They continued the conversation as they walked from the court room to the store. There was a long story for each to tell. Mr. West confessed that, for two years after his arrival at Valparaiso, he had accomplished very little. He drank hard, and brought on a fever, which had nearly carried him off. But that fever was a blessing in disguise; and since his recovery he had been entirely temperate. He had nothing to send to his family, and shame prevented him from even writing to his wife. He received the letter which conveyed the intelligence of the death of his wife and child, and soon after learned that his remaining little one was also gone.
Carpenters were then in great demand in Valparaiso. He was soon in a condition to take contracts, and fortune smiled upon him. He had rendered himself independent, and had now returned to spend his remaining days in his native land. He had been in Boston a week, and happened to stray into the Police Court, where he had found the son who, he supposed, had long ago been laid in the grave.
Edward Flint finished his career of "fashionable dissipation" by being sentenced to the house of correction. Just before he was sent over, he confessed to Mr. Wade that it was he who had stolen Harry's money, three years before.
The next day Harry obtained leave of absence, for the purpose of accompanying his father on a visit to Redfield. He was in exuberant spirits. It seemed as though his cup of joy was full. He could hardly realize that he had a father—a kind, affectionate father—who shared the joy of his heart.
They went to Redfield; but I cannot stop to tell my readers how astonished Squire Walker, and Mr. Nason, and the paupers were, to see the spruce young clerk come to his early home, attended by his father—a rich father, too.
We can follow our hero no farther through the highways and byways of his life-pilgrimage. We have seen him struggle like a hero through trial and temptation, and come off conqueror in the end. He has found a rich father, who crowns his lot with plenty; but his true wealth is in those good principles which the trials, no less than the triumphs, of his career have planted in his soul.
CHAPTER XXI
IN WHICH HARRY IS VERY PLEASANTLY SITUATED, AND THE STORY COMES TO AN END
Perhaps my young readers will desire to know something of Harry's subsequent life; and we will "drop in" upon him at his pleasant residence in Rockville, without the formality of an introduction. The years have elapsed since we parted with him, after his triumphant discharge from arrest. His father did not live long after his return to his native land, and when he was twenty-one, Harry came into possession of a handsome fortune. But even wealth could not tempt him to choose a life of idleness; and he went into partnership with Mr. Wade, the senior retiring at the same time. The firm of Wade and West is quite as respectable as any in the city.