THE SUPREME TEST.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 862, 14 November 1916, Page 4

THE SUPREME TEST.

Cecil, alighting from his two-thou-sand-hve-hundred-dollar runabout, crossed the sidewalk and stood in front of the window where the wonderful road-' ster was on exhibition. He knew by heart every, detail of its#perfeet form. Had he not gazed at it daily for a week? He drew from his pocket the catalogue. '' The finest roadster in the world. Six thousand dollars." Cecil's father lived in the big corner house on the avenue. Cecil might have gone to him courageously and asked him for the money, but the boy was too proud for that. "No," he muttered firmly to himself, .as he stood in front of the window. "■"Sliere is only one way. I must save and scriiup and deny myself everything." "" ",. . He stealthily felt* his pocket for all the loose change that accumulated there during the past few-days. Alas! It was a paltry s,joo. BuT? then, it must never be forgotten that Cecil was only 13, and that, in the stress of the war, he had naturally had |to endure his share of the national I burden.

From that moment, however, Cecil was a changed boy. A new light had come into his eyes ; a sense of something he had never felt before. For weeks thereafter he avoided his companions, his bills for gasoline ran down to almost nothing. His father and mother noticed his preoccupation, but wisely l'efrained from comment. "Let him alone," said papa, coming home one day from a ten-million-dollar directors' meeting. "I have great hopes of Cecil."

Two mouths later the boy's father looked out of the window and - saw something standing in front of the house. It was unfamiliar. He sent word by the third assistant butler to the boy's mother. They gazed at it curiously. Then they sent for the boy. "Cecil," said his father, not unkindly, "is that your car?" "Yes, father. It cost ,S6OOO, and I bought it with my own money." His mother's eyes filled with glad tears. "How did you do it?" she cried. "Oh, T denied myself. I saved and scrimped and did everything." His father laid a hand on the boy's curly head, as lie gazed at his mother. "And yet," he whispered, "they say our American youth is degenerating. Character, character—that's what did it."