re was a tugging and nagging at his nerve-ends, a
constant inward irritation which laid a hold on his thoughts, twitching
them off into unpleasant channels. It kept him from centering his
interest upon the casual things about him; inevitably it turned his mind
back to inner contemplations. The sensation was mental largely, but it
seemed so nearly akin to the physical that to himself Uncle Tobe
diagnosed it as the after-result of a wrench for his weak heart. You
see, never before having experienced the reactions of a suddenly
quickened imagination, he, naturally, was at a loss to account for it on
any other ground.

Also he was weighted down by an intense depression that his clean record
of ten years should have been marred by a mishap; this regret,
constantly recurring in his thoughts, served to make him unduly
sensitive. He had a feeling that people stared hard at him as they
passed and, after he had gone by, that they turned to stare at him some
more. Under this scrutiny he gave no sign of displeasure, but inwardly
he resented it. Of course these folks had heard of what had happened up
at the prison, and no doubt among themselves would be commenting upon
the tragedy and gossiping about it. Well, any man was liable to make a
slip once; nobody was perfect. It would never happen again; he was sure
of that much.

All day he mooned about, a brooding, uneasy figure, speaking to scarcely
any one at all, but followed wherever he went by curious eyes. It was
late in the afternoon before it occurred to him that he had eaten
nothing all day, and that he had failed to deposit the money he had
earned that morning. It would be too late now to get into the bank; the
bank, which opened early, closed at three o'clock. To-morrow would do as
well. Although he had no zest for food despite his fast, he figured
maybe it was the long abstinence which was filling his head with such
flighty notions, so he entered a small, smelly lunch-room near the
railroad station, and made a pretense of eating an order of ham and
eggs. He tried not to notice that the black waiter who served him shrank
away from his proximity, shying off like a breechy colt, from the table
where Uncle Tobe sat, whenever his business brought him into that part
of the place. What difference did a fool darky's fears make, anyway?

Dusk impended when he found himself approaching his three-room house,
looming up as a black oblong, where it stood aloof from its neighbours,
with