"May 13.--Lucy, I made a speech in third year rhetoric to-day and the teacher kept me after class. He said he'd been watching me for some time and he wanted to tell me he thought I'd make a great orator, some day. He's going to give me special training out of school hours, for nothing. I'm darned lucky. If a guy's going into politics, oratory's the biggest help. But to be famous as a speaker isn't why I'm going into politics. I'm going to clean Minetta Lane up. I'm going to try to fix it in New York so's a fellow couldn't have a mother and a stepfather like mine. You know what I mean, don't you? Darn it, a kid suffers so! You know that joint on Sixth Avenue where I go and play cards once in a while? Well, it was raided to-day. I wonder what Mr. Seaton would have said if he'd been alive and I'd been there and got pinched again! "I'm going to throw no bluffs with you, Lucy. Gambling's in my blood. Luigi used to say I came by my skill straight. And I get the same kind of craving for it that a dope fiend does for dope. I don't care to tell anybody about it, or they'd send me to an insane asylum. When I first came from the Canyon and moved out of Minetta Lane, I swore I'd never put foot in it again until I went in to clean it up. And I haven't and I won't. But for the first year my nails were bitten to the quick. If my mother--but what's the use of that! Mr. Seaton said every man has to have a woman to whom he opens up the deep within him. I have you and you know you've promised to help me." "June 1.--Lucy, I've got a job tutoring for the summer. The rhetoric teacher got it for me. It's the son of an Episcopal vicar. He is a boy of twelve and they want him taught English and declamation. Lord! If they knew all about me! But the kid is safe in my hands. I know how kids of twelve feel. At least, the Minetta Lane variety. So I'll be at the sea shore all summer. Going some, for Minetta Lane, eh? "Lucy, I made fifty dollars last night at poker from a Senior in the Student's Club. This morning I made him take it back." Enoch closed the book and leaned back in his chair as Jonas appeared at the door with a pitcher of ice water. "How come you don't try to get a little rest, boss?" asked Jonas, glancing disapprovingly at the black book. "I am resting, old man! Don't bother your good old head about me, but tumble off to sleep yourself!" "I don't never sleep before you do. I ain't for thirteen years, and I don't calculate to begin now." Jonas turned the bed covers back and marched out of the room. Enoch smiled and, opening the book again, he turned the pages slowly till another entry struck his eye.