school. That war in the winter. Ruth war so set on me ter come, "n" me the same, I couldn"t sleep. She said I"d be like Lincoln, "n" Clay, "n"
even finer--ef thar is sech a thing as bein" finer"n them! But I knowed I"d be jest as fine, "n" she did too. But ye see, with all our people daid, "cept me "n" her, I couldn"t leave. She knowed how "twar, "n" one day a woman come from over the mounting ter live with us. I reckon Ruth had the preacher ask her ter come "n" stay thar whilst I war heah ter school; fer her man had got caught makin" licker "n" had ter do time down in the settlemints."
"We say "her husband"; not "her man," Dale."
"Thank-ee. Well, she come, "n" Ruth says fer me ter light out, "n" ter tell ye all I know, as "twon"t take so long as tellin" ye all I don"t.
"N" she give me the ole mare, "n" nine dollars--all we had. The mawnin"
I left," his voice slipped back into the whispery accents, "she put her arms "round my neck, "n" asked me ter make her one promise."
"What was that promise? Can you tell me?"
"Hit war jest somethin"," he hesitated, flushing. "She said she war willin" fer me ter do any other kind of sinnin", ef I jest plain couldn"t git outen hit, but she hoped I might die afore doin" _that_.
Then she got on her knees "n" fer most a hour prayed Gawd ter strike me daid afore He"d see me do hit. She said," he added softly, "hit air on accounten _that_ sin as how-c.u.m she"s blind."
Jane shuddered. She could picture the cabin room, the girl kneeling on the rough board floor, her sightless eyes raised to the wall of logs and mud, her frantic prayer to have this only brother kept safe and sent back to her; but, if he were about to sin a certain sin, to strike him dead.
She was too deeply moved to speak, and indeed she felt that words would be out of place in this pause which seemed so eloquent of a curiously comforting holiness. On his own part, he merely sat there looking down at his awkward boots. Finally, with sincere, trembling regret in his voice, he murmured:
"I"m sorry ye"ve a headache."
"Thank you, Dale." Her reply was tenderer than she knew, for now he still further appealed to her. From men in the valley, this solicitation might probably have denoted no more than ordinary politeness, but she knew from experience that the phlegmatic mountaineers must be moved by strong emotion to sympathize with one in pain. "It"s all gone, now," she added.
"Whoop-ee!" he gave a sudden yell, at the same time springing into the air and striking his heels twice together in a wild dance of joy.
"Whoop-ee!" he yelled again. "Git hit, "n" let"s begin! Git hit, I say!"
"Dale!" she cried in consternation, drawing back from him. "Are you mad?"
"Bob said ye couldn"t teach "counten yo" haid," he breathlessly continued, his face glowing with excited pleasure. "But now ye kin! Now ye kin git the book "n" give me my larnin", can"t ye?"
He was looking down at her with an expression she had never beheld in anyone"s face--enthusiasm, wildness, even madness; but his eyes were not seeing her. They missed the parted, startled lips, the heightened color of her oval cheeks, the pulsing throat, and the frightened breathing.
They watched only for her to produce the key to his religion--a book.
And she read this in his burning eyes as though it were written there in cold, black, selfish letters. A deep smouldering and immoderate anger seized her. That this man who had seemed such a power of softness should so show himself to be a thing of self-centered flint, wounded her; and Jane rebelled at wounds. For the moment they stared, seemingly hypnotized; until at last her voice came as low and expressionless as his had been full of fire.
"Sit down. I"ll get a book, but before you look into it you shall learn a lesson that will be more useful."
He obediently dropped into his chair, but she remained standing and, in the same monotone, said:
"You"ve told me about your Sunlight Patch, and of a blind sister who reads all day and into the nights to throngs of ignorant people for their improvement; who gave the only horse and the last nine dollars on the place, and left herself nearer helpless than she already was, in order that you might start out to be a great man--a man like Lincoln, or like Clay." He missed a touch of fine sarcasm here. "Now let us see what you have done, and how far you have emulated the great hearts of those n.o.ble patterns you"ve set out to follow: Yesterday you arrived, and,"
here her cheeks turned a deeper pink, "defended a school teacher against insult. Understand, you did not champion a defenseless girl; it was the school teacher, whom you considered as a necessity to your future. This morning you went out before daylight--I"ve heard about it--to punish, not an offender against society, but a probable menace to your ambition. You are sorry if the school teacher has a headache, not because a human being is suffering, but because your own desire is thwarted. You have no more charity in your soul than a stone!"
He was silent, contrite and humble, but she had not finished with him yet. While the instinct of the teacher had been stirred, more thoroughly had been aroused a girl"s offended pride. So in the same voice she went relentlessly on:
"First learn that your mountain is not the only place which holds a Sunlight Patch! There is one everywhere," her hand, unconsciously placed against her breast, now pressed as she spoke. "In everyone there must be that same selfless desire to give the last horse and the last nine dollars to whomsoever it may carry to a higher goal, or mankind is a failure. Learn this now. Do not think because you were born in Sunlight Patch that any of its virtues are clinging to you. We carry no virtues but our own--remember that! Don"t forget that other people depend on you just as much as you depend upon them, and that life is a big game of give and take--the giver usually winding up with the largest share of happiness. Now go to the house. Bob has called you twice!"
