Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-11-06
HER GODFATHER.
How Hester Wright Was Kept
 from Starving.

1.-Two dollars and forty cents" Hes ter said, bitterly. It lay upon the ta- ble before her in .t pile of pennies and small pieces of silver and over it bent two faces, Hester Wright's and her mothers; faces that had been fair and beautiful, but were pallid with sorrow and the privations of two years of grind ing poverty.
 Not all at once had they fallen down the slope from wealth to want, although the first crushing blow had thrown them far along tho road. From a luxurious home to a small one; from that to a boarding house; from one to another, each poorer than the last, to Q room in a tenement house, until they were at last in bare, cold attic, so scantily furnished that the very emptiness was chilling. They had, at last reached the point where actual begging or star vation stared them in the face.
 'If we invest the forty cents in char coal" Hester said, in the same low, bit ter tone in which she had first spoken, two dollars won't pay our funeral ex- penses."
 "Hester! Don't, dearr' her mother said, in a voice of sorrow, but without one echo of tho ring that was in her daughters. Don't! God will not de- sert usl'
 People do starvoy was the quick TO- ply. And then, with a wall indescriba- ble in her voice, she cried: II could bear 1t alone! I could work, starve, die! But to sec you suffer Is moro than can endure. My heart is breakingp
 She threw herself into her mothers arms as she spoke, sobbing violently. A creature of impulse, of quick, sudden change of mood, she wept for few mo- ments, and then stood erect, dashing back the tears.
 Il will try once more," she said. "Give me two cents, mother, to buy a newspaper, I will answer every ad- vertisement"
 She took from a closet shabby, black shawl and heavily vailed crape bonnet, and began to put them on.
 "My birthday, toor' she said, present ly, buttoning her well-worn boots. II am twenty-one to-dayp
 And as she spoke there was a knock upon the door, and basket was handed in; a shallow, open, round basket, piled with fowers-roses of every tint, fra grant blossoms of various kinds, buried in soft moss and tender green leaves. Upon the top lay card.
 "HarryI' Hester said, hot tears fall ing upon the blooming gift that lighted up even that dull room. "Oh! he should not do so! Think what that has cost and he works so hardH'
 ''He will never learn economy" Mrs. Wright said, gently; "and he loves you 80 well, Hetty."
 "Our one friend," the girl replied.
 ''Say rather, your true loverl" said her | mother.
 Though he has good cause to hate mer'
 And kissing her mother tenderly, Hester went out, down the narrow, bare staircase, into the street, where a sharp October wind brought dreary promise of winters coming. A tall, handsome girl, whose moan attire could not rem der vulgar, she bore herself, even in her heart-sick misery, like O queen, carrying her shApely head with uncon- scious hauteur that lessened materially her chance of obtaining work. Sho had not learned yet to humble herself in manner, even though her heart burned with bitter humiliation-the humilia- tion of shame.
 Shame, because two years before, her father, who had reigned as a million aire, had been detected in fraudulent dealings that led on and on through the miro of dishonesty, forgery, misrepre- sentation and breach of trust, till, in a prison-cell, he committed suicide. | In his ruin was involved that of others, and the greatest sufferer had been his ward, Henry Ashworth, son of an old friend who had left 0 large estate I in the hands of Marcus Wright in trust for bis only child. For years, Harry Ashworth had been one of MT. Wright's family, leaving his homo only for school or college, and returning to it, natural ly, after graduating in the law-school, to assume a mans duties.