Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1896-10-15
THE PRODIGAL'S RETURN.

"Yes, mother, he will come. or
course he will Gomez and the girl
turned her drawn and anxious young
face toward the cottage door, just as
IL her blind. mother could see the ac-
ton.
1t is probable that the old woman di-
vlned the longing glance from the
change In the girls tone, for she, too,
half turned toward the door. 1t was
n habit these two women had acquired.
They constantly looked toward the
door for the arrival of one who never
came through the long summer days,
though the quiet winter evenings;
moreover, they rarely spoke OF other
things; this arrival was the topic OF
their lives. And now the old woman's
life was drawing TO close, as some
lives do, without its object. She her.
self felt it. and Ler daughter knew it.
There was in both OF them subtle
sense of clinging 1t was hard TO die
without touching the reward of won
drous patience. 1t was cruel to de-
prive the girl of this burden, for in
most burdens there is a safeguard, in
all a duty, and in some the greatest
happiness allotted to human existence.
1t was no new thing, this waiting for
the scapegrace son; the girl had
grown up to 1t, for she would not
know her brother should she meet
him in the street. Since sight had
left the old mothers eyes she had fed
her heart upon this hope.
He had left them eighteen years be-
fore in a tit of passionate resentment
against his father, whose only fault
had been too great an indulgence for
the son of his old age. Nothing had
been too good for dear Stephen-hard-
ly anything had been good enough.
Educated at charity school himself,
the simple old clergyman held the mis-
taken view that no man can be edu-
Gated above Iris station.
Stephen Leach's father, having risen
by the force of lis own will and the
capabilities of his own mind from the
people to the Church, held, as such men
do, that he had only to give his son a
good education to insure his career in
life. So everything-even to the old
parsons sense OF right and wrong-was
sacrificed to the education Of Stephen
Leach ut public school and university.
Here he met and selected for his
friends youths whose futures were in
sured, and who were only passing
through the formula of an education
SO that no one could say that they
We're unfit for the snug government
appointment living or inheritance of a
more substantial sort that might be
waiting for them. Stephen acquired
their ways of life without possessing
their advantages, and the consequence
was something very nearly approach
ing ruin for the little country rectory.
Stephen Leach had expensive tastes,
and he unscrupulously traded on his
fathers ignorance. He was cookbook
ing, and had certain brilliancy of
manner which goes down" well at the
Varsity. Everything was against him,
and at last the end came. At last the
rectors eyes were opened, and when a
narrOw-minded mans eyes are once
opened he usually becomes stony at
heart.
Stephen Leach left England, and be-
fore he landed in America his father
had departed on longer journey. The
neer-do-well had the good grace to
send back the little sums of money
saved by his mother In her widowhood.
and gradually his letters ceased. 1t
was known that he was in Chill, and
there was war going on there, and yet
the good old lady's faith never wa
vercd.
''He will come, Joyce" she would
say, ''he will surely come"
And somehow IL came to be an under
stood thing that he was to come in the
afternoon when they were all ready
for him-when Joyce had clad her pref
ty young form in a dark dress, and
when the old lady was up and seated
in her chair by the fire in winter, by the
door in summer. They had never
imagined his arrival at another time.
he make a mistake and come in the
morning, before Joyce had got the
house put right.
Yet he never came. A greater In
FIRMLY came instead and at last Joyce
suggested that the mother should not
get up in bad weather. They both knew
what this meant. but the episode
passed as others do. and Mrs. Leach
was bedridden. Still she said:
: HE will come, Joyce! He will sure
ly Gomez
And the girl would go to the window
and draw aside the curtains. looking
down the quiet country road toward
the village.
"Yes, mother. he will come" was her
usual answer: and one day she gave q
little exclamation Of surprise and al.
most of fear.
Mother" she exclaimed. ''there Is
someone coming along the road"
The old lady was already sitting IN
in bed. staring with her slghtless orbs
toward the window.
Thus they waited. The man stopped
opposite the cottage, and the two wo
men heard the latch of the gate. Their
Joyce, turning. saw that her mother
had tainted. But II was only momen
tary. BY the time she reached the bed
her mother had recovered conscious
ness.
60" said the old lady, breathlessly
ego let him In yourself"
Down stairs. on the doorstep, the
pirl found N fall man of thirty or tharo