A club attendant, with a telephone slip on a tray, stopped by Peters’ side. He excused himself and went along the porch, nodding from table to table.
“Curious chap,” said De Gollyer musingly.
“Extraordinary.”
The word was like a murmur in the group of four, who continued watching Peters’ trim, disappearing figure in silence, without looking at one another—with a certain ill ease.
A RETRIEVED REFORMATION[[9]]
By O. HENRY
[9]. From Roads of Destiny. Published by permission of the publishers. Copyright, 1909, by Doubleday, Page & Co.
A guard came to the prison shoe-shop, where Jimmy Valentine was assiduously stitching uppers, and escorted him to the front office. There the warden handed Jimmy his pardon, which had been signed that morning by the governor. Jimmy took it in a tired kind of way. He had served nearly ten months of a four-year sentence. He had expected to stay only about three months, at the longest. When a man with as many friends on the outside as Jimmy Valentine had is received in the “stir” it is hardly worth while to cut his hair.
“Now, Valentine,” said the warden, “you’ll go out in the morning. Brace up, and make a man of yourself. You’re not a bad fellow at heart. Stop cracking safes, and live straight.”
“Me?” said Jimmy, in surprise. “Why, I never cracked a safe in my life.”