# "Timber"/Chapter 25

CHAPTER XXV
About the time that Goddard was putting Taylor through his ordeal, the sheriff of Blueberry dropped into the Banner office. The editor was in the back room cutting paper for a handbill job when the officer thrust his head through the open doorway.
"Howdy, Hump," he said.
"Many of 'em, Joe! Anything special?"
"I'll leave it on your desk.
He disappeared and Bryant went on with his work, but something in the sheriff's tone lingered as a disturbing echo and presently he went into the front office and picked up the folded document. He scanned the outside carefully and his lips worked slowly in the white beard. He opened it, turning it up so he could read. When he had read he sat down quite suddenly, as though weary all at once. After a time his printer came to the door and asked about the paper.
"I started cutting it; finish her up, Will," he said.
He rose and climbed the stairs to his rooms above. He took off his vest, for it was hot, and unbuttoned the neck-band of his stiff-bosomed shirt.
"Oh, dear," he sighed.
He drew out his own rocker to the window and then brought the other chair from its corner. He sat down, but did not rock. His pudgy legs sprawled awkwardly, giving to his posture a significant listlessness. When he ​did move it was to stretch out a hand and stroke the arm of that other rocker as though he touched the arm of a dear friend for assurance and sympathy and comfort.
It was there that Helen Foraker found him. She was well within the room before he was aware that her car had halted below and her feet sounded on the stairs. He started up and summoned a smile.
"You're a ray of sunshine," he said wearily, "in a sunny but dreary day.
"Why, Helen!" looking sharply. "What's—"
She turned away quickly and he moved toward her. But she faced him with a sharp movement and said:
"Nothing much—but trouble!"
Her voice was hard and flat and her eyes were dry but he read that in her which she held back by heroic effort. He stood there a moment.
"Let's have it now—It's hurting you."
And, sitting in his wife's rocker, she told the story of Rowe's coming, in short sentences, hands clasped tightly in her lap, not looking once at her listener. She finished.
"Luke Taylor? His—father?"
"Yes, his father," dully.
The old man leaned closer and put a timid hand on her clenched fists. "And—he knew?"
"He knew, Humphrey—Oh, he knew!"
And with these words the flatness went out of her voice. It was the cry of wretched pain!
An hour later: "I have trusted so few people in my life and of them there has been only one worthy. That is you, Humphrey. I'm depending on you so, now!" His eyes shifted from her face uneasily. "It's make or break ​right now. I'm at the end of my rope and whether I let go or can climb back depends so much on you."
"There can be no dodging of anything now," he said. "At times it has been easier to trust Providence and put aside thoughts of threatening influences and to think only of the present. But the present and the future are too closely linked today, Helen. I have tried to be your helper. I will try so long as my bones and spirit hold together, but, to be an influence for good, one must have standing, authority or security—I have had little standing among the men of this county, but I have had authority and security because I've kept my hands clean while they fingered the mire of political degredation. Until now I have been an influence because no man has dared question my integrity. They've dared everything but that—until now."
"Now?"
The old man drew the paper the sheriff had left from his pocket, as if it required great physical effort.
"This," he said, after an interminable pause and in a voice which was husked, "is an order to appear in Probate Court Thursday and show cause why I should not be removed from my guardianship of Bobby and Bessy Kildare."
A flash of rage showed in the girl's eyes. "Be removed!"
"Removed—They have looked over my annual inventory and find that I've loaned fifteen thousand dollars of the children's money on four sections of your land. They are now calling on me to prove that I have not mishandled the funds left to my keeping."
"But you can. Fifteen thousand—and for four sections!"
​He smiled wistfully.
"I have not betrayed my trust; I have not made unwise investments. I can show that. Although our national idea of justice is to consider the accused innocent until he is proved guilty, in practice the accused is damned forever. He may escape legal punishment, he may prove that he has been besmirched by foul hands for despicable reasons, but he can never quite live down the question that was raised.
"I have trod upon the toes of a great power, of Chief Pontiac himself, and this is his method of fighting back. It's a good one—questioning the guardianship of a man over orphans!"
He cleared his throat rather vehemently.
"There is no charge that could be brought which would be more likely to ruin a man's influence. It may cost me my hold over the board in this matter of your taxation. It may cost me my seat in the senate."
"Oh, not that! Why, it may not even be Harris who is behind it."
He shook his head gravely.
"None else, my dear. The complaining witness is Lucius Kildare, the children's only living relative. It is immaterial to comment on the mental calibre of Lucius."
"But, Humphrey, if you prove—"
"Vindication is not the important thing, my dear. When you say that you have relied on me, you are right. When you say that I am your only trustworthy friend, perhaps you are nearly right again. You do need friends, but you need friends with influence, and if this matter ever reaches a hearing, my influence, I'm afraid, is gone. I will be scoffed at as a betrayer of orphans.
​"A great missile to hurl—a betrayer of orphans!"
"But what can we do?" she asked.
The old man rose. "Do?" he murmured and, drawing down his spectacles, walked to the high walnut bookcase. He opened the glass door and took down a huge volume, bound in black leather, stamped with gold. He returned to the window and riffled the thin pages. Pausing with a thick finger on the passage sought, he looked at her with something like a smile in his eyes. "Do? Fight! Fight, my dear! Fight as the men of Henry the Fifth fought at Agincourt! Fight—because it is an honorable battle. Fight with the spirit that Shakespeare poured into the ruler of Britain. Listen!
"'—he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart ...
We would not die in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us. ...
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors, ... Will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say "These wounds I had on Crispin's day." '"
His voice was profound, speech slow; he recited more than read those lines which reek with courage; his eyes snapped, his frame seemed straighter.
"—'And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, ... And gentlemen in England now a-bed Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.'"
He closed the book and dropped it to the table.
The girl rose. Her face was flushed and she breathed rapidly. The call to battle was in her blood!
"I'm not afraid of scars!" she said unsteadily. "With you, Humphrey—I will fight with you!"
He held out his arms and she swung into them and shuddered against his body; his hands stroked her hair; his old lips went to her forehead in a gentle kiss and he lifted his eyes in a flash of suffering, for he knew that upon her heart that day were scars of which she never could be proud.