Part 1 — LITTLE LOVE. BY THE AUTHOR OF “THE HOUSE OF YORKE.” “Of such is the kingdom of heaven.”

The first evening-bell of the N—— State Prison had rung, and the deputy-warden stood in the guard-room taking the ward keys from their nail, and looking at his revolver. A guard watched from each of the windows toward the yard, and at one of the narrow loopholes beside the door stood a little figure on tiptoe peeping out, only half her face reaching above the wood-work.

This was Minnie Raynor, the warden’s daughter—a child so happy and so beautiful, that lips unused to fanciful talk called her fanciful names; a child so sweet, too, that tender looks and thoughts ever followed her. Rough men patted her nestling cheek, and called her “darling”; to her father, she was “my angel”; but her mother went to the heart of the matter, and called her “Little Love.”

The deputy went toward the door near which she stood. “O Minnie! is it you?” he asked; “or is it a ray of sunshine that has come in at the window?”

She laughed as she settled down from tiptoe, and turned her head; and the level sunshine steeped her through—dimpled, delicate face, luminous brown eyes, flaxen hair, and all her baby whiteness.

“May I go out with you?” she asked in a voice of childish sweetness.

“Certainly!” he answered “Please open the door for me; my hands are full.”

She tried, in perfect good faith, to do as he bade her; and the men watched, between amusement and admiration, those tiny rosy hands that pulled ineffectually at iron bar and nail-studded oaken door.

“I can’t make it move,” she said at length; and, looking about, perceived that they were laughing at her.

They went out on to the platform, and the door was closed behind them.

“Now stand close to me while I ring the bell, and watch the men file in, then we will go down to the prison,” the deputy said.

At the second bell, the convicts marched slowly out of the different shops, joined in the yard, and passed by, on their way to the prison, the stairs at the head of which stood the deputy and Minnie Raynor.

The child looked in wonder at that long line of silent men, who walked so close together, with interlocked steps, and never raised their faces. There was something in it that provoked her to mischief. Sorrow and sin she knew nothing of, and she had never seen in those about her a gravity which her smiles could not banish. Why should she not be a sunbeam to this cloud also?

There was a flit of white drapery at the deputy’s side, and a toss of yellow-flaxen hair.

“Come back, and wait for me,” he said hastily, his eyes fixed on the advancing line.

There was a trill of bird-toned laughter, and Minnie Raynor scampered down the stairs as fast as her feet could carry her.

The officer dared not go after her, nor remove his eyes from his charge, but he leaned a little, and tried to catch her. She laughed, and fled on, leaving her blue sash in his hand, and, reaching the outer door of the prison, stood looking at the convicts as they passed by her.

Hundreds of men were there, each stained by some dark crime, yet Minnie smiled into their faces, and saw nothing to fear or dislike. And in every face, as she looked, dimly, as in troubled waters, there shone back on her a faint and far-away reflection of remembered childhood and innocence. Every hard face softened, and met her glance with brightening eyes, and every heart blessed her—the warden’s bonnie little daughter.

Near the end of the line was a man whose overseers never turned their backs on him—of whom every officer in the prison was wary. This man, William Jeffries, had been ten years under sentence of death for wilful murder, and had passed that time in daily expectation of the order for his execution.

If personal beauty had aught to do with virtue, one might say that this sentence was an unjust one; for the convict was not only strikingly handsome, but had an air of superiority. The black hair was thrown carelessly back, and left fully exposed the marble-white, exquisite features, whose expression, when he looked down, was one of pride and melancholy. But when he raised those full black eyes, the beholder shrank involuntarily from their hard and brilliant regard. No smile ever was seen on those compressed, haughty lips; they never spoke save when obliged to, and never asked a favor. And it was well known that he watched, day and, night, for any chance of escape, and cherished a deep, cold hate for his keepers.

