_ PART ONE CHAPTER X
When the hot, close-cropped fields took on their first suggestion of autumn and a fuller note was heard in the requiem of the songbirds, when the twilights were of purple and the morning skies delicately mackereled in gray, David entered the little, red, country schoolhouse. M'ri's tutelage and his sedulous application to Jud's schoolbooks saved him from the ignominy of being classified with the younger children.
When he sat down to the ink-stained, pen-scratched desk that was to be his own, when he made compact piles of his new books and placed in the little groove in front of the inkwell his pen, pencils, and ruler, he turned to Little Teacher such a glowing face of ecstasy that she was quite inspired, and her sympathies and energies were at once enlisted in the cause of David's education.
It was the beginning of a new world for him. He studied with a concentration that made him oblivious to all that occurred about him, and he had to be reminded of calls to recitations by an individual summons. He fairly overwhelmed Little Teacher by his voracity for learning and a perseverance that vanquished all obstacles. He soon outstripped his class, and finally his young instructress was forced to bring forth her own textbooks to satisfy his avidity. He devoured them all speedily, and she then applied to the Judge for fuel from his library to feed her young furnace.
"He takes to learning as naturally as bees to blossoms," she reported.
"He must ease off," warned Barnabas. "Young hickory needs plenty of room for full growth."
"No," disagreed the Judge, "young hickory is as strong as wrought iron. He's going to have a clear, keen mind to argue law cases."
"I think not," said M'ri. "You forget another quality of young hickory. No other wood burns with such brilliancy. David is going to be an author."
"I am afraid," wrote Joe, "that Dave won't be a first-class ranchman. He must be plum locoed with dreams."
This prognostication reached David's ears.
"Without dreams," he argued to Barnabas, "one would be like the pigs."
"Wal, now, Dave, mebby pigs dream. They sartain sleep a hull lot."
David laughed appreciatively.
"Dave," pursued Barnabas, "they're all figgerin' on your futur, and they're a-figgerin' wrong. Joe thinks you'll take to ranchin'. You may--fer a spell. M'ri thinks you may write books. You may do even that--fer a spell. The Jedge counts on yer takin' to the law like a duck does to water. You may, but law larnin', cow punchin', and story writin' 'll jest be steppin' stuns to what I know you air goin' ter be, and what I know is in you ter be."
"What in the world is that, Uncle Barnabas?" asked David in surprise. "A farmer?"
"Farmer, nuthin'!" scoffed Barnabas. "Yer hain't much on farmin', Dave, though I will say yer furrers is allers straight, like everythin' else you do. Yer straight yerself. No! young hickory can bend without breakin', and thar's jest one thing I want fer you to be."
"What?" persisted the boy.
Barnabas whispered something.
The blood of the young country boy went like wine through his veins; his heart leaped with a big and mighty purpose.
"Now, remember, Dave," cautioned Barnabas, "what all work and no play done to Jack. You git yer lessons perfect, and recite them, and read a leetle of an evenin'; the rest of the time I want yer to get out and cerkilate."
November with its call to quiet woods came on, and David was eager to "cerkilate." He became animated with the spirit of sport. Red-letter Saturdays were spent with Uncle Larimy, and the far-away echo of the hunter's bullet and the scudding through the woods of startled game became new, sweet music to his ears. Rifle in hand, with dog shuffling at his heels or plunging ahead in search of game, the world was his. Life was very full and happy, save for the one inevitable sprig of bitter--Jud! The big bully of a boy had learned that David was his equal physically and his superior mentally, but the fear of David and of David's good standing kept him from venturing out in the open; so from cover he sought by all the arts known to craftiness to harass the younger boy, whose patience this test tried most sorely.
One day when Little Teacher had given him a verbose definition of the word "pestiferous," David looked at her comprehendingly. "Like Jud," he murmured.
Many a time his young arms ached to give Jud another thrashing, but his mother's parting injunction restrained him.
"If only," he sighed, "Jud belonged to some one else!"
He vainly sought to find the hair line that divided his sense of gratitude and his protection of self-respect.
Winter followed, and the farm work droned. It was a comfortable, cozy time, with breakfast served in the kitchen on a table spread with a gay, red cloth. Pennyroyal baked griddle-sized cakes, delivering them one at a time direct from the stove to the consumer. The early hour of lamplight made long evenings, which were beguiled by lesson books and story-books, by an occasional skating carnival on the river, a coasting party at Long Hill, or a "surprise" on some hospitable neighbor.
