Shortridge High School - Annual Yearbook (Indianapolis, IN)

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-A--cn'-z mwK2l..lc',z:-A- The minutes dragged on. He could hear Sis's fingers tapping nervously on the table behind him. He glanced at -Art, who was bending down, poking the fire in a nervous fashion. How the fiery red of his hair was illumined by the firelight! I - Heavens! Couldn't he put the poker down without slamming it? Now he was striding to the table. Oh, hang it all! he was bringing the cigarette case. Won't you have one, kid '? , - What right had Art to call him kid? -How much older did he think he was! . And when would Art learn that this kid couldn't smoke? He wasn't good for anything but candy, or chewing gum, or some of your soft stuff. No, thanksg I-I believe not. U-ugh! He felt as though he were chok- ing, and he reached up to give a nervous tug at his collar. Just then he heard Sis's foot give an impatient kick, and then she came to perch herself on the arm-of his chair, to check the enemy's fire. A fold of her dress fell across his knee. He touched it reverently. What a warm, soft brown it was. How ex- quisitely it blended with the subdued shades of the room, like the soft brown of her 'hair and the cool grey of her eyes.. But come! come! He must make conversation at any cost. Er, when is it your boat leaves ? Now he knew it was useless to ask that question. Hadn't he heard them not half an hour ago saying they wished they knew how long 'it would be after Art reached the coast before the transport would sail for France? - Just then the clock out on the stairs struck. The time was up. Sis arose hastily and went to the door. - i The moment had come! He looked up at Art and saw, with the keen annoy- ance of his sensitive nature, so regardful of the minor details of dress, so pain- fully conscious of any carelessness in another's attire-one button missing from his brother's khaki coat. That empty button-hole and the idea that Sis had clipped that button because Art was going away, set his every nerve on edge: It made him suddenly furious. - So, somehow, when his brother strode over and grabbed his hand to boom Goodbye I that locket was in the other hand.. He managed to stammer, I- I-goodbye, I mean, and good luck. . Thenhe pressed the big, clumsy hand ever so lightly and swallowed hard. His brother was gone. The parting was over, and the invalid, vaguely aware of the sound of the footsteps passing down the hall to the outer door, bent forward in the firelight and laid his left hand stifiiy upon his knee. Then he opened it slowly, as though afraid and yet determined to look within. There, in the shadowed light, he saw the ugly white marks the locket had made in his clenched hand. '

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e--crm DYKYLI C-+iv'l HREE figures were grouped about the grate fire in the living room. The one seated in the deep arm-chair, in the firelight, was a young man of not more than eighteen, an invalid. Oh, yes, he would have told you, he was a dragon the family. He never did anything for themg they were always helping him. His brother, the man in khaki standing at the left ofthe mantel-piece -his brother Art didn't chum with him. And what was the use of anybody's chumming with an old invalid! Yes! and he was a grouch, too. Oh, he didn't blame Art for letting him alone! He -in fact, he wouldn't want Art hanging around babying him. Ugh! He hated being babied! Except by Sis. But Sis was different. Somehow, he always felt in another way when he thought about Sis. She always understood. When a fellow's back had felt like sixty all day, and he got to thinking about what a bore he was-nothing to do, nothing to say, wondering why he'd ever been born--then it was that Sis showed her metal. She didn't say, 'Now, you're just tired out-that's .all that's the matter with you, and you'd better come on to bed, just as if he were some little kid. No, Sis wouldn't act that way, even though she was the lonly mother he had any more. Sis would come and sit on the arm, of his chair and tell him in a thousand ways that she understood, and that she was there to help him. And Sis was there this evening. She hadn't left him in the lurch on the night of Art's departure. Somehow he felt sure she knew, although he'd never said anything about it, how he hated the sight of that khaki on Art. It re- minded him so of what he might have been. But this evening he wasn't going to hate it. He wouldn't be a cad like that. If things did seem all one-sided, he would just forget it. Even if Art didn't care anything about this-this-cripple, he'd try to make it up to Art this last evening. ' To clinch his good resolution he had brought something he knew would please Art. He'd heard Art asking Sis for her picture to take away with him, but because she had no recent one she fancied his having, she didn't give it to him. To be sure, she would send one later, but transportation overseas was risky. So he-he the good-for-nothing Koh, yes, that's just what he was, no matter what you said about it!-he'd brought a little locket Sis had given him several years before, with her picture in it, and had resolved to give it to Art just before he left. He would keep that locket in his right hand, and then when he and Art shook hands at the last-then that hateful thing that came inside him and made him do those little things-that thing couldn't stop him. He would give that locket in spite of himself. He would get the best, for once, of his over-sensitive, strained nature. j

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'U'-CHE IDYKYMIGC--lr' He felt, in a troubled way, his lips moving. They were faintly forming a tune. It was My Soldier Boy, the tune he had so often heard his brother whistle. Someone coming down the hall was humming it, he thought. Sis, of course-and, oh, yes, Art would be whistling it, too, out there, somewhere. An ache clutched his throat. His head fell back against the soft leather of the chair. His clenched hands relaxed. The locket fell to the floor and its crystal shattered. A shudder passed over his body and his eyes closed in pain. The barriers were down, the flood-gates were open. His cup of bitterness had overflowed. . A cool hand was laid across the Derelict's forehead. Sis was there. Sis understood. , ' I A ..... ppak - HELEN ATEN. R. EVE IQIIIG In CHE GGUIZ CRY E WERE sitting upon a large veranda, screened from the road with peony and rose of Sharon bushes. From the large garden on the left, arose millions upon millions of fire-flies, like perpen- dicular waves, which receded and then began again. Night was falling upon the wide and solemn country-side. The last without malice, yet reluctantly. The moon was just ascending K---N behind a cluster of trees, which stood whispering and sagely nodding, as if to announce their radiant visitor. Lavishly did she repay them, showering 'lher silver beams unrestrainedly. She reached the top, and the fields shown in tinsel glory. The corn shocks rose like so many wigwams. Fields and fields, until the, eye reached the horizon, where the first stars were visible. Ah, the stars! Shining, twinkling myriads of them! We could say, think, feel no more. Our souls were wraptg our hear blood, pulsing red, throbbed with purest ecstasy. A far-away cry of a near owl broke through the stillness. A cricket chirped his song. The winds gently tossed our hair. Were we inspired? As each star rayed its brightness ungrudgingly, lovingly, so we resolved to give the best in us. The brightness of each individual star makes the heavens a world of diamonds: the virtue of every man will bring peace on earth, good will to men. - - -HELEN WHITMAN. w w w, gray vestige of dusk surrendered as one great general to another,