Silently, an attendant conducted Tessibel through the long stone corridors to the prison hospital.
As she passed, eager eyes watched her from the rows of cots against the wall. She was piloted to a bed near the end of the room.
"Here's your company, Bennet," said the officer.
The figure on the bed turned and pain-ridden eyes peered up. Tess felt her throat throb with sympathy.
"What do ye want, miss?" growled a weak voice.
Tess smiled and bent over the bed. "I want to talk to you," she said. "May I?"
Bennet's face softened immediately. He thought a beautiful angel had dropped from Heaven to the side of his prison bed.
"Yep," he whispered, blinking at her. "There air somethin' under the bed to set on, ma'am."
Drawing forth a stool, Tess raised the lowered back and sat down.
In the presence of such misery, she had almost forgotten her little friend in the cell outside. Just then, she wanted to comfort Owen Bennet, to say something which would take away that writhing expression of suffering.
"You're very sick," she murmured. "Poor man, I'm sorry!"
Bennet kept his watery eyes on the pleading young face.
"Yep, I'm sick enough," he muttered.
"What can I do for you?" asked Tess. "Can't I do anything to make you feel easier?"
"Nope," was the answer. "I'll be dead, soon. Mebbe, I'll get out time nuff to die."
Then, Tessibel did forget Andy. And, even, Deforrest and the baby left her mind. She stretched forth her hand and touched the man's arm.
"Would you like me to sing to you, a little?"
Bennet bobbed his head.
"I like singin'," he mumbled.
In a low voice, Tessibel began to sing; nor did she take her hand from the thin arm lying inertly on the sheet.
"Rescue the Perishin'; Care for the Dyin'."
came forth like the chanting of the chimes.
When the words, "Jesus is merciful," followed, Bennet put up his hand and touched the girl's fingers. Tessibel closed her own over his. There was no thought then of her errand, no remembrance that the man before her was a murderer and had sworn his crime on little Andy.
"Jesus is merciful, Jesus is kind," sang Tess, and Bennet began to cry in low sobs that made the singer finish her song in tears.
"Oh, He is kind," she whispered. "He is merciful. Won't you believe that?"