"But I'm gittin' kinder ahead o' my story. Arter mother died, Betsy she thawed out some, an' come to see me twice, an' then she got married an' went to Californy. She writ one or two letters to me an' I answered 'em punctooal, but by'm by she left off writin', an' I knew _she'd_ gin me up. An' then I got sorter cross-grained an' callous; an' sez I to myself, 'what's the odds anyhow, it can't last to all etarnity; an' by'm by I'll go out o' this, feet fust, an' I hope 't 'ill be the last o' me.'"
"But Peter, my poor fellow," piously interposes Miss Parker, "you read the Bible sometimes, I trust, and found some comfort there; you couldn't have doubted God's providence, all His blessed promises to the penitent and believing soul?"
"Why, yes'm," responds Peter; "I read my Bible _some_, purty reg'lar, too, 'long at fust; an' mother bein' a church-member, I was brung up to set on providence 'en sich like; but them promises you tell on works best outside o' prisons; an' 'long 'bout the time I got upsot, I'd gin up readin' even in the Bible; for 't wa'n't no use; the letters all stood wrong eend up. I _did_ hang on to providence a spell, but by 'm by, I see _that_ wa'n't no use, nuther. 'Providence,' sez I, 'don't take no 'count o' _me_, an' I may as well try to jog along on my own hook.'
"Well, finally, I was took down with roomatic fever, an' went into the hospital a spell; an' arter I got round agin, I wa'n't strong enough to go back to the shoe shop, an' the doctor said a change would set me up agin. Twelve year I'd ben a workin' there at the same bench, an' one day exactly like t'other, till it 'peared to me as ef I was a sewin' one 'tarnal everlastin' shoe, over an' over, an' back an' forth, an' no mortal hope o' comin' to the eend on't in this world or next. An' when they sot me to runnin' arrants in the prison, an' doin' chores fur the warden's folks, I was mighty glad, I tell you! An' things kinder got right eend up agin. 'T wa'n't long arter that, afore this dear little creetur come to town. Children _air_ strange now, ain't they, marm? Would you b'leeve that, afore that child could set alone, she took a reg'lar shine to _me_! I _was_ beat, I tell you! An' when I felt them two little arms 'round my old neck, things somehow lifted up like; an' though I didn't go to prayer-meetin', and didn't ezackly git religin, as some on 'em do, I took a reg'lar hitch on to the Almighty; 'fur,' sez I, 'it's right down handsome in Him to send a blessed little angel to sich a place as this.' Fur she was a reg'lar angel to us, a growin' up there, so innocent, purty an' lovin'; an' she did our souls a heap more good than all the chaplain's Sunday sermons; an' when the boss got killed, an' you took her off, it seemed as ef there wa'n't nothin' left. I s'pose I took on, to myself, a leetle too hard, fur arter I'd had one or two poor spells, the doctor he overhauled me, an' I heered him say there was trouble with the heart; an' sez I to myself, 'you're right there _is_!' Next day as I was cleanin' up his office, the warden asked me 'bout my folks; an' how long I'd ben to the prison, an' how long I'd got to stay, an' so I told him, nigh as I could, the hull story, 'cept 'at I didn't let on 'bout mother, an' them reg'lar visits. He wouldn't 'a' b'leeved me, you see, an' besides, I never did like to let on much about _her_.