The Red Cloud chief., 1881-02-10
A Boy Again.

SCHOOL is done for the day. There
is s%kurrying along the hall, and happy
voices of boys scrambiing for their caps
and of girls searching for their wraps
ring out eXultingly. A few of the
grayer girls pause long enough To kiss
the wearied, but always thoughtful and
loving. teacher: but the boys, as If
moved by a common impulse, gallop
through the hall, and with a shrill
chorus of yells plunge headlong into the
big snow-drift that has gathered close
to the steps since we were last called
from play. As | emerge from the
white temptation | see above me on the
topmost step the figure of a little girl.
A wholesome face. half hidden by the
clo>o-fitting hood tied under the chin
with a daintinesS peculiar 10 its wearer,
looks laughingly down at me. The
black eyes snap and flash, and the 1.-THE
form dilates with the rash of high
health. look a single question. The
child on the step gives me a quick an
swering look. | lift nv arms and she
leaps gaily toward NE. Her momentum
is too great; l have been too confident.
and we 90 down together. We only
laugh the merrier, and | am thrice
happy and e%Nuliant. Had not she done
nv mute bid ling without an instants
wait or doubt? | had commanded her
by n mere glance. and twenty sturdy
bows had seen il who would have gone
dinneriess every day of the term to
have won the priceless prize now mine.
| lift her out of the snow. and hand
in hand we run to the place where |
keep nv sled during schoO! hours. She
needs no invitation. but takes her place.
and /. like a c~onquering hero. bear her
away in a more triumphant and beatific
frame of mind than | have ever known
since.
| count as untold treasure the fact
that time has not blurred the picture.
Standing there, at the gate. the while
our lips were voicing words which
meant nothing TO me. that living frag-
ment of my early life kept knocking
at my heart with a persistency that
could not be withstood. turned from
the gate with a word of parting and
straightway took my course TO the old
school house, quivering with eager hope
10 find it as | had known it in those
childish years. Ii was indeed very lit
tie altered, and had the time been De-
cember instead of June, | believe |
should have mounted the foot-worn
steps and essayed another plunge into
The drifted snow. As If was, sat there
and lived over that scene and many 9TH
ers not wholly unlike it. nor quite disas-
ISOLATED with the mother of my new
found friend.
| suppose it will be understood that
in the DAYS reflected in the picture out
lined here there was but one girl in all
this world, and she wore a hood with
strings bewitchingly tied under her
chin. l had just seen a stately woman,
splendid in attire and consciously supe-
rior in mien las all women thus en-
dowed are), fresh from those devOtions
to which she had been reared. She
called herself my earliest friend, but l
did not know her. In that hour | knew
only the radiant child who leaped into
nv uplifted arms from the self-same
perch on which | sat in dear commun-
ion with the memories of another
world and another life. What to me
was the hustle of this rafting world?
| was unconscious of it, rocked nothing
of its imperious calls. and scared far
and high above its tumultS. | do not
know how long | sat there undisturbed.
but the vision gradually faded and the
tangible Now again confronted me.
Here was the school-house. l tried to
look in through the nearest window, but
it was curtained and nothing could be
seen. There were other windows
which l would try; but before leaving
the spot | looked around on all the dear
familiar forms on the trees under
which l had lain in the lazy noontimes.
dreading the tinkling summons that
always came on the minute; the village
store, with its weather-stained and
misspelled signs Yer the way; the old
tavern sign by the roadside. mounted
on a post and deliberately adorned with
iron scrolls; the playground where |
played ball and crack-the-whip in sum-
mer, and fox-and-geeSe in the winter:
the horse shed in which l had practiced
circus feats a thousand times. and the
calm hills that stretched as far as eye
could reach. covered with summer verdi
ure or waving with ripening grains.
All these things | saw and was CRATE
full fOr.-Signor Mar, IN Detroit Free
Press.