[Illustration: Pippin ... breaks out into full-throated song: "Knives and scissors to grind, oh! Have 'em done to your mind, oh!" [PAGE 155]] PIPPIN _A WANDERING FLAME_ BY LAURA E. RICHARDS AUTHOR OF "FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE," "ELIZABETH FRY," ETC. [Illustration] FRONTISPIECE D. APPLETON AND COMPANY NEW YORK LONDON 1917 COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY D. APPLETON AND COMPANY Printed in the United States of America TO PIPPIN WHO WILL NEVER KNOW CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. PIPPIN SAYS GOOD-BY 1 II. PIPPIN MAKES A FRIEND 15 III. PIPPIN FINDS A TRADE, "TEMP'RY" 29 IV. PIPPIN GOES TO CYRUS 42 V. CYRUS POOR FARM 62 VI. PIPPIN SINGS FOR HIS SUPPER 74 VII. FLORA MAY 96 VIII. PIPPIN SETS BREAD AND LAYS A PLAN 105 IX. PIPPIN ENCOUNTERS THE RED RUFFIAN 111 X. PIPPIN LOOKS FOR THE GRACE OF GOD 122 XI. THE CHAPLAIN READS HIS MAIL 132 XII. NIPPER 142 XIII. ENTER MARY-IN-THE-KITCHEN 150 XIV. PIPPIN LOOKS FOR OLD MAN BLOSSOM'S LITTLE GAL 159 XV. PIPPIN MEETS AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE 172 XVI. PIPPIN ENCOUNTERS THE GIDEONS 185 XVII. THREE TETE-A-TETES 199 XVIII. PIPPIN KEEPS WATCH, WITH RESULTS 210 XIX. A KNOT IN THE THREAD 220 XX. THE PERPLEXITIES OF PIPPIN 234 XXI. MARY BLOSSOM 247 XXII. THE OLD MAN 261 XXIII. THE CHAPLAIN SPEAKS HIS MIND 272 XXIV. PRIMAL FORCES 281 XXV. PIPPIN OVERCOMES 290 XXVI. PIPPIN PRAISES THE LORD 297 PIPPIN PIPPIN CHAPTER I PIPPIN SAYS GOOD-BY The chaplain seemed to be waiting for some one. He was sitting in his office, as usual at this hour of the morning the little bare office in a corner of Shoreham State Prison, with its worn desk and stool, its chair facing the window (what tales that chair could tell, if it had power of speech!), its piles of reports and pamphlets, its bookshelf within arm's reach of the desk. (Bible, Concordance, Shakespeare, the "Life of John Howard," Pickwick, the "Golden Treasury"; these, thumbed and shabby, jostled the latest works on prison reform and criminology. An expressive bookshelf, as all bookshelves are.)