The window of the telegraph office on the canal at Ellenville faces the tow-path. Although day was breaking and the sky was cloudless, the telegraph operator was still working by the light of an oil lamp.

He was taking a message, which, when it was reduced to writing, read as follows:—

The operator, with the telegram in his hand, went out at the door and looked up the canal. As he did so he saw bearing down upon him a gray horse ridden by a boy. It was Joe with Old Charlie.

Both boy and horse were splashed with mud, and bore evidence of having come far and fast through the night.

The operator stepped quickly out upon the tow-path, and threw up his hand, with the telegram still fluttering in it.

“Stop!” he shouted. “Hold up, there!”

Joe reined in Old Charlie, and the young man seized the improvised bridle.

“Where are you going with this horse?” he asked.

“Home,” replied Joe, promptly.

“Isn’t this Bill Rosencamp’s horse?”

“No, sir,” said the boy, stoutly; “he isn’t. He’s my father’s horse! He was stolen, and I’m takin’ him back home.”

“Didn’t Captain Bill have him?”

“Yes, but he hadn’t any right to him, and he abused him, too.”

“Didn’t you take him without Captain Bill’s knowledge?”

“Of course I did! I couldn’t have got ’im at all if I hadn’t.”

“Well, I guess you’d better get off and let me take charge of the horse, and we’ll investigate this matter a little. Come,” he called, as Joe hesitated, “get down! Get down, I say!”

The boy let himself wearily to the ground.

Several men and boys who were standing near the offices and on the tow-path came crowding about.

“The superintendent is due here soon,” said the operator. “He’s coming up with the paymaster, and he’ll settle it.”

On the canal the superintendent’s authority was almost absolute. Local authorities deferred to him in all matters pertaining to the canal and its employes, unless the law were formally invoked.

The crowd stood about impatiently. The operator still held the horse, and Joe stood near, looking confident and very earnest. Presently a steam-launch came puffing up the canal, gave two shrill whistles, and was quickly made fast to the dock.

A heavy, well-built man, with a closely cropped beard and a kindly face, stepped from the deck to the tow-path. He was followed by a man who carried a heavy valise, and by one or two other men.

They were the canal superintendent and the paymaster and their assistants.

“What’s the matter here, Matthew?” asked the superintendent, approaching the group.

“This boy is charged with stealing this horse,” replied the operator. “Here’s the message.”

The superintendent took the telegram and read it.

“Is this Bill Rosencamp’s horse?” he asked, turning to Joe.

“No, sir!” repeated Joe. “He isn’t. He’s my father’s horse.”

“But he acknowledges having taken him from Rosencamp,” the operator explained.

“Well,” said the superintendent, “Rosencamp is coming. When he gets here we shall find out whose horse it is.”

“But I don’t want to stay here till he comes,” said Joe.

“Probably not,” remarked the operator, sarcastically.

The superintendent, who seemed to perceive that this was not an ordinary case of horse-stealing, now looked more closely at Joe, and noticed the boy’s haggard, hungry look.

“He won’t hurt you,” he said. “Rosencamp’s a rough fellow, but he won’t hurt any one around here; and if it turns out that the horse is yours or your father’s, you will get possession of him, of course. Meantime we shall have to find out the exact truth of the matter. Have you had any breakfast?”

“No, sir,” replied Joe, “I haven’t had any, nor Old Charlie either.”

The superintendent smiled. “Matthew,” he said, “tell the stable-man to take this horse up to the barn and feed him and rub him down. And you,” turning to the boy, who was not a little bewildered by the invitation, “come with me.”

He led the way across the street into a large boarding-house. There, in a warm and pleasant dining-room, Joe ate the first good meal he had taken in several weeks.

Under its cheering influence his heart warmed, his tongue was loosened, and to Mrs. Jones, the kind landlady, who sat by and served him, he told the story of his folly, his suffering, and his desire.

When he had finished his breakfast, Mrs. Jones went with him to the office, and calling the superintendent aside, said,—

“This boy is no thief. He is honest and right in what he has done.”

“We shall soon find out about it,” was the reply. “Here comes Rosencamp.”

Captain Bill rode up to the office door, dismounted, and tied his horse. To the group of men and boys who quickly surrounded him he told, with many threats and much rough language, the story of his night ride, and denounced the wickedness of Joe.

“Ef I once git my hands on ’im,” he muttered, “he’ll never want to see another hoss agin as long as he lives!”

Tired with his journey, splashed with mud, his face red with anger, he entered the office and demanded the gray horse.

“Was it your horse that the boy took?” inquired the superintendent.

“Course it was,” replied Captain Bill, with a fine pretence of indignation.

“Where did you get the horse?” was the next question.

“Bought ’im.”

“Where?”

“Right here in Ellenville.”

“From whom?”

Rosencamp hesitated a little. “I don’t rightly know the man’s name,” he said. “A feller ’at had ’im to sell.”

