glare into your eyes so blame natural that a
feller never used the back of his chair from start to finish, an' twice
I was on the point of shootin' him, thinkin' it was real.

If you ain't never read the book it'll pay you to fling up your job an'
wrastle through it. It starts out with a nice, decent young feller
sailin' home to marry his steady, but all his friends turn in an' stack
the cards on him, an' get him chucked into the rottenest dungeon in
France. He knowed how they soak it to a feller citizen in that country,
an' at first he was all for killin' himself; but after he'd studied it
over ten or twelve years, he suddenly heard a queer scratchin' noise.

In that same prison was another prisoner, an Abbey. An Abbey is a kind
of foreman priest. Well, this Abbey wasn't one to throw out a prayer
an' then set down to wait for results, not him. He was one o' these
nervous, fretty fellers what like to do their own drivin', an' he makes
him a set o' minin' tools out of a tin saucepan an' a bed-castor, an'
runs a level from his own cell into Eddie's--an' that was the queer,
scratchin' sound that made Eddie decide not to kill himself.

By George, if I could find a prison what had an Abbey shut up in it,
the' wouldn't be any way in the world to keep me out. This Abbey, he
cottoned to Eddie right from the start, an' durin' the next few years
they mine around in the prison till she's as holey as a Switzer cheeze;
an' durin' their leisure he edicates Eddie till he knows more'n a
college professor.

Then the Abbey begins to have fits, an' when all the medicine 'at he
could make out of old soot an' sulphur matches an' such stuff is gone,
he gives up an' tells Eddie where he has a little holler island, chuck
full o' diamonds an' money an' such like plunder. Then he dies, an'
Eddie gets in the sack. They chain a round shot to Eddie's feet an'
hurl him off a cliff into the angry sea, an' when it comes to that part
you can't hardly breathe; but Eddie kicks off the chain, rips open the
sack, an' when he strikes the water he's a free man.

He swims along for a couple of days until he overtakes a smuggler, an'
he climbs on board an' shows 'ern how to run their business accordin'
to Hoyle. He only stays with 'em long enough to learn all their
secrets, an' then he gives 'em the slip an' goes to his little holler
island. He pulls off the top, an' it's all so, what the Abbey told him.
Then he lifts up his hand an' he sez, sez he, "I'll