Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Silent Sam and other stories.djvu/29

Rh with intervals of a frowning and motionless vacuity from which he had to be wakened with a shake. Then he began to have trouble with his eyes—an inflammation, apparently. It kept them always blurred with a moisture that overflowed on his cheeks, as if he were peeling onions instead of potatoes. He seemed no longer able to see what he was doing, and he cut ruinous slices from the vegetables instead of merely peeling them.

The prison doctor found him suffering from a nervous affection of the tear ducts; they had so contracted that they were unable to drain the eyes. For want of a better place, he was given a cell in the hospital annex, where the feeble-minded were confined. They had the freedom of the corridor of their cell-house during certain hours of the day, and Sam walked there incessantly, with his head down, or rested, squatting on his heels in a corner, blinking his wet eyes.

When Deputy-Sheriff Johns had turned over his young burglar to the prison, he found the doctor in the warden's office reporting on Sam's condition. And the doctor was saying: "There 's nothing to prevent him from talking if he wants to. I thought he 'd been hurt in the head, perhaps—a brain lesion. No such thing. It is n't that he won't talk because he 's insane, but he 's probably going insane because he won't talk. We can't do anything for him, except keep him quiet and give him a chance."

Johns contained himself in silence—as a sort of proof to himself that he could be silent, for he had