As Garrison opened his eyes, dazed, weak as water, memory, full, complete, rushed into action. His brain recalled everything--everything from the period it is given man to remember down to the present. It was all so clear, so perfect, so workmanlike. The long-halted clock of memory was ticking away merrily, perfectly, and not one hour was missing from its dial. The thread of his severed life was joined--joined in such a manner that no hitch or knot was apparent.
To use a third simile, the former blank, utterly fearsome s.p.a.ce, was filled--filled with clear writing, without blotch or blemish. And on the s.p.a.ce was not recorded one deed he had dreaded to see. There were mistakes, weaknesses--but not dishonor. For a moment he could not grasp the full meaning of the blessing. He could only sense that he had indeed been blessed above his deserts.
And then as Garrison understood what it all meant to him; understood the chief fact that he had not deserted wife and children; that Sue might be won, he crushed his face to the pillow and cried--cried like a little child.
And a big man, sitting in the shelter of a screen, hitched his chair nearer the cot, and laid both hands on Garrison"s. He did not speak, but there was a wonderful light in his eyes--steady, clear gray eyes.
"Kid," he said. "Kid."
Garrison turned swiftly. His hand gripped the other"s.
"Jimmie Drake," he whispered. For the first time the blood came to his face.
CHAPTER XIII.
PROVEN CLEAN.
Two months had gone in; two months of slow recuperation, regeneration for Garrison. He was just beginning to look at life from the standpoint of unremitting toil and endeavor. It is the only satisfactory standpoint. From it we see life in its true proportions. Neither distorted through the blue gla.s.ses of pessimism--but another name for the failure of misapplication--nor through the wonderful rose-colored gla.s.ses of the dreamer. He was patiently going back over his past life; returning to the point where he had deserted the clearly defined path of honor and duty for the flowery fields of unbridled license.
It was no easy task he had set himself, but he did not falter by the wayside. Three great stimulants he had--health, the thought of Sue Desha, and the practical a.s.sistance of Jimmie Drake.
It was a month, dating from the memorable meeting with the turfman, before Garrison was able to leave the hospital. When he did, it was to take up his life at Drake"s Long Island breeding-farm and racing-stable; for in the interim Drake had pa.s.sed from book-making stage to that of owner. He ran a first-cla.s.s string of mounts, and he signed Garrison to ride for him during the ensuing season.
It was the first chance for regeneration, and it had been timidly asked and gladly granted; asked and granted during one of the long nights in the hospital when Garrison was struggling for strength and faith. It had been the first time he had been permitted to talk for any great length.
"Thank you," he said, on the granting of his request, which he more than thought would be refused. His eyes voiced where his lips were dumb. "I haven"t gone back, Jimmie, but it"s good of you to give me a chance on my say-so. I"ll bear it in mind. And--and it"s good of you, Jimmie, to--to come and sit with me. I--I appreciate it all, and I don"t see why you should do it."
Drake laughed awkwardly.
"It"s the least I could do, kid. The favor ain"t on my side, it"s on yours. Anyway, what use is a friend if he ain"t there when you need him?
It was luck I found you here. I thought you had disappeared for keeps.
Remember that day you cut me on Broadway? I ought to have followed you, but I was sore--"
"But I--I didn"t mean to cut you, Jimmie. I didn"t know you. I want to tell you all about that--about everything. I"m just beginning to know now that I"m living. I"ve been buried alive. Honest!"
"I always thought there was something back of your absent treatment.
What was it?" Drake hitched his chair nearer and focused all his powers of concentration. "What was it, kid? Out with it. And if I can be of any help you know you have only to put it there." He held out a large hand.
And then slowly, haltingly, but lucidly, dispa.s.sionately, events following in sequence, Garrison told everything; concealing nothing.
Nor did he try to gloss over or strive to nullify his own dishonorable actions. He told everything, and the turfman, chin in hand, eyes riveted on the narrator, listened absorbed.
"Gee!" Jimmie Drake whispered at last, "it sounds like a fairy-story. It don"t sound real." Then he suddenly crashed a fist into his open palm.
"I see, I see," he snapped, striving to control his excitement. "Then you don"t know. You can"t know."
"Know what?" Garrison sat bolt upright in his narrow cot, his heart pounding.
"Why--why about Crimmins, about Waterbury, about Sis--everything,"
exclaimed Drake. "It was all in the Eastern papers. You were in Bellevue then. I thought you knew. Don"t you know, kid, that it was proven that Crimmins poisoned Sis? Hold on, keep quiet. Yes, it was Crimmins. Now, don"t get excited. Yes, I"ll tell you all. Give me time. Why, kid, you were as clean as the wind that dried your first shirt. Sure, sure. We all knew it--then. And we thought you did--"
"Tell me, tell me." Garrison"s lip was quivering; his face gray with excitement.
Drake ran on forcefully, succinctly, his hand gripping Garrison"s.
"Well, we"ll take it up from that day of the Carter Handicap. Remember?
