Although Jim went directly back to Number 15 after his delayed supper he did not find Clem there. Perhaps, he thought, Clem had been there and, not finding him, had gone to look for him. In a way Jim was not sorry, for the explanation that was Clem’s due wasn’t going to be easy to make. He prepared to write a letter to his father, but, with pen hovering above paper, his thoughts went back to his talk with Webb and the letter was forgotten.
Webb had been so glad to see him that Jim’s anger had softened instantly, even though the former had shown no signs of contrition. He had been perfectly frank. Leaning against the sill of a barred window at one end of the corridor that extended along the front of the cells, Webb had explained everything in matter-of-fact fashion. After he had got that five dollars from Jim he had changed his mind about going to Norwalk just then. He didn’t see any sense in working so long as he had money. But yesterday the money had given out and in the afternoon he had gone to Haylow to ask for another loan. If he had got it he would have jumped the train at four and gone to Norwalk. Anyway, he had really meant to then. But no one had answered his knock, and he had gone in. He had looked around a bit and then sat down, intending to wait for Jim’s return. It wasn’t until then that the idea of taking Clem’s money had occurred to him.
When he had called there before and Jim had gone back into the room to ask Clem for the loan Webb had watched and listened through a crack in the door, for Jim had not quite closed it. He had seen Clem take the bunch of keys from the drawer and go to the closet. After that the action had been outside his range of vision, but his ears had supplied him with what his eyes had missed. So yesterday it had been easy enough. He had had trouble finding the keys, for they had become tucked into a fold of a garment, but after he had them what followed was fair sailing. A few minutes later, opening the door cautiously on an empty corridor, he had walked away again and down the stairs. Near the front door he had seen, both on entering and leaving, a “funny-looking sketch with a trick mustache readin’ a book, but he didn’t pay no attention to me, kid.” He went out the gate to Meadow street and returned to the village. There he visited a lunch-room and had a good feed, and it was while he was standing harmlessly in front of it that “a cop come along and pinched me.”
Webb had seemed neither proud nor ashamed nor greatly concerned with his present plight. He had heard that the Judge here was a “good guy,” and they didn’t have anything on him, anyway, because they couldn’t send a guy up for vagrancy when he had more than fifteen dollars in his pocket and was tryin’ hard to find a job. Webb had winked there.
“But suppose they found out you’d stolen that money, Webb?”
“How could they? I told ’em you gave it to me. All you got to do is tell ’em the same story, kid.”
“That would make me a thief, Webb.”
“How would it? I’ll be out o’ here to-morrow, and all you got to do is tell that guy the facts. Say, ain’t they asked you about it yet?” Jim nodded. “Well, what did you tell ’em?”
“That I gave it to you—lent it to you—this afternoon.”
“Sure! Well, that’s all right, ain’t it? They can’t do nothin’ to me if you stick to that, kid!”