More than Brothers.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXXXIV, Issue 58, 25 June 1908, Page 2

More than Brothers.

ORIGINAL STORY.

(By Christian A. Winter.) Now First Published. PART I. CHAPTER 111. "I don't think I ought to have gone in thero after all," thought Ern, as he put the billy down on the ground, and prepared to make his " escape. "Everybody will know about it by now, and' how on earth am I to get off without being seen. By rights I should have cleared out before it was discovered, and I'd be well away by now. Well, anyhow, I saw them all once more, if it was for the last time. Wish I could have said 'goodbye ' ; don't know how I managed to part from mother at the door without it, but I'm glad I didn't, she would have suspected something was up. There's one good thing its dark, and once I'm out of the light of these lamps I'll be safer."

He managed, by a little scheming, and by great coolness, to make his way into a quieter street unobserved. Everybody in the streets seemed to be discussing the recent act of violence, talking over his crime. He heard a few words from one person, and a few more from another, and though they made him feel as an outcast among them, there was a certain consolation in their words.

"Not half, a bad idea of mine that," he thought, "tying that rope across the road; they'll think it was only a joke now; they'll never think of anybody shying a stone at him. And if they should catch me but I'll look after that." Just at a street corner he was accosted by a young man in a white sweater. "Dreadful, ain't it, this news about young Graham ?" Era's hurried thoughts brought him to the conclusion that it would be safer to answer than to walk on in silence or feign ignorance. "It is that," he exclaimed, emphatically, slowing his pace down a little to reply, but not pausing in his walk. The man looked at him rather curiously, then remarked, "Oh, I thought you was one of my mates," and walked on.

Ern continued his walk, exercising more caution in keeping out of the light, feeling relieved that he had not been recognised, unless, indeed, the strange man was a spy, and only feigning ignorance of him. This thought made him cast a nervous glance over his shoulder, but the road he had just turned into was apparently deserted; he could neither see nor hear any one at his heels. The roadwas dark and gloomy, shadowed on either I eide by high banks overgrown with furze. For a moment Em hesitated, wondering whether it would be best to take the road, or leave it in favour of some less frequented place ? then its smooth, winding length reminded him that it would carry him further in a short time than any other route, and he decided to follow it. The loneliness, the dark furze shadows, would be serviceable to aid in his escape, yet he shrank from the solitude and the gloom. It reminded him of the place where Dick Graham had lain, concealed among the scrub. There was a stretching road, as lonely as this, and dark beneath the sombre pinetrees. How gaily Dick Grahara had gone spinning along it that morning—and now he was dead.' Ern shivered, and tried to think about some other subject, but it was no use trying; his thoughts would not be controlled. Every time he passed a dark clump of gorse he felt a desire to go up and <earch behind it; he felt as if, by ome -strange means, he would assuredly find Dick Graham's corpse there, if he looked for it. He tried to shake off th* idea, to argue that it was all nonsense, and that this was not the road where Dick had been killed., But the hunting sensation would not leave him. So strong did it grow that he could fancy he saw the corpse before him ; dreadfully still, with blood on its hair, and a torn handkerchief around its brows. He tried to force his mind to other topics ; he strove hard to think of something else, even if it was his present position. He thought of the past, and, dragging his thoughts from the morning's cri(me, he thought of the future. Suppose hewas captured, what would become of him ? Dick Graham was dead, there was no doubt of that. And had he not been murdered ? Ern knew nothing of the distinctions of the law, to his mind, manslaughter was undoubtedly murder. He knew the penalty for murder.

Then he shivered again, and thought of his parents, and what trouble it would bring upon them, and he thought of suicide, and wondered if it would mean escape from his present position. He was half resolved to try ; life held no attractions for him now, and suicide was surely bett«r than hanging. And yetr-to die ! to lie stiff and cold like Dick Graham ! No, he would cling to life while he had it; it might have no attractions for him, but he was afraid to leave it. It wag the firs! time he had confessed, even to himself, thai he was afraid of anything, and it gave him a queer sensation, as if he was turning into another '"boy, or as if he was just beginning to know himself. The last was true enough ; liiij life had been too constantly occupied to allow any time for thinking, his mind had been taken up with school work and play, and he had had no time or inclination to think about hia own character. He was a boy, that was enough for him, and he had no individual virtues or failings that he knew of; he was just a common boy, not like Alison ; whose character was too uncommon to pass unnoticed. But, at the thought of Alison, thoughts, recollections, and emotions gathered in su«h overwhelming profusion that only his strongest efforts saved him from a flood of tears. He had lost Alison now for ever, this gulf could never be bridged; he could not even write to h\m, without the danger of betraying himself. He must forget him for ever. The road now emerged fronS the

