第58章

THE TWO CANAANS

When Joe left Ariel at Judge Pike's gate she lingered there, her elbows upon the uppermost cross-bar, like a village girl at twilight, watching his thin figure vanish into the heavy shadow of the maples, then emerge momentarily, ghost-gray and rapid, at the lighted crossing down the street, to disappear again under the trees beyond, followed a second later by a brownish streak as the mongrel heeled after him.When they had passed the second corner she could no longer be certain of them, although the street was straight, with flat, draughtsmanlike Western directness:

both figures and Joe's quick footsteps merging with the night.Still she did not turn to go; did not alter her position, nor cease to gaze down the dim street.Few lights shone; almost all the windows of the houses were darkened, and, save for the summer murmurs, the faint creak of upper branches, and the infinitesimal voices of insects in the grass, there was silence: the pleasant and somnolent hush, swathed in which that part of Canaan crosses to the far side of the eleventh hour.

But Ariel, not soothed by this balm, sought beyond it, to see that unquiet Canaan whither her old friend bent his steps and found his labor and his dwelling: that other Canaan where peace did not fall comfortably with the coming of night; a place as alien in habit, in thought, and almost in speech as if it had been upon another continent.

And yet--so strange is the duality of towns--it lay but a few blocks distant.

Here, about Ariel, as she stood at the gate of the Pike Mansion, the houses of the good (secure of salvation and daily bread) were closed and quiet, as safely shut and sound asleep as the churches;but deeper in the town there was light and life and merry, evil industry,--screened, but strong to last until morning; there were haunts of haggard merriment in plenty: surreptitious chambers where roulette-wheels swam beneath dizzied eyes; ill-favored bars, reached by devious ways, where quavering voices offered song and were harshly checked; and through the burdened air of this Canaan wandered heavy smells of musk like that upon Happy Fear's wife, who must now be so pale beneath her rouge.And above all this, and for all this, and because of all this, was that one re-sort to which Joe now made his way; that haven whose lights burn all night long, whose doors are never closed, but are open from dawn until dawn --the jail.

There, in that desolate refuge, lay Happy Fear, surrendered sturdily by himself at Joe's word.

The picture of the little man was clear and fresh in Ariel's eyes, and though she had seen him when he was newly come from a thing so terrible that she could not realize it as a fact, she felt only an overwhelming pity for him.She was not even horror-stricken, though she had shuddered.The pathos of the shabby little figure crossing the street toward the lighted doors had touched her.Something about him had appealed to her, for he had not seemed wicked; his face was not cruel, though it was desperate.Perhaps it was partly his very desperation which had moved her.She had understood Joe, when he told her, that this man was his friend; and comprehended his great fear when he said: "I've got to clear him! I promised him."Over and over Joe had reiterated: "I've got to save him! I've got to!" She had answered gently, "Yes, Joe," hurrying to keep up with him.

"He's a good man," he said."I've known few better, given his chances.And none of this would have happened except for his old-time friendship for me.It was his loyalty--oh, the rarest and absurdest loyalty!--that made the first trouble between him and the man he shot.I've got to clear him!""Will it be hard?""They may make it so.I can only see part of it surely.When his wife left the office, she met Cory on the street.You saw what a pitiful kind of fool she was, irresponsible and helpless and feather-brained.There are thousands of women like that everywhere--some of them are `Court Beauties,'