Ashton-Kirk, Criminologist Part 27

"All his life," he said, as though speaking to himself, "all his life he did evil; and now that he is dead, the evil continues." He pointed to a bench at one side and added: "Will you sit down?" The two having seated themselves, he sank down weakly upon the edge of the cot. "I've been in poor shape since I came here," said he. "I can't sleep, and my nerves are gone."

"That's bad," said Bat Scanlon. "Nothing wears a man out like loss of sleep. Try to quit thinking of this affair; if you don't----"

"Quit thinking of it!" Young Burton laughed in a high pitched fas.h.i.+on that was very disagreeable to hear. "Quit it? You might as well ask me to stop the sun from coming up. I could do it just as easily."

There was a short silence; young Burton picked at the coverings of his bed with nervous fingers; and then he resumed:

"They say that any good thing brought into the world remains; that good can never be destroyed. I wonder if the same cannot be said of evil. He is dead; and yet what he did is living after him."

"That is probably one of the things that will oppress mankind forever.

The persistence of evil is the thought behind many ancient religions.

Indeed, one might include modern creeds as well," added Ashton-Kirk, "for Christianity teaches that evil clings from generation to generation, from age to age."

"I recall _him_ first as a man whom I felt to be a stranger, but whom I was told to call father," said young Burton. "He did not live with us, only appealing now and then and making my mother very unhappy. Even then, small boy as I was, I hated him; and I know he detested me."

The young man was in that queerly relaxing state which causes men to tell their private griefs to even casual acquaintances.

"Very often," he went on, "we were rather happy, but that was always when my father was away. I remember a little white house on the outskirts where we lived unmolested for several years. My sister was at school; I was employed by an old wood engraver, one of the last of his kind; my mother earned a good living and we were quite comfortable and happy. My father had been away for so long that I had almost forgotten him; when a thought of him did come into my mind, it was as of an old trouble--and one that would never come again.

"But one evening when I reached home I found him there. My mother's face was white and she was trembling. But he was smiling! I would rather,"

and young Burton raised a shaking hand, "have heard another man curse than see him smile."

"I know the feeling," said Bat Scanlon. "I've felt something like it myself."

"He wanted money," proceeded the young artist. "I knew my mother had a little store somewhere, which she had put away, for the winter was coming on. He was cunning and must have divined this--it was the kind of thing she would do. When she refused, he smiled and insisted. And finally--the smile still on his mouth, remember--he struck her! I had been silent until that; but when I saw the blow fall, I became a maddened young animal. I flew at him blindly, and he beat me like a dog.

A half hour later he went away, and with him went what money my mother had saved."

"Bad!" said Bat Scanlon. "Very bad!"

"And now," said the young man, "he's dead. But the evil which his life brought into the world still lives!" Oddly, his mind seemed to cling to this thought; his eyes, looking straight ahead, were filled with apprehension; his fingers picked nervously at the edge of a blanket.

"Evil is fear, and fear can be conquered," said Ashton-Kirk, quietly; "if a man wills it, he can stamp it out."

"Evil is fear!" The prisoner looked at Ashton-Kirk in sudden inquiry.

"In what way?"

"In every way," replied the investigator. "No matter what its form, evil has its base in fear. And it is one of the plain offices of man to destroy this monster which has ridden him from the beginning. For when the race was young, the world was filled with unnamed dread--the darkness was peopled with unseen things. From this fear sprang superst.i.tion. The future held the first men cowed; the past had left the marks of trials and the memory of pain. And the fear of life has since made more criminals than perhaps any other thing; while dread of repeating the past has broken countless lives."

Ashton-Kirk paused for a moment, his eyes still fixed upon the young man; then he went on:

"This evil which oppresses you so has its roots in a fear, has it not?"

Again there was a pause; the prisoner's eyes met those of the investigator, fixedly.

"Don't allow it to crush you. You are in deadly danger; you need your mind to save yourself."

He arose and stood before the other; one hand went out and touched the prisoner's shoulder.

"I have brought you news. New clues have been found. Before this, the police have worked only along lines which led to you. Now they've gone off on another track. There is a woman in the case," and he patted the drooping shoulder, "and they hope to fasten the crime upon her."

Young Burton came to his feet with a jerk.

"A woman!" he cried. "They are crazy! A woman!" Once more he uttered the high pitched laugh which had affected Bat so disagreeably. "What can they be thinking of!" He stared with excited eyes at the investigator, then at Scanlon, then back again to Ashton-Kirk. "I will not allow it,"

he cried. "Do you hear? I'll not allow it. No woman did this thing. Tell them I said so. I will not permit an innocent person to be blamed. I did it! I did it--alone!"

CHAPTER XVII

THE WATERS ARE TROUBLED

The vast machinery used in gathering the news makes it possible for an event, only an hour or two old, to gain a place in the types and proclaim itself to the public. And only a short time after Frank Burton made his confession of guilt in his cell in the county prison, the newsboys were crying the fact in the street.

Ashton-Kirk and Scanlon had finished with their lunch at Claghorn's; at the cigar counter in the lobby they paused while they selected their favorite brands.

"How are you?" said a familiar voice, and looking up they saw Osborne, big, smiling and serene. "Nasty day," he proceeded, shaking some raindrops from the rim of his hat. "I suppose you've heard the news."

Ashton-Kirk carefully lighted the tip of a blunt cigar.

"What news?" he asked.

The heavy shoulders of the headquarters man twitched with pleasure; he saw, in this answer, the evasion of a defeated man.

"Why," said he, with an effort to keep the triumph out of his voice, "the confession of Frank Burton."

"Oh, that!" The investigator elevated his brows. "Yes, we heard it. As a matter of fact the confession was made in the first place to Scanlon and me."

The elation died slowly in the broad face of Osborne; however, that he still felt his sagacity to be of a superior quality was plain. So he said, with a carelessness calculated to discount the point gained by the other:

"Oh, that so? Hadn't heard of it. Well," and he laughed good-humoredly, "that makes it all the better. You know it's true!"

"It's so, all right," said Scanlon. "He told it to us, and afterward to the warden and a half dozen of the prison people."

"I said the other night we had a good case against him," smiled Osborne, as he looked at Ashton-Kirk with nodding head. "Didn't I? Didn't I tell you I'd seen men sent to the chair on less?"

"Yes, I remember some such expression," replied the investigator.

"But you kind of pooh-poohed it," said the headquarters man, smiling even more broadly than before. "You spoke of other indications, don't you remember? It was your idea a woman was in it." He looked at Scanlon, and laughed. "Recollect that?" he asked. "He said a woman had been hanging around outside--with a revolver--an old flame of the Bounder's, maybe."

Scanlon also laughed--and in the sound was an indication of vast relief.

Women had disappeared out of the orbit in which the crime swung, for Mr.

Scanlon. He had gone for days with a fear in his mind, with his spirit sagging under a weight of expectation. But now he was free of that. No woman figured in the case--the murderer had said so in his confession.

Woman had vanished utterly from all things having to do with the affair.

And so Scanlon laughed--a laugh of relief; and as he looked at the big, good-natured face of Osborne, he realized that while he had always liked him, he had never appreciated him so much as now.

"Yes," said he, "I remember. He rather figured on the lady. But, then, I've heard it said that you never can count on ladies. You don't know just when you've got 'em."