THE GOVERNOR
I'm home at last. How long were you asleep? I startled you. The time? It's midnight past. Put on your slippers and your robe, my dear, And make some coffee for me--what a night! Yes, tell you? I shall tell you everything. I must tell someone, and a wife should know The workings of a governor's mind--no one Could guess what turned the scale to save this man Who would have died to-morrow, but for me. That's fine. This coffee helps me. As I said This night has been a trial. Well, you know I told these lawyers they could come at eight, And so they came. A seasoned lawyer one, The other young and radical, both full Of sentiment of some sort. And there you sit, And do not say a word of disapproval. You smile, which means you sun yourself within The power I have, and yet do you approve? This man committed brutal murder, did A nameless horror; now he's saved from death. The father and the mother of the girl, The neighborhood, perhaps, in which she lived Will roar against me, think that I was bought, Or used by someone I'm indebted to In politics. Oh no! It's really funny, Since it is simpler than such things as these. And no one, saving you, shall know the secret. For there I sat and didn't say a word To indicate, betray my thought; not when The thing came out that moved me. Let them read The doctor's affidavits, that this man Was crazy when he killed the girl, and read The transcript of the evidence on the trial. They read and talked. At last the younger lawyer, For sometime still, kept silent by the other, Pops out with something, reads an affidavit, As foreign to the matter as a story Of melodrama color on the screen, Which still contained a sentence that went home; I felt my mind turn like a turn-table, And click as when the switchman kicks the tongue Of steel into the slot that holds the table. And from my mind the engine, that's the problem, Puffed, puffed and moved away, out on the track, And disappeared upon its business. How Is that for metaphor? Your coffee, dear, Stirs up my fancy. But to tell the rest, If my face changed expression, or my eye Betrayed my thought, then I have no control Of outward seeming. For they argued on An hour or so thereafter. And I asked Re-reading of the transcript where this man Told of his maniac passion, of the night He killed the girl, the doctors' testimony I had re-read, and let these lawyers think My interest centered there, and my decision Was based upon such matters, and at last The penalty commuted. When in truth I tell you I had let the fellow hang For all of this, except that I took fire Because of something in this affidavit Irrelevant to the issue, reaching me In something only relevant to me. O, well, all life is such. Our great decisions Flame out of sparks, where roaring fires before, Not touching our combustibles wholly failed To flame or light us.
Now the secret hear. Do you remember all the books I read Two years ago upon heredity, Foot-notes to evolution, the dynamics Of living matter? Well, it wasn't that That made me save this fellow. There you smile For knowing how and when I got these books, Who woke my interest in them. Never mind, You don't know yet my reasons.
But I'll tell you: And let you see a governor's mind at work. When this young lawyer in this affidavit Read to a certain place my mind strayed off And lived a time past, you were present too. It was that morning when I passed my crisis, Had just dodged death, could scarcely speak, too weak To lift a hand to feed myself, but needed Vital replenishment of strength, and then I got it in a bowl of oyster soup, Rich cream at that. And as I live, my dear, As this young lawyer read, I felt myself In bed as I lay then, re-lived the weakness, Could see the spoon that carried to my mouth The appetizing soup, imagined there The feelings I had then of getting fingers Upon the rail of life again, how faint, But with such clear degrees. Could see the hand That held the spoon, the eyes that looked at me In triumph for the victory of my strength, Which battled, almost lost the prize of life. It all came over me when this lawyer read: Elenor Murray lately come from France Found dead beside the river, was the cousin Of this Fred Taylor, and had planned to come To see the governor, death prevented her-- Suppose it had?
That affidavit, doubtless Was read to me to move me for the fact This man was kindred to a woman who Served in the war, this lawyer was that cheap! And isn't it as cheap to think that I Could be persuaded by the circumstance That Elenor Murray, she who nursed me once, Was cousin to this fellow, if this lawyer Knew this, and did he know it? I don't know. Had Elenor Murray lived she would have come To ask her cousin's life--I know her heart. And at the last, I think this was the thing: I thought I'd do exactly what I'd do If she had lived and asked me, disregard Her death, and act as if she lived, repay Her dead hands, which in life had saved my life.
Now, dear, your eyes have tears--I know--believe me, I had no romance with this Elenor Murray. Good Lord, it's one o'clock, I must to bed....
You get my story Merival? Do you think, A softness in the heart went to the brain And softened that? Well now I stress two things: I can't endure defeat, nor bear to see An ardent spirit thwarted. What I've achieved Has been through will that would not bend, and so To see that in another wins my love, And my support. Now take this Elenor Murray She had a will like mine, she worked her way As I have done. And just to hear that she Had planned to see me, ask for clemency For this condemned degenerate, made me say Shall I let death defeat her? Take the breach And make her death no matter in my course? For as I live if she had come to me I had done that I did. And why was that? No romance! Never that! Yet human love As friend can keep for friend in this our life I felt for Elenor Murray--and for this: It was her will that would not take defeat, Devotion to her work, and in my case This depth of friendship welling in her heart For human beings, that I shared in--there Gave tireless healing to her nursing hands And saved my life. And for a life a life. This criminal will live some years, we'll say, Were better dead. All right. He'll cost the state Say twenty thousand dollars. What is that Contrasted with the cost to me, if I Had let him hang? There is a bank account, Economies in the realm of thought to watch. And don't you think the souls--let's call them souls-- Of these avenging, law abiding folk, These souls of the community all in all Will be improved for hearing that I did A human thing, and profit more therefrom Than though that sense of balance in their souls Struck for the thought of crime avenged, the law Fulfilled and vindicated? Yes, it's true. And Merival spoke up and said: "It's true, I understand your story, and I'm glad. It's like you and I'll tell my jury first, And they will scatter it, what moved in you And how this Elenor Murray saved a life."
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The talk of waste in human life was constant As Coroner Merival took evidence At Elenor Murray's inquest. Everyone Could think of waste in some one's life as well As in his own. John Scofield knew the girl, Had worked for Arthur Fouche, her grandfather, And knew what course his life took, how his fortune Was wasted, dwindled down.
Remembering A talk he heard between this Elenor Murray And Arthur Fouche, her grandfather, he spoke To Coroner Merival on the street one day: