In the first place, though the atmosphere of crime
is polluting in a large city, it infects nobody here. I tell you, sir,
the murderer on a Texas prairie is miserable. There is nothing so
terrible to him as this freedom and loneliness, in which he is always
in the company of his outraged conscience, which drives him hither and
thither, and gives him no rest. For I tell you, that murderers don't
willingly meet together, not even over the whisky bottle. They know
each other, and shun each other. Well, sir, this subject touches me
warmly at present, for I am just come from the death-bed of such a
man. I have been with him three days. You remember Bob Black, John?"
"Yes. A man who seldom spoke, and whom no one liked. A good soldier,
though. I don't believe he knew the meaning of fear."
"Didn't he? I have seen him sweat with terror. He has come to me more
dead than alive, clung to my arms like a child, begged me to stand
between him and the shapes that followed him."
"Drunk?"
"No, sir. I don't think he ever tasted liquor; but he was a haunted
man! He had been a sixfold murderer, and his victims made life a terror
to him."
"How do you account for that?"
"We have a spiritual body, and we have a natural body. When it pleases
the Almighty, he opens the eyes and ears of our spiritual body, either
for comfort, or advice, or punishment.
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