As he approached her, Minnie smiled up into his face, then started forward, and, taking his hand, walked on with him, to the horror of the guards and the malicious amusement of the convicts. For the man himself, he merely submitted to the soft clasp of her fingers, and kept his eyes downcast; but his face turned a deep red, which had not faded when he reached his cell door.

There the overseer interfered, and drew Minnie away, just as she was entering the cell.

“I want to go into his play-house, and see the pretty pictures on the walls,” she said.

“You must not!” was the reply. “It is wicked to go in there. It’s no place for you.”

Jeffries drew his cell-door to, and, as he stood holding it, gave the overseer a glance. That glance blazed.

“Don’t stare at me!” the officer exclaimed.

The convict lowered his eyes.

Minnie walked on reluctantly to the end of the ward, and stood there while the cell doors were locked; then, when she saw the hands pushed through the gratings, she ran down the walk, full of frolic, and caught one of them.

“You can’t get it away!” she cried, holding on to the white and well-formed hand with her tiny fingers.

Had any of his keepers been in front of Jeffries’ cell then, they would scarcely have recognized him. The bold eyes were soft and humid, the pallid face faintly colored, and a smile of tender sweetness trembled about the mouth.

Minnie leaned close against the grating, and looked through at the pictures that lined the walls of the cell. Only the iron rods separated her head from that guilty breast, some of her bright locks pushed through and touched the convict’s sleeve, and her tender hands still caressed that hand that had been stained with a brother’s blood.

“Are they your pictures?” she asked.

He reached, and, taking the prettiest one from the wall, gave it to her. Not even to her would he break the rule of silence.

“O Minnie! Minnie!” said the deputy chidingly, as he came down the walks, after making his rounds. “Why did you run away from me?”

She displayed her picture with childish delight. “He gave it to me,” she said, nodding toward the convict. “Isn’t he good?”

“He is very kind,” the officer replied. “Did you thank him?” “Well, we must go now. You can come again some other time.”

“Good-bye!” Minnie called out to her new friend. “I shall come to see you again very soon. And I want to kiss you now,” running back again.

The deputy, with the child’s hand in his, hesitated, and looked embarrassed. He made a point of being scrupulously civil to the convicts, and was particularly careful not to offend this one; but he shrank from allowing such a leave-taking.

“It won’t hurt her, sir,” said the prisoner, in an eager voice. “She is too pure to take a stain.”

The child’s hand was released, the convict bent inside his cell, and took the kiss she gave him through the bars; then Minnie went into the house with her protector.

“I am not sure that I like it,” Mr. Raynor said, after he had heard the story. He took the child in his arms. “I am not sure that I shall let my angel go down to that place again.”

“But, father,” his wife said gently, “if our angel can do good there, we ought not to refuse. I should not wish her to go unguarded, nor, indeed, very often in any way; but she might go down occasionally with one of us, or the deputy. As Jeffries says, she is too pure to take a stain.”

The wife prevailed; and, thereafter, Minnie Raynor’s sweet face often cheered the gloom of the prison. The convicts learned to bless her small shadow as it fell across the work or book carried close to the cell door for light. They would start and smile at any sign of her coming—a laugh, a word, or the patter of light feet on the stones. Those who were on the side of the prison next the street thought themselves repaid if, after a day of toil and silence, they caught a glimpse of the child in a window, or in the garden of the warden’s house. They fabricated wonderful toys for her in their leisure hours—balls that bounded marvellously, ornaments carved from soupbones, and rattles that were a puzzle to take apart or put together. In return, she gave them smiles and thanks, and whatever dainty she could coax from her mother to carry in.

But to no one was this fair vision so dear as to him on whom she had first bestowed her preference; for on her he concentrated all the softness which the others showed toward any one who noticed them. She was the only one to whom he spoke, on whom he smiled; and for her sake he would humble himself to any extent. He who had before scorned to ask a favor, now begged for tools and materials to make toys for the warden’s daughter. He showed jealousy when she noticed any one else—he begged her constantly for assurances of affection. On her he poured out all the suppressed tenderness of his heart; for she was the only being who had ever come to him with perfect trust—the only being who believed him good.

“I think you are real nice,” she would say, gazing at him admiringly. “And you are pretty, too. I wish that you lived in our house, so that I could see you all the time.”

Once, when she was missing from the prison several days, Jeffries could scarcely taste his food, and at length, unable longer to endure the suspense, he asked for her.

“Is anything the matter with the warden’s daughter, sir?”

“Is that any of your business?” the overseer demanded roughly.

The warden, unseen by him, was at his elbow, and reproved his rudeness sharply.

“A civil question deserves a civil answer,” he said; “and you are not lowered by speaking to one whom my daughter talks with. Minnie is well, Jeffries, and I will tell her that you inquired. She has been away on a visit.”

The longing for freedom had never left this man’s heart, and now a new motive for desiring it was added. Minnie had confided to him her desire to own a little gold watch with hands that went round and round; and, even while listening to her, he had resolved that, should he ever escape, he would buy and send to her the tiniest and prettiest gold watch that could be found. He dreamed over this plan, as other men dream over ambition or love. He fancied the brown eyes dilating at sight of a package addressed to herself, the dear little head advanced in eager curiosity as father and mother broke the package open, her cry of delight and wonder when she saw its contents, the dimpled hands that snatched at the gift, and the sweet voice uttering thanks to the far-away “Mr. William,” as she had chosen to call him.

Always, now, this golden thread ran through the dark and tragical web of his retrospections and anticipations.

Thus more than six months passed away. The fall and winter were over, and spring had come again; and those mysterious impulses of new life which the reawakening of nature brings to the human heart made this man’s confinement every day less tolerable to him. He said to himself that he should go mad if it were longer continued. The monotony and restraint were hard enough; but that constant dread of the sword of justice, for ever suspended over him, was a torture. Hanging would be better than such a life.

Early in the spring Jeffries had been moved from his cell on the inner side of the block to one next the street, and through the long window opposite his grating he could see the warden’s house, its visitors coming and going, its pleasant, open windows, with curtains blowing in and out, and, better than all else, he could see little Minnie at her play in house or garden. He could see her dance into the breakfast-room at morning, and run to kiss her father, who would lift her to her place at the table. He knew that she drank milk from a silver mug, and that she sometimes took a lump of sugar from the sugar-bowl. He could see her mother lead her away to bed at evening, and knew that she always took a pet kitten with her, sometimes in her arms, sometimes chasing through the hall after her. He could see her by day soberly hushing a doll to sleep, bending absorbed over a picture-book, or romping in the garden. Once she stumbled and fell there, and the convict, watching her, sprang at his bars as though he would break them. He gazed an hour after she was carried into the house, and let his supper grow cold while he waited to assure himself that she was not much hurt. Being satisfied at length, he ate his cold mush and molasses, and drank his cold tea without milk, and lay down to dream of his idol.

There was good reason, for his being peculiarly anxious about his little friend that night and indifferent about his supper, for he meant to be a free man the next day or to seal his fate at once. All his preparations were made. He had sewed another dark half under the gray half of his suit, so that by ripping a few stitches he could pull off the gray leg of his pantaloons, the gray side of his cap and jacket, and appear in plain dark clothes, and he had procured a guard-key and a slender iron bar two feet long, to defend himself with if attacked.

Besides these preparations, he had been careful to make a good impression on the minds of his keepers. He had been so quiet and docile that for some time no search had been made, and no suspicions entertained of his designs. Moreover, he had for the first time since his condemnation begun to speak of trying to have his sentence commuted to imprisonment for life, of course with the appearance of hoping for ultimate pardon. No one would suspect him of risking his life in trying to escape while he had any chance of a commutation.

