The Oakdale Affair | Page 9

a hundred and ten. He had won his military title as a
boy in the famous march of Coxey's army on Washington, or, rather, the title had been
con- ferred upon him in later years as a merited reward of service. The General, profiting
by the precepts of his erstwhile companions in arms, had never soiled his mil- itary
escutcheon by labor, nor had he ever risen to the higher planes of criminality. Rather as a
mediocre pick- pocket and a timorous confidence man had he eked out a meager
existence, amply punctuated by seasons of straight bumming and intervals spent as the
guest of various inhospitably hospitable states. Now, for the first time in his life, The
General faced the possibility of a serious charge; and his terror made him what he never
before had been, a dangerous criminal.
"You're a cheerful guy," commented Dopey Charlie; "but you may be right at dat. Dey
can't hang a guy any higher fer two 'an they can fer one an' dat's no pipe; so wots de use.
Wait till I take a shot--it'll be easier," and he drew a small, worn case from an inside
pocket, bared his arm to the elbow and injected enough mor- phine to have killed a dozen
normal men.
From a pile of mouldy hay across the barn the youth, heavy eyed but sleepless, watched
the two through half closed lids. A qualm of disgust sent a sudden shudder through his
slight frame. For the first time he almost re- gretted having embarked upon a life of crime.
He had seen that the two men were conversing together earn- estly, though he could
over-hear nothing they said, and that he had been the subject of their nocturnal colloquy,
for several times a glance or a nod in his direction as- sured him of this. And so he lay
watching them--not that he was afraid, he kept reassuring himself, but through curiosity.
Why should he be afraid? Was it not a well known truth that there was honor among
thieves?
But the longer he watched the heavier grew his lids. Several times they closed to be
dragged open again only by painful effort. Finally came a time that they remained closed
and the young chest rose and fell in the regular breathing of slumber.
The two ragged, rat-hearted creatures rose silently and picked their way, half-crouched,
among the sleepers sprawled between them and The Oskaloosa Kid. In the hand of
Dopey Charlie gleamed a bit of shiny steel and in his heart were fear and greed. The fear
was engend- ered by the belief that the youth might be an amateur detective. Dopey
Charlie had had one experience of such and he knew that it was easily possible for them
to blunder upon evidence which the most experienced of operatives might pass over
unnoticed, and the loot bulg- ing pockets furnished a sufficient greed motive in them-
selves.
Beside the boy kneeled the man with the knife. He did not raise his hand and strike a
sudden, haphazard blow. Instead he placed the point carefully, though lightly, above the
victim's heart, and then, suddenly, bore his weight upon the blade.
Abigail Prim always had been a thorn in the flesh of her stepmother--a well-meaning,
unimaginative, ambitious, and rather common woman. Coming into the Prim home as

house-keeper shortly after the death of Abigail's mother, the second Mrs. Prim had from
the first looked upon Abigail principally as an obstacle to be overcome. She had tried to
'do right by her'; but she had never given the child what a child most needs and most
craves--love and understanding. Not loving Abigail, the house-keeper could, naturally,
not give her love; and as for understanding her one might as reasonably have ex- pected
an adding machine to understand higher mathe- matics.
Jonas Prim loved his daughter. There was nothing, within reason, that money could buy
which he would not have given her for the asking; but Jonas Prim's love, as his life, was
expressed in dollar signs, while the love which Abigail craved is better expressed by any
other means at the command of man.
Being misunderstood and, to all outward appearances of sentiment and affection, unloved
had not in any way embittered Abigail's remarkably joyous temperament. made up for it
in some measure by getting all the fun and excitement out of life which she could
discover therein, or invent through the medium of her own re- sourceful imagination.
But recently the first real sorrow had been thrust into her young life since the
half-forgotten mother had been taken from her. The second Mrs. Prim had decided that it
was her 'duty' to see that Abigail, having finished school and college, was properly
married. As a match- maker the second