Both Pat and his master would have been willing to travel on all night by rail, but the forty miles were soon passed, and they got out at the busy junction.
The old woman was helped in her changing, and then Dick earned twopence by carrying a heavy portmanteau for another passenger. And then the two pilgrims took to the road again.
The days that followed were very much alike, and in after years Dick remembered little about this part of the journey.
Sometimes he earned enough to buy a meal or pay for a humble night's lodging, but they would often have been very hungry but for Paddy's half-crown. This was spent carefully, a penny at a time, and chiefly for dry bread.
The last sixpence had been changed when a sign-post with the words "Ironboro' two miles" was passed. Dick took off his cap and looked up to the wintry sky with joy and gratitude, and there and then thanked God.
No Lionheart crusader could have felt more fervent gladness at the first sight of the Holy City!
Bub Dick's goal did not look very promising, as he drew near. A pall of smoke hung low over the narrow streets, tall chimneys sent black clouds into the biting air, and there was the clang and whirl of machinery, and the throb of huge hammers going on all the time.
He was entering the town by the least inviting road. On one side were rows of miserable houses with broken windows and grimy walls and doors, that looked as if all their brightness had gone into the smart public-houses on each corner.
On the other side stretched a piece of waste land, where iron clinkers and slag lay in great heaps, and rubbish of all kinds was deposited. Not a blade of grass or tree could be seen, and the children playing and quarrelling together were as dingy as the dirt they played with.
Two big lads were standing by the edge of a dark pool, not far from the roadside, laughing at something that wriggled in their hands.