adventure Mr. Tutt stood motionless over the crack of light which showed them to be in the right place. Below, all was silence, penetrated by an occasional hiss and punctuated now and then with a snore. What had occurred? Was there in fact a deadlock? Would Skinny the Tramp have to face another trial for his life? After what seemed an incredible period of time a chair scraped and a voice was heard:

“What time is it now, Bill?”

There was a momentary hiatus during which a watch was evidently consulted and then the foreman made reply:

“Ten minutes to twelve.”

Again the cloak of silence descended upon the so-called deliberations of the jury. Then Mr. Tutt was startled by the voice of Sawyer, the foreman, who evidently sat just beneath them.

“Well, boys,” he exclaimed in a voice full of relief, “it’s five minutes after midnight--Saturday mornin’--an’ I guess we’re safe to claim another day’s pay. After all, three dollars is real money--wuth gettin’!--All up! Seventh inning!”

There was a tremendous scuffling of feet below,--intermingled with loud yawns.

“Well,” said the foreman again, “we’re all agreed, ain’t we? It’s an acquittal, ain’t it?”

“Yep!--You betcher!--Sure!” came from eleven husky throats.

The foreman pounded sharply upon the door of the jury room and the sheriff scrambled hastily towards the attic door.

“An’ the next thing--after we git outer here,” continued the foreman drily, “is to decide what we’re goin’ to do with Squire Mason!”

* * * * * *

The crowd surged about Skinny, caught him up on its shoulders and bore him struggling and feebly protesting out of the court room, down the steps, and over to the Phoenix House. “Ma” Barrows was waiting for them, and when they dumped Skinny down on the piazza she threw her arms about him and with the tears streaming down her cheeks cried:

“You poor, poor boy! Come right in and let me give you some nice hot supper and after that a soft clean bed!”

But Skinny shook his head.

“The supper’s all right,” he said. “But I guess I’d rather sleep outdoors!”

In the court room Sheriff Higgins approached Mr. Tutt, who was gathering up his papers.

“Well,” he said, taking a fat envelope out of his breast pocket and glancing into it, “Here’s your fee--Two hundred and fifty dollars!--Wisht I could earn money that easy!”

Mr. Tutt waved the envelope away with a careless gesture.

“Give it to Skinny,” he said. “He needs it!”

Then with a rush the crowd came piling into the court room again.

“Where’s Mason?” they demanded angrily. “Where’s the old son of a----!”

But the Squire, being wise in his generation, had taken his departure.

* * * * * *

On a hillside overlooking the fertile valley of the Sacramento, Skinny the Tramp lay amid a clump of giant redwoods and watched the sun drawing water through the rain clouds gathered a thousand feet below him. Resting upon a thick bed of pine needles, he leaned luxuriously against a rock, while at his feet, propped over a small fire, a tomato can bubbled cheerily and gave forth a sweet-smelling savor. It was six months after the trial and two months since One-eyed Pedro, heir-apparent of the Zingara Gipsies, had confessed in the deathhouse at Sing Sing, where he was awaiting execution for the murder of his father, that he had killed Drake, the Hermit of Turkey Hollow.

This was the first real opportunity that Skinny had had a chance to sit as he loved with the world at his feet--and think----! With his eyes half closed and the gray smoke from his cigarette coiling and uncoiling in the shaft of sunlight that shot through the branches above his head, Skinny recalled the events leading up to his trial. It had been very much the same sort of an afternoon that the hermit was killed; there had been the same softness in the air, the same flooding sunlight shining gold-red on the trees and fields against the blue-gray of the rainclouds. He had been lying just that same way on the hillside above Turkey Hollow,--dreaming as usual of pots of gold. Then the storm had burst and for half an hour it had poured, as it was raining now at the other end of the valley, and the rainbow had come out against the leaden sky with one end of it on the hermit’s hut.