When you and Waterbury had it out? Now, I had suspected that Dan Crimmins had been plunging against his stable for some time. I had got on to some bets he had put through with the aid of his dirty commissioners. That"s why I stood up for you against Waterbury. I knew he was square. I knew he didn"t throw the race, and, as for you--well, I said to myself: "That ain"t like the kid." I knew the evidence against you, but it was hard to believe, kid. And I believed you when you said you hadn"t made a cent on the race, but instead had lost all you had, I believed that. But I knew Crimmins had made a pile. I found that out.
And I believed he drugged you, kid.
"Now, when you tell me you were fighting consumption it clears a lot of s.p.a.ce for me that has been dark. I knew you were doped half the time, but I thought you were going the pace with the pipe, though I"ll admit I couldn"t fathom what drug you were taking. But now I know Crimmins fed you dope while pretending to hand you nerve food. I know it. I know he bet against his stable time and ag"in and won every race you were accused of throwing. I tracked things pretty clear that day after I left you.
"Well, I went to Waterbury and laid the charge against the trainer; giving him a chance to square himself before I made trouble higher up.
Well, Waterbury was mad. Said he had no hand in it, and I believed him.
The upshot of it was that he faced Crimmins. Now, Crimmins had been blowing himself on the pile he had made, and he was nasty. Instead of denying it and putting the proving of the game up to me, he took the bit in his mouth at something Waterbury said.
"I don"t know all the facts. They came out in the paper afterward. But Crimmins and Waterbury had a sc.r.a.p, and the trainer was fired. He was fired when you went to the stable to say good-by to Sis. He was packing what things he had there, but when he saw you weren"t on, he kept it mum. I believe then he was planning to do away with Sis, and you offered a nice easy get-away for him. He hated you. First, because you turned down the crooked deal he offered you, for it was he who was beating the bookies, and he wanted a pal. Secondly, he thought you had split about the dope, and he laid his discharge to you. And he hated Waterbury. He could square you both at one shot. He poisoned Sis when you"d gone.
"Every one believed you guilty, for they didn"t know the row Crimmins and Waterbury had. But Waterbury suspected. He and Crimmins had it out.
He caught him on Broadway, a day or two later, and Crimmins walloped him over the head with a blackjack. Waterbury went to the hospital, and came next to dying. Crimmins went to jail. I guess he was down and out, all right, when, as you say, he heard from his brother that Waterbury was at Cottonton. I believe he went there to square him, but ran across you instead, and thought he could have a good blackmailing game on the side.
That wife game was a plot to catch you, kid. He didn"t think you"d dare to come North. When you told him about your lapse of memory, then he knew he was safe. You knew nothing of his showdown."
Garrison covered his face with his hands. Only he knew the great, the mighty obsession that was slowly withdrawing itself from his heart. It was all so wonderful; all so incredible. Long contact with misfortune had sapped the natural resiliency of his character. It had been subjected to so much pressure that it had become flaccid. The pressure removed, it would be some time before the heart could act upon the message of good tidings the brain had conveyed to it. For a long time he remained silent. And Drake respected his silence to the letter. Then Garrison uncovered his eyes.
"I can"t believe it. I can"t believe it," he whispered, wide-eyed. "It is too good to be true. It means too much. You"re sure you"re right, Jimmie? It means I"m proven clean, proven square. It means reinstatement on the turf. Means--everything."
"All that, kid," said Drake. "I thought you knew."
Garrison hugged his knees in a paroxysm of silent joy.
"But--Waterbury?" he puzzled at length. "He knew I had been exonerated.
And yet--yet he must have said something to the contrary to Miss Desha.
She knew all along that I was Garrison; knew when I didn"t know myself.
But she thought me square. But Waterbury must have said something. I can never forget her saying when I confessed: "It"s true, then." I can never forget that, and the look in her eyes."
"Aye, Waterbury," mused Drake soberly. He eyed Garrison. "You know he"s dead," he said simply. He nodded confirmation as the other stared, white-faced. "Died this morning after he was thrown. Fractured skull. I had word. Some right-meaning chap says somewhere something about saying nothing but good of the dead, kid. If Waterbury tried to queer you, it was through jealousy. I understand he cared something for Miss Desha.
He had his good points, like every man. Think of them, kid, not the bad ones. I guess the bookkeeper up above will credit us with all the times we"ve tried to do the square, even if we petered out before we"d made good. Trying counts something, kid. Don"t forget that."
"Yes, he had his good points," whispered Garrison. "I don"t forget, Jimmie. I don"t forget that he has a cleaner bill of moral health than I have. I was an impostor. That I can"t forget; cannot wipe out."
"I was coming to that," Drake scratched his grizzled head elaborately.
"I didn"t say anything when you were unwinding that yarn, kid, but it sounded mighty tangled to me."
"How?"
"How? Why, we ain"t living in fairy-books to-day. It"s straight hard life. And there ain"t any fools, as far as I can see, who are allowed to take up air and s.p.a.ce. I"ve heard of Major Calvert, and his brains were all there the last time I heard of him--"
"What do you mean?" Garrison bored his eyes into Drake"s.
"Why, I mean, kid, that blood is thicker than water, and leave it to a woman to see through a stone wall. I don"t believe you could palm yourself off to the major and his wife as their nephew. It"s not reasonable nohow. I don"t believe any one could fool any family."