A Debt of Honor

Now it was the turn of Gerald and Mr. Brooke to look surprised.

“Why, I thrashed Jake Amsden within an hour,” said the tourist, “for an attack upon Gerald.”

“He doesn’t seem to have improved then,” said Carter. “Does he live hereabouts?”

“Yes.”

“Is he in business in this neighborhood?”

“His chief business,” answered Gerald, “is to get drunk, and when he can’t raise money any other way he steals it.”

“Evidently he is the same man. He is the cause of all my misfortunes.”

“Here he is coming back!” said Gerald suddenly.

“Good!” exclaimed the tourist. “I have some business with him.”

Jake had evidently visited Pete Johnson’s saloon again, judging from his flushed face and unsteady gait. Still he was in a condition to get around.

“Stay in the cabin till I call you!” whispered Noel Brooke to Carter.

“Well,” he said, turning to meet Amsden, “have you come back for another boxing lesson?”

“No, squire,” answered Jake.

“What then?”

“I thought you might like a guide, considerin’ this is your first visit to Colorado. Don’t you want to go up Pike’s Peak?”

“I have engaged Gerald here to go about with me.”

“He’s a boy. He don’t know nothin’ of the country.”

“He will satisfy me as a companion better than you.”

“If you’re goin’ away, Gerald,” said Amsden with unabashed assurance, “won’t you let me live in the cabin till you come back?”

“It has been engaged by another tenant,” answered Gerald.

“Who is it? It isn’t Pete Johnson, is it?”

“No, I don’t propose to let my cabin for a saloon.”

“You’re right, boy. You’d better let me have it.”

“But I told you that it was already promised to another party.”

“Who is it?”

“An old acquaintance of yours.”

At a signal from Noel Brooke John Carter came out, leading Oscar by the hand. He looked earnestly at Jake Amsden. It was the first time in many years that he had seen the man who was the prime mover in the events that had brought about his financial ruin. He would hardly have known Jake, so much had his appearance suffered from habitual intemperance.

Jake Amsden on his part scanned Carter with curious perplexity.

“Do I know you?” he asked.

“You knew me once. I have good reason to remember you,” answered John Carter gravely.

Something in his voice recalled him to Amsden.

“Why, it’s Carter,” he said, “John Carter. How are you, Carter, old fellow? It does me good to set eyes on an old friend.”

Carter was unprepared for this cordial welcome, and when Jake Amsden approached with hand extended, he put his own behind his back.

“I can’t take your hand, Jake,” he said. “You’ve done me too much harm.”

“Oh, you mean that old affair,” said Jake in an airy tone. “I did act meanly, that’s a fact, but we’re both older now. Let bygones be bygones. It’s all over now.”

“It isn’t all over. That false accusation of yours has blighted my life. It has driven me from factory to factory, and finally driven me out here in the hope that I might begin a new life where it would no longer be in my way.”

“I’m sorry for that, Carter,” said Jake Amsden. “’Pon my soul, I am. I know it was a mean trick I played upon you, but it was either you or I.”

“And you ruined this man’s reputation to save your own?” said Noel Brooke sternly.

“I didn’t think much about it, squire, I really didn’t,” said Jake. “You see I run in a hole, and I was ready to do anything to get out.”

“It was the act of a scoundrel, Amsden. There is only one thing to do.”

“What is it? Take another lickin’?”

“No, that wouldn’t mend matters. You must sign a confession that you committed the theft of which Carter was unjustly accused, so that he may have this to show whenever the old charge is brought up against him hereafter.”

“I’ll do it, squire. I’d have done it long ago if I’d known.”

“It is better late than not at all. Come into the cabin, both of you.”

His orders were obeyed, and after asking questions as to details he wrote out a confession exonerating John Carter and laying the blame on the right party. Gerald furnished him with pen, ink and paper.

“Now,” he said, when the document was completed, “I want you, Jake Amsden, to sign this and Gerald and I will subscribe our names as witnesses.”

“All right, squire, I’ll do it. You must not mind the writin’ for I haven’t handled a pen for so long that I have almost forgotten how to write.”

Jake Amsden affixed his signature in a large scrawling hand, and the two witnesses subscribed after him.

“Now, Mr. Carter,” said Noel Brooke, as he handed him the paper, “keep this carefully, and whenever that scoundrel who has made it his business to persecute you engages again in the same work you can show this document, and it will be a satisfactory answer to his base charges.”

“I thank you, Mr. Brooke,” said Carter in a deep voice. “You cannot conceive what a favor you have done me. I feel that a great burden has been lifted from my life, and that it has passed out of the shadow which has obscured it for so long. Now I shall be able to leave Oscar an untarnished name!”