Sonora Union High School - Green and Gold Yearbook (Sonora, CA)

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---- GREEN AND com l-.vi Whether Dcnnis regarded the next stride as leading upwards or down, we cannot say. At last reports, he had not expressed himself sufficiently on the subject. I should regard it rather as a final one, and one which got him practically nowhere-fof COUFSE, speaking figuratively. Dennis had not been serving long in the Carlton household before he was acquainted with the whole situation, and he found it particularly appealing to his sense of humor. And he had not been in the service much longer when hc regarded tho whole affair as a huge practical joke. This is why. Carlton called his valet to him one morning, after he had breakfasted as usual, and showed him a letter from the uncle, which had come by the last post, and which really seemed to seal young Carlton's fate. It was terse and to the point. It read: 'AManchester, May 12, 1914. '4Sidney Carlton, London. Dear Sir: As you know, I am your lawful guardian. In many ways, recently, you have outraged my authority. Now it is my time to act, and I will see to it that you do as I tell you. As soon after you receive this letter as possible, go straight to the Army Recruiting Office and enlist to serve as a private in the king's armies for a term. Then you may learn how to behave. By that time you will have become of nge, and whatever happens to you after that is a matter of little consequence to me. There is only one thing, Sidney said when his valet had laid the letter down, only one thing which will save me. It will require a little change on your part, but with an increased salary, and my only hope is in you. You want me to enlist ? asked Dennis. Precisely, Carlton answered, and under my name. And you? Oh, I can take care of myself, he said. London is large and I am small. I can live incognito, quite unspected. You will become Sidney Carlton and join the king's army? Quite as you say, sir, Dennis replied. II There is a round earthen pot which is always full of water, hanging from a crane in the huge grate of the world. Often a fire is burning beneath the pot, and then the water it contains begins to boil, slowly at first but always growing more furious. Again, at times, there is no fire burning in the grate, and then the water is allowed to coolg but as soon as busy hands begin laying up a store of wood and straw beneath the round earthen pot, one can always expect a blaze, sudden though it may appear. Strangely enough, this round earthen pot is called the World, and a most disagreeable thing it is. But that hardly concerns the story, although the pot does play rather n signifis cant part. It relieved the tediousness of life by beginning to boil just at the most inopportune moment for poor Dennis, and drew him with the rest, in 'o its awful cataclysm. Can you imagine the horror of the poor soldier-valet when l. realized -Page419-

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-ii. GREEN .mo Goto -li- Dennis, C. V. by LEONARD REHM -is I ln all the two and twenty years of Dennis' young life, he had never had anything very exciting happen to him. As the son of Irish parents living in London, he had been raised much the same as other poor London children, with a fair elementary education to his credit. He always had been a very intelli- gent chap, but somehow, things never came his way, and his life had seemed -to him at least--one of unprecedented quiet. It was probably because his life had been so uneventful, that his hanker- ing for things more exciting caused Dennis to set up in his mind the idea that he had been intended for some higher plane and wider sphere than just that of a mere street boy of London. Who could tell what his future would be 2' Might he not have been intended for a pet of royalty or a descend- ant of some long lost scion of a noble house? Or would it be among the sciences or professions that he would find his calling? Dennis did not know, any more than you or I, but he had some vague notion that he would have to make the first move before fickle fortune would help him upward. Therefore, hc determined upon his first step. It carried him upwards a little, he thought, and what more could he expect? He sought employment among the wealthy of London, and was taken in by one Sidney Carlton, for whom he was to act as confidential valet. Sidney Carlton was a rich young fellow, younger than Dennis by some years, who had been left an enormous fortune by his late fatherg but not content with leaving him just that, the father had left his son under the guardianship of a crabbed old uncle-Lester Sidney, by name-who then resided at Manchester, summcrcd regxlarly at Ostcnd, nnd who young Sidney had not seen since too young to remember. At first, Carlton thought that his uncle would be easy with him, for they lived at such a distance from each other, and so the young :nan proceeded to spend the paternal millions in u way almost unprecedented in London. Becoming rather alarmed, Carlton's former valet, who, by the way, was a commissioned spy of the uncle. wrote to old Sidney, giving accounts of the young fellow's extravagances in London life and society. After receiving the valet's communication, Cai-lton's uncle did a very unwise thing. I-le wrote to his nephew, reprimanding him severely for his conduct, incidentally stating the source of his news. Need it be told how enraged Sidney Carlton was? Without even an hour's warning, he turned the poor servant out of employment, even refusing him recommend- ation for future use. Dennis got the job, but instead of being merely an ordinary servant, the Irish lad received the title of confidential valet . His first long step was accomplished. -Page 18-

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-ii-1-1 GREEN AND GOLD- ---- that he would have to go to war? Soon, as one of the King's Army he would be sent to France to be basely murdered by the dreadful Germans, and just for his one desire to do something noble for the world. And his omnipotent idea still possessed him. Iiis fate was leading him on and his fame would he gained not in the arts or sciences or wages of peace but on the field of battle, possibly by achieving some noble deed or by alleviating the suffering of his fellow creatures. Who knew? That thought was some in- spiration, yet it did not dispel the trance-like state of mind he was in, when he left England's shores and found a new home in the fields of France. And down in London town, Sidney Carlton heard that Dennis' regiment had gone to the front, his servant with it, and Carlton believed that he had sent a good man to his death. For days he sorroxved in silence, scarcely eating, and spending many night hours without sleep. At last in despair, he sought the inevitable end, and as men did long before his time, and have done since, he drowned his sorrows, and tried to forget the past. Even Lester Sidney, himself, was somewhat perturbed when the war broke out. While he secretly regretted having forced his nephew to join the army, he never betrayed this feeling to anyone. He at least rejoiced in the fact that his family would be represented in the trenches and have an opportunity to show their English courage. Before Sidney had fully recovered from the effects of the many whiskics and sodas he had downed, he made up his mind that the only thing he could honorably do was to join the army. So he was rather surprised, one morn ing, on awakening, to find himself in an army volunteer camp, enlisted not under his own name, but under that of his valet. He did not dare disclose his identity to anyone, but departed from England's shores aboard an old transport, just as Dennis had done a few weeks before. Even the servant was unaware of his master's latest move. Life in France was somewhat diiierent from what Dennis had imagined. His regiment was not sent to the front until several weeks after they had been assigned to positions quite beyond the range of battle. In these camps, where they awaited the call to tight, the soldiers saw wounded men pass by continually, in the steady stream of army ambulances, slowly rolling to shelter from fire. Dennis could picture himself as he would return from the front in but a few weeks, an occupant of one of those vehicles of mercy. Lester Sidney wrote often to his nephew in France. His letters were eloquent tributes to bravery of all ages, and exhortations to the nephew to fight for every drop of blood that was in him, whenever called upon to do so. These epistles-for they deserved that lofty title-were really a great de- light to Dennis, who welcomed their coming as a breath from England, and the idea that he still had someone there, however false that one may have been. What a life he would have led, had he enlisted under his own name, for then nobody would care just what happened to him,'and he would be quite alone. The uncle, too, was very considerate of his soldier nephcw's comfort, and often sent him large boxes meant to help and cheer the boy. These boxes always contained liniments, bandages, playing cards, and on thc top of every one was a small English flag. Often they held more. One -Page 20-