Theron heard it, and the importance of hurrying on some further
disclosure seemed to suggest itself. "I can see you think I'm just
drunk," he said, in low, sombre tones. "Of course that's what HE
thought. The hackman thought so, and so did the conductor, and
everybody. But I hoped you would know better. I was sure you would see
that it was something worse than that. See here, I'll tell you. Then
you'll understand. I've been drinking for two days and one whole night,
on my feet all the while, wandering alone in that big strange New York,
going through places where they murdered men for ten cents, mixing
myself up with the worst people in low bar-rooms and dance-houses, and
they saw I had money in my pocket, too, and yet nobody touched me, or
offered to lay a finger on me. Do you know why? They understood that I
wanted to get drunk, and couldn't. The Indians won't harm an idiot, or
lunatic, you know. Well, it was the same with these vilest of the vile.
They saw that I was a fool whom God had taken hold of, to break his
heart first, and then to craze his brain, and then to fling him on a
dunghill to die like a dog. They believe in God, those people. They're
the only ones who do, it seems to me. And they wouldn't interfere when
they saw what He was doing to me. But I tell you I wasn't drunk. I
haven't been drunk. I'm only heart-broken, and crushed out of shape
and life--that's all. And I've crawled here just to have a friend by me
when--when I come to the end."

"You're not talking very sensibly, or very bravely either, Theron Ware,"
remarked his companion. "It's cowardly to give way to notions like
that."

"Oh, I 'm not afraid to die; don't think that," he remonstrated wearily.
"If there is a Judgment, it has hit me as hard as it can already. There