Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1909-03-05
HOMECOMING OF THE BOY

On these words and their meaning the
household at Glendochie had hinged for
the last eleven years-e eleven years since
Jock had started of at to his first
school, to be followed by Eton and Sand
hurst-a passage OF uneventful years
Ipunctuated up at Glendochie by the an
ticipation and realization OF the boys
holidays Katherine had married, true;
but Katherine. dearly loved daughter as
she was. was only a girl, and Sandy
poor little weakly Sandy-had lain in
the old kirkyard for the last seven years
and had become pitiful and tender
memory And Sandy, the younger boy
had ever been aiIing 1t was Jock who
really counted the boy" as they fond
| ~ termed him.
He was dear boy, too-weak, if one
was to trust that teltale mouth and
chin. but charming. utterly charming,
and everyones friend Only his mother
caught her breath sometimes in a sigh
| that was an unuttered prayer as she
looked from her boy to one of the por-
traits that hung on the dining room
walls at GIendochie. 1t represented the
laird of two generations ago, with the
same pleasant smiling blue eyes and
undecided, weak mouth, who. when he
had died at The Hague, a ruined gam
bier unable to set foot in his own coun-
try. no one had said anything worse
of him than Poor Duncan, he was his
own enemy!" There lay the inherent
curse of the Matheson family, their fatal
love of gambling. From father to son
! it had been handed down, in a lesser or
greater degree-a passion for cards that
amounted to a disease I'm the present
household they were anathema. The
| laird had never touched one himself and
| had eXtorted q perhaps unwise promise
| from his boys to do the same. TO poor
little Sandy it had proved only too easy
of keeping; but Jock, giving his word
| lightly but with every intention of keep
! ing it. found it possible at Elton, more
difficult at Sandhurst and the friends
| houses where he began to stay, and al
together out of the question-so it
seemed to the boy-in the lancer regi-
ment in which he found himself at 90
Bridge was played for high stakes and
the boy had no lack of money. Refusal
| to play would have been accounted mere
meanness or so he argued, with the blood
in his veins running holly and the fam
lily curse upon his young shoulders. And
so he played-played and won for the
first three months, then luck turned and
he could not touch a winning card Pres
emily the boy found himself in some
straits TO write home for money to
pay his card debts was impossible. even
to his indulgent mother. He played once
again, staked high and lost. In a mo-
mcnt of mad excitement, replying to
what seemed like taunt on the nom
! 4. = |. -
lifted his hand The blow was given
to a superior officer. and in the heat of
his young passion the boy said things
for which he was hardly TO be held re-
sponsble. There was only the inevitable
to follow an interview with his colonel
Ia personal friend of the laird), and
presently there would be subaltern
less in a lancer regiment.
But fate stepped in with a telegram.
The boy. standing half defiant, half
sullen, before his superior officer, was
told to open it,
Come at once, Your mother danger
ously ill.,"
lie was told to 90 Immediately and
if needs be. say nothing at present of
what had happened at Aldershot. The
colonel saw him 90 with a sigh of re
lief, as one respited from a painful task
The boy missed the night mail from
Euston and only sped northwards in the
early hours of the next morning. He did
not allow himself to think much as yet
There was only one idea in his mind-to
see his mother again. And after that
nothing mattered. or was. at least. mer-
cifully hazy and dim, OF his fathers
face presently he did not care to think
hint la. fsth H., 4
thought of then. Oddly enough. it was
of Sandy he kept thinking and dream
ing, too. when he fell into a brief
troubled sleep-Sandy dead these seven
years. Would Sandy have acted as he
lock. had done?
Inverness presently, and another
change. The little, well known station
at last, but. to the boys surprise, moth
ing there to meet Him. He would walk
on the five miles rather than wait for
the slow moving machine" that the
lstation-master would get ready lin a
wee while He would, of course. meet
the carriage soon, He set out over the
hills Praying-he who had prayed little
OF iate-that he might be i'm time
1t was good to be in Scotland again.
TO feel the heather under ones feet and
smell the peet and bog myrtle. There
was no place like it to a Scotchman.
The hoy held his head a little higher
and stepped out more freely at the
thought lie had broken his promise to
his father, disgraced himself in the ewes
of his regiments but his mother would
understand. He could not have faced his
father alone. OF course. she would be
better when he arrived She was sol
often ILL.,
Tie was nearing Glendochie now. Still
the carriage did not meet him. He real
lied that it must have taken the longer
and better road The short October even.
ing was drawing in hut it would be
light for quite while vet on the top
of the hills. Another turn and he would
see the white turrets of old Gleudochic
Iamoug the trees. Every stick and stone
he passed held its memories for him