The Elbert County tribune., 1915-02-05
This isn't buslness.~ Enocn.s


l can look decent people in the face
again"
Merry did not speak. He sat watch
ing Enochs wasted fingers search
through a mass of papers in the little
drawer. He lifted out bankbook and
a yellow envelope. then he set the
drawer aside and laid the leather
covered booklet upon Merry's knee.
That is yours" he explained. You
will find there every cent of royalties
from The House. 1t was banked apart
from my private account 1t grew
amazingly during the spring. You are
wealthy man"
Andrew opened it and glanced
through the pages. He looked bewil-
dered for a moment
''Jehu, What can / do with SO
much money? | swear. Enoch. don't
care picayune for being wealthy
man except"
Wentworth did not answer. He was
staring at a slip of paper he had drawn
from the yellow envelope. You re-
member this. Andrew" he asked
abruptly.
Merry nodded He caught glimpse
of Wentworth's name and his own
upon the fiimsy thing they had called
the bond. Enoch leaned back against
the pillow and began to destroy the
paper with slow deliberation, tearing
it across and across until it was re-
duced to heap of flakes which fut-
tered down into the hollow OF his
gannt palm. He shook them into the
envelope and handed it to Merry. who
took 1t without word and slipped
1t between the leaves of the bank
book.
If you can trust me, Boy, until the
right time comes and l reach the right
place, will make full restitution be-
fore the world"
Don't. old man. let us bury this
now and forever. Good God. isn't 1t
restitution enough to have saved my
life7"
No." Enoch spoke with swift pas
sion, mo. it isn't restitution. Don't
stand in my way. You have to humor
sick men, you know. Besides, l want
to lay my soul bare to you now, An
drew. Had been a Catholic l should
have done 1t to a priest long ago,
suppose"
Go. ahead, Enoch, I'll listen." he
said gently.
Wentworth turned in bed and
clasped his hands around one bent
knee. Years ago." he began brus-
quely. Il was wandering about in the
Tennessee mountains on an assign
ment when 1 fell in with a chap who
taught psychology in Yale. He was
nothing wonderful, but his science was
fascinating. Time and again. since
those days. I have planned, If coutd
find the leisure, to go into psychology
and study the thing out Still. any
man who knocks about the world as
have done learns to puzzle things
out for himself. There must be some
thing alluring, though, to be able to
reduce the promptings of ones own
soul to science and then to work out
problem in yourself. Don't you
think so?"
Il should imagine SO. Still, it's an
unopened book to me-" Merry admit.
ted.
We used to sit and talk every night
around the campfire. / remember once
this young MacGregor explained to
me why man we had both known
committed murder. He killed his
wife first. then. horror-stricken, shot
himself. It's common enough story,
you read it in the papers every day
oF b4 l,,,t ~
because we had both known the fellow
well. He was decent, quiet, cheerful
citizen. with genial. kindly way
about him. His taking off seemed a
mystery. None of us had even seen
him angry. Suddenly he turned into
a flaming fend, a murderer, and a sui
eide. Nothing but insanity or the
Yale mans theory explained it."
What was his theory"
Wentworth paused for a minute with
a haunted look in his eyes. He claims
that the morals of every human being
are nodded during the first twenty
years of his life. Into fairly decent
career there comes occasionally-for
the life of me l can't remember his
technical name for i'll should call it
a moral lesion. Some sin which a man
has committed, and you might say
lived down, before he was twenty,
crops out again years after and it
conquers him. Each time he may
repent and turn over a new leaf The
world looks on him not as an Admir-
able Crichton perhaps. but as toler-
ably good fellow. Then suddenly,
without the ghost of a warning. even
after he imagines he has outgrown the
tendency to that particular sin, there
comes temptation. and he goes under
as IL his backbone was gristle He falls