"'Tain't right to steal," he said aloud. "I know 'tain't right, 'cause a fellow always feels mean and sneaking after it, and 'cause he's so awful afraid of being found out. When I've done a nice decent thing, I don't care whether I'm found out or not; but then I didn't steal. I didn't go into his pocket-book, it blew down to me--no fault of mine; all I did was just to pick a piece of paper off the floor, no harm in that. How did _I_ know it was worth anything? What's the use of me thinking about it anyhow? He'll never miss it in the world; he's rich--my! as rich as the President." Tode turned uneasily on his pillow, shut his eyes very tight, and pretended to himself that he was asleep. No use, they flew open again. He began to grow indignant. "I hope I'll never have another ten dollars as long as I live, if it's got to make all this fuss!" he said in a disgusted tone. "I wish I'd never picked up his old rag--I don't like the feeling of it. I didn't steal it, that's sure; but I've got it, and I wish I hadn't." "The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good." That verse again, coming back to him with great force, beholding the evil and the good. Which was this? Was it good? Tode's uneducated, undisciplined conscience had to say nay to this. Well, then, was it evil? "I feel mean," he said, reflectively. "As mean as a thief, pretty near. I wouldn't like to have anybody know it. I wouldn't tell of it for anything. S'pose I go down there to that prayer-meeting and tell it. Would I do _it_? No, _sir_--'cause why? I'm ashamed of it. But then I didn't _steal_ it; I didn't even know it was money. Oh bah! Tode Mall, don't you try to pull wool over your own eyes that way. Didn't you s'pose it was, and would you have took the trouble to get it if you hadn't s'posed so? Come now. And then see here, I wouldn't have anybody know about it; and after all there's them eyes that are in every place, looking right at me. 'Tain't right, that is sure and certain. I didn't steal it, but I've got it, and it ain't mine, and I oughtn't to have it. I could have handed it back easy enough if I'd wanted to. So I don't see but it looks about as mean as stealing, and feels about as mean, and maybe after all it's pretty much the same thing. Now what be I going to do?" And now he tumbled and tossed harder than ever. That same miserable fear of those pure eyes began to creep over him again, accompanied by a dreary sense of having lost something, some loving presence and companionship on which he had leaned in the darkness. "I'll never do it again," he said at last, with solemn earnestness. "I _never will_, not if I starve and freeze and choke to death. I'll let old rags that blow to me alone after this, I will." Then, after a moment's silence, he clasped his hands together and said with great earnestness: "O Lord Jesus, forgive me this once, and I'll never do it again--never."