The Legacy of Cain Read online

"Does she wish you to be present?" I asked.

  "She positively forbids it. 'After what you have done for me,' she said, 'the

  least I can do in return is to prevent your being needlessly distressed.' She

  took leave of me; she kissed the little girl for the last time--oh, don't ask me

  to tell you about it! I shall break down if I try. Come, my darling!" He kissed

  the child tenderly, and took her away with him.

  "That man is a strange compound of strength and weakness," the Doctor remarked.

  "Did you notice his face, just now? Nine men out of ten, suffering as he

  suffered, would have failed to control themselves. Such resolution as his may

  conquer the difficulties that are in store for him yet."

  It was a trial of my temper to hear my clever colleague justifying, in this way,

  the ignorant prediction of an insolent woman.

  "There are exceptions to all rules," I insisted. "And why are the virtues of the

  parents not just as likely to descend to the children as the vices? There was a

  fund of good, I can tell you, in that poor baby's father--though I don't deny

  that he was a profligate man. And even the horrible mother--as you heard just

  now--has virtue enough left in her to feel grateful to the man who has taken

  care of her child. These are facts; you can't dispute them."

  The Doctor took out his pipe. "Do you mind my smoking?" he asked. "Tobacco helps

  me to arrange my ideas."

  I gave him the means of arranging his ideas; that is to say, I gave him the

  match-box. He blew some preliminary clouds of smoke and then he answered me:

  "For twenty years past, my friend, I have been studying the question of

  hereditary transmission of qualities; and I have found vices and diseases

  descending more frequently to children than virtue and health. I don't stop to

  ask why: there is no end to that sort of curiosity. What I have observed is what

  I tell you; no more and no less. You will say this is a horribly discouraging

  result of experience, for it tends to show that children come into the world at

  a disadvantage on the day of their birth. Of course they do. Children are born

  deformed; children are born deaf, dumb, or blind; children are born with the

  seeds in them of deadly diseases. Who can account for the cruelties of creation?

  Why are we endowed with life--only to end in death? And does it ever strike you,

  when you are cutting your mutton at dinner, and your cat is catching its mouse,

  and your spider is suffocating its fly, that we are all, big and little

  together, born to one certain inheritance--the privilege of eating each other?"

  "Very sad," I admitted. "But it will all be set right in another world."

  "Are you quite sure of that?" the Doctor asked.

  "Quite sure, thank God! And it would be better for you if you felt about it as I

  do."

  "We won't dispute, my dear Governor. I don't scoff at comforting hopes; I don't

  deny the existence of occasional compensations. But I do see, nevertheless, that

  Evil has got the upper hand among us, on this curious little planet. Judging by

  my observation and experience, that ill-fated baby's chance of inheriting the

  virtues of her parents is not to be compared with her chances of inheriting

  their vices; especially if she happens to take after her mother. There the

  virtue is not conspicuous, and the vice is one enormous fact. When I think of

  the growth of that poisonous hereditary taint, which may come with time--when I

  think of passions let loose and temptations lying in ambush--I see the smooth

  surface of the Minister's domestic life with dangers lurking under it which make

  me shake in my shoes. God! what a life I should lead, if I happened to be in his

  place, some years hence. Suppose I said or did something (in the just exercise

  of my parental authority) which offended my adopted daughter. What figure would

  rise from the dead in my memory, when the girl bounced out of the room in a

  rage? The image of her mother would be the image I should see. I should remember

  what her mother did when she was provoked; I should lock my bedroom door, in my

  own house, at night. I should come down to breakfast with suspicions in my cup

  of tea, if I discovered that my adopted daughter had poured it out. Oh, yes;

  it's quite true that I might be doing the girl a cruel injustice all the time;

  but how am I to be sure of that? I am only sure that her mother was hanged for

  one of the most merciless murders committed in our time. Pass the match-box. My

  pipe's out, and my confession of faith has come to an end."

