He walked resolutely up to the poor fellow, and suddenly drawing me from his pocket, held me out towards him, saying,-- "Look at this, Tom Drift!" Tom knew me at once, and I never saw a man change as he did that moment.
The savage scowl vanished from his face, and a sudden pallor came to his hollow cheeks.

A trembling seized him as he held out his hand to take me, and but for Jim's support he would hardly have remained standing.

My master led him gently to the bench, and putting me into his hand, said,-- "I'll leave it with you till to-morrow, old fellow; good-bye." I heard the key turn in the door behind him, and counted his retreating footsteps down the gallery, and then became fully conscious where and in whose charge I was.
And now an old familiar sound rang in my ears once more, "Be good to Tom Drift!" Long, long had I ceased to believe it possible that the chance of obeying my dear first master's request would ever again come to me; but here it was.

I lay in the prodigal's trembling hands, and looked up into his troubled face, and heard his deep-drawn sigh, and felt that there was still something left for me to do.
No one disturbed Tom Drift and me that night, Jim had explained enough to the governor to gain permission for me to remain in the poor fellow's company till next day, and I need hardly say I never left his hand.
Memories of better days, of noble friends, of broken vows, crowded in upon him as he sat bending over me that night.
Daylight faded, but still he never stirred; the governor made his nightly round, but he never took his eyes off me; and when it was too dark to see me he held me clasped between his hands as tenderly as if I had been a child.
I cannot, and would not if I could, describe all that passed through Tom Drift's soul that night.

What struggles, what remorse, what penitence.
Once he murmured Charlie Newcome's name, and once he whispered to himself, in the words of the parable he had so lately heard, "No more worthy, no more worthy!" Save for this he neither spoke nor moved, till an early streak of dawn shot through the grated window and fell upon us.
Then he turned and knelt, with me still clasped in his hands.