“And ne’er forget will I,”

murmured the little fiddle.

He would have knocked the man down who had told him twenty years ago that he ever should forget; that he should be here to-night, with his ticket bought, bound for Colorado.

But it was better for her to be free from him. He and his cursed ill-luck were a drag on her and the children, and would always be. What was that she had said once?

“Never mind, Jack, I can bear anything as long as I have you.”

And here he was, with his ticket bought, bound for Colorado.

He wondered if it were ever too late in the day for a fellow to make a man of himself. He wondered:

“And she’s a’ the world to me, And for bonnie Annie Laurie I’d lay me doon and dee,”

sang the little fiddle, triumphantly.

Harmon shook himself, and stood up. The train was slackening; the lights of a way-station bright ahead. It was about time for supper and his mother, so Tommy put down his fiddle and handed around his faded cap. The merchant threw him a penny and returned to his tax-list. The old lady was fast asleep with her mouth open.

“Come here,” growled Harmon, with his eyes very bright. Tommy shrank back, almost afraid of him.

“Come here,” softening, “I won’t hurt you. I tell you, boy, you don’t know what you’ve done to-night.”

“Done, sir?” Tommy couldn’t help laughing, though there was a twinge of pain at his stout little heart, as he fingered the solitary penny in the faded cap. “Done? Well, I guess I’ve waked you up, sir, which was about what I meant to do.”

“Yes, that is it,” said Harmon, very distinctly, pushing up his hat, “you’ve waked me up. Here, hold your cap.”

They had puffed into the station now and stopped. He emptied his purse into the little cap, shook it clean of paper and copper alike, was out of the car and off the train before Tommy could have said Jack Robinson.

“My eyes!” gasped Tommy, “that chap had a ticket for New York, sure! Methusalah! Look a here! One, two, three—must have been crazy; that’s it, crazy.”

“He’ll never find out,” muttered Harmon, turning away from the station lights, and striking back through the night for the red flats and home. “He’ll never find out what he has done, nor, please God, shall she.”

It was late when he came in sight of the house; it had been a long tramp across the tracks, and hard; he being stung by a bitter wind from the east all the way, tired with the monotonous treading of the sleepers, and with crouching in perilous niches to let the trains go by.

She stood watching at the window, as he had known that she would stand, her hands raised to her face, her figure cut out against the warm light of the room. He stood still a moment and looked at her, hidden in the shadow of the street, thinking his own thoughts. The publican, in the old story, hardly entered the beautiful temple with more humble step than he his home that night.

She sprang to meet him, pale with her watching and fear.