Consequently Sam went at the work
with great energy, and little by little nearly all the work came to be
done by him.
He had hammered away for a few minutes on a sole to be placed on the
bottom of a well-worn shoe belonging to a workingman, when a new
customer entered the shop. Sam looked up at him and saw Reynolds
Bartram. He offered a short, spasmodic, disjointed prayer to heaven,
for he remembered what the judge's wife had said, and he had known
Reynolds Bartram as a young man of keen wit and high standing as a
debater before Sam's enforced retirement; now, he knew, Bartram had
become a lawyer.
"Well, Sam," said Bartram, as he seated himself in the only chair and
proceeded to eye the new cobbler, while the blows of the hammer struck
the sole more rapidly and vigorously than before,--"well, Sam, I
understand that you have been turning things upside down, and instead
of coming out of the penitentiary a great deal worse man than when you
went in, as most other men do, you have been converted."
"That's my understandin' of it, Mr. Bartram," said the ex-convict,
continuing his inflictions upon the bit of leather.
"Sam," said Bartram, "I am a man of business, and I suppose you are
from what I see you doing. I wish to make you a proposition: I will pay
you cash for two or three hours' time if you will tell me--so that I
can understand it--what being converted really amounts to.
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