That was after I'd done my best to raise you and you was just
about old enough to chatter a bit. There wasn't nothing else to do. My
wife, she went pretty near crazy when I brought you home. And she'd of
killed you, Pierre, if I hadn't took you away.
"You see, I was married before I met Irene. So there ain't no alibi
for me. But me being so close to hell now, I look back to that time,
and somehow I see no wrong in it still.
"And if I done wrong then, I've got my share of hell-fire for it. Here
I lie, with my boys, Bill and Bert, sitting around in the corner of
the room waiting for me to go out. They ain't men, Pierre. They're
wolves in the skins of men. They're the right sons of their mother.
When I go out they'll grab the coin I've saved up, and leave me to lie
here and rot, maybe.
"Lad, it's a fearful thing to die without having no one around that
cares, and to know that even after I've gone out I'm going to lie here
and have my dead eyes looking up at the ceiling. So I'm writing to
you, Pierre, part to tell you what you ought to know; part because I
got a sort of crazy idea that maybe you could get down here to me
before I go out.
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