Jeffries had been for months at work on a doll-house, which he meant as a surprise to the warden’s daughter, and also as a souvenir, and a help in his escape. From the carriage-shop he had begged fine wood, and, since no tool could be taken to the cells, he had been allowed to shape the parts of his cottage in the same shop. Every night, unknown to his keepers, he had bartered away his supper to the convict in the next cell, receiving in return glue to fasten his work together, a bit of glass to smooth the wood, and oil to polish it. It was really a beautiful toy-house, for the man had taste and ingenuity, and a heart to do his best. It was finished with windows, doors, and balconies, and the rooms inside were carpeted and curtained with silk and velvet, and had chairs and tables so finely carved out of bones the convicts saved from their dinners as to look like delicate ivory work. All his leisure time for months had been given to perfecting this gift, and now it was completed, and there remained only to present it.

It was a bright evening in May, and the chaplain was going his rounds, changing the books, and speaking a kind word here and there. Minnie, who had recovered from her fall, was with him, and when they reached Jeffries’ cell, she went no farther. She seldom got beyond that, and to-night it was impossible to do so; for the prisoner now showed her his present, and promised that the next day it should be given into her possession.

Minnie gazed in rapturous delight while he displayed its beauties to her. She could scarcely wait till morning to inspect it more closely, and she put her hands through the bars to touch it, and make sure that it was real.

The chaplain admired and praised, then went on. “I see that I must go alone, Minnie,” he said. “I cannot expect you to leave such an attraction as that.”

“Will you remember me for this, darling?” the prisoner asked, when the two were left to themselves.

“Oh! yes,” she answered fervently. “I will love you always. My father says that you want to go home, and when the governor comes here again, I’m going to ask him to let you. The governor is a splendid man, and lets me coax him. But he pulls my hair. Though,” she added, after a pause, “he pulls it real easy.”

“Do you love the governor better than you do me?” the convict asked jealously, with a real pang at heart. What did that man, high in wealth, rank, and happiness, want of this little girl? Jeffries began to conceive a dislike for him, to think that even pardon would be unwelcome from him.

“I love you best,” Minnie said thoughtfully, “and”—looking up with serious eyes—“I’m saying prayers for you every night, and asking God to save you. Mamma said I might.”

“To save me!” he repeated.

“Yes. What is save, Mr. William? Mamma said it is something good.”

“I—I don’t know,” he replied, both puzzled and embarrassed. Religion was about the last subject he would have thought of; and when the chaplain mentioned it professionally, the brilliant, scornful eye of Jeffries had often checked the words upon his lips. But that his darling and idol should pray for him, was a very different thing.

Steps were heard returning. Jeffries hastily snatched the little hands still stretched through the bars, kissed them passionately, then turned away from the door.

“Come, little lady!” the chaplain called out.

“Good-bye, Mr. William!” Minnie said, with her face pressed close to the grating.

He echoed her good-bye hoarsely, without looking round.

“Good-bye!” she said again, lingering, and wishing to see his face. “I shall come soon again.”

He made no reply, and she was obliged to go. But no sooner had she gone than he sprang to the door again, and listened hungrily for the sound of her retreating footsteps, cursing the chaplain’s heavy boots and empty talk. It was her last visit to him there, he knew.

The warden had gone away from home for a day or two, and the deputy had entire charge. So completely had Jeffries’ appearance imposed on him, he consented to allow him the privilege of presenting to Minnie Raynor her playhouse with his own hands.

“He is so fond of her, and has taken such pains to make the baby-house, it seems a pity he should not have the pleasure of giving it to her,” he said. “It is best to encourage a man who is trying to reform. Last year there wasn’t a worse man in the prison, now there isn’t a better one, and it is all that child’s doing. Mrs. Raynor is willing, and there is no reason why I should object. I want Jeffries to see that I trust him.”

One of the guard drew his face down to a preternatural length, and gave a low whistle. “The deputy’s soft,” he whispered to a companion.

The deputy heard the whistle, though not the whisper, and his spirit rose.

“Any one who knows better than I do, had better take my place,” he said.

