A	>>	B	>>	C	>>	D	>>	E
F	>>	G	>>	H	>>	I	>>	J
K	>>	L	>>	M	>>	N	>>	O
P	>>	R	>>	S	>>	T	>>	U
V	>>	W	>>			X	>>	Z

Morgan Callaway - "Select Poems of Sidney Lanier"

those who wish to do so. To be sure you have an - "Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen"

Izaak Walton - "The Complete Angler"

Robert Louis Stevenson - "Catriona"

The Fortune Hunter

P >> Phillips >> The Fortune Hunter




Hilda flung her arms high above her head and sank into a chair
and buried her face. ``It's a dream!'' she moaned. ``Wake
me--wake me!''

Otto and Brauner looked each at the other in horror. ``Murder!''
whispered Brauner hoarsely. ``My Hilda--murder!''

Otto went to Hilda and put his arms about her tightly and kissed
her.

``She's got to come,'' said Casey angrily. ``Now, will she go
quietly or shall I call the wagon?''

This threat threw them into a panic. ``You'd better go,'' said
Otto in an undertone to Hilda. ``Don't be frightened, dear.
You're innocent and they can't prove you guilty. You're not poor
and friendless.''

At the pressure of his arms Hilda lifted her face, her eyes
shining at him through her tears. And her heart went out to him
as never before. From that moment it was his, all his. ``My
love, my dear love,'' she said. She went to the closet and took
out her hat. She put it on before the mirror over the
mantelpiece. ``I'm ready,'' she said quietly.

In the street, she walked beside Casey; her father and Otto were
close behind with O'Rourke. They turned into Sixth Street. Half
a block down, in front of Meinert's, a crowd was surging, was
filling sidewalk and street. When they came to the edge of it,
Casey suddenly said ``In here'' and took her by the arm. All
went down a long and winding passage, across an open court to a
back door where a policeman in uniform was on guard.

``Did you get her, Mike?'' said the policeman to Casey.

``Here she is,'' replied Casey. ``She didn't give no trouble.''

The policeman opened the door. He let Casey, Hilda and O'Rourke
pass. He thrust back Brauner and Otto. ``No, you don't,'' he
said.

``Let us in!'' commanded Otto, beside himself with rage.

``Not much! Get back!'' He had closed the door and was standing
between it and them, one hand meaningly upon the handle of his
sheathed club.

``I am her father,'' half-pleaded, half- protested Brauner.

``Cap'n's orders,'' said the policeman in a gentler voice. ``The
best thing you can do is to go to the station house and wait
there. You won't get to see her here.''

Meanwhile Casey, still holding Hilda by the arm, was guiding her
along a dark hall. When they touched a door he threw it open.
He pushed her roughly into the room. For a few seconds the
sudden blaze of light blinded her. Then--

Before her, stretched upon a table, was--Mr. Feuerstein. She
shrank back and gazed at him with wide, fascinated eyes. His
face was turned toward her, his eyes half-open; he seemed to be
regarding her with a glassy, hateful stare--the ``curse in a dead
man's eye.'' His chin was fallen back and down, and his lips
exposed his teeth in a hideous grin. And then she saw--
Sticking upright from his throat was a knife, the knife from
their counter. It seemed to her to be trembling as if still
agitated from the hand that had fiercely struck out his life.

``My God!'' moaned Hilda, sinking down to the floor and hiding
her face.

As she crouched there, Casey said cheerfully to Captain Hanlon,
``You see she's guilty all right, Cap'n.''

Hanlon took his cigar from between his teeth and nodded. At this
a man sitting near him burst out laughing. Hanlon scowled at
him.

The man--Doctor Wharton, a deputy coroner--laughed again. ``I
suppose you think she acts guilty,'' he said to Hanlon.

``Any fool could see that,'' retorted Hanlon.

``Any fool would see it, you'd better say,'' said Doctor Wharton.
``No matter how she took it, you fellows would wag your heads and
say `Guilty.' ''

Hanlon looked uneasily at Hilda, fearing she would draw
encouragement from Wharton's words. But Hilda was still moaning.
``Lift her up and set her in a chair,'' he said to Casey.

