"The days must seem long to you," she said.
She came nearer, and leaned against the door. "Yes, they are long; but I thank God for every one of them. My coming here was the best thing that ever happened to me. I was getting to be drunkard, and this put a stop to it."
As he spoke, he lifted his face and looked out at the strip of sky visible through the window across the corridor, and his eyes began to kindle.
"Have you a family?" the lady asked.
He waited a moment before answering, seemed to break some link of thought that had a bright fracture, and his expression underwent a slight but decided change. A light in it that had been lofty softened to a light that was tender, as at her question he looked down again. "There's Larry," he said.
"And who is Larry?"
The convict stared with astonishment at her ignorance. And, indeed, Mrs. Raynor was the only person about the prison who had not heard the name of this Larry. "He is my step-brother, ma'am," he replied. "We had but the one father; but he had his own mother. When she died, there were two of us left, and I took the lad and brought him to this country. He was five years old then, and I was twenty. I was a stone-cutter, and thought to do better here; and, faith, one way I have, and another way I haven't. Shame never touched one of us at home."
"Who took care of the child?" Mrs. Raynor asked.
"Myself, ma'am. He ate and slept with me, and I took him on my arm as often as I put my hat on. He had his little chair on the table in my shop, or he played about at the end of a long string. For the lad was venturesome, and I never trusted him but with a tether."
"He must have been a great care," she said.