  It was useless to dispute with a man who possessed his command of language. At

  the same time, there was a bright side to the poor Minister's prospects which

  the Doctor had failed to see. It was barely possible that I might succeed in

  putting my positive friend in the wrong. I tried the experiment, at any rate.

  "You seem to have forgotten," I reminded him, "that the child will have every

  advantage that education can offer to her, and will be accustomed from her

  earliest years to restraining and purifying influences, in a clergyman's

  household."

  Now that he was enjoying the fumes of tobacco, the Doctor was as placid and

  sweet-tempered as a man could be.

  "Quite true," he said.

  "Do you doubt the influence of religion?" I asked sternly.

  He answered, sweetly: "Not at all"

  "Or the influence of kindness?"

  "Oh, dear, no!"

  "Or the force of example?"

  "I wouldn't deny it for the world."

  I had not expected this extraordinary docility. The Doctor had got the upper

  hand of me again--a state of things that I might have found it hard to endure,

  but for a call of duty which put an end to our sitting. One of the female

  warders appeared with a message from the condemned cell. The Prisoner wished to

  see the Governor and the Medical Officer.

  "Is she ill?" the Doctor inquired.

  "No, sir."

  "Hysterical? or agitated, perhaps?"

  "As easy and composed, sir, as a person can be."

  We set forth together for the condemned cell.

  CHAPTER VII.

  THE MURDERESS CONSULTS THE AUTHORITIES.

  THERE was a considerate side to my friend's character, which showed itself when

  the warder had left us.

  He was especially anxious to be careful of what he said to a woman in the

  Prisoner's terrible situation; especially in the event of her having been really

  subjected to the influence of religious belief. On the Minister's own authority,

  I declared that there was every reason to adopt this conclusion; and in support

  of what I had said I showed him the confession. It only contained a few lines,

  acknowledging that she had committed the murder and that she deserved her

  sentence. "From the planning of the crime to the commission of the crime, I was

  in my right senses throughout. I knew what I was doing." With that remarkable

  disavowal of the defense set up by her advocate, the confession ended.

  My colleague read the paper, and handed it back to me without making any remark.

  I asked if he suspected the Prisoner of feigning conversion to please the

  Minister.

  "She sh
all not discover it," he answered, gravely, "if I do."

  It would not be true to say that the Doctor's obstinacy had shaken my belief in

  the good result of the Minister's interference. I may, however, acknowledge that

  I felt some misgivings, which were not dispelled when I found myself in the

  presence of the Prisoner.

  I had expected to see her employed in reading the Bible. The good book was

  closed and was not even placed within her reach. The occupation to which she was

  devoting herself astonished and repelled me.

  Some carelessness on the part of the attendant had left on the table the writing

  materials that had been needed for her confession. She was using them now--when

  death on the scaffold was literally within a few hours of her--to sketch a

  portrait of the female warder, who was on the watch! The Doctor and I looked at

  each other; and now the sincerity of her repentance was something that I began

  to question, too.

  She laid down the pen, and proceeded quietly to explain herself.

  "Even the little time that is left to me proves to be a weary time to get

  through," she said. "I am making a last use of the talent for drawing and

  catching a likeness, which has been one of my gifts since I was a girl. You look

  as if you didn't approve of such employment as this for a woman who is going to

  be hanged. Well, sir, I have no doubt you are right." She paused, and tore up

  the portrait. "If I have misbehaved myself," she resumed, "I make amends. To

  find you in an indulgent frame of mind is of importance to me just now. I have a

  favor to ask of you. May the warder leave the cell for a few minutes?"

  Giving the woman permission to withdraw for a while, I waited with some anxiety

  to hear what the Prisoner wanted of me.

  "I have something to say to you," she proceeded, "on the subject of executions.

  The face of a person who is going to be hanged is hidden, as I have been told,

  by a white cap drawn over it. Is that true?"

