Page 16 - 1947

taunts, no more laughter. If he could only live in Kinot, how happy, how coment he would be!
Thus, in his caildish imag·i11ation, the cnppled boy, neither pure white 11or pure black, excluded from normal ailsociatwn with other cnildren, by · his <1eJ.·ormity and his impure race, created for h.mself a clream-wol'ld, a haven lJ'om lHtte1· reality, filled with misty, Ita!£ formed id.eas. The one concrete t11ought developed from his imaginings was his increasing desire to move t.o h.mot. It haunted his waking moments and filled his sleep with dreams. It.:; fulfillment was, he was sure in his simplicity, the remedy for all the >ague, ununderstandable .longings which ~ssailed h i m .
Then, one day it happened. Lan- J:ie's mother announced that they were 1noving to another town. Into her son's dark eyes filtered the oddly intense look which puzzled the observer.
\\1cn h,s head averted and a curiously 1~dult e x p r e s s i o n o f e x p e c t / a t i o n p r e - pared to turn to resignation, he waited the significant word in the answer to hts tremulous query. When it came, he could scarcely comprehend his mother's reply. A numbness clutched at his ' senses. Gradually understand- il1g filled the void created by the initial shock. A great happiness consumed any doubts or misgivings. His was
complete joy.
Over the events of tl1e following
weeks settled a tenuous veil of imag.. inings which obscured reality from l annie's eyes. He drifted along, c•ccnpied by only one thought. Day r,nd night were one to him, for waking O"' sleeping Kinot and his new life there dominated his mind. Never orice did he think of disenchantment. H h child-faith was flawless; his anticipa- tion unmarred by doubt.
Lannie had 11ever before travelled on a train. It should have been an experience to stir the blood in a frenzy o1 excitement, but he was oblivious to
the new sounds and smells and people. Seated beside his mother in the pass- enger coach, he thought only of the playground and the children in Kinot. He could go straight to it. He wouldn't
' wait to see their house. He .... Un- consciously he lifted his bony shoulders and held his head high in excitement. His eyes, with their dark fire, in his pinched face, presented a startling contrast to the traveller's usual apath- dic glance. The train stopped. They were there! Forgetting his mother, Lannie pushed ahead through the
crowd. With an air oddly military despite his dragging foot, he marched uut to meet his new life. On the plat- rorm, a little girl, caught by the eage1· look on his child-like, yet strangely old face, pulled at her sister's hand ;:;nd wnispered "Look ! That little boy's eyes. '!hey shine like .... like fire!"
"'Nonsense, Emma!" Then more sharply. ''Why, he's only a dirty little nigger, and a cripple, at that! yon k,tow what Mama said!"
The words were spoken in an ill- disguised voice-too ill-disguised to miss Lannie's ear. He turned slowly to look at the agents of his disen- chantment. There had been no mistake in what he had heard. The older child, dragging away her sister, shot a con- tempt-charged glance at the lame boy. At once the breath seemed to pass from him; his shoulders drooped; his eyes lost their expectant gleam. V ery deliberately he drew forth from his shirt pocket the cherished pin. Care-
fully he placed it on the cinders at his feet, with the brightly coloured play- ground picture turned upward. Then, with the exact precision of a machine, his heel ground it into the dust.
C. C. I. GLEANER
ONE
Margaret Hughes
2nd Prize (Middle School)
DA Y AS A CAMP COUNCILLOR
I woke up to the rousing strains of a parody on "There's a Long Long '!'rail A-Wmding." Why couldn't those girls be quiet? But I had made up my mind to be a model councillor that day, and this resolve prompted my aCLion of opening my eyes slowly as ii awakening from delicious sleep and saying sweetly "Good-mornmg, girls. 1 trust that you slept well."
Evidently they had, for they were unusually active-most certainly a presentment of evil-and at intervals they interrupted their ribald song to roar over some joke, which they had just enjoyed. I knew, without a doubt, that it was a practical joke, and that I was the victim of their cruelty. Upon attempting to rise, I was doubly certain, for I found myself very neatly lashed to the bed. Evidently I was expected to be a little annoyed. I did not disappoint them. But my sup- posedly cutting sarcasms were without effect, and I soon learned that there was more to the joke than merely being tied down in bed. Now that I was