Captain Jim got it shaved off and then there was no doubt -- Dick Moore it was -- his body at least . His mind was n't there -- as for his soul , in my opinion he never had one ! '' `` What had happened to him ? '' `` Nobody knows the rights of it . All the folks who kept the boarding house could tell was that about a year before they had found him lying on their doorstep one morning in an awful condition -- his head battered to a jelly almost . They supposed he 'd got hurt in some drunken row , and likely that 's the truth of it . They took him in , never thinking he could live . But he did -- and he was just like a child when he got well . He had n't memory or intellect or reason . They tried to find out who he was but they never could . He could n't even tell them his name -- he could only say a few simple words . He had a letter on him beginning ` Dear Dick ' and signed ` Leslie , ' but there was no address on it and the envelope was gone . They let him stay on -- he learned to do a few odd jobs about the place -- and there Captain Jim found him . He brought him home -- I 've always said it was a bad day 's work , though I s ` pose there was nothing else he could do . He thought maybe when Dick got home and saw his old surroundings and familiar faces his memory would wake up . But it had n't any effect . There he 's been at the house up the brook ever since . He 's just like a child , no more nor less . Takes fractious spells occasionally , but mostly he 's just vacant and good humored and harmless . He 's apt to run away if he is n't watched .
That 's the burden XXXXX has had to carry for eleven years -- and all alone .
Dick Jim Leslie Moore day doorstep house mind morning year