THE poor father, whom Judith Hart had so cruelly abandoned, sat alone in the old house, patient in his broken-heartedness and more poverty-stricken than ever. He had no neighbors near enough to drop in upon his solitude, and all wish for reading had left him, with the thankless girl he had worshipped.
When he came home and found himself alone in the saddest of all sad hours, that in which a day passes into eternity with the sun, his desolation was complete. It was something, when the cow he had petted into loving tameness would come to the garden wall, and look at him with her soft intelligent eyes, as if she knew of his sorrow and longed to share it with him. Sometimes he would go out and talk to her as if she possessed human sensibility—gather grass and wild flowers, and caress the animal's neck as she licked them from his hands.
He was sitting thus lonely at the window between twilight and dark, when the figure of a woman came walking down the lane, that made the almost dead pulses of his heart stir rapidly. It was so like Judith, the free movement, the very poise of her head. The resemblance almost made him cry out. But, no, he had been mistaken before. The dusk was gathering. It must be some neighboring woman come to chat a moment with him. Some of the old friends were kind enough for that now and then when Judith was at home.
No, no—it was Judith. He could see her face now. She was smiling, and waved one hand; in the other she carried a bundle which did not trouble her with its weight, she was so young and strong—Judith, his daughter, come back again.
The old man got up from the window and went into the porch, holding out his arms.
"Judith! Judith! Oh, my child! my child!" She came up with breathless speed, flung her bundle down on the porch, and clasped the old man in her arms.
"So you have missed me, father? Take that and that for loving me so."
She kissed his face, and shook both his hands with emphasis; then turned about, crossed the yard and patted the cow on its forehead.
"There, now, that I have got all the welcome there is for me, let's go in and strike a light. How dark you are!"
Directly the girl had a match flaring and a candle lighted.