She displayed her picture with childish delight. “He gave it to me,” she said, nodding toward the convict. “Isn’t he good?”
“He is very kind,” the officer replied. “Did you thank him?” “Well, we must go now. You can come again some other time.”
“Good-bye!” Minnie called out to her new friend. “I shall come to see you again very soon. And I want to kiss you now,” running back again.
The deputy, with the child’s hand in his, hesitated, and looked embarrassed. He made a point of being scrupulously civil to the convicts, and was particularly careful not to offend this one; but he shrank from allowing such a leave-taking.
“It won’t hurt her, sir,” said the prisoner, in an eager voice. “She is too pure to take a stain.”
The child’s hand was released, the convict bent inside his cell, and took the kiss she gave him through the bars; then Minnie went into the house with her protector.
“I am not sure that I like it,” Mr. Raynor said, after he had heard the story. He took the child in his arms. “I am not sure that I shall let my angel go down to that place again.”
“But, father,” his wife said gently, “if our angel can do good there, we ought not to refuse. I should not wish her to go unguarded, nor, indeed, very often in any way; but she might go down occasionally with one of us, or the deputy. As Jeffries says, she is too pure to take a stain.”
The wife prevailed; and, thereafter, Minnie Raynor’s sweet face often cheered the gloom of the prison. The convicts learned to bless her small shadow as it fell across the work or book carried close to the cell door for light. They would start and smile at any sign of her coming—a laugh, a word, or the patter of light feet on the stones. Those who were on the side of the prison next the street thought themselves repaid if, after a day of toil and silence, they caught a glimpse of the child in a window, or in the garden of the warden’s house. They fabricated wonderful toys for her in their leisure hours—balls that bounded marvellously, ornaments carved from soupbones, and rattles that were a puzzle to take apart or put together. In return, she gave them smiles and thanks, and whatever dainty she could coax from her mother to carry in.
But to no one was this fair vision so dear as to him on whom she had first bestowed her preference; for on her he concentrated all the softness which the others showed toward any one who noticed them. She was the only one to whom he spoke, on whom he smiled; and for her sake he would humble himself to any extent. He who had before scorned to ask a favor, now begged for tools and materials to make toys for the warden’s daughter. He showed jealousy when she noticed any one else—he begged her constantly for assurances of affection. On her he poured out all the suppressed tenderness of his heart; for she was the only being who had ever come to him with perfect trust—the only being who believed him good.