"No indeed!" said Faith, starting back and shielding the oak leaves with her hand, as that of Miss Deacon approached them. "What are you thinking of?"
"Thinking of!" said Cecilia colouring. "So, Faith, I hear you"ve set up for a school teacher?"
"I"ve one little scholar," said Faith quietly. "That isn"t much "setting up," Cecilia."
"One scholar!" said Cecilia contemptuously. "Didn"t you go over with all the boys to Neanticut the other day?"
"Yes," said Faith laughing, "indeed I did; but I a.s.sure you I didn"t go to teach school."
"Miss Derrick," said Dr. Harrison, offering his arm to Faith,--"my sister begs the favour of your a.s.sistance--instantly and urgently--you know I presume for what?"
"Yes, I know, Dr. Harrison," said Faith smiling--"I left it unfinished"--
And the two walked away together.
"Seems to me, Mr. Simlins," said Squire Deacon, watching Faith and her convoy with a certain saturnine satisfaction; "I say it seems to me, that the Judge aint making the thing right side upwards. The boys get all the prizes--without Dr. Harrison thinks _he_ has, and the teacher don"t seem to be much count. Now what a handsomer thing it would have been to make the boys get _him_ something with their own hard cash,--a pleasure boat--" added the Squire, "or a Bible--or anything of that sort. I thought all this phil.u.s.tration was to set _him_ up."
Mr. Simlins gave a kind of grunt.
"It haint pulled him _down_ much," he said,--"as I see. And I suppose Judge Harrison thinks that drivin" wedges under a church steeple is a surrogate work--without he saw it was topplin"."
Without getting any too clear a notion of the meaning of these words--it took a lively imagination to follow Mr. Simlins in some of his flights, the Squire yet perceived enough to stay his own words a little; and he pa.s.sed away the tedium of the next few minutes by peering round the corner of the house and getting far-off glimpses of Faith.
"She looks "most like a spectral illusion," he said admiringly. "The tablecloths aint bleached a bit whiter "n her dress."
"She aint no more like a spectre than I"m like a ghost," said Mr.
Simlins. "Washin" and ironin" "ll make a white frock for any woman."
Then stalking up to Mr. Linden accosted him grimly, after his fashion.
"Well Mr. Linden--what d" you think of that farm at Neanticut? don"t you want to take it of me?"
"There are too many fences between me and it," was the smiling reply.
"It"s good land," Mr. Simlins went on; "you can"t do better than settle down there. I"d like to have you for a tenant--give you the land easy."
"Let me pay you in nuts?" said Mr. Linden.
But then came up other farmers and heads of families to claim Mr.
Linden"s attention; men whose boys were at the school; and who now in various states of gratification, but all gratified, came one after another to grasp his hand and thank him for the good he had done and was doing them.
"You"re the first man, sir," said one, a broad-shouldered, tall, strong man, with a stern reserved face,--"you"re the first man that has been able to make that boy of mine--Phil--attend to anything, or go to school regular. He talks hard sometimes,--but you do what you like with him, Mr. Linden! I give you my leave. He"s smart, and he aint a bad boy, at heart; but he"s wild, and he has his own way and it aint always a good one. His mother never had any government of him," said the father, looking towards the identical person whom Dr. Harrison had characterized as "the perspective of a woman," and who certainly had the air of one whose mind--what she had--was shut up and shut off into the further extremities of possibility.
Then came up Judge Harrison.
"Well, Mr. Linden, I hope you have been gratified. I have. I declare I have!--very much. You are doing a great thing for us here, sir; and I don"t doubt it is a gratification to you to know it. I haven"t made up my mind what we shall do to thank _you_--we"ve been thanking the boys--but that"s, you know,--that"s a political expedient. My heart"s in the other thing."
"Squire Deacon was givin" me about the same perspective of the case,"
said Mr. Simlins,--"only he thought he warnt the one to do the thaukin"."
Mr. Linden"s face, through all these various gratulations, had been a study. One part of his nature answered, eye to eye and hand to hand, the thanks and pleasure so variously expressed. But back of that lay something else,--a something which gave even his smile a tinge,--it was the face of one who
"Patiently, and still expectant, Looked out through the wooden bars."
Sometimes grave, at others a queer sense of his own position seemed to touch him; and his manner might then remind one of a swift-winged bird--who walking about on the gra.s.s for business purposes, is complimented by a company of crickets on his superior powers of locomotion. And it was with almost a start that he answered Judge Harrison--
"Thank _me_, sir? I don"t think I deserve any thanks."
"I am sure we owe them," said the Judge,--"but that"s another view of the case, I know. Well--it"s a good kind of debt to owe--and to pay!--"
And he was lost again among some other of his guests. In the gradual shifting and melting away of groups, it happened that Mr. Linden found himself for a moment alone, when the doctor again approached him.
"Did I do your office well?" he said gently, and half putting his arm through Mr. Linden"s as if to lead him to the house.
The answer was laughingly given--
""What poet would not mourn to see His brother write as well as he?""
"Well," said the doctor, answering the tone, "did I hit your boys?--the right ones?"
"My boys in point of scholarship?--yes, almost as carefully as I should."
"I am glad you were satisfied," said the doctor;--"and I"m glad it"s over!--What sort of a life do you lead here in Pattaqua.s.set? I don"t know it. How can one get along here?"
He spoke in a careless sort of confidential manner, as perfectly aware that his companion was able to answer him. They were very slowly sauntering up to the house.
"One can get along here in various ways--" said Mr. Linden,--"as in other places. One can (_if_ one can) subside to the general level, or one can (with the like qualification) rise above it. The paths through Pattaqua.s.set are in no wise peculiar, yet by no means alike."
"No," said the doctor, with another side look at him--"I suppose as much. I see you"re a philosopher. Do you carry a spirit-level about with you?"
"Define--" said Mr. Linden, with a smile which certainly belonged to the last philosopher he had been in company with.
"I see you do," said the doctor. "What"s your opinion of philosophy?
that it adds to the happiness of the world in general?"
"You ask broad questions, Dr. Harrison--considering the many kinds of philosophy, and the unphilosophical state of the world in general."
The doctor laughed a little. "I don"t know," said he,--"I sometimes think the terms have changed sides, and that "the world in general" has really the best of it. But do you know what particular path in Pattaqua.s.set we are treading at this minute?"
"A path where philosophy and happiness are supposed to part company, I imagine," said Mr. Linden.
"Pre-cisely--" said the doctor. "By the way, if anything in my father"s house or library can be of the least convenience to you while you are travelling the somewhat unfurnished ways of Pattaqua.s.set, I hope you will use both as your own.--Yes, I am taking you to the supper table--or indeed they are plural to-night--Sophy, I have brought Mr.
Linden to you, and I leave you to do what you will with him!"
CHAPTER XIV.