Hilda recovered herself somewhat and sat before the captain, her
eyes down, her fluttering hands loose in her lap. ``What was the
trouble between you and him?'' Hanlon asked her presently in a
not unkindly tone.

``Must I tell?'' pleaded Hilda, looking piteously at the captain.
``I don't know anything about this except that he came into our
store and told me he was going to--to--''

She looked at Feuerstein's dead face and shivered. And as she
looked, memories flooded her, drowning resentment and fear. She
rose, went slowly up to him; she laid her hand softly upon his
brow, pushed back his long, yellow hair. The touch of her
fingers seemed to smooth the wild, horrible look from his
features. As she gazed down at him the tears welled into her
eyes. ``I won't talk against him,'' she said simply. ``He's
dead--it's all over and past.''

``She ought to go on the stage,'' growled Casey.

But Wharton said in an unsteady voice, ``That's right, Miss.
They can't force you to talk. Don't say a word until you get a
lawyer.''

Hanlon gave him a furious look. ``Don't you meddle in this,'' he
said threateningly.

Wharton laughed. ``The man killed himself,'' he replied. ``I
can tell by the slant of the wound. And I don't propose to stand
by and see you giving your third degree to this little girl.''

``We've got the proof, I tell you,'' said Hanlon. ``We've got a
witness who saw her do it--or at least saw her here when she says
she wasn't here.''

Wharton shrugged his shoulders.

``Don't say a word,'' he said to Hilda. ``Get a lawyer.''

``I don't want a lawyer,'' she answered.

``I'm not guilty. Why should I get a lawyer?''

``Well, at any rate, do all your talking in court. These fellows
will twist everything you say.''

``Take her to the station house,'' interrupted Hanlon.

``But I'm innocent,'' said Hilda, clasping her hands on her heart
and looking appealingly at the captain.

``Take her along, Casey.''

Casey laid hold of her arm, but she shook him off. They went
through the sitting-room of the saloon and out at the side door.
When Hilda saw the great crowd she covered her face with her
hands and shrank back. ``There she is! There she is! They're
taking her to the station house!'' shouted the crowd.

Casey closed the door. ``We'll have to get the wagon,'' he said.

They sat waiting until the patrol wagon came. Then Hilda,
half-carried by Casey, crossed the sidewalk through a double line
of blue coats who fought back the frantically curious, pushed on
by those behind. In the wagon she revived and by the time they
reached the station house, seemed calm. Another great crowd was
pressing in; she heard cries of ``There's the girl that killed
him!'' She drew herself up haughtily, looked round with
defiance, with indignation.

Her father and Otto rushed forward as soon as she entered the
doors. She broke down again. ``Take me home! Take me home!''
she sobbed. ``I've not done anything.'' The men forgot that
they had promised each the other to be calm, and cursed and cried
alternately. The matron came, spoke to her gently.

``You'll have to go now, child,'' she said.

Hilda kissed her father, then she and Otto clasped each the other
closely. ``It'll turn out all right, dear,'' he said. ``We're
having a streak of bad luck. But our good luck'll be all the
better when it comes.''

Strength and hope seemed to pass from him into her. She walked
away firmly and the last glimpse they had of her sad sweet young
face was a glimpse of a brave little smile trying to break
through its gray gloom. But alone in her cell, seated upon the
board that was her bed, her disgrace and loneliness and danger
took possession of her. She was a child of the people, brought
up to courage and self-reliance. She could be brave and calm
before false accusers, before staring crowds. But here, with a
dim gas-jet revealing the horror of grated bars and iron ceiling,
walls and floor--

She sat there, hour after hour, sleepless, tearless, her brain
burning, the cries of drunken prisoners in adjoining cells
sounding in her ears like the shrieks of the damned. Seconds
seemed moments, moments hours. ``I'm dreaming,'' she said aloud
at last. She started up and hurled herself against the bars,
beating them with her hands. ``I must wake or I'll die. Oh, the
disgrace! Oh! the shame!''

