"Sam Wright's Sam has come back," the doctor said, "the young man

arrived on the noon stage. I wonder what monkey-shines he'll be up to

next!"

"Oh!" she said, and he saw her hands clasp in her lap; "I wonder if

his grandfather knows?"

The color was hot in her face, and William said to himself that the

cub ought to be thrashed! "Maybe he's got some sense by this journey

in search of a publisher," he announced comfortingly.

In her consciousness of old Mr. Wright's dismay, she hardly heard what

the doctor said; but she asked vaguely if Sam had found a publisher.

"Perhaps; I don't know. There are fools in every profession--except

medicine, of course! But I believe he has not imparted any information

on that point. His father merely told me he had come back." In spite

of himself, William's face fell into its own kind lines. "His father

is hard on him," he said; and then he began to tell her stories of the

three generations of Wrights; ending with the statement that, in a

dumb sort of fashion, Samuel loved his son like the apple of his eye.

"But he has always taken hold of him the wrong way," William said.

Certainly the doctor's opinion was borne out by the way in which Sam

senior took hold of his son on his return. Reproaches were perhaps to

be expected, but, alas, the poor, sore-hearted father tried sneers as

well. A sneer is like a flame; it may occasionally be curative because

it cauterizes, but it leaves a bitter scar. Of his dreadful anxiety in

these seven or eight weeks of absence, of his sleepless nights, of his

self-accusings, of his anguished affection, the senior warden could

find nothing to say; but for anger and disappointment and contempt he

had fluent and searing words. Such words were only the recoil from

anxiety; but Sam could not know that; he only knew that he was a

disgrace to his family. The information left him apparently unmoved.

He did not betray--very likely he really did not recognize in

himself--the moral let-down that is almost always the result of such

upbraiding. He was silent under his father's reproaches, and patient

under his mother's embraces. He vouchsafed no information beyond, "I

had to come back," which was really no information at all. Mr. Wright

sneered at it, but Mrs. Wright was moved, she said, her mild eyes

swimming in tears, "Of course, Sammy, dear. Mother understands. I knew

you couldn't stay away from us."




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