l right, because I don't want to disgrace my folks. They
don't know where I am, and I wouldn't have my mother know for anything.
You see, I'm the black sheep of the family, the rest are all right. I'm
the only one that ain't goin' straight. But when I get out of here I mean
to go straight. Say, Tom, do you think I can get a job, here in Auburn? My
bit is up in December, and I should like to stay here and get straight
before I go back home."

"When you get out," is my answer, "it will be up to me to stand treat for
a dinner of beefsteak and fried potatoes, at any rate. And I'll do the
best I can to help you get a job, Joe, if you really do mean to go
straight. But in that neither I nor any one else can help you; you know
you'll have to do that yourself."

Poor Number Four! I have not the slightest doubt he means what he says,
but here again--this cursed System. It is particularly deadening to a
young fellow like Joe. He evidently has just that lively, good-natured,
shiftless, irresponsible temperament which needs to be carefully trained
in the bearing of responsibility.

While Joe and I are conversing, Number Eight makes his one remark. "Would
there be a job for a bricklayer around here?"

I don't know, and tell him so; but add, as in Joe's case, that if he means
to go straight I will gladly do what I can for him; and in any event I
consider that I owe each of them a good dinner. Thus it is agreed that
they will all dine with me in turn upon the happy occasions of their
release.

"By the way, Tom, did you go up to that Bertillon room?" Joe is off on a
new tack.

"Oh, yes. I did all the regular stunts."

"Were you measured and photographed, and all that?"

"Yes, and my finger prints taken. I went through the whole thing."

"Gee! Well, then, they'll have your picture in the rogues' gallery, won't
they, along with the rest of us?"

"I suppose they will," is my answer, and then I tell how my scars and
marks were all discovered and duly set down in the record; and wind up
with a variation of the same mild joke which so bored the clerk of the
Bertillon room. "And do you know, boys, after he had got me all sized up
and written down, I felt as if it would never be safe for me to adopt
burglary as a profession; and I've always rather looked forward to that."

My companions are not bored but appreciative, they laugh with some
heartiness. Then after a pause Joe says quite seriously, "Well say, Tom! I
can just tell you