And she flung herself into a corner of the bench, to dread the
time when the darkness and the loneliness would cease to hide
her.



XII

EXIT MR. FEUERSTEIN

The matron brought her up into the front room of the station
house at eight in the morning. Casey looked at her haggard face
with an expression of satisfaction. ``Her nerve's going,'' he
said to the sergeant. ``I guess she'll break down and confess
to-day.''

They drove her to court in a Black Maria, packed among thieves,
drunkards and disorderly characters. Upon her right side pressed
a slant-faced youth with a huge nose and wafer-thin, flapping
ears, who had snatched a purse in Houston Street. On her left,
lolling against her, was an old woman in dirty calico, with a
faded black bonnet ludicrously awry upon scant white hair--a
drunkard released from the Island three days before and certain
to be back there by noon.

``So you killed him,'' the old woman said to her with a leer of
sympathy and admiration.

At this the other prisoners regarded her with curiosity and
deference. Hilda made no answer, seemed not to have heard. Her
eyes were closed and her face was rigid and gray as stone.

``She needn't be afraid at all,'' declared a young woman in black
satin, addressing the company at large. ``No jury'd ever convict
as good-looking a girl as her.''

``Good business!'' continued the old woman. ``I'd 'a' killed
mine if I could 'a' got at him--forty years ago.'' She nodded
vigorously and cackled. Her cackle rose into a laugh, the laugh
into a maudlin howl, the howl changing into a kind of song--

``My love, my love, my love and I--we had
to part, to part!
And it broke, it broke, it broke my heart
--it broke my heart!''


``Cork up in there!'' shouted the policeman from the seat beside
the driver.

The old woman became abruptly silent. Hilda moaned and quivered.
Her lips moved. She was murmuring, ``I can't stand it much
longer--I can't. I'll wake soon and see Aunt Greta's picture
looking down at me from the wall and hear mother in the
kitchen--''

``Step lively now!'' They were at the Essex Market police court;
they were filing into the waiting-pen. A lawyer, engaged by her
father, came there, and Hilda was sent with him into a little
consultation room. He argued with her in vain. ``I'll speak for
myself,'' she said. ``If I had a lawyer they'd think I was
guilty.''

After an hour the petty offenders had been heard and judged. A
court officer came to the door and called: ``Hilda Brauner!''

Hilda rose. She seemed unconcerned, so calm was she. Her nerves
had reached the point at which nerves refuse to writhe, or even
to record sensations of pain. As she came into the dingy, stuffy
little courtroom she didn't note the throng which filled it to
the last crowded inch of standing-room; did not note the scores
of sympathetic faces of her anxious, loyal friends and neighbors;
did not even see her father and Otto standing inside the railing,
faith and courage in their eyes as they saw her advancing.

The magistrate studied her over the tops of his glasses, and his
look became more and more gentle and kindly. ``Come up here on
the platform in front of me,'' he said.

Hilda took her stand with only the high desk between him and her.
The magistrate's tone and his kind, honest, old face reassured
her. And just then she felt a pressure at her elbow and heard in
Otto's voice: ``We're all here. Don't be afraid.''

``Have you counsel--a lawyer?'' asked the magistrate.

``No,'' replied Hilda. ``I haven't done anything wrong. I don't
need a lawyer.''

The magistrate's eyes twinkled, but he sobered instantly to say,
``I warn you that the case against you looks grave. You had
better have legal help.''

Hilda looked at him bravely. ``I've only the truth to tell,''
she insisted. ``I don't want a lawyer.''

``We'll see,'' said the magistrate, giving her an encouraging
smile. ``If it is as you say, you certainly won't need counsel.
Your rights are secure here.'' He looked at Captain Hanlon, who
was also on the platform. ``Captain,'' said he, ``your first
witness--the man who found the body.''

``Meinert,'' said the captain in a low tone to a court officer,
who called loudly, ``Meinert! Meinert!''

A man stood up in the crowd. ``You don't want me!'' he shouted,
as if he were trying to make himself heard through a great
distance instead of a few feet.

