CHAPTER XXIX

CHAPTER XXIX

Joycecast a helpless look around at the busy little figures behind their desks. She glanced at the clock. It was only half past nine. There was a train to the city in three-quarters of an hour. She must make it. She would have to go home for money, too, and to change some of her things. She must get some one to take her place, and she must manage it so that no one would ask her any questions. Her brain seemed fairly burning up with the rapidity of her thoughts.

Miss Beatty was a retired teacher who lived not far away and who sometimes substituted when a teacher was ill. Would she be at home now, and free? And how could she get out to telephone her?

With fingers that trembled so that she could hardly move her pencil she wrote a little note to the teacher of the senior high school class and sent it by one of the children. It read:

“Dear Miss Clayton: Can you let me have Mary Grover to keep order for a little while? I am obliged to be out of the room.”

Mary Grover appeared in three or four minutes. Meantime Joyce had summoned her senses and picked up everything she did not want to leave in her desk, and slipped out to the telephone booth in the hall. She dared not take the time to run across the street to the drug store for more privacy. While she waited for her number she prayed that the Lord would arrange the way before her. Herhead was throbbing so that she could scarcely see, and her heart beating wildly. She did not dare to think except just about getting to the train. It seemed if she did, that she would have to cry out and shout the horror of her soul at what had happened.

Queer that at such a time our breathless minds will pick out trivialities and dwell upon them. During that tense moment while she waited for her answer it came to Joyce how Professor Harrington would smile in his cynical way if he knew what she was doing, and ask her, didn’t she think Miss Beatty would be at home just the same if she didn’t pray? Then Miss Beatty’s precise voice echoed reassuringly over the wire. “Yes? Ellen Beatty at the phone!” and Joyce, with a thrill of triumph, spoke in her trembling voice:

“Oh, Miss Beatty, I’m so glad you are there! I hope you aren’t busy. This is Miss Radway at the school. I’ve had bad news from home and I must catch this next train.Couldyou take my place?”

“Why, yes, I think so,” answered the kindly voice. “I’m very sorry——”

But Joyce cut her off quickly:

“Oh, thank you, then. Will you come over at once? I’m leaving directions on the desk, and Mary Grover is with the class till you get here. I haven’t a minute. Good-bye.”

She wrote a hurried note to Harrington there in the telephone booth:

“I have had bad news from home and must go at once. Miss Beatty is taking my place. Did not want to disturb your class, and had not a minute to wait. Willtelegraph if I cannot get back tomorrow. Sincerely, Joyce Radway.”

She slipped back to her own room and despatched this note by another delighted child, got her hat from the dressing room and got away before Harrington had had time to even open her note. She ran all the way home, hastily changed her dress, put a few things into her little brief case that she had bought at a bargain counter to carry her papers in back and forth to school, and arrived at the station with three or four minutes to spare and a tumult in her heart that demanded an opportunity to cry.

Those three or four minutes seemed longer than the whole preceding three-quarters of an hour, and she walked to the far end of the platform and kept her eye out toward the street. She somehow had a feeling that Harrington would not like it that she had not consulted him before going, and she was almost sure if he could make it that he would come down to the train. But it had happened that Harrington was busy with three guests from another school, committeemen sent out to size him up, and Joyce’s note lay harmlessly on his desk for half an hour before he even had an opportunity to read it. Even then his mind was so filled with wondering if he had made the right impression that he scarcely took it in except to be annoyed, for he had purposed taking the guests in to Joyce’s room to show it off, intending later, if matters developed sufficiently to whisper a suggestion that she might be the future Mrs. Harrington. It was very annoying of Joyce not to consult him. He would punish her for that by coldness for a few days. She was altogether too prone to take matters into her own hands.That’s what came of having an independent religion that taught one to think in unconventional lines. He had no thought of her trouble. He didn’t take that in. But Joyce was riding away into the morning and facing the awful facts that had called her from her work. Facing the possibilities that might be ahead of her.

Suppose they had found Darcy and had the trial! There had been time enough for that she supposed. Supposing they had convicted him! But how could they when it was all false? Still, if such things could be published in the paper when they were not true, what might not happen? Law was a strange thing. Would they have hung him? Or electrocuted him? Did they do those things so soon after the trial? The paper had spoken of eye-witnesses. False witnesses of course. How could they be true since the thing never happened? And what was Gene doing in it all? The paper had spoken of Gene. She hardly dared to get it out again and read it over lest some one should read it over her shoulder. It seemed so terrible to see Darcy’s name in such connection. Darcy who had just given himself to Christ, who had made over his life. And this to meet him at the outset. It was enough to make some lose their faith. Not Darcy. Oh, not Darcy! She cradled the thought of him like a child in her prayers as the miles crept by and the morning went on.

By and by the train stopped suddenly with a jerk and a groan and after one or two attempts to creep a few steps, lay there for a long time. She remembered dimly that some such thing had happened on her way up. She wondered idly if it were a part of every day’s journey? Herimpatience leaped ahead anxiously. Oh, if she were only there!

