I
Now it had come, he was not quite sure that he wanted it. For a moment
he longed to go back and join the men marching away to the shoe-shop.
Inside those walls he had never had to think of what he should eat or
drink, or wherewithal he should be clothed.
Over against the gray parapet echoed the buzzing of the electric cars, a
strange sound to ears accustomed only to the tramp of marching feet, the
harsh voices of wardens, and the clang of iron doors. Below him the
harbor waves danced and sparkled, ferry-boats rushed from shore to
shore, big ships moved slowly toward the distant islands and the still
more distant sea, while near at hand the busy street flowed like a
river, which he was compelled to swim but in which he already felt the
millstone of his past dragging him down.
His heart sank as he asked himself what life could hold for him. How
often, sitting on his prison bed with his head in his hands, he had
pictured joyously the present moment! Now he felt like a child who has
lost its parent's hand in the passing throng.
There had been a day, the year before, when his old mother's letter had
not come, and, instead, only a line of stereotyped consolation from the
country pastor to the village ne'er-do-well. No one had seen him choke
over his bowl of soup and bread, or noticed the tears that trickled down
upon the shoe-leather in his hand. She had been the only one who had
ever written to him. There was nothing now to take him back to the
little cluster of white cottages among the hills where he was born.
As he stood there alone facing the world, he yearned to throw himself
once more upon his cot and weep against its iron bars--for three years
the only arms outstretched to comfort him.