He recalled vividly how he had rushed down through the drenched woods, passing the lumberman Emerson, whose greeting in his hurry he had neglected to return, and peeked in through the hermit’s window to find him counting his gold. What a thrill the sight had given him! His faith had at last been justified! Just as he’d always known it sometime would be; rainbow--pot of gold! The fact that the gold belonged to someone else didn’t really affect the soundness of the theory one way or the other, and when the hermit had good-naturedly agreed to exchange twenty of the smaller pieces for a hundred dollars in bills he had been almost as well pleased as if he had found the gold hidden in the earth. Then he had strode on through the woods to the village.

That was all there had been to it. It had taken him twenty minutes to walk the mile--he knew it, because the hermit’s clock had pointed to twenty minutes to four when he left the shanty. Suddenly the blood in the tramp’s jugular leaped violently. Yes, the clock had certainly pointed to twenty minutes to four--and if so--it must have--_must_ have stopped--run down or something--at the very moment the old man died!--And he, Skinny, was the only person alive who knew it,--for he was the only person who knew positively that it had been going just before the murder. Funny!--a prickly feeling spread over his back--like a needle bath, only he had never had one. It _was_ funny! And then there was that enormous gray moth that Emerson said had been trying to get out the window. Hadn’t he warned the hermit that some day those bugs would wriggle off their pins and go for him! Sure! And the clock had stopped!--The tune of the old song floated through his mind and unconsciously he hummed the words over to himself:

“O my grandfather’s clock was too high for the shelf, So it stood ninety years on the floor. It was taller by half than the old man himself, Though it weighed not a pennyweight more. It was bought on the morn of the day that he was born, And was always his treasure and pride, But it--stopped--short--never to go again-- When--the old--man--died.”

It had,--too! He was the only one who knew it--or the whole story about the moth! How the hermit had jokingly said that some day maybe he’d go flappin’ off like a big gray moth.--Now he was in that other world--that world that was right along beside us!

Skinny looked around apprehensively but there was no moth in sight. Had it grown chilly? He shivered and noticed that his cigarette had gone out. He lighted it again on his knees at the fire and as he did so the sweet savor of the soup rose to his nostrils. It was nearly done! He forgot all about the murder in the anticipation of soup.

Back through the whole being of Skinny the Tramp surged a warm delirious joy--merely at being alive. Kneeling there he looked like the votary of some forest god, as he rubbed his lean hands over the blaze and stretched his arms outward and upward towards the sky. He yawned deliciously. Then he observed with interest that a rainbow had appeared on the opposite side of the valley--a wonderful, gleaming arch, whose blending colors seemed to singe the clouds. One end of it descended directly upon a field hard by a yellow farmhouse. Pots of gold again!

Skinny watched, as it momentarily grew brighter, beckoning him to wealth and possible adventure; then forgetful of the soup he scrambled to his feet.

The next instant he had plunged down the hillside towards the valley--after the rainbow!

[The End]

Transcriber’s Notes

Minor spelling inconsistencies (e.g. grandstand/grand-stand, weathercock/weather-cock/weather cock, etc.) have been preserved.

Alterations to the text:

Add ToC.

Abandon the use of drop-caps.

Fix some quotation mark pairings/nestings.

[Chapter I]

Change “some one o’ these days them _bugs ’ll_ wiggle” to _bugs’ll_.

[Chapter II]

“almost at his heels,--_never-the less_, and this is the crux” to _nevertheless_.

[Chapter III]

(“Keerful how you light a match” cautioned the prosecutor.) add a comma after _match_.

“I can’t stop it, ’cause I _aint’_ got no idee where it is” to _ain’t_.

“and endeavored to paw _Cassopeia_ from the zenith” to _Cassiopeia_.

“there persisted in Mr. _Tutts_ perfervid, but fast fading, consciousness” to _Tutt’s_.

“delivered upon the one o’clock train for _Pottsvile_” to _Pottsville_.

“Come at once, _bringing_ Bonnie Doon and four detectives” to _bring_.

[Chapter IV]

“who was _nochalantly_ sitting on an empty lemon crate smoking” to _nonchalantly_.

(“Well?” whispered Mr. Tutt) add a period to the sentence.

[End of text]