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Speaker 1: The guilty man a study and tragedy appearances, as has

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often been said, are misleading. Many A girl on a

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fur coat, gold buckled shoes, and an expensive Marcelle Snip's

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ribbon behind the counter. That inoffensive cloud over there may

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darken and spit forth lightning. Your sweet faced wife may

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be plotting to deceive you. Persons go wrong. Jeffrey Sobs,

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sitting with outward placidity on a box before his barn door,

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with a keen bladed, horn handled knife in his hand,

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slowly whittling, as though his sole aim in life was

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to model a yacht in perfect miniature, was in reality

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thinking how smoothly that same knife would carve into the

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heart of his enemy, Philip Lober. His hate was a

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black hate, compounded of jealousy, envy, a sense of inferiority,

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and fear. It had begun twelve years ago when the

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two men, owning adjoining farms, and having been good friends

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until then, Philip Loeber commenced to climb and Jeffrey Sobs

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to go down. Jeffrey drank, but that was his own affair.

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Lots of men took a glass now and then and

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made money just the same. But he was driven to

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borrow money from the more prosperous Philip, not once, but

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again and again, and he grew to hate the man

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who had befriended him. Then Martha Hansen came along with

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her yellow hair and her fresh cheeks and her soft,

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laughing eyes, to settle with her uncle in the old

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leather bey place. The uncle had fallen from his threshing

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machine the following year and was killed. There been a quiet,

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slow but determined battle for her hand between the two men.

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Lober had won. Although Martha was dead now, and Geoffrey

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could see the daisies waving in the spring on her

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grave in the orchard corner over there, on his neighbor's land,

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he had neither forgiven nor forgotten. This was Count two. Also,

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Lober had given him advice about his habits, advice which Jeffrey,

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growing more and more aloof and bitter hearted and weasel

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faced and grim for the smoldering hate in his heart, considered,

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had been offered with a superior air. Count three, And

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Lober had sworn yesterday to have Sobs arrested for stealing

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a dozen of his fine white leghorns. It was the

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fear that followed this threat that had started the whittler's

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brain on its evil scheming. He would kill him, and

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he wondered why he had not thought of it before.

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It would be easy. Since his wife's death, Philip Lober

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had lived alone with only a man serpent, who slept,

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as Jeffrey knew, in a room over the carriage house

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a few hundred yards from the back door. When the

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two farmers had been friends, Sobs had often spent the

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evening talking and smoking with his neighbor. That was before

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he'd become full of hate and had taken to drink.

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He knew where his enemy slept, and that there was

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only a very simple lock on the outside door downstairs.

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His knife would get through that easily. The hired man,

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a young, melancholy but on the whole good natured Dane,

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would be in his loft by eight o'clock or nine

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at the latest. Lober would be sitting by the fire

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or preparing for bed, dropping his big boots on the

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floor and yawning widely. After the hard day in the fields.

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The man with the knife would come up behind speak

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so that the other would turn. It was part of

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his design that the enemy should see the hand that

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struck him down, and the knife would be in his

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heart before he could cry out. The man in the sun,

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whittling at the miniature ship, smiled grimly, and with one powerful,

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vicious plunge of the sharp blade, cut his work in

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two like a piece of cheese, and flung it aside.

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His thinking was done. It was a propitiously dark night,

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black as Jeffrey SOB's soul and is full of turmoil,

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a night full of the ohs and ahs of wind

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tortured trees that bent curiously down to see the man

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who was going to kill his friend. It was March,

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and the water in the creek that ran between the

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two farms was high and noisy, rushing through the darkness,

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as if anxious to be away from the menacing meadows

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of the little Wood and the big dark man who

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crossed heavily over the uncertain bridge. Some newborn lambs cried

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pitifully from the sheepfold, and a coyote howled in answer.

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A streak of moon peered out fearfully and disappeared. Approaching

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his victim's house, he looked up and saw that the

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farm hand was moving about in his room, undressing, perhaps already,

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although it was not yet nine. No, he was moving

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swiftly back and forth, stooping to lift something, passing the window,

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almost at a run. Suddenly, as though he felt the

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scrutiny of the man outside, he snatched at the blind,

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and the window was dark. Whatever he was doing, he

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was up there and out of the way, thought Geoffrey Sobs.

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My work is here. It will soon be over, and

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I will be home with my tracks well covered before

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anything is discovered. I shall be rid of the fool

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in a little while. How simple a thing murder is,

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after all, he meditated as he crept toward the door

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he had planned to enter. That suspicion would certainly never

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fasten on him. He had carried his enmity in his

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heart like a secret disease, and had confided in nobody.

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The crime would no doubt be laid to the robbers

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and drifters who infested the highway into town. He had

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no fear that he would be caught, only that he

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might find his enemy alert and waiting, and that the

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deed might be defeated. There was a light in the kitchen,

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as he could see through a slit in the door.

