“Dropped the Damascus bowl on his head, did you?” gasped the doctor.  Then, as he looked at Buck as if he saw him for the first time, he beheld his bleeding feet and torn knees.  “Officers,” said the great:  surgeon, “you asked who he is.  He’s our boy!  He’s my boy!  I never had a son of my own, but—­but—­Buckney goes to college next year, and he goes as my adopted son.  This night has shown me what he’s made of.”

Then, for the first time in all that dreadful night, Miss Connie gave out.  She sat weakly down, crying like a very little child.  “Oh, Buckney!” she sobbed, “they told us not to take a Barnardo boy; that they were, half of them, just street arabs; that we—­we couldn’t trust them.  So, sometimes I’ve been afraid to hope you were all right; and now you have probably saved my life.”

“No ‘probably’ about it, Miss Connie,” said the officer; “he undoubtedly has saved your life, and the doctor’s too.  But, come, child, don’t cry; get to bed—­there’s a good little girl.  You’ve had a bad night of it.”  Then, turning to his men, he commanded:  “March those two choice specimens to the police station at once.  Well, good-night, doctor!  Good-night, Miss Connie.”  And looking at Buck he said, curiously, “Good-night, youngster!  So you’re a Barnardo boy, eh?”

“Yes, sir,” said Buck, lifting his chin a little.  “I used to be ashamed of it, but—­”

“You needn’t be,” said the officer.  “It’s not what a boy was, but what he is, that counts nowadays.  Goodnight!  I wish we had more Britishers like you.”

Then the door closed and the tramp of the policemen and their prisoners died slowly away in the night.

The Broken String

Archie Anderson was lying on the lounge that was just hidden from the front room by a bend of the folding doors.  He was utterly tired out, with that unreasonable weariness that comes from what most of his boy chums called “doing nothing.”  He had been standing still, practising for two hours steadily, and his throbbing head and weakening knees finally conquered his energy.  He flung himself down among the pillows, his violin and bow on a nearby chair.  Then a voice jarred on every nerve of his sensitive body; it was a lady’s voice in the next room, and she was saying to his mother: 

“And how is poor Archie to-day?”

“Poor Archie!” How he hated to be called “poor” Archie!

His mother’s voice softened as she replied:  “Oh, he’s pretty well to-day; his head aches and he seems to be weak, but he has been practising all the morning.”

“He must be a great care and anxiety to you,” said the caller.

Archie shuddered at the words.

“Only a sweet care,” said his mother.  “I am always hoping he will outgrow his delicate health.”

Archie groaned.  How horribly like a girl it was to be “delicate.”