Cullom," said David soothingly,
putting his hands on her shoulders and gently pushing her back into her
chair. "Set right down an' take it easy.--Yes," to John, "I acknowledge
that I signed that."

He turned to the widow, who sat wiping her eyes with John's
handkerchief.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, "It's as true as anythin' kin be. I wouldn't no
more fool ye, ye know I wouldn't, don't ye? than I'd--jerk a hoss," he
asseverated. "Your place is clear now, an' by this time to-morro' the'
won't be the scratch of a pen agin it. I'll send the satisfaction over
fer record fust thing in the mornin'."

"But, Dave," protested the widow, "I s'pose ye know what you're
doin'--?"

"Yes," he interposed, "I cal'late I do, putty near. You ast me why I
done it, an' I'll tell ye if ye want to know. I'm payin' off an old
score, an' gettin' off cheap, too. That's what I'm doin'! I thought I'd
hinted up to it putty plain, seein' 't I've talked till my jaws ache;
but I'll sum it up to ye if you like."

He stood with his feet aggressively wide apart, one hand in his
trousers pocket, and holding in the other the "morgidge," which he waved
from time to time in emphasis.

"You c'n estimate, I reckon," he began, "what kind of a bringin'-up I
had, an' what a poor, mis'able, God-fersaken, scairt-to-death little
forlorn critter I was; put upon, an' snubbed, an' jawed at till I'd come
to believe myself--what was rubbed into me the hull time--that I was the
most all-'round no-account animul that was ever made out o' dust, an'
wa'n't ever likely to be no diff'rent. Lookin' back, it seems to me
that--exceptin' of Polly--I never had a kind word said to me, nor a
day's fun. Your husband, Billy P. Cullom, was the fust man that ever
treated me human up to that time. He give me the only enjoy'ble time 't
I'd ever had, an' I don't know 't anythin' 's ever equaled it since. He
spent money on me, an' he give me money to spend--that had never had a
cent to call my own--_an'_, Mis' Cullom, he took me by the hand, an' he
talked to me, an' he gin me the fust notion 't I'd ever had that mebbe I
wa'n't only the scum o' the earth, as I'd ben teached to believe. I told
ye that that day was the turnin' point of my life. Wa'al, it wa'n't the
lickin' I got, though that had somethin' to do with it, but I'd never
have had the spunk to run away's I did if it hadn't ben for the
heartenin' Billy P. gin me, an' never knowed it, an' never knowed it,"
he repeated mournfully.