ion, which I had taken with me to call upon the beautiful Madam
Whitworth before my Cherry had befallen me as a gift, and which I had
without thought brought into that prison with me, I parried the blow
of the knife at my beloved Gouverneur Faulkner, but not in such a
manner as to prevent a glancing of that knife, which inflicted a
scratch of considerable depth upon my forearm under its sleeve of
brown cheviot.

"My God, boy!" exclaimed that Gouverneur Faulkner as he caught the
knife from the floor where it had fallen from the hand of the poor man
who had sunk down on the cot, trembling and panting. "Two inches to
the left and a little more force and the knife would have stuck in
your heart."

"Is it not better my heart than yours, my great Gouverneur Faulkner?
And behold it is the heart of neither and only a small scratch upon my
humble arm, which will not even prevent the driving of that new Cherry
car," I answered him as I put that arm behind me and pressed it close
in its sleeve of brown cheviot so that there would be no drippings of
blood.

"I didn't go to hurt the young gentleman nor you either, Governor,"
said the man from the cot as he sobbed and buried his head in his
arms. "I was always a good man and now I--"

"Don't say another word, Timms," interrupted my Gouverneur Faulkner in
a voice that was as gentle as that father of State which he had said
himself to be to Timms. "Nobody will know of this, for your sake. I
was--was baiting you. I know what I want to know now and you'll not
hang on the sixteenth. The State will try you again. Call the
superintendent, Robert."

"Don't say nothing to hurt Mary, Governor. Jest let me hang and I
won't never care what--" the poor human began to plead.

"I'll look after Mary--and you too, Timms. I'll see to it that--" my
Gouverneur Faulkner was answering the trembling plea for his mercy
when the superintendent came in and unlocked the cage.

"Don't let him know of the--accident, youngster," whispered the
Gouverneur Faulkner to me, and in a very few minutes we were out of
that prison into the Cherry car, and whirling with great rapidity down
the country road with its tall trees upon both sides.

"Stop, Robert," commanded His Excellency as we came under a large
group of very old trees which made a thick shelter of their green
leaves as they leaned together over the stone wall that bordered the
side of the road. "Now let me see just what did happen to that arm
which