Cleveland County herald., 1919-04-17
CHAPTER XII.
The Bolt Falls.

Three times that winter I had seen Benjamin Grimshaw followed by the Silent Woman clothed in rags and pointing with her finger.
 The trial of Amos came on. He had had blood on his feet" as they used to say, all the way from Liekitysplit to Lewis county in his flight, having attacked and slightly wounded two men with bowie knife who had tried to detain him at Rainy Lake. He had also shot at an officer in the vicinity of Lowville, where his arrest was eff fected. He had been identified by all these men, and so his character as a desperate man had been established. This in connection with the scar on his face and the tracks, which the boots of Amos fitted, and the broken gun stock convinced the jury of his guilt.
 remember well the look of the venerable Judge Cady as he pro- rounced the sentence of death upon Amos Grimshaw. A ray of sunlight slanting through a window in the late afternoon fell upon his gracious coun- teLance, shining also, with the softer light of his spirit. Slowly, solemnly, kindly, he spoke the words of doom. It was his way of saying them that first made me feel the dignity and majesty of the law. The kind and fa- therly tone of his voice put me in mind of that supremest court which is above all question and which was swiftly fn it1I 1oy1t in thicS mo f. ter and in others related to it.
 Slowly the crowd moved out of the courtroom. Benjamin Grimshaw rose and calmly whispered to his lawyer. He had not spoken to his son or seemed to notice him since the trial had begun, nor did he now. Many had shed tears that day, but not he. MT. Grimshaw never showed but one emo- tion-that of anger. He was angry now. His face was hard and stern. He muttered as he walked out of the courtroom, his cane briskly beating the floor.
 The Silent Woman-as ragged as ever-was waiting on the steps. Out went her bony finger as he came down. He turned and struck at her with his cane and shouted in a shrill voice that rang out like trumpet in his frenzy:
 "Go way from me. Take her away, somebody. I can't stan it. She's killin' me. Take her away. Take her away. Take her away"
 His face turned purple and then white. He reeled and fell headlong, like a tree severed from it's roots, and lay still on the hard, stone pavement. It seemed as if snow were falling on his face-it grew so white. The Silent Woman stood as still as he, pointing at him with her finger, her look un- changed People came running toward us. lifted the head of MT. Grimshaw and laid it on my knee. It felt like the head of the stranger in Rattleroad. Old Kate bent over and looked at the eyelids of the man which fiuttered faintly and were still.
 "Dead !" she muttered.
 Then, as if her work were finished, she turned and made her way through the crowd and walked slowly down the street. Men stood aside to let her pass, as if they felt the power of her spirit and feared the touch of her gar ments.
 Two or three men had run to the house of the nearest doctor. The crowd thickened. As I sat looking down at the. dead face in my lap, lawyer who had come out of the courtroom pressed near me and bent over and looked at the set eyes of Benjamin Grimshaw and said:
 "She floored him at last. l knew she