SHORT STORY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13303, 9 October 1906, Page 3

SHORT STORY.

A LITTLE PARADISE. A country garden, full of sweet, old-fashion-ed country garden flowers -that load the air with perfume—the snapdragon, the gay marigold, the nodding Canterbury bells, the tall hollyhock, the" fragrant lavender, and the clustering honeysuckle, the bright-hucd and the prim, the flaunting blossoms that stare boldly up to the alky, and the modest little ones "that nestle to the wall and hide under green hedgerows— at them, how they blend into one harmonious wave of colour and shimmer in the midday sun. ' Just the spot this which the busy wayfarer would pause at and look upon with envy; just the place this where the tired worker could fling himself down and forget his cares; just the place this which the poet, his souses charmed by music, of the insects, the perfume of the flowers, and the drowsy bliss that reigns around, would call a little paradise. ■. , The casement is half open already; see, the breeze catches it and swings it back, ■, so that we can see the occupants of this charming retreat. You know that lady in deep blank and a widow's cap who sits at the open window; you know the little boy and girl with the wavy brown hair and the laughing eyes. _: The children you should recognise in a moment; the woman you might not. There has passed over her head since we last saw her one of those mental storms of anguish and horror which sear the heart, which inflict such agony upon the soul that the writhing is reflected in the face. If wo were to question the neighbours, we should bo told that she is a widow from London —a Mrs. Johnson, who has lately lost her husband, and who has taken the cottage that she may live very quietly and recruit her shattered health. How they know so much is a mystery, for Mrs. Johnson keeps no servant, does all her own errands at the little village shop, goes deeply veiled, and speaks to no one. They wore not quite sure she is not hiding from the police; and old Jones, the cobbler, who reads the newspaper out loud at the pump on the common on Sunday morning, never comes to the record of a .mysterious crime, without, conjecturing, with a shake of the head, that "maybe Mistress Johnson, up yon, could tell us somethin' about that. Hum 1" Alas! wo know there is one crime, which made all England shudder, about which Mrs. Johnson could tell us all; how vengeance, swift and sure, caino. upon the guilty wretch, and how to-day, in an obscure' village, shattered in health and broken-hearted, she hides with her children, under an assumed name, because her husband was a murderer, who was hanged by the nock for his crime, and buried in quicklime in the precincts of the gaol, lest any accursed atom of him should remain to taint the ground. Frank Barton's crime was brought home to him, and he has paid the penalty. Over the wavy brown hair and the laughing eyes of the "good fellow" the white cap was drawn, and a professional gentleman slung him out of existence one Monday morning, and then went off to the North to strangle an idiot who'd burned his mother alive. ' So there is an end of jolly, good-humoured Frank. Amid some considerable public excitement the end came, and the murderer was duly murdered, and sent to eternity in the presence of a wealthy publican who happened -to be sheriff and half-a-dozen representatives of the press. ' • Everything was perfectly legal and in ordel, and society took its revenge with every due form and ceremony punctiliously observed, , and a certain amount of kindly consideration for the victim. There was about ten minutes' mental agony,. a few seconds of physical pain, and then, so far as the murderer was concerned, all was over. But what about the wretched wife at home? What about the innocent children? They have committed no sin, yet the vengeance which society will

