I have always suspected that the sheriff did not do all
in his power to quiet the feeling. It was to a large extent, however,
the past reasserting itself. Though Radnor's record was not so black as
it was painted, still, it was not so white as it should have been.
People shook their heads and repeated stories of how wild he had been as
a boy, and how they had always foreseen some such end as this. Reports
of the quarrels with his father were told and retold until they were
magnified beyond all recognition. The old scandals about Jeff were
revived again, and the general opinion seemed to be that the Gaylord
boys were degenerates through and through. Rad's personal friends stood
by him staunchly; but they formed a pitifully small minority compared to
the general sensation-seeking public.

I visited Radnor in the Kennisburg jail on the morning of my uncle's
funeral and found him quite broken in spirit. He had had time to think
over the past, and with his father lying dead at Four-Pools, it had not
been pleasant thinking. Now that it was too late, he seemed filled with
remorse over his conduct toward the old man, and he dwelt continually on
the fact of his having been unwilling to make up the quarrel of the
night before the murder. In this mood of contrition he mercilessly
accused himself of things I am sure he had never done. I knew that the
jailer was listening to every word outside, and I became unspeakably
nervous for fear he would say something which could be twisted into an
incriminating confession. He did not seem to comprehend in the least the
danger of his own position; he was entirely taken up with the horror of
his father's death. As I was leaving, however, he suddenly grasped my
hand with tears in his eyes.

"Tell me, Arnold, do people really believe me guilty?"

I knew by "people" he meant Polly Mathers; but I had not had an
opportunity to speak with her alone since the day of the tragedy.

"I haven't talked to anyone but the sheriff," I returned.

"Mattison would be glad enough to prove it," Radnor said bitterly, and
he turned his back and stood staring through the iron bars of the
window, while I went out and the jailer closed the door and locked it.

All through the funeral that afternoon I could scarcely keep my eyes
from Polly Mathers's face. She appeared so changed since the day of the
picnic that I should scarcely have known her for the same person; it
seemed incredible that three days could make su