, within fifty rods of the blessed outer air, he would not
after all have to lie down and die with Ralph in his arms.

But as soon as such thoughts came to him he brought his tremendous
will and magnificent courage to the rescue, and arose and struggled
on.

The boy had not spoken since the journey began, nor had he opened his
eyes. He was still unconscious, but he was breathing; his heart was
beating, there was life in his body, and that was all that could be
asked or hoped for.

At last! oh, at last! The straight, steep, dreadful half mile of slope
was at Bachelor Billy's back. He stood out once more in the free and
open air. Under his feet were the grass and flowers and yielding soil;
over his head were the shining stars, now paling in the east; below
him lay the fair valley and the sleeping town clothed lightly in the
morning mist; and in his arms he still held the child who had thought
never again to draw breath under the starry sky or in the dewy air.
There came a faint breeze, laden with all the fragrance of the young
morning, and it swept Ralph's cheek so gently that the very sweetness
of it made his eyes to open.

He looked at the reddening east, at the setting stars still glowing in
the western sky, at the city church spires rising out of the sea of
silver mist far down below him, and then at last up into the dear old
face and the tear-wet eyes above him, and he said: "Uncle Billy, oh,
Uncle Billy! don't you think it's beautiful? I wish--I wish my mother
could see it."

"Aye, lad! she s'all look upon it wi' ye, mony's the sweet mornin'
yet, an it please the good God."

The effort to look and to speak had overpowered the weary child, and
he sank back again into unconsciousness.

Then began the journey home. Not to the old cottage; that was Ralph's
home no longer, but to the home of wealth and beauty now, to the
mansion yonder in the city where the mother was waiting for her boy.

Aye! the mother was waiting for her boy.

They had sent a messenger on horseback shortly after midnight to tell
her that the lad's tracks had been found in the old mine, that all the
men at hand had started in there to make the search more thorough,
that by daylight the child would be in her arms, that possibly, oh! by
the merest possibility, he might still be living.

So through the long hours she had waited, had waited and watched,
listening for a footfall in the street, for a step on the porch, for
a sound at her door;