“I don’t profess to know more than you do in other things, sir,” the guard answered. “But I’ve been in this prison ten years, and I have learned something of the quirks and turns of convicts. I believe that fellow cares no more for Minnie Raynor than I do for the man in the moon. He is trying to curry favor with the warden, to get a commutation, or get eased up so that he may cut and run.”

“We’ll see who is right,” the deputy said. “Meantime, I don’t mean to give him a chance to cut and run.”

About ten o’clock in the forenoon, Jeffries was called out of his shop, the toy-house was given him, and he was bidden go up-stairs to meet the little lady who had come out for her present.

A great color rushed to his pallid face at this summons, and a great breath swelled his breast. The hour has come! After ten years of servitude and confinement, the green fields and the wide world were before him, if he succeeded. If he failed, speedy death would be his reward for the attempt. He well knew that if he were prevented from going out, or arrested when he had once got out, the order for his execution would be issued immediately. He had been warned of that.

His heart beat hard and high as he stepped from the shop, but it sank in his bosom as he glanced across the yard. There stood Minnie at the head of the stairs, to be sure; but the deputy stood beside her in an attitude that showed plainly he was on his guard, and the door was locked behind them.

He had expected to be called into the guard-room, or, at least, that Minnie would have stood in the open door. Moreover, besides these precautions, his quick eye caught the gleam of a scarcely covered rifle-barrel at one of the windows.

But he went up firmly, without any appearance of disappointment, and presented his gift to the child, smiling on her involuntarily, even at that bitter moment.

Minnie took her present with delight, and, being unable to hold it, put it into the deputy’s hand. Then, before either of them divined her intention, she flung her arms around the convict’s neck, and gave him a loving kiss.

It was too much. In the despair of that moment, he cared little for the curious eyes that watched him. Clasping the child in his arms, he burst into tears.

There was a moment of silence. All were awed by such a display of emotion in such a man. In that moment Jeffries had controlled himself, put away the little hands that tenderly strove to wipe his tears, and turned to descend the steps.

The guard inside unlocked the door, and the deputy was leading his charge in. Jeffries was half-way down the stairs when the click of the lock struck his ear, and stiffened his nerves like steel. One bound, and he was within the door, pushing with main strength against three men who struggled to close the lock before he could enter. The strength of desperation was his, and he overcame them, and entered the guard-room, caught Minnie Raynor in his arms, as a shield, while he hastily pulled out the bar of iron suspended from his waist, and fumbled for the guard-key which was to unlock the last door that stood between him and liberty.

It was all the work of a minute. The child clung to his breast, pale and trembling, and hid her face in affright from the muzzles of fire-arms that sought to find him unguarded, and, holding her as his defence, Jeffries reached the outward door.

An accident favored him, for it was the hour for changing guard on the walls, and the relieved guard, coming up outside, opened the door behind the fugitive. The surprise was too sudden. They could not stop him. Still holding the child for a shield, Jeffries sprang down the outer stairs, and found himself in the opened yard of the warden’s house.

But the alarm-bell had been rung, and a command shouted across the posts, and as the fugitive fled across the green to the gate, he was confronted by one man, while two others followed close on his steps. There was no help for it. This man in his path must be disabled. He dropped the child from his arms, and raised the iron bar at the same moment that his opponent, having apparently more faith in the strength of the stock than the accuracy of his aim, lifted the butt-end of his rifle for a blow.

“You shall not strike him!” cried Minnie Raynor, and flung herself forward to shield her friend; and, at the same instant, both blows fell. The guard aimed falsely, but the convict, striking with fierce precision, would have hit his adversary but for that loving interposition. Alas! the blow struck the fair temple of the prisoner’s dearest and only friend.

Minnie Raynor dropped like a flower before the scythe of the mower.

All was confusion. The mother rushed shrieking from the house, men came from the street, the guard from the prison. There was a moment when he might have escaped, but Jeffries did not take advantage of it. Throwing himself down by the child, he called upon her in agony, kissed her pale lips, and chafed her chilling hands. “O my God! my God!” he muttered.

