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Show ruAPTER XIII Continued , sat for a few moments In C n'e had been condemned to LrNnuient because this forgo t-5 t-5 Submerged Identity had mas-3r mas-3r d through some strange cere-f cere-f ary, as the real man. Ihe . s too much to grasp. jnt J f itnJs 8lniul by me? i jsked brokenly. Ibe'doctor shook his head. M It deal of sympathy developed ..Lain Sutton. I'm afraid your deserted you In the hour of it W Ie help?" 116 trem' ivriib auxiety. doctor looked at him with a ,,.(row on bis face. -;; seems incredible you ve forgot-a, forgot-a, Sbe has divorced you. No n Is expected to stick to a lifer." "n forced themselves through . , 1 eves. Even Natica, for whom :"tod sinned, had thrown him aside. ..."rapaurethe doctor went on talk- ';Tll. exceptional sentence was due , v01Ir stubbornness. The judge Jed you to confess. Yes," he added lively; "1 think if you had made "lean breast of it you'd have had a pparatlTely light sentence." Pat50D Grant gripped the edge of cot New hope was born. There jgHt be a way of reducing his term 'Doctor," be cried excitedly: "Do m suppose If I were willing to make i Mil confession now it would help? Tbe doctor considered the matter. It's not eas7 to say, off-hand." But your testimony would help." Uine," said tbe doctor: "What do a mean by my testimony?" ' wmld say you found me whol- ., unconscious of the past. 'You could ore I was a different man at the HI and that I ought to have another lance." Hold your horses," the doctor said, Wing, "I couldn't testify to any-i!jg any-i!jg of the kind. All I could truth-Sj truth-Sj declare was that you pretended ;on didn't know who you were and ai to substantiate your truth, or by making up your bed like one -In had never done it before. Now, ;oi ere an educated man and you Klit to be able to see my side of it. 1 ask you this. How long would I :t here If I believed the tale of all le geniuses In Sing Sing?" "My God!" Grant cried, "you can't link I'm lying?" "Why not?" the doctor retorted. "Do , ion suppose It would be the first " Visible lie I have listened to? I sup-Y'i sup-Y'i we get the pick of the best crim-ul crim-ul brains in the country In Sing ;iig and they're most of 'em Just as anions to better their lot as you. I'm :ed to these stunts but 1 never lose iterest In them; that's why I came :o see what new one you were trying :." Grant watched the doctor cross to it cell door. He felt that with him ;pe would step Into the corridor not ata to return. "Doctor," he called anxiously, "just i moment Do you know anything font the action of a drug they call tag In the East?" The physician did not open the cell ''. He turned and looked with re-:d re-:d Interest at the convict "1 know all about It," he said. "1 'is a ship's surgeon before I came e and I've seen all I want to of 3heesh. Why?" '1 got In the habit of taking It. Do, Ton think It might have robbed me -By mind?" "lour mind?" said the doctor. He ed to have a contempt for the lay ' of expression. "I simply don't remember anything has happened. I never saw you .ore. I never saw that guard and e says he has been on this cor-' cor-' for a month." "Ms very Interesting," comment- the other. "The drug's real name Urmabis Indlca, or Indian Hemp. ;' aulteti itself In many very ;;se ways, perhaps, according to ;? tn of purity, is this another jour facile excuses?" Wt anything make yon believe?" t walled. 2v ' .,tl1'Dg'" Sa,d the d' Md m , J0U were sincere you make a confession, properly s 4 and not these sniveling ex I5 are trying 0n me." k ! iKt what ' want to do." :i .ed excitedly. -Til tell yJu . '"S from the beginning." , lthe tlme or ''inntion to ::.oSa"0ueh t0 kcep n,e :,orlcir?e'.Hy JUS,iCe r deceuc tbe prisoner exclaimed. Vv omt"ented the physl-t physl-t i had a perfectly fair trial." W" won't understand that, it ;!s den?S trled' The n who :i It 2 , Ug was talldng-not ,,, SK . dont listen to me you Eian." f 5-u-self as a fair-mind 'ifbj tlle doctor was Im- "iS"rm'linS, t0 60 w" "'O," he fnid n physician. It's up to the : of parao,,s- ni f chief P . ' r" g0 nn1 see , " i, away T))a( tksi!,v ned oiT- , Qp!ng.Uard eame nnd 'coked at A"' sin! Bm tWs tlme he saw rwetar nr,ser. Presentlv a 0oJ5 " tne chief, who was iar7, came In with a male WY1MDMAM MARTYN CopyrlRht by Bars. 4 Hopktn. WNU Sorvlce stenographer. The doctor came back with them. Grant looked upon him as n friend, nnd was glnd. ne poured out his whole tortured soul to them. lie concealed nothing-the nothing-the relief ue feIt wa3 amnz ; Through nil the devious ways by which he had set out to trap his benefactor bene-factor they followed him. They learned why Sophy McKlnnon had ter farm given her; the name of the man who falsified the entries was set down; and that hired gangster who had, for a few pieces of silver, thrust a loaded revolver in Captain Sutton's pocket was written in. When the typed statement was brought back in an amazingly short space of time Payson Grant signed It eagerly, it was not a confession that he felt he was signing. It was a document which might lessen his dreadful punishment Of contrition there was no trace. He found himself him-self already relying on the promised help of the physician. "It's my Arm belief," the doctor declared de-clared to the chief's secretary, "that this man does not remember a word that passed at his trial and I will testify tes-tify to that belief before any jury of mental experts In the country. It will be a most Interesting case." As Grant looked at the signed Instrument In-strument his eye fell on the date Una He saw that it was given as September Septem-ber 28. "This