He rose slowly. There was a tightness in his throat; his head throbbed and hurt. His capacity for learning, the true offspring of his insatiable desire, had become so like a dry sponge drawing in from every trickle of knowledge which flowed through his remote habitation, that he missed no word of what she said--each had sunk deep into his mind as a marble that is tossed into a limpid pool, gradually settling until it rests on the clear bottom, forever to be undisturbed, but forever in sight.
It suddenly occurred to him that Bob had really called, and he took a step in that direction, but turned once more to look at her. No one could have met that look unmoved, much less this girl who had been the necessary cause of it. It was so haunted, so pleading for another chance, and he seemed so pitifully helpless in his awkwardness and homespun clothes, that in spite of herself two tears welled into her eyes, balanced, and fell. She dashed them quickly away and turned her back to him. Again the tightness seized his throat while wave after wave of something particularly cruel swept through him.
His sister had never cried--or, at least, not in his presence; nor had the few bare-footed girls he knew. They might have bawled their eyes out and he would have calmly walked away. But this one was different, very different, and he could not move; this was the teacher, his teacher, the thing he had set up on a pedestal by the throne of G.o.d Himself--yes, higher; or, at any rate, more continuously in his thoughts.
"Have you forgotten Bob wants you?" she finally asked.
"No"m," he answered. "I war jest "bout ter go."
A woodp.e.c.k.e.r tapping on the dead top of a tree now stopped amidst a breathless stillness. Bees were droning in the air, and softly over the land came the song of a happy field hand. It was all very peaceful and very quiet; too peaceful, too cloyingly quiet for Jane just then, and, as he continued to stand, she fairly screamed at him:
"Are you petrified?"
"What"s petrified?" he asked simply.
Slowly she turned and faced him; her eyes showing no tears, only tolerant surprise and amus.e.m.e.nt.
"Really, Dale, you are the most extraordinary person! Petrified means having become stone, or stony; sometimes stunned, or dazed. Now run along to Bob!"
While she watched him striding over the lawn, a low, merry laugh made her turn to behold Nancy, a picture of mischief--although with traces of a recent storm in her own eyes. Yet, like so many of the physically mature but mentally undeveloped, sorrows did not rest heavily upon her for any length of time.
"I didn"t mean to laugh," she apologized, "but it did sound so funny sending that big feller away like that! That"s all I heard," she added quickly.
"He"s really no more than a boy," Jane smiled. "You"ll probably see him in school Monday. What"s the matter?"
"Oh, lots;" Nancy flopped, rather than sat, on the gra.s.s. "I can"t keep on goin" to school! I can"t do these sums a-tall! Pappy"s drunk again, an" throwin" things around the house just awful. He can"t mortgage the farm for any more, an" the storekeeper in town says he"s goin" to sue him for what he owes, an" he"s got drunk to forget it, I reckon. I can"t work out this old thing in long division, anyway, Miss Jane, let alone when he"s throwin" things!"
Most of this story had often before been poured into the teacher"s sympathetic ears.
"You must have more grit than that," she said, patting one of the girl"s hands. "You know I"ll stand by you, and you know you"re doing very nicely!"
"I reckon I ought to know," Nancy sighed. "But, honest, Miss Jane, I"ve used up enough grit for a flock of dominick hens! There isn"t any more left on our place!"
Jane laughed. "If I"m not terribly mistaken in the girl, you"ll find another supply before getting home."
"I reckon you"re awful mistaken, then," she sighed dolefully. "I"ve just plain got to the end of the pile. It"s hard, Miss Jane, honest it is, with Pappy cussin" an" drunk, an" barely enough to eat, an" not decent clothes to wear! His mealy-mouthed wife stands for it, but I don"t, an"
that makes things all the hotter. I"m tired of it! Why, I could have everything I want if--if--"
"If what?" Jane quickly asked. She looked fixedly at the girl whose face, suddenly crimson with blushes, made an effort to look calmly back.
"Oh, if nothin", I reckon," Nancy stammered.
"Sit over here nearer to me, Nan," Jane said after awhile. "I"m lonely myself today, and I"ve just heard something I want to tell you."
In no school could she have acquired that faculty for reaching one"s confidence, and this artfully expressed feeling of loneliness touched a response in the girl"s nature which she now frankly confessed by timidly snuggling against Jane"s knees.
"Poor, tired thing," Jane murmured, her fingers touching Nancy"s hair.
"Do you sometimes fancy everyone unsympathetic?"
"Sort of," came a trembling little sigh.
Again the bees droned their drowsy lullaby. The song of the field hand was hushed, but in its place was the smell of new turned earth that told of a labor finished.
With every detail vividly drawn, she related the story of the blind girl in a remote wilderness which had achieved the name of Sunlight Patch; of what she had accomplished; of all she had given to the lives of those about her. And in a lowered voice told of the promise exacted of her brother, her only brother and support. When she finished, Nancy was looking up with wide open eyes.