Page:Haworth's.djvu/374

312 had work in her hands. It was Christian who heard him first. She threw down her work and stood up.

"He is here," she cried. "He is coming up the step."

She was out in the narrow entry and had thrown the door open before he had time to open it with his key.

The light fell upon his dark pale face and showed a strange excitement in it. He was disheveled and travel-worn, but his eyes were bright. His first words were enough.

"It is all right," he said, in an exultant voice. "It is a success. Where is my mother?"

He had taken her hand as if without knowing what he did and fairly dragged her into the room. His mother had risen and stood waiting.

"It is a success," he cried out to her. "It is what he meant it to be—I have finished his work!"

She turned from him to the girl, uttering a low cry of appeal.

"Christian!" she said. "Christian!"

The girl went to her and made her sit down, and knelt before her, clasping her arms about her waist, and uplifting her glowing young face. At the moment her beauty became such a splendor that Murdoch himself saw it with wonder.

"It is finished," she said. "And it is he who has finished it! Is not that enough?"

"Yes," she answered, "but—but——"

And the words died upon her lips, and she sat looking before her into vacancy, and trembling.

Murdoch threw himself on the sofa and lay there, his hands clasped above his head.

"I shall be a rich man," he said, as if to himself, "a rich man—and it is nothing—but it is done."