“I know!” piped out a shrill voice from the crowd that had gathered in the room. “It was Callipers, the man that’s been in prison for horse-stealing. I see ’em strike the bargain here on the tow-path yisterday.”

Rosencamp lost something of his bravado. The kindly look disappeared from the face of the superintendent.

“Did you get this horse from Callipers?” he asked severely.

“Well, yes, if that’s what ’is name is,” replied Captain Bill, doggedly.

“Don’t you know that Callipers has been convicted of horse-stealing?”

“I don’t know’s I do.”

“And didn’t you know that this horse had been stolen?”

“If I had ’a’ knowed it, do you s’pose I’d ’a’ took ’im? Who says it was a stolen hoss, anyhow?” added Captain Bill, looking the crowd over savagely.

“I say so,” said a man who had just entered the room. “I saw Callipers arrested last night for stealing the horse he traded to Bill Rosencamp. The constable has the irons on him now, and the sheriff has gone across to Port Jervis to head off the horse.”

“Well, Rosencamp,” said the superintendent, “what have you to say to that?”

“If the hoss was stole,” said Rosencamp, “how was I to know it? Nobody told me it was stolen.”

“Yes, somebody did tell you!” exclaimed Joe. “I told you the horse was stolen, and the man you got him of stood right there an’ didn’t deny it, either! I said it was my father’s horse, an’ it is!”

The superintendent turned to Joe. “Who is your father?” he asked.

Joe hesitated a moment. Then he replied, “His name is Gaston.”

“What Gaston? Do you mean Leonard Gaston, of Laymanville?”

“Yes, sir, that’s his name. That’s where he lives.”

“And you—look here! Are you the boy who ran away from home last June? I know your father, if you are Joseph Gaston, and I know that he has been breaking his heart about you for three months.”

Joe turned his face from the crowd, and looked down at the floor. There was perfect stillness in the room. Joe was the first to break the silence. He held up his head, and looked the superintendent squarely in the face.

“I did run away from home,” he said, “and it was foolish and it was wicked. I didn’t know it then, but I do now, and I want to go back, especially since I found the horse. I think maybe if I take Old Charlie back with me they—they won’t be so hard on me; they—they’ll be gladder to—to—”

The boy burst into tears, and broke down completely. The superintendent rose from his chair, and opened the door into a private office.

“Here,” he said to Joe; “come in here. I want to talk with you.”

On the threshold the superintendent turned to look at Captain Bill.

“Are you going to institute proceedings against this boy? If you are, he will be placed under bonds, and I shall become his bondsman. If you are not going to prosecute him, you may go straight back to your boat,” he said sharply. “And if I hear of your dealing in stolen horses again, or abusing any more boys, this canal company will dispense with your services on very short notice.”

Rosencamp, disappointed, cowed, more angry than ever, knowing that he could not prosecute Joe, made his way to the door and out to the tow-path amid the jeers of the waiting crowd. He mounted his horse, and rode away.

Fifteen minutes later Joe and the superintendent came out from the private office. It was evident that the boy had been weeping; but in his eyes there was a look of gladness and firmness that expressed, more plainly than words could have done, the condition of his mind.

“Matthew,” said the superintendent, “tell the stable-man to get this boy’s horse, put a saddle and bridle on him, and bring him here. Have him get out a horse for you, for I want you to go with the boy as far as Darbytown. From there he knows the way home, and can go alone.”

That afternoon, while the sun was still high, Joe and Old Charlie were on the highway not far from their home. Matthew had left them at Darbytown, after getting a good dinner for all of them, and now they were travelling homeward alone.

The old horse jogged on, trotting or walking as he liked, stopping at the roadside now and then to nibble at a tempting bunch of grass or a bit of fresh foliage, or to plunge his nose into the cooling waters of a wayside stream.

Even now, however, they were not making very slow time on the whole; and earlier in the day they had gone faster. It had seemed to Joe that he could not wait till the white front of the old farmhouse should come into sight from the top of Hickory Hill.

The eager anticipation of his return to the dear old home had heightened his spirits, and brightened his eyes.

But after Matthew left him he began to think; and the more deeply he thought, the slower became his progress. Many suspicions and misgivings had come into his mind.

He no longer paid heed to the beauty of the day, the splendor of the sun, or the rich luxuriance of the early autumn foliage. He was looking only into his own heart. He was thinking only of his inexcusable folly and wickedness in leaving so good a home. He was wondering what his father would say to him; how his mother would receive him; whether his little sister would ever again care to play with him as of old.

He was wondering, indeed, if his parents would wish to have him come home at all, disgraced as he was; if the door of his father’s house would not be shut and barred against him forever.

“Hello, ther! W’at’s the matter wi’ ye?”

