A prison guard came to the shoe-shop where Jimmy Valentine was busy sewing, and took him to the front office. There the warden handed Jimmy his pardon, signed that morning by the governor. Jimmy took it in a tired, careless way. He had served nearly ten months of a four-year sentence, but he had friends outside, and a man with so many friends seldom stays long in prison. "Now, Valentine," said the warden, "you will go out tomorrow morning. Take this chance and become an honest man. You are not bad at heart. Stop breaking open safes, and live straight." "Me?" said Jimmy in surprise. "Why, I never broke a safe in my life." "Oh, no," laughed the warden. "Of course not. How was it, then, that they sent you here for the Springfield job? Was it because you did not want to prove where you really were? Or was it only a wicked jury that hated you? With you innocent men it is always one or the other." "Me?" said Jimmy, his face full of innocence. "Why, warden, I was never in Springfield in my life." "Take him back," said the warden, smiling. "Give him his outgoing clothes. Set him free at seven in the morning. Think over my words, Valentine." The next morning Jimmy stood in the warden's office again. He put on a badly fitting suit and a pair of stiff new shoes that the state gives to every freed prisoner. The clerk gave him a railroad ticket and a five-dollar bill. The warden shook his hand and gave him a cigar. Valentine, number 9762, was written down in the books as "Pardoned by the Governor," and Mr. James Valentine walked out into the sunshine.