``You want--''

``Come forward !'' commanded the magistrate sharply, and when
Meinert stood before him and beside Hilda and had been sworn, he
said, ``Now, tell your story.''

``The man--Feuerstein,'' began Meinert, ``came into my place
about half-past one yesterday. He looked a little wild-- as if
he'd been drinking or was in trouble. He went back into the
sitting-room and I sent in to him and--''

``Did you go in?''

``No, your Honor.''

``When did you see him again?''

``Not till the police came.''

``Stand down. I want evidence, not gossip. Captain Hanlon, who
found the body? Do you know?''

``Your Honor, I understood that Mr. Meinert found it.''

The magistrate frowned at him. Then he said, raising his voice,
``Does ANY ONE know who found the body?''

``My man Wielert did,'' spoke up Meinert.

A bleached German boy with a cowlick in the center of his head
just above his forehead came up beside Hilda and was sworn.

``You found the body?''

``Yes,'' said Wielert. He was blinking stupidly and his throat
was expanding and contracting with fright.

``Tell us all you saw and heard and did.''

``I take him the brandy in. And he sit and talk to himself. And
he ask for paper and ink. And then he write and look round like
crazy. And he make luny talk I don't understand. And he speak
what he write--''

Captain Hanlon was red and was looking at Wielert in blank
amazement.

``What did he write?'' asked the magistrate.

``A letter,'' answered Wielert. ``He put it in a envelope with a
stamp on it and he write on the back and make it all ready. And
then I watch him, and he take out a knife and feel it and speak
with it. And I go in and ask him for money.''

``Your Honor, this witness told us nothing of that before,''
interrupted Hanlon. ``I understood that the knife--''

``Did you question him?'' asked the magistrate.

``No,'' replied the captain humbly. And Casey and O'Rourke shook
their big, hard-looking heads to indicate that they had not
questioned him.

``I am curious to know what you HAVE done in this case,'' said
the magistrate sternly. ``It is a serious matter to take a young
girl like this into custody. You police seem unable to learn
that you are not the rulers, but the servants of the people.''

``Your Honor--'' began Hanlon.

``Silence!'' interrupted the magistrate, rapping on the desk with
his gavel. ``Proceed, Wielert. What kind of knife was it?''

``The knife in his throat afterward,'' answered Wielert. ``And I
hear a sound like steam out a pipe--and I go in and see a lady at
the street door. She peep through the crack and her face all
yellow and her eye big. And she go away.''

Hilda was looking at him calmly. She was the only person in the
room who was not intensely agitated. All eyes were upon her.
There was absolute silence.

``Is that lady here?'' asked the magistrate. His voice seemed
loud and strained.

``Yes,'' said Wielert. ``I see her.''

Otto instinctively put his arm about Hilda. Her father was like
a leaf in the wind.

Wielert looked at Hilda earnestly, then let his glance wander
over the still courtroom. He was most deliberate. At last he
said, ``I see her again.''

``Point her out,'' said the magistrate-- it was evidently with an
effort that he broke that straining silence.

``That lady there.'' Wielert pointed at a woman sitting just
outside the inclosure, with her face half-hid by her hand.

A sigh of relief swelled from the crowd. Paul Brauner sobbed.

``Why, she's our witness!'' exclaimed Hanlon, forgetting himself.

The magistrate rapped sharply, and, looking toward the woman,
said, ``Stand up, Madam. Officer, assist her!''

The court officer lifted her to her feet. Her hand dropped and
revealed the drawn, twitching face of Sophie Liebers.

``Your Honor,'' said Hanlon hurriedly, ``that is the woman upon
whose statement we made our case. She told us she saw Hilda
Brauner coming from the family entrance just before the alarm was
given.''

``Are you sure she's the woman you saw?'' said the magistrate to
Wielert. ``Be careful what you say.''

``That's her,'' answered Wielert. ``I see her often. She live
across the street from Meinert's.''

``Officer, bring the woman forward,'' commanded the magistrate.

Sophie, blue with terror, was almost dragged to the platform
beside Hilda. Hilda looked stunned, dazed.

``Speak out!'' ordered the magistrate.