They surrounded and bound him.

“I won’t try to run away, I swear I won’t!” he cried wildly. “Don’t mind me; see to her. Go for a doctor. Do something for her quickly. O God! O God! Open your eyes, my angel! I didn’t mean to hurt you. I would rather stay here all my life, or be hanged to-day, than hurt you, my darling!”

They tore him away from her, and carried him back to prison. There they searched him, but found nothing but a lock of silken hair in his breast, done up in a paper.

“She gave it to me,” he said piteously, but made no remonstrance when they did not return it to him.

“Only see how she is, and tell me,” he begged. “You know I’ve got to hang now, and you know that I wouldn’t have hurt a hair of her head for my life. I didn’t mean to strike any one, except in self-defence. You can’t blame me for trying to escape. It was only natural. But tell me how she is.”

The deputy looked at him fixedly.

“The child never breathed after you struck her,” he said.

The eyes of the convict remained wide open, and fixed on the speaker’s face. And, still with that gaze full of horror, he sank at the officer’s feet.

He lay in the punishment-cell that night without sleeping, apparently without sense. And he lay there all the next day in darkness, quiet and silent, never tasting food.

The second morning, the warrant for his execution was read to him.

“I am glad of it!” was all his comment.

They put him back into his cell, no change being made in his fate on account of the child’s death. One had but to look into his face to see that his punishment was severe enough. One only request he made; that, after his death, the little lock of hair which Minnie had given him might be put into his breast, and buried with him. Then he set himself to prepare for death.

“She wanted me to be saved, and I will not disappoint her, if I can help it,” he said.

The chaplain of the prison and the warden’s family were Protestants; but Jeffries hated the chaplain, and he recollected having heard Minnie speak of a certain “splendid priest” in the town, who had once given her a picture of a lady with a baby in her arms, and a gold ring round her head. The child knew nothing of creeds, and had clung as trustingly, perhaps more trustingly, to the black-robed father, than to any of the clergymen who visited her father’s house.

For this priest Jeffries sent.

“I know nothing of God, nor of religion, sir,” he said. “But I have only a few days to live, and I want to repent, and make what atonement I can. I can say sincerely that I am sorry I have not lived a better life, and that I deserve all the punishment I have had. If God should refuse to forgive me, I will not blame him. But I think he will not. The God who made that little angel must be better than I can even conceive.”

Looking through the window into the street, on that first day he was returned to his cell, Jeffries saw the house that he had made desolate. He saw the closed blinds, and the mournful faces of those who came and went. He saw flowers brought. Later, carriages came, and a crowd slowly gathered. Then he fell on his knees before the grated door, and prayed. One glimpse, only one glimpse of the casket that held her!

Presently there was a stir about the door, and four boys appeared, bearing out the lost treasure. The cemetery was near, and these boys were to bear the child to her resting-place there. Slowly and tenderly they carried their burden, and not far away those eyes, full of hopeless agony, strained to watch them.

The sill of the gate was a step higher than the garden walk, and as the foremost boys mounted this step, the casket tilted a little, and the eyes of the condemned man saw, through the glass lid, a white little face turned sidewise, with its cheek in the palm of a waxen hand, and sunny hair flowing around, the whole framed in flowers.

As the sweet, pathetic vision passed, the convict fell on his face, with loud and bitter weeping.

Three days after, Jeffries mounted the scaffold, humbled, penitent, and hopeful.

“I am glad it is God’s will that I should die now,” he said. “After what I have done, my life would be too terrible to me, and would not profit any one else. But I do not consider this hanging the punishment for my crime. No; my reward for having killed willingly one I hated, was that I afterward destroyed unwillingly a life dearer to me than my own. I forgive all who have injured me, and ask pardon of all whom I have injured. And I bless God for the little love on earth that made me believe in the Infinite Love in heaven.”

They were his last words.

Perhaps the warden’s dear little girl would never, in a long and beautiful life, have accomplished the good which was effected by her early and pitiful death.