Here he succeeded in
getting a good job; his spirits began to revive; he made some good
acquaintances, and prospered beyond all expectation for nearly a year.
One day he noticed a man in the street who stared hard at him; not long
after he saw the same man standing in front of the house in which he
lodged; the next morning his landlord came to him and, with some
embarrassment, said that he would have to ask him for his room; a
relative was about to visit him and he needed the accommodation.
It was as he had feared--the detectives had run him down. He put what he
possessed in a trunk and left town that evening for a place nearly a
thousand miles west. Here he was left undisturbed for fifteen months,
and made a new start in business. Then the chief of the local police
sent for him and said, "I don't want to be rough on you; but the best
thing you can do is to skip; we're on to you--understand?" "But I'm
doing a straight business," H. pleaded. "You may be; but you're a
crook," was the reply.
We need not follow him further; he was driven from one place to another.
At last he was caught with stolen goods on him, he having undertaken to
help an old friend of his out of a tight place by carrying his gripsack
from one place to another; it proved to contain some plunder from a
recent burglary. He got off with a two year sentence; but it was the end
of his attempt to reform.
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