Westmont Hilltop Senior High School - Phoenician Yearbook (Johnstown, PA)

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they would search every stitch of him. Like a Hash, a thought burst upon him; he jerked loose his hand, tore off the glove and stuffed something into his mouth. “Hold there!” cried someone. One swallow, two swallows;—oh, if he only had some water to wash it down! Get it—he’s swallowing it,” yelled another voice. A cough, one big gulp and down it slowly but surely went. Then when Webster fully realized what was happening, he began to struggle violently; but the iron hold that grasped him immediately checked his floundering . “Young man, quit this and give us that formula,” de- manded one unknown voice. “I can’t,” replied Webster. “Here, we know you’ve swallowed it, but we also know you have it in your head, now don’t you?” “Yes.” “Well, just tell it to us and you’ll be free as soon as we’ve tried it out.” With this last statement he did not dare to give the wrong formula. “Are you going to tell us?” These thousand dollars are yours if you do. Webster shook his head. “Not enough, eh?” quivered one of the unknown. “Ten thousand then.” Still no answer. “Make it twenty, Bill, it’s worth it,” said the other in an undertone. “We’ll make it twenty,” repeated the other. Again the young doctor said nothing. “Listen young man, I offer you thirty thousand dollars cash; if you know what’s good for you, you’ll tell us and take the money. We can hold you here; no one would ever know the difference. We can fix up a nice story and skip, at which trade we are no means experts. Do you take it?” Before Webster’s mind floated the vision of thirty thou- sand dollars. It would pay off all his debts with an ample amount remaining. All the work and worry of the thing would be over. It was hard telling whether he would ever become any more than a private assistant to Dr. Hamilton anyway. Thirty thousand dollars—thirty thousand dollars, and all his own! Back and forth hia thoughts raced; what couldn’t he do with all that money? “You’ve had five minutes now. Have you decided?’’ “Yes.” “Do you take the offer?” “No.” The blindfold slipped off and a friendly hand was ex- tended toward him. “Shake hands, my boy, you’ve proved your lead. I’m satisfied,” said the voice of old Dr. Hamilton. FLORENCE STUTZMAN, ’25. MORE “MUCH ADO Miss Abigal Ashburton put down her crocheting. It was the laziest day;—even the bees that buzzed in Miss Abigal’s hollyhocks seemed lazy today. And the butterflies rested longer than usual on the giant larkspur bushes which screened the little porch. M iss Abigal could hear Amanda’s snore coming from be- tween the stiffly parted curtains at one edge of the porch. She was glad Amanda was asleep; she had looked forward to the afternoon when she could be alone. For Miss Abigal had something on her mind. ♦•••••♦» Miss Amanda Ashburton sweated and tossed and mussed the very tidy little bed on which she lay; but for once she did not care. Miss Amanda had a problem to solve. For ages, it seemed to her, she lay and listened to the even creak of the porch rocker where Abigal sat sewing, and thought and thought, and then tried not to think. The sisters had a strangely quiet meal that evening, but both were too engrossed in their own thoughts to notice the other. Amanda did not even wonder at her sister’s willingness to wash the dishes alone. Abigal worked slowly, her eyes fixed on the distant blue hills, behind which the evening sun was just setting. She saw not the crooked village street that stretched like an orange ribbon in front of her, smelled not the flowers of her garden and heard not the robin’s evening call. The deep dusk had fallen and one by one the New England stars began to peep. But all the silent beauty of the approaching night was lost to Abigal, for she had stood between the blue-bordered kitchen

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A DOUBLE DECISION T was a cold night in January. During the day a heavy snow had fallen and the city pavements had not all been shoveled clean. But as young Dr. Webster came down the steps of 118 Commonwealth avenue, he was not aware of this. He was thinking deeply of a remark made by old Dr. Hamilton, which faintly suggested an offer that many a young doctor just out of college like Dr. Webster would have been glad to have received. Dr. Hamilton was a man of great re- noun. He was considered Boston’s best physician, and could not be excelled for skill and experience in the lines of surgery. Now he was getting up in years and since he had no sons or heirs to whom he could impart his invaluable knowledge, he decided to find a young doctor who was clean, trustworthy and ambitious, and one whom he could trust, and think of, as a son. Dr. Webster was now the third assistant he had; the other two having, as people thought, resigned because of the old doctor’s exaspirating methods. But they did not know the real cause, for Dr. Hamilton never told any one of his in- nermost intentions. That day the older doctor had told young Webster that he was going to appoint him as his private as- sistant, a thing that he had never before done for any young man. He then gave him a valuable formula for a cure of paralysis which he had worked out and proved himself, and which many surgeons would have been glad to have in their possession. Webster was told to part with it under no cir- cumstances. This was not the only thing that the young doctor was worrying about as he shuffled through the snow; for he had another big problem on his mind. There were yet seven thou- sand dollars to be paid for his college course, and in addition to that were the twenty thousand that friends had lent his father in stacks and which by the cruel trickery of another party his father had lost. It was now up to Dr. Webster to pay the debts. Young Webster strode along through the sifting snow, pondering over his worries. Suddenly a hand smote him and he fell backward, two hands grabbed his wrists, something slipped over his eyes, so that he could not see, and he was bodily picked up and jolted down an alley into a dimly-lighted room . The first thing that entered his mind was the two-inch square piece of paper, held inside his glove, containing the formula. The doctor’s last words, “Under no circumstances part with it.” kept ringing in his ears. That’s what the ruffians were after! What should he do with it,—what could he do with it? His necktie—his hat band—his secret pocket? No,

