Pippin; A Wandering FlameRichards, Laura Elizabeth Howe
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Pippin; A Wandering Flame
Richards, Laura Elizabeth Howe
Bildungsromans; Ex-convicts -- Fiction; Love stories; Orphans -- Fiction; Young men -- Fiction
"'Now,' he says, slow and careful, 'what you like in me is just the
little bit of God that's in me. The little bit that's in you finds the
little bit that's in me, do you see? And _likes_ it, because they belong
together. There's another bit in the Warden, and another in Tom Clapp
there, though I'll own he doesn't look it (and he didn't); and there's a
bit in everybody here and elsewhere. And that's not all! Go you out into
that field yonder and sit there for an hour, and you'll find other
little bits, see if you don't! And see if they don't fit together.'
"He pointed out of the window to a field a little ways off: I could see
the buttercups shinin' in it from where I sat. I stared at him. 'Go
along!' says he. 'What do you mean?' I says. 'I mean _go_!' he says.
'I've the Warden's leave for you whenever I see fit, and I see fit now.'
I looked at him, and I see 'twas true. I got up kind o' staggerin',
like, and he tucked his arm into mine, and he opened the door and we
went out. Out! I'd been in there a year, sir. I don't believe you could
guess what 'twas like. He marched me over to that field--we clum over
the fence, and _that_ done me a sight of good--and told me to set down.
Then he give me his watch--gold watch and chain, handsome as they make
'em--and said, 'Come back in an hour. Good-by, boy!' and he went off and
left me there. Green grass! do you understand? He never turned round
even. He left _me_--a crook, a guttersnipe, a jailbird--out there alone
in the sunshine, with the buttercups all round me."
Pippin's voice broke. Mr. Bailey produced a voluminous bandanna
handkerchief and blew his nose loudly. There was silence for a few
moments. Pippin went on.
"Then, after a while, I found the Lord, like the Elder said. He come all
round me, like the air; I couldn't get away from Him. A little bird come
and tilted on a bush by where I was sittin', and he sang, and there was
a bit of the Lord in him, and he said so, over and over, plain, and I
heard him. And the sun shined on the buttercups, and they had a bit too,
and appeared like they knowed it, and kind o' nodded and was pleased;
and the leaves on the trees rustled, and they appeared pleased, too. And
like a voice said inside me, 'It all belongs, and you belong too!' and
all at once I was down on my knees. 'It's the Lord!' I says. 'I've found
Him, and He's the Whole Show!'"
CHAPTER III
PIPPIN FINDS A TRADE, "TEMP'RY"
There was a silence when Pippin finished his story. He had no more to
say. He sat erect, looking straight before him, with parted lips and
shining eyes. Jacob Bailey glanced at him once or twice, and cleared his
throat as if to speak, but no words came. Again he looked his horse
over, slowly and critically, as if he rather expected to see something
out of place.
"That strap's worked a mite loose!" he muttered. "He crabs along so, you
can't keep the straps in place."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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