Petaluma High School - Trojans Yearbook (Petaluma, CA)

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Ittiii ' r tlf? (Urban? HERE the moonbeams played brightest upon the old blockwood doorstep sat Johnny. His hands were clasped tight, his bare, sunbrowned feet pressed deep into the yielding dust, his eyes resting on a glimmer of light far across the fields—the party! The door of the little log house stood open behind the boy, show¬ ing a bright patch of moonlight on the rag carpet, the scarlet corner of a colored tablecloth, and a bit of a chair; deeper in the shadows vague, ghost-like forms revealed themselves in hazy outlines. No human figure was within—only silence, blackness, shadows and that one spot of light. It was on these vague forms that Johnny had turned his back. He was afraid—and he was wishing for that something the absence of which made the world seem so queer and lonely and the moonlight so cold and cheerless. Again he looked with sorrowing eyes across the fields, while in his throat there came a choking. He stirred un¬ easily. Something which gleamed pearl-like in the night glow found its way down the boy’s cheek. Slowly he turned his head toward the dumpy line of old cedars near the white fence, where a slight rough¬ ness in the earth showed new and fresh. The little form rose from the step, pattered through the few feet of dusty bareness and stepped into the dewladen grass. He found the rough brown spot by the fence and sank, there wearily. His eyes sought the scrawled wording of a penciled single which slanted awkardly from the ground. The moonlight seemed to shine brightest on one word, “Tad.” The tears came again, and this time his voice was choking. “I wisht—I had him again. He never ran off from me—” A little sob, then silence. The eye-lids drooped, opened wide, then failed in their task. Slowly the head bent forward, inclining the body with it. m —25—

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THE ENTERPRISE, ’13 and the open heart,” as Ruskin puts it. Perhaps it will spr J full bloom at once; it needs cultivation to bring it to perfection, but if one desires it there is no possibility of failure. It is a thousand pities that reading should ever seem hard work. Certainly vacatioin reading should be unadulterated pleasure. Put the dictionary and reference books aside for awhile, unless your in¬ terest sends you to them, (then, so much the better) and simply lea and enjoy. As to choosing, if you are so fortunate as to ie wi m reach of ' a library, indulge yourself in a good browse among the shelves, skimming a bit here and a snatch there, until t ieiig i 00 T draws you as the iron filing is drawn by the magnet. If not, may Fate send the right book in your path. I say “book” again and again, for the great danger of vacation reading is that it will be frittered away entirely on magazines. We couldn’t do without the magazines; we must have them to keep a- hreast of the world of politics, of invention, of discovery. But the trou¬ ble is that too many of us slip lightly over these things and spend the most of the time on the stories. And magazine stories are, for the most part (not all, mark you) like some waffles we bought once at the beach—burned at one end, raw at the other, deluged with sugar, and altogether a menace to digestion. One who loves good books is armed cap-ci-pic against the enemy of society, boredom. His mind is a gallery of pleasant pic¬ tures, a storehouse of entertaining thoughts. He lias count ess friends to turn to in every idle hour, and if an attack of t le i ues threatens, he has only to take a whiff of “Samivel Veller” and pres¬ to, change! the sun shines again. Then Ho for a booke and a shadie nooke, Eyther in-a-doore or out, With the grene leves whisp’ring overhead, Or the street cryes all about; Where I may read, all at my ease, Both of the newe and olde, For a jollie goode booke whereon to look Is better to me than golde. H. C. P. —24—

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THE ENTERPRISE, ’13 The light in the distance flashed out. The frogs held their own for a while; then came the sound of plodding hoofs, the squeak of ungreased axles, human voices. Two figures showed in the moonlight and stopped a moment by the door. The man turned, started a bit, then stepped toward the gleaming fence and roughened patch of earth. He stooped and raised a drowsy form in his arms. When he re¬ turned to the doorstep he looked queerly at the woman awaiting him there. “Guess we’ll have to buy this kid a new pup,” he said. “What’s he see in dogs, anyhow!” It was some twenty years later and a quiet August evening. There was a soft shimmer in the air that veiled the distant hills with a mellow haze. The sun had just gone to rest beyond the western horizon, leaving a golden glow behind it. Those distant hills were the same ones upon which the moonbeams had shone that night long before, when Johnny had lost his dearest friend—“Tad.” A balmy wind came from the wood on the opposite bank of the stream, bring ing the sweet odor of pines and the cool breath of damp nooks, and, as it passed along, ruffled the lily leaves on the banks until they showed their purple linings. It swept shadowy ripples through the long grass, and, in its passing softly caressed the fair brow of a young girl, who, standing by the side of her husband, was gazing with an enraptured look at the beautiful landscape before them, her blue eyes filled with a dreamy wonder. Looking up she met the glance of her husband fixed intently on her. “Well, dear,” he said softly, “does it fulfill your expectation!” “Ah,” she breathed, “I did not realize—did not think that it could be one half so beautiful.” He smiled gently, and, taking her hand in his, pointed across the stream to the ruins of an old log-house. “That was the home of my childhood,” he said reverently, and turning his head toward the dumpy line of old cedars he added, “how well I remember the night that the moon shone for the first time on a little grave among those trees. The future was a blank to me then.” His gaze returned to her face and he smiled dreamily as he softly said, “I did not realize what the future really held for me.” ALICE M. SILVA, ’13. —26—