There was a package for Walter, who had now been some months in California,—a package of letters and papers both,—and with a beating heart he sat down to read, taking Mr. Graham's letter first, for that might have a message from Jessie.

It was glorious news which the letter contained, and it wrung a cry of delight from Walter, which was heard by the captain, who turned to see what it was that thus affected his companion.

"Listen, Captain Murdock," Walter exclaimed, "listen to this. My father is proved innocent. Heyward was the robber,—he came back and confessed it the night before he died, and——"

He did not finish the sentence, for, like a wild beast startled from its lair by a sudden fright, Captain Murdock bounded to his side, and, snatching the letter from him, devoured its contents at a glance then striking his hands together, he fairly screamed:

"Thank God! the year of jubilee has come,—the day I've waited for so long!"

Earnestly and half fearfully Walter gazed up into the marble face, and into the eyes that burned like coals of fire, seeing in them now, for the first time, a look like his grandfather. Then a suspicion of truth burst upon him, and springing up he caught the gray-haired captain by the arm, demanding faintly:

"Who are you? Tell me, or I shall die."

"I am your father, boy," and, opening his arms, the father received to his embrace his fainting son.

The news and the surprise combined were too much for Walter, and for some little time he lay upon the bed, whither his father had borne him, unconscious of the caresses, the words of love, the whispered blessings showered on him by one who felt now that he trod a different earth, and breathed a different air from what he had done for twenty-four long years.

"Father,"—how like music that word sounded in his ear when Walter said it at last, and how it wrung tears from eyes which, until recently, were unused to weep.

"Say it again, my son. Call me father often. 'Tis the name I've thirsted for, but never expected to hear," and the strong man, weak now as a woman, kissed lovingly the face of the handsome boy.

"Read it aloud," Walter said, pointing to the crumpled letter lying on the floor.

Mr. Marshall complied, and read in tremulous tones how Ralph Heyward, after an absence of eighteen years, had again asked shelter at the farm-house, saying he was tired and sick. His request was granted, and when the morning came he was too ill to leave his bed, but lay there for many days, kindly cared for by the deacon, to whom he made a full confession of his guilt, saying that he, and not Seth Marshall, robbed the Deerwood Bank; that it was what he intended to do when he came there that night, feigning drunkenness the better to cover his design.

He knew that Seth kept the keys in his pocket, and when sure that the household were asleep, he arose, and putting on his victim's coat, cap and shoes, left the house stealthily, committed the theft, hid the money, and then as cautiously returned to his room, and was settling himself a second time into an apparently drunken sleep, when he heard some one up, looking, as he supposed, for the cause of the disturbance he had made in accidentally upsetting a chair as he left Seth Marshall's room. Then he was still again until the morning came, and the arrest was made.

At the examination, when he saw the terrible anguish of the young wife, he was half tempted to confess, but dared not, for fear of what might follow; so he kept his own counsel, and for a few years remained in the vicinity of Deerwood, hoping to hear something of the man he had so wronged, and then he went away to the West, wandering up and down with that burden of guilt upon his soul, until at last, knowing that he must die, he returned to Deerwood, and seeking out the farm-house, asked permission to lay his head again beneath its hospitable roof. This done, he acknowledged to the father how he had sinned against the son, and after making an affidavit of his guilt, died a penitent and, it was to be hoped, a better man.

"And now," wrote Mr. Graham in conclusion, "I wish I could convey to you some little idea of the present excitement in Deerwood. Everybody is talking of the disclosure, and of your father, who, were he here, would be a greater lion even than Lafayette in his day. And I wish that he were here. Poor Seth! God forgive me that I testified against him. I verily believed him guilty up to the hour when Heyward proved him innocent. Oh, if he only could come back to me again, and to the home where your aged grandfather prays continually that his sun may not go down until he has seen once more the face of his boy. Poor old man, it is a touching sight to see his lips move continually, and hear the words he whispers: 'God send him back, God send him back.' You know Aunt Debby always said, 'Seth allus was a good boy;' she repeats it now with ten-fold earnestness, as if it were a fact in which everybody concurred. It may be that your father is dead, and if so he cannot return; but if still living, I am sure we shall see him again, for I shall take means to have the story inserted in the papers far and near, so that it will be sure to meet his eye.

