about him," he said when they informed him of their trouble. "I'll
provide for him right enough. He'll send in his resignation to you the
night, Mr. McCaughan. I'm sure, we're all queer and obliged to you for
the trouble you have taken in the matter."

"Ah, not at all, not at all," they said together.

"And I'll not forget it to either of you, you can depend on that. I
daresay Matthew'll be a help to me in the shop!..."

Thus it was that, unpensioned and in the shadow of disgrace, Uncle
Matthew left the service of the National Board of Education.

John admitted to himself, though he would hardly have admitted it to
anyone else, that his Uncle Matthew's behaviour had been very unusual.
He could not, when invited to do so, imagine either Mr. McCaughan or
Mr. Cairnduff breaking the windows of a haberdasher's shop because of
an advertisement which showed, in the opinion of some reputable people,
both feeling and enterprise. Nevertheless, he did not consider that
Uncle Matthew, on that occasion, had proved himself to be lacking in
mental balance. He said that it was a pity that people were not more
ready than they were to break windows, and he was inclined to think
that Uncle Matthew, instead of being forcibly retired from the school,
ought to have been promoted to a better position.

"If you go on talking that way," his mother said to him, "people'll
think you're demented mad!"


"I wouldn't change my Uncle Matthew for the whole world," John stoutly