Mitch Miller Part 17

"So here you are. Well, now to return a little, don't you have all kinds of visions and dreams, Mitchie?"

"I do."

"Wait," says my pa, "that don't go to the witness' right to testify, but only whether he's to be believed after he does testify."

"Yes," said the judge.

Then Major Abbott took another exception. There were some more questions, and finally the judge said Mitch could tell his story. So my pa settled down to business, and the jury waited anxious like. And this is the way it went.

"Where were you on the night Joe Rainey was killed?"

"Up in a tree in his yard."

"What were you doin' there?"

"Listenin' to the music."

"Were you alone?"

"Yes, sir."

"You chum with my boy, don't you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Do you know where he was that night?"

"Out to his grandpa's."

"How did you happen to be in that yard?"

"I was lonesome and I wanted to hear the music."

"Well, you go on now in your own way and tell what you saw and heard."

"I was lookin' from the tree through the window into the room. I could see all of you. You was singin' the 'Merry, Merry Maiden.' Just then two men came up the sidewalk. I got back of some thick limbs, limbs thick with leaves, for fear they'd see me and say something and do something.

Pretty soon I saw it was Joe Rainey and Temple Scott."

"What were they saying to each other?"

"They was walkin' arm in arm, friendly like. And I heard Joe Rainey say: 'I've always been a good friend of yours, Temp, and I want to be still.

But you mustn't come to my house any more, especially when I'm not there. You know why, and I want you to promise.' Then Mr. Scott said, 'You're always bringin' that up, why do you? It gets me mad.' Then Joe Rainey says, 'My wife don't want you around, as far as that goes.' And Temp said, 'You don't know what you're talkin' about.' And Joe Rainey says, 'I do, and I'll go in and get her now and she'll come out here and say to you just what I say.' 'No,' says Temp, 'you'll make her say it; she must say it of her own free will.' They began to quarrel then."

"Don't say quarrel, tell us what they said."

"Well, Temp said, 'You're a liar, and n.o.body believes what you say.' And Joe Rainey said, 'You're another liar, and if you didn't have a pistol on you, I'd take it out of you right now. I'm goin' in for my wife.'

Then he tore away from Mr. Scott and went into the house, but came right out again, and Mr. Scott began to shoot at Joe Rainey, and he fell down on the porch."

"Then what happened?"

"Then everybody in the room screamed. And somebody came out and some others and picked up Joe Rainey and carried him into the house."

"What did you do?"

"I still stayed in the tree."

"What for?"

"Well, I was kind of scared--then I wanted to see what they did with Joe Rainey. I thought they might take him into the room where they had been singin' and I could see him."

"Did you?"

"No, sir."

"Then what happened?"

"Well, while I was waiting, about ten minutes maybe, I heard some one coming from the back of the house. It was a woman."

"What did she do?"

"She came up by the porch, knelt down kind of and ran back to the rear of the house."

"What did you do then?"

"I waited a few minutes then I got down out of the tree and went over to the porch and picked up what the woman had left there."

"What was it?"

"A pistol."

"Have you got the pistol?"

"Yes, sir."

"Will you hand it to me?"

"Yes, sir."

Mitch took a pistol out of his pocket and handed it to my pa.

Then Mrs. Rainey, who was still sittin' in the court room, fainted dead away. And some women and a doctor came up and carried her out. Temple Scott was white as death, and was leanin' his head on his hand and lookin' down.

And then my pa went on.

"Where has this pistol been since that night?"

"Buried."