  How another man might have felt, in my place, I cannot, of course, say. To my

  mind, such a question--on her lips--was too shocking to be answered in words. I

  bowed.

  "And the body is buried," she went on, "in the prison?"

  I could remain silent no longer. "Is there no human feeling left in you?" I

  burst out. "What do these horrid questions mean?"

  "Don't be angry with me, sir; you shall hear directly. I want to know first if I

  am to be buried in the prison?"

  I replied as before, by a bow.

  "Now," she said, "I may tell you what I mean. In the autumn of last year I was

  taken to see some waxworks. Portraits of criminals were among them. There was

  one portrait--" She hesitated; her infernal self-possession failed her at last.

  The color left her face; she was no longer able to look at me firmly. "There was

  one portrait," she resumed, "that had been taken after the execution. The face

  was so hideous; it was swollen to such a size in its frightful deformity--oh,

  sir, don't let me be seen in that state, even by the strangers who bury me! Use

  your influence--forbid them to take the cap off my face when I am dead--order

  them to bury me in it, and I swear to you I'll meet death tomorrow as coolly as

  the boldest man that ever mounted the scaffold!" Before I could stop her, she

  seized me by the hand, and wrung it with a furious power that left the mark of

  her grasp on me, in a bruise, for days afterward. "Will you do it?" she cried.

  "You're an honorable man; you will keep your word. Give me your promise!"

  I gave her my promise.

  The relief to her tortured spirit expressed itself horribly in a burst of

  frantic laughter. "I can't help it," she gasped; "I'm so happy."

  My enemies said of me, when I got my appointment, that I was too excitable a man

  to be governor of a prison. Perhaps they were not altogether wrong. Anyhow, the

  quick-witted Doctor saw some change in me, which I was not aware of myself. He

  took my arm and led me out of the cell. "Leave her to me," he whispered. "The

  fine edge of my nerves was worn off long ago in the hospital."

  When we met again, I asked what had passed between the Prisoner and himself.

  "I gave her time to recover," he told me; "and, except that she looked a little

  paler than usual, there was no trace left of the frenzy that you remember. 'I

  ought to apologize for troubling you,' she said; 'but it is perhaps natural that

  I should think, now and then, of what is to happen to me to-morrow morning. As a

  medical man, you will be able to enlighten me. Is death by hanging a painful

  death?' She had put it so politely that I felt bound to answer her. 'If the neck

  happens to be broken,' I said, 'hanging is a sudden death; fright and pain (if

  there is any pain) are both over in an instant. As to the other form of death

  which is also possible (I mean death by suffocation), I must own as an honest

  man that I know no more about it than you do.' After considering a little, she

  made a sensible remark, and followed it by an embarrassing request. 'A great

  deal,' she said, 'must depend on the executioner. I am not afraid of death,

  Doctor. Why should I be? My anxiety about my little girl is set at rest; I have

  nothing left to live for. But I don't like pain. Would you mind telling the

  executioner to be careful? Or would it be better if I spoke to him myself?' I

  said I thought it would come with a better grace from herself. She understood me

  directly; and we dropped the subject. Are you surprised at her coolness, after

  your experience of her?"

  I confessed that I was surprised.

  "Think a little," the Doctor said. "The one sensitive place in that woman's

  nature is the place occupied by her self-esteem."

  I objected to this that she had shown fondness for her child.

  My friend disposed of the objection with his customary readiness.

  "The maternal instinct," he said. "A cat is fond of her kittens; a cow is fond

  of her calf. No, sir, the one cause of that outbreak of passion which so shocked

  you--a genuine outbreak, beyond all doubt--is to be found in the vanity of a

  fine feminine creature, overpowered by a horror of looking hideous, even after

  her death. Do you know I rather like that woman?"

  "Is it possible that you are in earnest?" I asked.

