The old convict drew up a chair to the bedside and sat down.
“I thought you told me you wanted to be a man and to be respected?” said this philanthropist, with evident displeasure.
Jeffy choked down a sob and sat up again. He gestured freely with his arms in expostulation.
“I was drunk when I said that. Yes, sir, I was as full as I could stick. Now I'm sober, I know rotten well what I want.”
“What do you want, Jeffy?”
“Well, I want a lot of things.”
“Well, what, for instance?”
“Well, sir, it ain't no prayers, and it ain't no Bible talks, and it ain't no lousy work. It's coming warm weather. I want to lay up along the crick-bank in the sun and do nothing—what I always done. I've had a durned hard winter, and I been a-living for the spring.”
A look of the keenest disappointment clouded Roger Oakley's face as Jeffy voiced his ignoble ambitions. His resentment gave way to sorrow. He murmured a prayer that he might be granted strength and patience for his task, and as he prayed with half-closed eyes, the outcast plugged his ears with his fingers. He was a firm believer in the efficacy of prayer, and he felt he couldn't afford to take any chances.
Roger Oakley turned to him with greater gentleness of manner than he had yet shown.