"However, I finally agreed to look after the little one, in case
anything happened to the mother, and commenced then to send the money
for her board and tuition, and the mother dropped out of all connection
with the child or those having her in charge.
"The mother made her pile and got out of the business, and at my
suggestion went down near Los Angeles and bought a nice country place,
to start respectable before she took the little one home. She left money
in Carson, subject to my check, for the little girl, and things slid
along for a year or so all smooth enough.
"I was out on a snow-bucking expedition one time the next winter,
sleeping in cars, shanties or on the engine, and I soon found myself all
bunged up with the worst dose of rheumatiz' you ever see. I had to get
down to a lower altitude, and made for Sacramento in the spring. I paid
the Mission a year in advance, and with less than a hundred dollars of
my own, struck out, hoping to dodge the twists that were in my bones.
"A hundred blind gaskets don't go far when you're sick, and the first
thing I knew I was dead broke; couldn't pay my board, couldn't buy
medicine, couldn't walk--nothing but think and suffer.
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