"Fellow hustles peaches like he'd been at it all his life," the commission man told his partner.
A few days later came the question that Sanders had been expecting.
"Where'd you work before you came to us?"
"At the penitentiary."
"A guard?" asked the merchant, taken aback.
"No. I was a convict." The big lithe man in overalls spoke quietly, his eyes meeting those of the Market Street man with unwavering steadiness.
"What was the trouble?"
Dave explained. The merchant made no comment, but when he paid off the men Saturday night he said with careful casualness, "Sorry, Sanders. The work will be slack next week. I'll have to lay you off."
The man from Cañon City understood. He looked for another place, was rebuffed a dozen times, and at last was given work by an employer who had vision enough to know the truth that the bad men do not all go to prison and that some who go may be better than those who do not.
In this place Sanders lasted three weeks. He was doing concrete work on a viaduct job for a contractor employed by the city.
This time it was a fellow-workman who learned of the Arizonan's record. A letter from Emerson Crawford, forwarded by the warden of the penitentiary, dropped out of Dave's coat pocket where it hung across a plank.