The exclamation, coming so suddenly and unexpectedly, so startled Joe that he almost fell from his horse. He had been so deeply engrossed in thought that he had not seen any one approaching. He looked down now and discovered a little old man standing near the horse’s head.

The man was shrunken, knock-kneed, eccentric in dress and manner, and leaned heavily on his cane. Joe recognized him at once as a neighborhood character, whom every one knew by the name of Uncle Billy.

“W’y, I thought ye was asleep,” said the old man. “I was fearful ye’d tumble off the hoss.”

“I wasn’t asleep,” replied Joe. “I was thinkin’.”

“A-thinkin’!” exclaimed Uncle Billy; “w’at right’s a boy like you got to be a-thinkin’, I’d like to know?” He advanced a step and laid his hand on Old Charlie’s neck. “Ben a good hoss in ’is day,” he commented; “looks like the hoss Leonard Gaston use to hev,—the one ’at was stole.”

“It is,” replied Joe; “it’s the same horse.”

The old man started back so quickly that he tripped and almost fell over his cane.

“Who be you?” he exclaimed, shading his eyes with his hand, and looking up intently at Joe. “You aint Joe Gaston, be ye?”

“Yes, I am; I’m Joe Gaston,” responded the boy, sadly.

Uncle Billy retreated still farther. “Well, I’m dumflustered!” he exclaimed. After a minute he added, “W’ere ye goin’?”

“Home!” replied Joe.

The old man shook his head solemnly. “Ye won’t git much of a welcome ther,” he said.

“Why? Is my father set against me?” asked Joe, anxiously.

“Set aginst ye? That’s puttin’ it too mild. He’s cast ye off. He’s unherited ye. He won’t speak of ye to nobody, an’ he won’t let nobody so much as mention yer name in his presience. Now what ye think o’ that?”

The old man seemed to take delight in giving his unwelcome information. He looked up at Joe with a quizzical smile on his thin face, and waited for an answer.

Joe did not reply to the question, but after a minute he asked,—

“Do—do you know whether my mother feels the—the same way?”

“Of course she doos! First along she purty near cried ’er eyes out over ye. She went around makin’ out’t ye never stole that hoss; said ye’d be back in a day or two an’ clear it all up. But she’s give ye up now. They don’t none on ’em ever expect to see ye agin; an’ w’at’s more, I guess they don’t none on ’em want to. What ye think o’ that? Hey?”

Again the old man smiled grimly at Joe, and again Joe left his question unanswered. He was struggling now with a great lump in his throat that was growing larger and more uncontrollable each moment.

“What—what does my little sister—what does Jennie think?” he asked, choking sadly over the question.

“Well there now!” was the reply; “that gal—I didn’t think o’ her. She don’t da’s’t talk about ye to hum, ye know, but w’en she’s away she kind o’ finds opportetunities to discuss the subjec’. ’Twa’n’t but last week she says to me over to Williams’s place, says she, ‘It’s awful lonesome without Joe,’ she says. ‘I wisht he’d come back an’ be a good boy,’ says she. ‘Aint it sad about his goin’ away so?’ she says. ‘Do you think he’ll come back agin soon, Uncle Billy?’ says she. An’ I says, ‘No, he won’t never come back agin. He’s gone too fur,’ says I, ‘in more ways ’an one,’ says I. What ye think o’ that? Hey?”

But this time Joe could not have answered the question if he had tried. The lump in his throat seemed to have dissolved into tears; they filled his eyes, and ran freely down his face.

The old man saw that the boy was crying, and for a moment seemed to repent his hardness of heart.

“I’m sorry for ye, sonny,” said Uncle Billy, after an awkward pause; “but I tell ye they aint no use o’ yer goin’ hum; they don’t ixpect ye, an’ they don’t want ye.”

Still Joe sat, weeping and speechless.

“Well,” the old man added, “I must be joggin’ on. Somebody might come along an’ see us two together, an’—well, I’ve got a reppytation to lose, ye know.”

He burst into a shrill cackling laugh, grasped his twisted cane more firmly, and hobbled on around a bend in the road and out of sight.

Old Charlie, unheeded by his young master, started on.

The sun sank till the light it threw on the green September foliage was mellow and golden. From somewhere in the distance came the ting-a-ling of a cow-bell, as the herd wandered slowly home. The sound and the memories it brought started fresh tears into Joe’s eyes, and when the mist they occasioned had cleared away he found himself on the summit of Hickory Hill.

Down in the valley, half-hidden by trees, he saw the white front of his home. Behind it rose the gray roofs of the barns; before it stretched the yellow road; on it fell the soft light of the dying day.

He had drawn the reins and sat looking down on it, while Old Charlie, pricking up his ears in glad recognition of the familiar sight, pawed the ground impatiently.

“No,” Joe said, at last, “we won’t go on. It’s no use. I’m sorry, but—it’s no use.”

He turned the horse’s head, and Joe and Charlie started back.