Newark leader. ([Newark, Ohio]) 1917-1946, 1922-09-01

10 him. And sometimes he drew IN
Gians and cowboys. And one day
when he wasn't half watching what
he was doing-he drew something
quite different
Perhaps he wouldn't have looked at
it twice, if the teacher hadn't stepped
Hp behind him and taken it out of his
hands 1t was geography" then, not
drawing" and he should have been
paying attention" And he had every
reason to think that the teacher would
crumple up his picture and send him
to the cloak-room for punishment
But she did no such thing When
her eyes glanced down, her fingers
slowly straightened. Then she looked
a@ain-carefully.
"What is this Bruce?" she asked
what have you been drawing?"
IL don't Know" the child an
swered. He looked and for an instant
let his thoughts go wandering here
and there ''Those are trees" he
said A word caught at his throat and
he blurted it out. pines Pine trees,
growing on a mountain"
"NOt bad for a SiX-year-Old boy"
the teacher commented. But where
Bruce, have you ever seen or heard
of such pines?" But Bruce did not
know
Another puzzling adventure that
stuck in Bruce's memory had happened
only few months after his arrival
at the Square house, when a man had
taken him home on trial with the idea
of adoption.
All the incidents and details of the
excursion with this prospective parent
were extremely dim and vague. He
did not know to what city he went,
nor had he any recollection whatever
of the people he met there. But he did
remember with remarkable clearnesS
the perplexing talk that the man and
the superintendent of the Square
house had together on his return.
He won't do" the. stranger had
said. 81 tried him out and he won't
fill in in my family. And I've fetched
him back
II believe in being frank, and / tell
you there's something vicious in that
boys nature. 1t came out the very
first moment he was in the house,
when the Missus was introducing him
to my eight-year-old son. This is lit
tie Turner she said-and this boy
sprang right at him. I'd never let
little Turner learn to fight and this
boy was on top of him and was pound
ing him with his fists before we could
pull him off. / DIDN'T understand it
at all"
Nor did the superintendent under
stand; norm these later years
Bruce either
He was quite a big boy, nearly ten,
when he finally left the Square house.
And there was nothing tiickering or
dim about the memory of this occasion.
beside the window-a man well
dressed but with hard lines about his
mouth and hard eyes. Yet the superin-
tendent seemed particularly anxious
to please him. "You will like this
sturdy fellow" he said, as Bruce was
ushered in.
The mans eyes Travelled slowly from
the child's curly head to his rapidly
growing feet; but no CLEAN of inter
est came into the thin face. II sup
pose he'll do-as good as any. 1t was
the wife's idea, anyway, you know.
What about parentage? Anything de-
cent at all?"
The superintendent seemed to wait
a long time before answering. Little
Bruce, already full of secret conjec-
lures as to his own parentage, thought
that Some key might be given him at
last. There is nothing that we can
tell you, Mr.. Duncan" he said at
last. "a woman brought him here
with an infant girl-when he was
about four. l suppose she was his
mother-and she didn't wait to talk
to me. The nurse said that she wore
outlandish clothes and had plainly had
hard time"
"'But she didn't wait-?"
"She dropped her children and fled"
A cold little smile fiickered at the
mans lips. 1T looks rather dam