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curtains and watched that same moon rise from behind that same hill for many a year. No, Abigal saw, instead, a desert stretching far and si- lently, where the heavens seemed so near and the dark-skinned natives glided silently through the burning sand. Abigal heard the amorous voices of the gondoliers, and the splash of oars in deep blue waters. Then Abigal saw Amanda eating a silent supper, blowing out the candle and crawling into a lonely bed leaving Chess, the cat, unfed. Oh! she must not be such a coward. Poor Amanda, she would miss her so! It is rather comforting to feel some one m the world needs you. Well, she would go to Amanda and have it over. Abigal drew a deep breath, set her jaw as firmly as was possible for her, and advanced to her sister’s room. ou here, Amanda?” she addressed the darkness, almost hoping that her sister had gone across the street to sit with old lady Weston. “Y— yes, I’m here, Abigul, come in. I have something to tell you. I—I—you—remember why,” she made a sound which was unmistakably a gulp—“we will have to quit getting eggs from Thompsons; they aren’t fit to use. I—I guess I’d better go to bed.” And she stalked out leaving Abigal to make her resolution all over again. As Amanda got ready for bed, she administered a stern scolding upon herself. “Baby, coward! Act like a two-year-old. A body would think I had done something to be ashamed of. Why Abigal will be glad, and it isn’t as though John wouldn’t be perfectly willing to have her live with us; then she would not lose me and she’d be gaining a brother.” Amanda resorted to the old argument. Then she fell to picturing poor Abigal in her lonely state; Abigal though timid, arguing with the fruit man who always tried to do” her; Abigal, the impractical, adding up her bills at the end of the month. Poor girl, she would miss her sister; but well, it is good to feel one is needed. When Miss Abigal saw Mary Margaret Kennidy turn in at the front gate, she called her into the garden. ’Morning, Miss Abigal—I just brought the mail up from the post office. No, only a seed catalogue or something, I don’t know what it is. Oh, but your mock orange smells lovely, but I’m most afraid to go any closer for fear I spoil the grass.” “Never mind, some day I’m going to have my own selfish way about this garden. I’m not going to clip the tree branches nor pull up the dandelions and the Sweet William is going to spring up and bloom whenever it chooses. And that nice or- derly hedge isn’t going to be trimmed like a poor little puppy dog’s tail, but is going to be high and straggley, and at night when the moon shines in my garden it will all look strange and new.” Oh, Miss Abigal, if it only could be something new! I know it is lovely here—mother says I’m wicked not to ap- preciate it and be satisfied; satisfied to get up and wash dishes, market and sweep, get dinner, wash dishes, then read some of your books and be more dissatisfied than ever. Today. Miss Abigal, 1 was washing windows when that big grey car from the house on Heming's Ridge passed. It was full of girls, my age, but you’d never know it. They had the most beautiful hair—all curly and sunshiny—and they went into Jake Hart- ley’s store with knickers on—like boys. Father was working in the potato field—he saw them, too. He thinks it is dread- ful. I don’t. I like it,—and they just go past again, leaving me here to do the same thing every day.” “Would you like to take a little trip with me, Mary Margaret?” “Oh, you know I’d love it. We had a wonderful time when we went down to Boston, hadn’t we? Why. I could have just stood on the street corner forever and watched the people go by.” They had had a good time. Miss Abigal had been there before, but she had never enjoyed herself more than she did that smeltering July day with Mary Margaret, unless it was the time she had met Cousin Susan there and had spent the day with her. She and Mary Margaret had walked up and down the busiest avenues, walked slowly and watched the peo- ple as they passed. They had stopped to gaze into every shop window, and had taken their time at luncheon. It had been quite a different day front those she and Amanda had spent together, those expeditions from which they had returned tired,—very tired and not very happy. Amanda always had great plans for her days in Boston. She hunted bargains re- lentlessly and never stopped to look in at windows unless to remark, “My lands, that’s an awful price for that hat, but