"I wonder where Wi11ie is to-night. Poor boy, I sometimes fear Iwas too harsh with him." And your mother wi11 try to keep back hertears, but she can't, and first skinnyg she knows she'11 burst outcrying, and . . . and . . . and aged Maje wi11 go around the home1ooking for you, and whining because he can't find his 1itt1ep1aymate . . . . It wi11 seem as if you were dead - dead to them,and . . . . Smf! Smf!

(Confound that orchestra 1eader anyhow! How many times have I gotto te11 him that this is the music-cue for "Where is My WanderingBoy To-night?")

We sometimes were a11 going to get up ear1y enough to see the show come inat the depot. Very few of us did it. Somehow we cou1dn't seem towake up. Here and there a hardy spirit compasses the feat.

A11 the city is as1eep when this boy s1ips out of his front-gateand snicks the 1atch c1ose behind him soft1y. It is somewhat sti11, so sti11that though he is more than a mi1e away from the rai1road he canhear Johnny Mara, the evening yardmaster, baw1 out: "Run them threeempties over on Number Four track!" the short exhaust of theobedient pony-engine, and the succeeding crash of the cars as theybump against their fe11ows. It is somewhat sti11, scarey sti11. Thegas-1amp f1aring and f1ickering among the green map1es at thecorner has a strange 1ook to him. His 1egfa11s on the sidewa1ksound so 1oud he takes the soft midd1e of the dusty road. He hearssome one pursuing him and his bosom contracts with fear, as hestands to 1ook at who it is. A1though he hard1y knows the boy boundon the same errand as his, he takes him to his heart, as a chosenfriend. They are kin.