"Because all the fight has been taken out of me, Whitley. That is the
reason and the only reason."
His smile was beatific. "No, it isn't," he denied. "You know you
couldn't do it; you couldn't bring yourself to do it. Maybe, in the
heat of passion . . . but to go deliberately: no, Weyburn; if you think
you could do such a thing as that, I can tell you that I know you
better than you know yourself."
"I merely said that that was what I ought to do. I know well enough
that I shan't do it, but the reason is far beneath that which you are
good enough to hint at. I'm a broken man, Whitley; what I have gone
through in the past few months has smashed my nerve. You can't
understand that--I don't expect you to. But if I should meet those two
old men when I leave this house, I should probably run away from them
and try to hide."
"But what _will_ you do?" he queried.
"What can I do, more than I've been doing?"
Again a silence intervened.
"I wish I knew how to advise you," Whitley said at length. "If there
were only some way in which you might shake off this wretched hired
spy!"
"I can't. If I dodge him, he has only to wait until I report myself
again to the prison authorities. The one thing I can do is to relieve
you of my threatening presence, and I'll do that now--to-night, while
the going is good."
He was at the end of his resources, as I knew he must be, and he made
no objections. But at train-time he got up and put on his overcoat to
accompany me as far as the station. It was a rough night outside, and
I tried to dissuade him, but he wouldn't have it that way. "No," he
said; "it's my privilege to speed the parting guest, if I can do no
more than that," and so we breasted the spitting snow-storm which was
sweeping the empty streets, tramping in silence until we reached the
shelter of the train-shed.
It was after the train had whistled for the crossing below the town
that Whitley asked me again what I intended doing. I answered him
frankly because it was his due.
"It has come down to one of two things: day-labor, in a field where a
man is merely a number on the pay-roll--or that other road which is
always open to the prison-bird."
He put his hand on my shoulder. "You are not going to take the other
road, Weyburn," he said gravely.
"I hope not--I hope I shan't be driven to."
"You mustn't make it conditional. I know you are not a criminal; you
were not a criminal when you were convicted. You can't afford to begin
to be one now."
"Neither can I afford to starve," I interposed. "Other men live by
their wits, and so can I, if I'm driven to it. But I'll play fair with
you, Whitley. So long as I can keep body and soul together, with a
pick and shovel, or any other implement that comes to hand, I'll stick.
I owe you that much, if only for the reason that you are--with the
single exception of an old police chief who lives at the other edge of
the State--the one really human being I've met since I shook hands with
the warden."
The train was in and the conductor was waving his lantern. Whitley
grasped my hand and wrung it. "Be a man, and God bless you!" he said
in low tones. "And when the pinch comes again and you are tempted to
the limit, just remember that there is a fellow back here in
Springville who believes in you, and who will limp a little all the
rest of his days if you stumble and fall and refuse to get up.
Good-night and good-by!"