take upon them almost surpasses description ; their punishment will be tenfold his—it will be a slow torture, a lingering life in death. Lucy Barton loved her husband as fondly and devoutly on the day the executioner took the breath out of him as she had done when he wooed and won her among her native hayfields. To her ho was still the love of her youth, the merry, light-hearted Frank, the big man : with a boy's heart; a little too generous, a little; too fond of gaiety, but her fond and affectionate husband always. Her Frank had been tempted fby a wicked woman, who had - hounded him on to his destruction, and now he was to die. To die a shameful death far away from her, and leave his helpless children outcasts. It seemed too horrible, to be true. Night after night, after the dread sentence had been pronounced, she would start up and fancy it was some fearful nightmare, from which presently she would wake and thank God. But it.was all too real. She had parted with him for ever; her lips had kissed his, her arms had been flung about his neck, for the last time. They had carried '_ her fainting and senseless from the clutch of' the sobbing and agonised man, and when she came to herself she knew that on her husband's face she should look no more. A life of torture and despair was crowded into the next two days, and then came the Sunday night. The few friends she had came about, her, and wanted to take the children away for a while. For God's sake, no," she wailed; leave me them, or T shall die." -_ - All through the long night, up in the quiet room, she knelt by the children s bedside, and moved her lips in hysterical prayer. And ever and anon, across the night wind, came the. booms of sound that struck another hour from her husband's life. Then the dawn peered, in at the window at the sleeping faces, and the white, worn, weeping watcher at the bedside. Higher and higher rose the light in the sky, and the birds came and sang their merry matin to the morn. For the myriad sleepers another day of life was . come- for him a day of death. _ '■ •; _ The clock struck six. ' i The woman bowed her head lower and lower, and her lips moved faster in prayer. Right : away through gates went her thoughts info the little cell. She could ', see the whole. scene rehearsed; she watched the warder touch the sleeper's arm, she saw the haggard face turn and the blue, eyes open, and the wavy brown hair lifted from the pillow. - . And then came on her the wild yearning to fling hoi arms once more about her husband's neck, to seize him and ■; hold him and cry— " .../.'. " You shall not have him ! He is mine !" And in her despair she shrieked aloud, " Frank!" and the children started up and cried, Mamma, mamma, what- is it?" She fell on her knees in a moment, and clasped them to her breast, and the hot tears rained down upon their cheeks. Nothing, my darlings," she sobbed, and then a wild, unconquerable impulse seized her, and she said, "My darlings, papa is in great danger. He is very ill, far away from here. Kneel down by me and pray for poor papa." The children crept frightened from their bed and knelt beside their mother, and then, with their little eyes reverently raised to heaven and their little hands joined humbly in prayer, repeated after her, " Pray God bless dear papa." And as the words left their lips the clock struck seven. The last hour had come. From that moment Lucy Barton ceased to weep; there were no more tears left to flow. Only a grey shadow fell across , her face, and a weird-set look' came in her eyes that told of the agony within. She raised the children from their knees and coaxed them into bed again,' and. then flung open the window for air. : She stared through space with those tearless eyes until she saw right away- through the prison walls, right away to where her husband was. She heard tho chaplain sneaking to him; she saw him as he stood. dressed— ready. This was the man she had loved and borne children to. This was her hero, her darling —the man who was to have gone through life with her, and sat opposite to her in the chimney corner when they ■both grew old, and the children , had grown up and married and gone to other';homes; ( ' ■;•, There he stood, this handsome husband of hers, between stern men,-, pinioned and waiting to die. Then she saw the hangman join the party, and someone give the signal to move forward. Step by step he was going to his death. '"Frank!" she shrieked, "Frank, my darling! I—" \ ■' The clock struck eight ! ; ■ With a low moan Lucy Barton fell heavily to the floor, and the frightened children, hardly 'knowing what they said, ran to her ,'■ erj'ing, ■ and called aloud— v ; v- ,'X- :- - -.■'' " Papa, ; papa, : come to' mamma, she is dead !'-', '. " _' ,--.'. .".;.';-. And even while they called the soul of their father had left his strangled body and passed to its heavenly Judge. Since then the weary days have crept by one. by one, and that night of horror is an unobliterablo memory of the past for the murderer's widow.- ■ A few kind frinds who knew her and her husband in the old days, when they held their heads high, have come round and given her money, and sent her away to the quiet cottage in the far-away country village where we see her now. She has changed the name which is a byword and a reproach, and henceforth she and her children will be known by.it no more. \ . They are outcasts. The children whose father was hanged lie under the shadow of the gallows for life; the widow of a murderer is a thing to shrink from, or at the best to gaze upon as something ticketed and labelled in life's chamber of horrors. As we &eo them now in that rose-covered cottage, did we not know their history, who would guess the great disaster that. has blurred their lives for ever? The set, worn face of the mother, with the eyes that seem for ever looking back, tells a story; but the sunbeams fall upon the baby boy and girl, and the black shadow that lies over them no eye can see. But it must follow them for evermore. ■'. " Presently the little girl darts through the. open dcor and dances down the pathway chasing a butterfly from flower to flower, and the boy claps his little brown hands and toddles after her. Happy children, laughing among the flowers, ye heed not the Nemesis behind! You will forget the name that is your own, and you will be taught never to speak of' your dead father. Some fiction will be told you, and you will believe it; but you will learn the truth some day, and the- blow will crash yu. What man will woo and wed a maiden to be the mother of his children when he knows her father was hanged? What chance in life lias a murderer's son? - - Hiding for a time from the sleuth-hounds of scandal, the widow will War her burden bravely, and. strive to lengthen the pilgrimage for the sake of her children, but not for long. Sooner or later she will be recognised, to be stared; at, bv the village gossips, pitied by some, shunned by all.. Then she will gather together her meagre household gods and fly to hide her shame elsewhore. ' ..; » •■. It would have been the glory of her life to teach her children to love, and respect their father. It must be her bitter task to eradicate all;traces of his memory from their minds, lest, 'their innocent prattle' should at any moment bring tho brand of Cain to light. When they grow up she will never know a moment's peace, lest some chance should reveal the ghastly secret to them. Besides this, there is the terror lest her trie-rids should drop awav and leave them to abject want. And over all is the eternal picture present to her eyes day and night of the strong arms that might be hers to lean on now, of the loving eyes that might be looking into hers, but for that black and awlu story of shame, which she seeks to torget and cannot. ft is strange, if you will, but. it is true, mat there are times when, though (he man and the woman lie in their graves, there comes into Lucy Barton's heart a sharp pan-* ot jealousy. 'Hard as is this suffering ladv's lot in life, it is doubly hard when she re-" members that her husband has died a shameful death and that, she and her children are outcasts for life, all to avenge the loss of a worthless woman who met her death while trying to drive too hard a bargain. Look, reader, once again at the cottage inn the rases and , the gaily-decked garden I and the sportive children, ere we turn I the kaleidoscope How fair without; how foul Si i, do ?, B no l require that I should £v,r V ll that lies bcfOTe «» tinted family. You can guess. I have sketched no fancy picture. All I have described I have S, I , could take you this warm Julv weather down into the country and show you the cottage and the garden. I could push the lathee ajar, and let. you see the hempen widow and her children, and I know you would; pity them, knowing their story. . But. -I also know if I said to you, " Rev I-™,™.' Mr So-and-So, you wan( : a ho(1 . Keeper; this poor woman's husband was lianged-will you take her?''-you would crv H? tan . t .- V 'n How can you ask such a thing: , Or if I said. " Let. these little outcasts play with your children, madam : thev are lonely, and have no playmates "—you would gather your little ones close to your skirts and flee as if from a plague. ;<■' ." Is it right that the sins of the fathers should be visited upon the children? Society answers no.; but society acts yes. In that letter age to which we are drifting these I things may be altered ; for . the , present the , penalty of crime bears oftentimes' heaviest ion those, who least deserve- it. • :;/- ,; ■;