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Try as he might, it was a very difficult thing

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to raise the lock with his knife without making a sound,

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But after a full fifteen minutes he accomplished it. He

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opened the door, pushing it in softly and cautiously, inch

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by inch. A creak he sprang inside. In the kitchen,

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a lamp was burning, but as far as he could see,

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no one was there in the bedroom. Perhaps He strode

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across the bare floor, looking with quick motions of his

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head to left and right like a jungle beast who

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expects death to leap from every shadow. Not a sound

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in the house, And then he saw the body of

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Philip Lober, whom he had come to kill, already dead,

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with a knife jab in his thick red neck and

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his inert legs sprawling grotesquely. He noticed that the room

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was in confusion. A chair air was overturned, the cloth

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was dragged partly from the table and lay along the

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floor among a litter of broken china. A blackened log

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lay on the hearth rug, as if it had been

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seized for a weapon. He stood, gaping like an idiot,

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with the knife in his hand, and his eyes riveted

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to the spectacle of his enemy slain. The work he

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had come to do was done. He could not move,

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even when he heard a heavy step approaching. He could

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only stand helpless on the spot. Albert, the hired man,

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tall and blond almost to whiteness, with a smooth, boyish

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face and the wide open, brilliantly blue eyes of a child,

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came into the room, carrying an old straw suitcase in

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one hand and his cap in the other. He started

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on seeing a visitor, and of his face had not

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yet been already as white as paper, he would have paled,

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mister Sobs, for God's sake, mister Soalbs, He looked with

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a shuddering glance at the body of his employer that

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lay between them. Sobs put his knife away and said, deliberately,

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do you know who killed him? The man stammered, but

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what do you do here, mister Sobs. A hard look

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came over the face of the would be murderer, but

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he did not answer. He seemed hunting for words. Suddenly,

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the Dane shut his square jaw with a snap, and

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bright red color flowed into his face. The arteries in

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his neck stood out, and he pointed a finger that

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shook with emotion at the other man. You you were

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his enemy, he told me, you did it. I saw

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the knife you put away. I did not do it,

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said Jeffrey Sobs quietly. Albert dropped his suitcase and in

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the flash of a half second, had an ugly looking

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revolver leveled at the other man. You sit down in

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that chair. I'm going to telephone for the sheriff. Wait,

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get that rope from the nail. Sobs took a quick

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look at the ominous black mouth of the weapon and

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pulled down the rope sullenly. In a few minutes, he

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was bound tightly to the chair and was sitting alone

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with the dead man while he listened to the farm

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hand's thick voice speaking into the telephone. He let his

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head fall to his breast, for suddenly all the energy

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that had driven him here subsidy and left him weary

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and only desiring rest sleep. The Dane came back, striding

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thunderously in his big boots, and sat down opposite his prisoner.

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For a long time, they were silent, the one with

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his glance on the floor at his feet, sunk in

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an apparent apathy, and the other with his face averted

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from the huddle that had been his master, and then

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slowly hesitatingly, his big blonde head turned and he looked,

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but with aversion, at the dead man. As he did so,

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Jeoffrey Sobs raised his eyes. I thought, so, Albert, he

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threw out with a laugh. You killed him? What you

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think that, I, mister Sobs, You killed him, repeated Sobs.

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I'm only curious to know. Why do you mind telling

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me you think I I know it. Don't lie, boy,

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when you came in, you didn't even go near the body,

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and you've hardly looked at it, since that's one reason

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an innocent man would have gone over to see if

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he were really dead. You were the color of chalk

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when you came in and before you saw him. Also,

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I see by your face that I'm right. Untie me

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for answer, the younger man put his head down on

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his hands and burst into loud sobbing, And when he

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raised it again, his face was wild and tears streaked,

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and this big strong frame shook. He was as a

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child who fears nothing so much as his own sin.

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I did it, he flung out, speaking quickly. I did it,

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but I swear by my dear old mother in the fatherland,

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by my little sister. I didn't mean to no, I

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didn't mean to kill him. I ain't the kind of

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fellow can kill anybody, mister Sobs. He got to his

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feet and stood there wringing his hands. It was because

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of my little sister, Elsa, who works as maid in town.

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I sent for her from home last year seventeen. She

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is and pretty. He shuddered and looked fearfully toward the

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man he had killed. He began paying her attention, and

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when I asked him what he intended to do, he laughed.

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He just laughed at me, and you killed him. We

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fought like two men. Called him a name, and he

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struck me, and we fought. He was a big man,

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stronger than me. He took a knife from the table

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it was fixed for supper, and he ran at me.

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It was me or him again. Geoffrey Sobs laughed always.

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His laughter had a sinister, dark note in it. He said, lightly,

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or with an assumption of lightness. You have a hard

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time making the police believe your story. I know it.

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I was going to run away, but now I got

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to hang for that, mister Sobs, and little Elsa, my mother.

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He sat down heavily again, with his face hidden in

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his hands. Me he muttered never, never could I heard

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a fly like a girl I am. He got up

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suddenly and came over to untie the ropes, but Sobs

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stopped him with a sharp word of command. Leave them

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alone when they come, keep your mouth shut. I'm the murderer,

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not you. The Dane's eyes opened wide you he began.

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I came here tonight to kill him. I hated him

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for years, envied and despised him. I came with my

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knife in my hand, through the neck of the woods

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over the bridge and opened the door with the blade.

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I planned the whole thing, but for you, my hands

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would be read. Now. You killed him in an honest

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fight over a woman's honor. I wished to put him

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out of the way because you was richer, more lucky

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with the women. He lorded it over me. I came

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to kill him. Can I let you hang, mister Sobs,

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for what I did. You'll have to, boy, because I

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left a note home in case anything happened to me

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about my property. In that I'll tell them to get it.

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I'll swear I came to kill him in my heart.

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I had committed the crime a dozen times over. The

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law would say you were the guilty man, But which

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one of us is a murderer? You or I? Voices

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and stamping and hurried feet outside, and three burly men

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came in, grim faced and hard eyed and determined. They

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gave quick comprehending glances about the room, advanced to the

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man in the chair, and unbound him. He stood silently

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while they put the cold iron circlets around his wrists.

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He even smiled when the Danes seized his manacle hands

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and pressed them in a frantic sobbing good bye. End

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of the Guilty Man, A study and tragedy.