``You have heard what this witness testified.''

Sophie was weeping violently. ``It's all a mistake,'' she cried
in a low, choked voice. ``I was scared. I didn't mean to tell
the police Hilda was there. I was afraid they'd think I did it
if I didn't say something.''

``Tell us what you saw.'' The magistrate's voice was severe.
``We want the whole truth.''

``I was at our window. And I saw Hilda come along and go in at
the family entrance over at Meinert's. And I'd seen Mr.
Feuerstein go in the front door about an hour before. Hilda came
out and went away. She looked so queer that I wanted to see. I
ran across the street and looked in. Mr. Feuerstein was sitting
there with a knife in his hand. And all at once he stood up and
stabbed himself in the neck--and there was blood--and he
fell--and--I ran away.''

``And did the police come to you and threaten you?'' asked the
magistrate.

``Your Honor,'' protested Captain Hanlon with an injured air,
``SHE came to US.''

``Is that true?'' asked the magistrate of Sophie.

Sophie wept loudly. ``Your Honor,'' Hanlon went on, ``she came
to me and said it was her duty to tell me, though it involved her
friend. She said positively that this girl went in, stayed
several minutes, then came out looking very strange, and that
immediately afterward there was the excitement. Of course, we
believed her.''

``Of course,'' echoed the magistrate ironically. ``It gave you
an opportunity for an act of oppression.''

``I didn't mean to get Hilda into trouble. I swear I didn't,''
Sophie exclaimed. ``I was scared. I didn't know what I was
doing. I swear I didn't!''

Hilda's look was pity, not anger. ``Oh, Sophie,'' she said
brokenly.

``What did your men do with the letter Feuerstein wrote?'' asked
the magistrate of Hanlon suspiciously.

``Your Honor, we--'' Hanlon looked round nervously.

Wielert, who had been gradually rising in his own estimation, as
he realized the importance of his part in the proceedings, now
pushed forward, his face flushed with triumph. ``I know where it
is,'' he said eagerly. ``When I ran for the police I mail it.''

There was a tumult of hysterical laughter, everybody seeking
relief from the strain of what had gone before. The magistrate
rapped down the noise and called for Doctor Wharton. While he
was giving his technical explanation a note was handed up to the
bench. The magistrate read:

GERMAN THEATER, 3 September.
YOUR HONOR--I hasten to send you the inclosed letter which I
found in my mail this morning. It seems to have an important
bearing on the hearing in the Feuerstein case, which I see by the
papers comes up before you to-day.
Very truly yours,
WILLIAM KONIGSMARCK,
Manager.


The magistrate handed the inclosure to a clerk, who was a German.
``Read it aloud,'' he said. And the clerk, after a few moments'
preparation, slowly read in English:

To the Public:

Before oblivion swallows me--one second, I beg!

I have sinned, but I have expiated. I have lived bravely,
fighting adversity and the malice which my superior gifts from
nature provoked. I can live no longer with dignity. So, proud
and fearless to the last, I accept defeat and pass out.

I forgive my friends. I forget my enemies.

Exit Carl Feuerstein, soldier of fortune, man of the world. A
sensitive heart that was crushed by the cruelty of men and the
kindness of women has ceased to beat.

CARL FEUERSTEIN.

P. S. DEAR. MR. KONIGSMARCK-- Please send a copy of the above to
the newspapers, English as well as German.
C. F.


The magistrate beamed his kindliest upon Hilda. ``The charge
against you is absurd. Your arrest was a crime. You are free.''

Hilda put her hand on Otto's arm. ``Let us go,'' she murmured
wearily.

As they went up the aisle hand in hand the crowd stood and
cheered again and again; the magistrate did not touch his
gavel--he was nodding vigorous approval. Hilda held Otto's hand
more closely and looked all round. And her face was bright
indeed.

Thus the shadow of Mr. Feuerstein-- of vanity and false emotion,
of pose and pretense, passed from her life. Straight and serene
before her lay the pathway of ``work and love and home.''

Copyright (c) 2007. fullstories.net. All rights reserved.