Is wrong," he said anxiously. "You'll have to correct the date." He was not going to have the statement invalidated by such an error. He r - , Grant Sat for a Few Moments In Agony. knew he could not be in the wrong. Sutton himself had stamped the date vividly on his mind when he had declared de-clared that the seventeenth, as written writ-ten In his threatening note, should have read the twenty-seventh. The notary looked at It and smiled. "I guess that's near enough," be remarked. "Like h 1 It Is," Grant snapped". He appealed to the doctor. "Don't worry about that," said the doctor. "There's more than that to come." Amazing Incidents crowded one upon another. The little cell seemed suddenly sud-denly to have ceas?ed to be occupied by donr, hard men whose work was disciplinary. The warder, for Instance, had his arm on the shoulder of the doctor. "Boy," said the warder, whose face as he smiled was altered as though another man was there. "I thought I was It, but yours Is the name that goes In the electrics1." Grant was still too Intent upon getting get-ting the date changed to have time to speculate on the meaning of this. He saw himself being put In the wrong by a notarial error. "Doctor," he urged, "this is Incorrect." Incor-rect." He felt his fate was in the oflicial's hands. The doctor alone could aid him. "You'll have to see the boss aboul this," sviid the doctor. "Don't worry; you've done your bit." He whispered something to the war der, who left the cell. He was back s within the minute accompanied by Anthony Trent, suave and debonair. "Xou," said Grant, astonished. "How do you come to be here?" At a motion of Trent's head the others left the cell, Grant noticed that he was scanning the confession. When be had glanced through it be put It in an Inner pocket "What's that to do with you?" Grant demanded. "Do you remember that night before be-fore you shot Sutton I gave you the opportunity to confess? You wouldn't do it. Then, later, Swithin Weld asked you to confess, but you refused. You've had to do it at last and it has cost me a great deal of trouble." "Cost you trouble," Grant cried, not wholly clear as to Trent's meaning. "What has It cost me?" Trent ignored the question. "It has cost me a great deal more than you think. I suppos-e you know that you are In Ossining?" Grant's nerves were on edge. He felt tired, hungry and in no condition to listen to Trent And there was rising the feeling that there was some conspiracy in which he was Involved whose motives he could not comprehend. compre-hend. "There are some things I don't get clearly yet," he snapped, "but I know where I. am even if I don't know how I. got here." "Let me ehow you the secrets ot your prison house," Trent said. He gripped the convict by the arm and took him to the open door of the cell so that a view might be obtained of the corridors. The cell which Grant had believed to be but one of a great block of cells was revealed as a solitary unit standing stand-ing in what had been a flower garden. The corridors ran only a few yards either side of the cell, just sufficient, Indeed, that no end of them could be observed by the prisoner. Remorselessly, Remorseless-ly, Trent dragged him across the yard where he bad seen the convicts at work. The wall on which the blue-uni-formed guards still walked was a thing built of beaver-board, plastered over. The river was real, and Uaverstraw occupied her familiar site, but everything every-thing else was constructed as a moving mov-ing picture get The cell was more solidly built than a studio would need and the bars were steel instead of blackened wood. At a little distance, the convicts Grant had seen were sitting around talking. It was the first professional engagement when they had not been made-up or photographed. Carpenters were even now beginning to tear down the wall. None paid any particular atteation to Payson Grant. Only a few knew for what purpose the drama was staged. The motion picture extra is not a curious person; be is engaged en-gaged for scenes possibly in the middle mid-dle of pictures whose title and plot is unknown. The twenty men who had earned five dollars and transportation transpor-tation had no idea that they had been assisting a bit of real life. They only knew later that whereas they had been engaged to come for five dollars per diem they were sent home with twice as much. Payson Grant suffered himself to be led to the upper room of the old mansion, man-sion, where he found the warder and others he remembered too well. "Your warder," Trent began, "Is Mr Joseph Clarke, formerly city editor oi a metropolitan daily. This," he indi cated the small man who had swept the passages and was still in prison livery, "is Mr. David More, who has been of great assistance In getting evl dence." Trent next Introduced the man who had masqueraded as the doctor. doc-tor. "This is my friend and attorney Fleming Dearholt" "Then he'll be a disbarred attorney before he knows It," Grant snarled. "I doubt it," said Fleming Dearbol' modestly, "and even if 1 am, I so-a so-a great future before me on screen and stage. Speaking as a lawyet your confession goes off to the gov ernor by special messenger at once." "What about your confession? Grant cried. "What about the con fession Weld and Trent will have t make? If I'm to suffer for killing Sut ton they'll suffer with me." H. turned to Trent with flaming face "1 accuse you of Introducing -Suttoi Into my room that night when I wa on the ragged edge with that crini. talk." Fleming Dearholt turned to b-client b-client with an appearance of concern "Can this be true?" he demanded. (TO BE CONTINUED.) |