Four days before the Sunday of the tragedy Archie Koerner finished his year’s imprisonment and passed from the prison within the walls to the larger prison that awaited him in the world outside. The same day was released another convict, a man aged at fifty, who had entered the prison twenty years before. The judge who had sentenced him was a young man, just elevated to the bench, and, intoxicated by the power that had come to him so early in life, had read the words, "twenty years," in the statute book, and, assuming as axiomatic that the words were the atonement for the crime the man had committed, without thinking, had pronounced these words aloud, and then written them in a large book. From there a clerk copied them on to a blank form, sealed it with a gilt seal, and, like the young judge, forgot the incident. The day the man was released he could no longer remember what crime he had committed. He was old and shattered, and had looked forward to freedom with terror. Time and again he had asked his guard to report him, so that he might be deprived of his good time and have the day of release postponed. The guard, however, knowing that the man’s mind was gone, had refused to do this, and the man was forced out into the world. Having no family, no friends and no home, he clung to Archie as to the last tie that bound him to the only life he knew. Archie, of course, considered him an incubus, but he pitied him, and when they had sold their railroad tickets to a scalper, they beat their way back to the city on a freight-train, Archie showing the old man how it was done. At eleven o’clock on Friday morning they entered Danny Gibbs’s saloon. Archie was glad to find the place unchanged--the same whisky barrels along the wall, the opium pipe above the bar, the old gray cat sleeping in the sun. All was familiar, save the bartender, who, in fresh white jacket, leaned against the bar, a newspaper spread before him, and studied the form sheets that were published daily to instruct men how to gamble on the races. "Where’s Dan?" asked Archie. The bartender looked at him superciliously, and then concluded to say: "He’s not here." "Not down yet, heh?" said Archie. "Do you know a certain party called--" Archie glanced about cautiously and leaned over the bar, "--called Curly?" The bartender looked at him blankly. "He’s a friend of mine--it’s all right. If he comes in, just tell him a certain party was asking for him. Tell Dan, too. I’ve just got home--just done my bit." But even this distinction, all he had to show for his year in prison, did not impress the bartender as Archie thought it should. He drew from his waistcoat pocket a dollar bill, carefully smoothed it out, and tossed it on to the bar. "Give us a little drink. Here, Dad," he said to the old convict, "have one." The old man grinned and approached the bar. "Never mind him," said Archie in a confidential undertone, "he’s an old-timer."