furze-grown cutting, and ran through a bleak and desolate" flat, where patches of scrub alone broke the sweep of the keen, penetrating wind. Em drew back behind the scrub suddenly; for in turning a' ; sharp corner he had almost ran into a couple of men, walking along in the opposite direction, and talking over the recent tragedy. "Well, if you ask me," one of them was saying, "that rope was just put there for to mislead people. Leastways, when I went along some time this afternoon, it wasn't there then. jHe'd had a row with poor Dick Graham, too, young Brandon had; I know that for a fact. And it looks very much to me as if he'd waited there for him to come along, and then let ily at him with a stone. Fastening, the rope there was just to make out that it was a joke. See how careful he was to hide all traces of it,—oh, he's deep, that young folliow, and tearing the name out his handkerchief and all. And because he didn't think about the rope at first, he came back after and done it, there ain't no doubt about it, 'cause it wasn't there when I came by." "You may be right, but I should hope not. They'll bring it in ' manslaughter/ if its found out. Is he any relation to William Brandon, do you know ?" "Son, yes, and a regular bad lot, too. I know him well enough, and a bit too well. Don't know how he's managed to keep out of the lock-up so long. You've seen him, I daresay; goes about with young De Renzy a lot. They say it will be the death of young De Eenzy ; he's got brain fever through it, and he's not strong enough to stand anything like that.*' The voices died away in the distance, and Ern,, mechanically drawing further back from the road, hn\> down on a boulder that stood behind a thick* clump of lawyer. He covered his face with his hands, but tears would not now come to his relief. He could not thmk, he could only listen to an echo that never paused in its repetition or grew fainter <ib it went on, "It'll be the death of young De j Renzy, the death of young De Renzy, the death of young De Renzy, it'll be the death of young De Renzy, the death of young De Renzy," :md _ so on, without an instant's pause, without the least variation. - ; At length he became a»\ are that his own lips were repeating the words, and ho shut his mouth titiht, and pressed his lips firmly together, but that did not quiet the echo in his heart, nor relieve his mind h\>m its sudden crushing weight. The fact that his little ruse with the rope had failed did noi distress him at all. He had thought it a good idea, but he had not entirely trusted in it; he had had an idea that the truth would leak out somehow, or he would not have hidden Dick's bicycle in readiness to escape. It would be brought in manslaughter, he didn't care about that, but the thought of Alison dy-' ing was too much for hyn. # "Well, this won't do," he said at last, rising wearily, with both hands pressed to his throbbing temples. Then he paced backwards and forwards behind the screen of lawyer, but without coming_ to any decision about his next action. _ His intelligence Beemed, for the time, to have { quite deserted him. "Come, this won't do !" he repeatad, sharply. "I shall have to d« something or go somewhere, I can't stay here and get run in. > Could I manage to see old Al again, for the last time? S'pose I'll have to decide • that." - . It did not take very long to decide. He would have b&en only too glad to have seen his chum again, he would have scorned the difficulties that lay in his way. He reflected sadly, however, that if Alison was as ill as ho had heard, a hasty glance would bo all that he could possibly get, jus* one farewell glance through the window—and even that much was very doubtful. He would be running a risk of being ignominiously captured, and besides this, he could do Alison no good. It brought to his recollection a story of somebody who ran all manner of risks to look their last on a sick friend. He recollected, word for word, his own scathing comments on the story, and how Alison had defended it from no other motive than love of contradiction. How he wished these seemingly forgotten incidents would not return to him. If he could only forget that Alison had ever existed, if he could be the boy he was , before Alison ca,me into his life. And now, having looked his last on his parents and on his sisters and brother, and having decided not to creep by a round-about way down to Major De Renzy's house, on the chance of being able to caich a glimpse of Alison through the window, he had no further inducement to stay in Pinehurst. There was Dick Graham's bicycle, waiting to carry him off into safety. The very thought of it recalled the scene on the lonely road, and the corpse .hidden among the scrub. He hardly liked the idea of ' using it; in broad daylight it had seemed a splendid scheme, now there seemed something very cold-blooded in his plans, and he recoiled from them, wondering that he could have devised them. Yet in his present position, as a criminal escaping from the law, he could not afford to let such emotions master him, especially now, whin he had just overcome far stronger inclinations—the desire to see his chum once more. He must be his everyday, matter-of-fact self, and not allow himself to be influenced by his feelings ; it was necessary, it was absolutely essential for him to make his way as soon as possible into some place where he would nofc be recognised.

Leaving his cheerless resting-place behind the scrub, Ern made his way back to the road, and resumed his lonely walk. The wind had fallen; everything was quiet; he was alone with his thoughts. Darkness preven-! ted him from travelling as fast as he' would have wished, but he hurried on ( as fast as possible, hoping, by bodily : exertions, to forget the sadness of his j heart, to become, in fact, too exhaus-; ted to think. But nothing of the sort took place; on the contrary, all the thinking he had neglected during his boyhood seemed concentrated in this, miserable night., j Presently he was obliged io pause again, . to await the rising of the

moon, for ho must have light to search the place where he had con l cealed Dick's bicycle.. It was a good way off the public road, and he could not find his way in the darkness. IJe paced up and down restlessly,-haunt-ed by thoughts of the corpse in the pine shadows, or repeating mechanically the last news ho had .heard of Alison, or seeing, in imagination, his home, his parents, and his sisters and brother.

After he had been pacing up and down in all the horrors of loneliness, and the ghastly, haunting fears connected with the tragedy, for a long time, the moon arose. It seemed to Ern as if ho had been waiting a lifetime for her light. Now, at last, this intolerable inaction was over for the time. Now, at last, he could set out again. Walking, especially rough walking, would help to keep his thoughts from gaining the mastery over him.

Daylight was already blending its first grey light with the moon-beams, when Ern dragged his weary feet over the lumps-and hillocks to his place of concealment, and there before him stood Dick's bicycle—the means of escape. (To be Continued.)