The stranger at the gate

One evening at dusk, a stranger leans on Hagberd's gate and asks whether he has been advertising for his son.

Hagberd, who is always afraid of being laughed at, takes him for a grinning 'information fellow' who has come to make fun of him or to claim a reward. He refuses to let him in, and locks himself inside his cottage.

The stranger then talks to Bessie, and tells her that he is Harry. When he hears that his father expects his son 'to-morrow', he thinks some impostor must be planning to swindle the old man.

Bessie explains: there is no impostor. He himself is the son awaited 'to-morrow'. For the old man, it is all to-morrow, without any to-day: he can only wait, and can never accept that the waiting is over.

When Harry knocks at the door, his father throws a shovel at him from the window, just as he once beat him as a boy to stop him from going away.