Haworth's

by Frances Hodgson Burnett

He landed on the strange shore with high hopes in his breast, and a little unperfected model in his shabby trunk.

This was thirty years ago, and to-day he was in Lancashire again, in his native town, with the same little model among his belongings.

During the thirty years' interval he had lived an unsettled, unsuccessful life. He had labored faithfully at his task, but he had not reached the end which had been his aim. Sometimes he had seemed very near it, but it had always evaded him. He had drifted here and there bearing his work with him, earning a scant livelihood by doing anything chance threw in his way. It had always been a scant livelihood,—though after the lapse of eight years, in one of his intervals of hopefulness, he had married. On the first night they spent in their new home he had taken his wife into a little bare room, set apart from the rest, and had shown her his model.

"I think a few weeks will finish it," he said.

The earliest recollections of their one child centered themselves round the small room and its contents. It was the one touch of romance and mystery in their narrow, simple life. The few spare hours the struggle for daily bread left the man were spent there; sometimes he even stole hours from the night, and yet the end was always one step further. His frail body grew frailer, his gentle temperament more excitable, he was feverishly confident and utterly despairing by turns. It was in one of his hours of elation that his mind turned again to his old home. He was sure at last that a few days' work would complete all, and then only friends were needed.

"England is the place, after all," he said. "They are more steady there, even if they are not so sanguine,—and there are men in Lancashire I can rely upon. We'll try Old England once again."

The little money hard labor and scant living had laid away for an hour of need, they brought with them. Their son had remained to dispose of their few possessions. Between this son and the father there existed a strong affection, and Stephen Murdoch had done his best by him.

"I should like the lad," he used to say, "to have a fairer chance than I had. I want him to have what I have lacked."

As he lay upon the horse-hair sofa he spoke of him to his wife.

"There are not many like him," he said. "He'll make his way. I've sometimes thought that may-be——" But he did not finish the sentence; the words died away on his lips, and he lay—perhaps thinking over them as he looked at the fire.