FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   389   390   391   392   393   394   395   396   397   398   399   400   401   402   403   404   405   406   407   408   409   410   411   412   413  
414   415   416   417   418   419   420   421   422   423   424   425   426   427   428   429   430   431   432   433   434   435   436   437   438   >>   >|  
you did before, now would yuh?" "No, Mr. Chapin, I wouldn't, exactly," said Cowperwood, truly enough, "though I believed I was right in everything I did. I don't think legal justice has really been done me." "Well, that's the way," continued Chapin, meditatively, scratching his grizzled head and looking genially about. "Sometimes, as I allers says to some of these here young fellers that comes in here, we don't know as much as we thinks we does. We forget that others are just as smart as we are, and that there are allers people that are watchin' us all the time. These here courts and jails and detectives--they're here all the time, and they get us. I gad"--Chapin's moral version of "by God"--"they do, if we don't behave." "Yes," Cowperwood replied, "that's true enough, Mr. Chapin." "Well," continued the old man after a time, after he had made a few more solemn, owl-like, and yet well-intentioned remarks, "now here's your bed, and there's your chair, and there's your wash-stand, and there's your water-closet. Now keep 'em all clean and use 'em right." (You would have thought he was making Cowperwood a present of a fortune.) "You're the one's got to make up your bed every mornin' and keep your floor swept and your toilet flushed and your cell clean. There hain't anybody here'll do that for yuh. You want to do all them things the first thing in the mornin' when you get up, and afterward you'll get sumpin' to eat, about six-thirty. You're supposed to get up at five-thirty." "Yes, Mr. Chapin," Cowperwood said, politely. "You can depend on me to do all those things promptly." "There hain't so much more," added Chapin. "You're supposed to wash yourself all over once a week an' I'll give you a clean towel for that. Next you gotta wash this floor up every Friday mornin'." Cowperwood winced at that. "You kin have hot water for that if you want it. I'll have one of the runners bring it to you. An' as for your friends and relations"--he got up and shook himself like a big Newfoundland dog. "You gotta wife, hain't you?" "Yes," replied Cowperwood. "Well, the rules here are that your wife or your friends kin come to see you once in three months, and your lawyer--you gotta lawyer hain't yuh?" "Yes, sir," replied Cowperwood, amused. "Well, he kin come every week or so if he likes--every day, I guess--there hain't no rules about lawyers. But you kin only write one letter once in three months yourself, an' if you wan
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   389   390   391   392   393   394   395   396   397   398   399   400   401   402   403   404   405   406   407   408   409   410   411   412   413  
414   415   416   417   418   419   420   421   422   423   424   425   426   427   428   429   430   431   432   433   434   435   436   437   438   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Cowperwood
 

Chapin

 
replied
 

mornin

 

supposed

 

thirty

 
continued
 

months

 
lawyer
 
friends

things

 

allers

 

afterward

 

sumpin

 

amused

 
Newfoundland
 

letter

 

lawyers

 

relations

 

promptly


depend

 

runners

 
winced
 

flushed

 
Friday
 

politely

 
Sometimes
 

genially

 

grizzled

 
fellers

forget
 

thinks

 

scratching

 

believed

 

wouldn

 

meditatively

 

justice

 

remarks

 

intentioned

 

solemn


closet

 

fortune

 

present

 
making
 
thought
 

detectives

 

courts

 

people

 

watchin

 
version