Alias Jimmy Valentine
By: O. Henry
A guard came to the prison
show shop, where Jimmy Valentine
had been working for the ten
months of his stay.
“Warden wants you in the
front office,” said the guard, taking
Jimmy’s arm. “Looks like
you’ve got your pardon from the governor.
“About time,” said Jimmy.
A man with as many friends
“on the outside” as Jimmy
Valentine had was never in
prison for long. Ten months was the most
time he’d ever done.
The Warden didn’t hand him
the pardon right away. As always,
he gave him strong words of
advice first.
“You’ll go out in the
morning, Valentine, and this time I have
you to make an honest man of
yourself. You’re not a bad fellow at
heart. Just stop cracking
safes, and go straight.”
“Me?” said Jimmy, in
surprise. “Why, I never cracked a safe in
my life.”
The warden laughed.
“Oh no. Of course not. Then
how come you got sent up on that
Springfield job? Was it just
a mean old jury that had it in for you?”
“Me?” Jimmy kept on looking
surprised. “Why, warden, I never
was in Springfield in al my
life!”
“Take him back, guard,” said
the warden, “and fix him up wit a
new suit and shoes. Have him
in my office at seven in the morning.
And Valentine: better think
over my advice.”
*****
At quarter past seven next
morning, Jimmy stood in the
warden’s office. He had on a
cheap, shiny, badly fitting suit. On his
feet were stiff, squeaky
shoes.
The warden gave him a
railroad ticket, a five-dollar bill, a cheap
cigar, and a handshake. He
also gave him yesterday’s advice all over
again, and wished him luck.
Mr. James Valentine, no
longer Prisoner Number 9762, walked
out into the sunshine.
Not even glancing at the
trees, the birds, the flowers, Jimmy
went right to the nearest
restaurant and had the biggest breakfast he’d
had in ten months. He
finished it off with a far better cigar than the
warden had given him.
*****
Then he walked to the
railroad station and boarded a train.
Within three hours, he was in
a little town near the state line. He
went at once to a bar owned
by an old pal, Mike Dolan. The two shook
hands.
“Sorry we couldn’t make it
sooner, Jimmy,” said Mike, “but the
governor was a tough one. How
are you?”
“Fine,” said Jimmy. “Got my
key?”
He got his key and went
upstairs, unlocking the door of a room
at the rear.
Everything was just as he had
left it, even the collar button on
the floor, the one he had
yanked from the shirt of Detective Ben Price,
the man who had come to
arrest him.
From the back of the closet,
Jimmy pulled his dusty old suitcase.
He opened it and stood
staring happily at the finest set of safecracker’s
tools anywhere in the
Midwest.
There were drills, punches,
clamps, even a few special pieces
designed by Jimmy himself.
The whole set was worth nearly a thousand
dollars.
When he went downstairs
again, Jimmy was dressed in a
handsome, well-fitting suit.
He was carrying his cleaned, dusted
suitcase.
“What’s up this time, Jimmy?”
Mike wanted to know “Got
anything in mind?”
“Me?” Jimmy looked surprised.
“Just off to do an honest day’s
work, Mike. I’m the new sales
manager for the finest cookie and biscuit
company in the Midwest.”
Mike laughed so hard he
nearly dropped the glass he was
drying”
*****
A week after the release of
Prisoner Number 9762, three safe
burglaries were reported to
the police. Not a clue was left to any of
them, except that they were
all done in the same manner.
“That’s Jimmy Valentine,”
declared Ben Price.
He knew Jimmy’s habits. The
jobs were clean, neat, easy. No
trace of the burglar was ever
left behind.
“He’ll no his full sentence
this time,” vowed Ben. “No more
pardons for Jimmy Valentine!”
*****
One afternoon, Jimmy climbed
off the train in an small town
called Elmore, carrying his
heavy suitcase. He looked so handsome in
his fine new suit, he might
have been a college student home for a visit.
A lovely young lady crossed
the street, passed him a the corner,
and walked up the steps of
the Elmore Bank.
Jimmy Valentine took one look
at her, forgot who he was, and
became a new man.
Shyly, the young lady
returned his glance. Young men of
Jimmy’s style and good looks
were scarce in Elmore. Then she looked
quickly away and hurried into
the bank.
A little boy was loafing on
the steps. Jimmy tossed him a dime.
“Beg pardon,” he said, “but
wasn’t that, um, Miss Polly Simpson
that just went into the
bank?”
“Nope,” said the boy, “but I
know who it is. Got another dime?”
Three dimes later, Jimmy
found out that the lady was Miss
Annabel Adams. Three more
dimes and he knew that she was the bank
owner’s daughter.
Jimmy Valentine, the new man,
needed a new name. At the
local hotel, he signed in as
Mr. Ralph D. Spencer.
He also needed a new means of
earning a living. There was only
one thing he knew as much
about as safecracking.