  "I know as well as you do," he answered, that this is neither a time nor a place

  for jesting. The fact is, the Prisoner carries out an idea of mine. It is my

  positive conviction that the worst murders--I mean murders deliberately

  planned--are committed by persons absolutely deficient in that part of the moral

  organization which feels. The night before they are hanged they sleep. On their

  last morning they eat a breakfast. Incapable of realizing the horror of murder,

  they are incapable of realizing the horror of death. Do you remember the last

  murderer who was hanged here--a gentleman's coachman who killed his wife? He had

  but two anxieties while he was waiting for execution. One was to get his

  allowance of beer doubled, and the other was to be hanged in his coachman's

  livery. No! no! these wretches are all alike; they are human creatures born with

  the temperaments of
tigers. Take my word for it, we need feel no anxiety about

  to-morrow. The Prisoner will face the crowd round the scaffold with composure;

  and the people will say, 'She died game.' "

  CHAPTER VIII.

  THE MINISTER SAYS GOOD-BY.

  THE Capital Punishment of the Prisoner is in no respect connected with my

  purpose in writing the present narrative. Neither do I desire to darken these

  pages by describing in detail an act of righteous retribution which must

  present, by the nature of it, a scene of horror. For these reasons I ask to be

  excused, if I limit what I must needs say of the execution within the compass of

  a few words--and pass on.

  The one self-possessed person among us was the miserable woman who suffered the

  penalty of death.

  Not very discreetly, as I think, the Chaplain asked her if she had truly

  repented. She answered: "I have confessed the crime, sir. What more do you

  want?" To my mind--still hesitating between the view that believes with the

  Minister, and the view that doubts with the Doctor--this reply leaves a way open

  to hope of her salvation. Her last words to me, as she mounted the steps of the

  scaffold, were: "Remember your promise." It was easy for me to be true to my

  word. At that bygone time, no difficulties were placed in my way by such

  precautions as are now observed in the conduct of executions within the walls of

  the prison. From the time of her death to the time of her burial, no living

  creature saw her face. She rests, veiled in her prison grave.

  Let me now turn to living interests, and to scenes removed from the

  thunder-clouds of crime.

  . . . . . . .

  On the next day I received a visit from the Minister.

  His first words entreated me not to allude to the terrible event of the previous

  day. "I cannot escape thinking of it," he said, "but I may avoid speaking of

  it." This seemed to me to be the misplaced confidence of a weak man in the

  refuge of silence. By way of changing the subject, I spoke of the child. There

  would be serious difficulties to contend with (as I ventured to suggest), if he

  remained in the town, and allowed his new responsibilities to become the subject

  of public talk.

  His reply to this agreeably surprised me. There were no difficulties to be

  feared.

  The state of his wife's health had obliged him (acting under medical advice) to

  try the influence of her native air. An interval of some months might elapse

  before the good effect of the change had sufficiently declared itself; and a

  return to the peculiar climate of the town might bring on a relapse. There had

  consequently been no alternative to but resign his charge. Only on that day the

  resignation had been accepted--with expressions of regret sincerely reciprocated

  by himself. He proposed to leave the town immediately; and one of the objects of

  his visit was to bid me good-by.

  "The next place I live in," he said, "will be more than a hundred miles away. At

  that distance I may hope to keep events concealed which must be known only to

  ourselves. So far as I can see, there are no risks of discovery lurking in this

  place. My servants (only two in number) have both been born here, and have both

  told my wife that they have no wish to go away. As to the person who introduced

  herself to me by the name of Miss Chance, she was traced to the railway station

  yesterday afternoon, and took her ticket for London."

  I congratulated the Minister on the good fortune which had befriended him, so

  far.

  "You will understand how carefully I have provided against being deceived," he

  continued, "when I tell you what my plans are. The persons among whom my future

  lot is cast--and the child herself, of course--must never suspect that the new

  member of my family is other than my own daughter. This is deceit, I admit; but

  it is deceit that injures no one. I hope you see the necessity for it, as I do."

  There could be no doubt of the necessity.

  If the child was described as adopted, there would be curiosity about the