At last the train started on again and suddenly she realized that she must plan what she would do when she got there. Should she go home and send for the police, or should she go and try to find Darcy? She had no idea where he lived now, and if he were at home he would probably be in jail unless he had been able to prove that he was innocent. Then suddenly she thought of Judge Peterson. He would know what to do. He was a judge. She would go straight to his house. Afterward she would have to go home and explain her absence and what she was doing, she supposed, but that could take care of itself. She had Darcy now to think about.

She had hoped to get the noon train from the city out to Meadow Brook, but when she reached her home city her train was so late that there was no Meadow Brook train till quarter of two. Then her impatience could wait no longer and she called up Judge Peterson’s house.

At first she could get no answer, but just as she was about to give up in despair a gruff voice said: “Hello! Dan Peterson at the phone?”

“Oh,” said Joyce in a relieved little voice. “Then is the Judge there? I would like to speak to him a moment please.”

“No. He isn’t here. He’s over at the court house. Everybody’s over there. I just happened to run home for some papers. Who is this?”

“This is Joyce Radway,” Joyce’s voice was all of a tremble. What if she should be too late after all. What if the trial was days ago?

“What! Joyce! Oh,Glory! Is that really you, Joyce? Where are you? In town? Say, take the ‘L’ and I’ll meet you at Sixty-third Street with the car. You’re wanted here, you certainly are. And say, you there yet? Say, don’t talk to anybody on the way out! Mind that! What’s that? In time? Oh, sure, the nick of time. Couldn’t be better. All right. Get a hustle on. I’ll meet you.”

Joyce hung up the receiver and hurried out to the elevated train, her heart beating high with hope.

Dan dashed out to his car and rattled over to the court house, sent a note up to the Judge’s desk and waited by the door. The message came up.

“Say, Dad: The dead has come to life. Have her here in half an hour. Where do you want me to bring her? Here or over home?Dan.”

“Say, Dad: The dead has come to life. Have her here in half an hour. Where do you want me to bring her? Here or over home?

Dan.”

The message came back with one word written across the back:

“Here.”

But a light flashed from the eye of father to son as Dan turned to dash out again.

Dan almost upset a small, forlorn figure pressed close to the swinging, leathern doors, with woebegone look and white, tear-stained cheeks.

“Hello there, Kid, did I hurt you?” He paused in his wild rush to set her on her feet again. “Why, little Lib Knox, is this you?” he said tenderly, discovering her identity and the tear streaks on her cheeks. “This is no place for you, child. Come on, take a ride with me.”

But Lib drew a sigh of sobbing and held back.

“No, I gotta stay here,” she said. “I gotta stay here an’ help my Uncle Darcy.”

“Come on, then an’ we’ll help him.” He swept her under one arm and marched away, she wearily resisting. “Listen, Kid, I’ve got glad news. Wait till we sail an’ I’ll tell you who we’re goin’ after.”

Lib suddenly relaxed and looked in his face. There was no mistaking the light in Dan’s eye. He had really some glad news. Lib climbed into the machine and sat back wearily, a poor little sinner with all her spirit gone, and allowed herself to be led away from the scene of her sorrow. Things had been going hard in there where Uncle Darcy was with the bad red-haired man. She knew it by the stern look on his face when the door swung back and she got a glimpse. She knew it by the leer on Tyke’s evil face, and by the smug exclamations of the ladies who sat in the back seat and the knowing winks of rough men near the door. She knew it by the hard set of the old Judge’s mouth as he eyed the witnesses, and by the way he worried them with questions now and then like a cat with a mouse. If anything could be glad now, Lib was ready to believe it.

When they had swung the second corner beyond the court house Dan leaned down and whispered:

“Now, Lib, do you know who we’re going after? Guess?”

“God, I guess,” said Lib drearily. “I guess that’s all’s could help my Uncle Darcy any. I heard the men say he was as good as hung now!” She caught a sob with a gulp and let the big tears roll down her worried little face.

“Well, I guess God had something to do with it,” allowed Dan comfortably. “He generally does. Cut out that weeping, Lib. That’s not like you!”

“But it’s all my fault!” she sobbed out, utterly broken at last. “It’s ’cause I went and took that ride with that nasty red-haired man in his motor cycle. He—he—he made me tell where Uncle Darcy was.”

“Why, how did you know where he was?”

“I—I—Ididunt!” wept Lib. “I made it up. I told alie. I said he was in Canada. And I told God it was a lie, huh-huh-huh!” she sobbed. “But it didunt do any good. God didn’t like it.” Dan put one arm around her gently.

“There now, Lib, that’s all nonsense. You did a brave thing and it didn’t have a thing to do with your uncle’s trouble. It probably only held the man off a little longer. Besides, there’s no need for you to worry any more. Listen. Who do you think we’re going after? Joyce Radway. She’s down at Sixty-third Street Station waiting for us now. I just talked to her over the phone.”

Lib Knox sat up as straight as a pipe stem and her eyes got round and great behind their tears:

“Then Hedidhear!” she said in an awestruck tone.

“Who heard?”

“God heard, away up in heaven like they said in Sunday School. I didn’t believe it but now I do. But I tried it anyway, and He heard. I ast Him would He please bring her back to life again and He’s done it!”

Dan pressed the little hand he held and said huskily:

“Yes, Kid, He’s done it. I guess there was more than one asking for that same thing. Well, here we are, and—There she is!”

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