“Look here, Shays! You don't get nourishment enough! You've burnt holes in your stomach till it won't hold any more than a fish net. Now, I'll tell you what you'd better do.” “Misser Hennion--Misser Hennion--I want you to see me through!” He stretched out his hand with scattered fingers, appealingly. “I want you--Misser Hennion--you see me through!” “Oh, come in! Sit down.” Shays sat down, and Hennion looked him over. “Had any breakfast?” “I want you see me through!” “What's the matter?” Shays sat on the edge of the chair and told his story, waving a thin hand with high blue veins. He hurried, stumbled, and came on through confusion to the end. “Hicksy come about three o'clock,” he said. “I didn't do nothing, and Tom he was asleep. Tha's right. We didn't want him, but he woke me up, and he says, 'I'm off, Jimmy,' like that. 'I broke jail,' he says, 'an' ye needn't wake Coglan,' he says, like that. Then I gets up and I falls down, plunk! like that, and Tom woke up. Then he goes arguin' with Hicksy, like they always done, and he says, 'You stay under Jimmy's bed,' he says, friendly, like that. 'You get off when there ain't nobody lookin',' he says. But Hicksy says, 'You're lookin' for the reward; you're goin' to sell me out,' he says. Then he says he's off, but Tom won't let him. Then they clinched, and Hicksy hit him with the chisel. Oh, my God! Misser Hennion! You see me through! He dropped, plunk! like that, plunk! Oh, my God! Misser Hennion! Jus' like that, plunk! He clipped him dead. He did, too!” Shays paused and rubbed his lips. “What next?” “Then he says, 'Jimmy, that's the end of me,' like that, and he put that thing what he done it with in his pocket. He goes creepin', scroochin' out the door, like that, creepin', scroochin'. Oh, my God! Misser Hennion! I ain't goin' to stay there alone! Not me! I goes after him. And in Muscadine Street I see him, but it was dark, but I see him creepin', scroochin' along to the bridge; I see the chisel fall out and it clinked on the stones. Pretty soon I picks it up, and pretty soon I see Hicksy out on the bridge. Then he stopped. Then I knowed he'd jump. Then he jumped, plunk! jus' like that, plunk!” He had the chisel in his hand, and showed it to Hennion. “Let me see that.” Hennion swung away in his chair toward the light and examined the battered handle with the straggling, ill-cut, and woe-begone face traced there. He turned slowly and took a newspaper from his desk, rolled up the chisel in the newspaper, thrust it into a drawer, locked the drawer and turned back to the muttering Shays. “I see. What next?” “I says, 'Wha' for? Wha's that for?' Then I come to that place, and there ain't nothin' there. He got under quick, he did. He stayed there. He never come up. I watched. He never come up. Oh, my God! Misser Hennion, I ain't goin' to stay there! Folks was comin' on the bridge. I ain't goin' to stay there!” “I see. What next?” “Next?” “Where'd you go then?”