One morning he came into school with face and eyes aglow with something more than the mere delight of living. It meant mischief, pure and simple, but Little Teacher was not always discerning. She gave him a welcoming smile of sheer sympathy with his mood. She didn't smile, later, when the schoolroom was distracted by the sound of raucous laughter, feminine screams, and a fluttering of skirts as the girls scrambled to standing posture in their chairs. Astonished, she looked for the cause. The cause came her way, and the pupils had a fresh example of the miracles wrought by a mouse, for Little Teacher, usually the personification of dignity and repose, screamed lustily and scudded chairward with as much rapidity as that displayed by the scurrying mouse as it chased for the corner and disappeared through a knothole.
As soon as the noiseful glee had subsided, Little Teacher sought to recover her prided self-possession. In a voice resonant with sternness, she commanded silence, gazing wrathfully by chance at little Tim Wiggins.
"'T was David done it," he said in deprecating self-defense, imagining himself accused.
"David Dunne," demanded Little Teacher, "did you bring that mouse to school?"
"He brung it and let it out on purpose," informed Tim eagerly.
Little Teacher never encouraged talebearing, but she was so discomfited by the exposure of the ruling weakness peculiar to her sex that she decided to discipline her favorite pupil upon his acknowledgment of guilt.
"You may bring your books and sit on the platform," she ordered indignantly.
David did not in the least mind his assignment to so prominent a position, but he did mind Little Teacher's attitude toward him throughout the day. He sought to propitiate her by coming to her assistance in many little tasks, but she persistently ignored his overtures. He then ventured to seek enlightenment regarding his studies, but she coldly informed him he could remain after school to ask his questions.
David began to feel troubled, and looked out of the window for an inspiration. He found one in the form of big, brawny, Jim Block--"Teacher's Jim," as the school children all called him.
"There goes Teacher's Jim," sang David,
soto voce.
The shot told. For the second time that day Little Teacher showed outward and visible signs of an inward disturbance. With a blush she turned quickly to the window and watched with expressive eyes the stalwart figure striding over the rough-frozen road.
In an instant, however, she had recalled herself to earth, and David's dancing eyes renewed her hostility toward him. Toward the end of the day she began to feel somewhat appeased by his docility and evident repentance. Her manner had perceptibly changed by the time the closing exercise began. This was the writing of words on the blackboard for the pupils to use in sentences. She pointed to the first word, "income."
"Who can make a sentence and use that word correctly?" she asked.
"Do call on Tim," whispered David. "He so loves to be the first to tell anything."
She smiled her appreciation of Tim's prominent characteristic, and looked at the youngster, who was wringing his hand in an agony of eagerness. She gave him the floor, and he jumped to his feet in triumph, yelling:
"In come a mouse!"
This was too much for David's composure, and he gave way to an infectious fit of laughter, in which the pupils joined.
Little Teacher found the allusion personal and uncomfortable. She at once assumed her former distant mien, demanding David's presence after school closed.
"You have no gratitude, David," she stated emphatically.
The boy winced, and his eyes darkened with concern, as he remembered his mother's parting injunction.
Little Teacher softened slightly.
"You are sorry, aren't you, David?" she asked gently.
He looked at her meditatively.
"No, Teacher," he answered quietly.
She flushed angrily.
"David Dunne, you may go home, and you needn't come back to school again until you tell me you are sorry."
David took his books and walked serenely from the room. He went home by the way of Jim Block's farm.
"Hullo, Dave!" called Big Jim, who was in the barnyard.
"Hello, Jim! I came to tell you some good news. You said if you were only sure there was something Teacher was afraid of, you wouldn't feel so scared of her."
"Well," prompted Jim eagerly.
"I thought I'd find out for you, so I took a mouse to school and let it loose."
"Gee!"
David then related the occurrences of the morning, not omitting the look in Little Teacher's eyes when she beheld Jim from the window.
"I'll hook up this very night and go to see her," confided Jim.
"Be sure you do, Jim. If you find your courage slipping, just remember that you owe it to me, because she won't let me come back to school unless she knows why I wasn't sorry."
"I give you my word, Dave," said Jim earnestly.
The next morning Little Teacher stopped at the Brumble farm.
"I came this way to walk to school with you and Janey," she said sweetly and significantly to David.
When they reached the road, and Janey had gone back to get her sled, Little Teacher looked up and caught the amused twinkle in David's eye. A wave of conscious red overspread her cheeks.
"Must I say I am sorry now?" he asked.
"David Dunne, there are things you understand which you never learned from books." _