“I’m planning to settle in
Elmore,” he told the hotel clerk. “I
was thinking about opening a
shoe store. Are there any others in
town?”
“Not a one,” said the clerk.
“We could really use a good shoe
store. I’m sure you’ll be a
success, Mr. Spencer.
*****
Mr. Spencer was a success.
The shoe store did well from the
start, as did its handsome
and charming owner. Soon he had many
friends in Elmore. Among
those was Miss Annabel Adams.
At the end of a year, the two
were engaged to be married. Mr.
Ralph D. Spencer was warmly
welcomed into the Adams family.
One day Jimmy sat down and
wrote a letter to an old friend in
St. Louis.
“Dear Billy,” the letter
read, “I have a gift for you. I want you to
have my kit of tools. I have
no need for them now. I’m going to marry
the finest girl in the world
in two weeks. She believes in me, Billy, and
I wouldn’t do another crooked
thing for the world. Meet me in Sully’s
Bar on Tuesday night. I’ll
have the tools with me. Your old pal,
Jimmy.”
On the very day he wrote this
letter, Ben Price came to Elmore.
From the drugstore across the
street from Spencer’s Shoe Store, he got a
good look at its owner, Mr.
Ralph D. Spencer.
“Aha!” said Ben to himself.
“Marry the banker’s daughter, will
you, Jimmy Valentine? We’ll
see about that!”
*****
On Tuesday morning, when
Jimmy was to leave for St. Louis,
Annabel’s father asked him to
stop off at the bank for a moment, along
with the rest of the Adams
family. He wanted to show off to them all
his brand-new bank vault.
They were a large, happy
party: Annabel, her married sister and
two small daughters, Mr.
Ralph D. Spencer, and Mr. Adams.
Laughing and talking as they
went into the bank, they didn’t
notice Ben Price. His back
was turned to them, he was leaning against a
wall outside the room they
were entering.
The shiny new vault was a
marvel, with a time-lock that had to
be turned this
way and that to make the
heavy door close.
Since the vault was no yet in
use, the door stood open now. The
little girls were more
interested than anybody. They looked inside,
listening and watching as Mr.
Adams explained its workings.
And then, all in a moment,
the bigger girl playfully pushed her
little sister inside and
slammed the door shut. She turned the knob, just
as she had seen Mr. Adams do.
Then she smiled, proud of what she had
done.
Inside the vault, her sister
screamed in terror.
Mr. Adams was terrified, too.
So were the child’s mother and
everyone else in the room.
“I can’t open the door!”
cried Mr. Adams, pulling at the handle
just the same. “The time-lock
hasn’t been set yet! There isn’t a man
nearer than a hundred miles
from here who can do it! And there isn’t
much air in that vault!”
*****
“Oh, Ralph!” Suddenly Annabel
was pulling at the sleeve of the
man she loved, certain that
he, above all men on earth, would be the one
to perform a miracle. “Oh,
Ralph, isn’t there something you can do?”
He looked at here with a
strange smile on his lips. All at once,
Mr. Ralph D. Spencer was gone
from the room. In his place stood
Jimmy Valentine.
In a flash, he threw off his
coat. Then he set his heavy suitcase
on a table and opened it. He
took out his tools, one by one, and set them
out.
Then he went silently to
work. In a minute his pet drill was
biting into the heavy door.
Within a few minutes more, breaking his
own speed record, Jimmy
opened the door.
The frightened child,
unharmed, fell into her mother’s arms.
*****
Jimmy Valentine put on his
coat, packed up his tools, and
walked to the front door. Ah
he went, he thought he heard a faraway
voice that he once knew
calling out “ Ralph! Oh, Ralph!” but he never
stopped walking.
At the door, a big man stood
in his way.
“Hello, Ben,” said Jimmy,
still smiling his odd, sad smile.
“Here at last, are you? Well
let’s go. Can’t see that it makes much
difference now.”
And then Ben Price did a
strange thing.
“You must be mistaken, sir. I
don’t believe I know you.”
Without another look, he
turned away and strolled down the
street.
O’Question Sheet:
Complete the following
questions in a new word processing document
and save it in your personal
folder (not on the desktop). Lost files will
not receive marks, so I would
recommend saving it on a USB key or emailing
your answers to yourself in
case of a problem.
1) Summarize
the end of the story, from the time the girls were locked
up in the bank vault in 2-3
sentences.
2) Were
you surprised to read about Jimmy’s interaction with Detective
Ben Price at the end? Explain
why you were or were not surprised,
using details from the story
to support your opinion.
3) Identify
each of the following parts of this short story using complete
sentences to describe each
point in the story and why it relates to the
particular element you have
identified:
1. Exposition
2. Rising Action
3. Climax
4. Falling Action
5. Resolution
4) Do
you think that people can really change? If no, why not, and if
yes, why? Defend your answer
with evidence from the short story and
from your life. Please
respond in paragraph form.
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