"Meanwhile, Walter, come home as soon as you are able to bear the journey. We want you here to share in our great joy. Leave the business, if it is not arranged, and come. We are waiting anxiously for you, and none more anxiously than Jessie. She has been wild with delight ever since I told her your father was innocent. Mrs. Bellenger, too, shares the general joy, and were yourself and your father here our happiness would be complete."

"We will go, too," cried Walter, "you as Captain Murdock at first, to see if they will know you. Oh, I wish it were now that we were there," and Walter's dark eyes danced as he anticipated the meeting between the deacon and his son.

"Yes, we will go," Mr. Marshall answered, and then, after looking over the papers which Mr. Graham had sent, and which contained Heyward's confession, he sat down by Walter and told of his wanderings since that dreadful night when he left his home, branded as a thief and robber. "But first," said he, "let me tell you how I chanced to run away. I should never have done it but for Mr. Graham, who begged and entreated me to go."

"Mr. Graham!" exclaimed Walter. "Why, he, I thought, was your bail."

"So he was," returned the father, "but he wished me to come away for all that. He would rather lose all his fortune, he said, than know I was in prison, and sent there on his testimony. So he urged me to leave, contriving a way for me to do so, and even carrying me himself, that stormy night, many miles from Deerwood. I dreaded the State prison. I believe I would rather have been hung, and I yielded to his importunities on one condition only. I knew his father would be very indignant, and that people would censure him severely, too, if it were known he was in my secret, and, as I would not have him blamed, I made him promise to me solemnly that he would never tell that he first suggested my going and then helped me away. He has kept his promise, and it is well. I have ample means, now, for paying him all I owe, and many a time I have thought to send it to him, but I have been dead to all my friends so long that I decided to remain so. I wrote to him from Texas, asking for you all, and learning from him of Ellen's death, and of your birth. You were a feeble child, he said, and probably would not live. I had never seen you, my son, and when I heard that my darling was gone,—my mother, too,—and that my father and best friend still believed me guilty, I felt a growing coldness toward you all. I would never write home again, I said. I would forget that I ever had a home, and for a time I kept this resolution, plunging into vices of every kind,—swearing, gambling, drinking——"

"Oh father,—father!" said Walter, with a shudder. "You do not tell me true."

"It's all true, my boy, and more," returned the father, "but I was overtaken at last, by a terrible sickness, the result of dissipation in New Orleans. A sister of charity saved my life, and opened my heart to better things. Her face was like Ellen's, and it carried me back to other days, until I wept like a little child over my past folly. From that sick bed, I arose a different man, and then for years I watched the Northern papers to see if they contained anything like what we have just read. But they did not, and I said I cannot go home yet. I sometimes saw Mr. Graham's name, and knew that he was living, but whether you were dead or alive I could not even guess. Here, in California, where I have been for the last ten years, I have never met a single person from the vicinity of Deerwood. At first I worked among the mines, amassing money so fast as even to astonish myself. At length, weary of the labor, I left the mines and came to the city, where I am known as Captain Murdock, the title having been first given to me in sport by some of my mining friends. Latterly I have thought of going home, for it is so long since the robbery, that I had no fears of being arrested, and I was about making up my mind to do so, when chance threw you in my way, and it now remains for you to say when we both shall start."

"At once,—at once," said Walter, who had listened intently to the story, giving vent to an occasional exclamation of surprise. "We will go in the very next steamer. I shall not have a chance to write, but it will be just as well. I wish to see if grandpa or Mr. Graham will recognize you."

Mr. Marshall had no objections to testing the recollections of his father, and he readily consented to go, saying to his friends that as New England was his birthplace he intended accompanying his young friend home.

"I can write the truth back to them," he thought, "and save myself much annoyance."

Thus it was arranged, and the next steamer for New York which left the harbor of San Francisco, bore on its deck the father and his son, both eager and expectant and anxious to be at the end of the voyage.