"I"ll git ter the top, Mr. Polk,--ef I don"t die on the way," he said with solemn earnestness.
It was a most unexpected, peculiarly intense moment for both, and in the silence which followed, the imagination of boy and man scaled lofty peaks, but the mountain of material success which filled Mr.
Polk"s vision was not the beautiful, mystic height upon which the boy gazed, and neither dreamed of the conflict which this fact was to bring about in future years.
"G.o.d hath set eternity in the heart of man," and the child of the woods felt the stirring of an eternal purpose, undefined though it was. The glamour of the world had long since intervened for the man.
The telephone rang noisily, having no respect for visions, and Mr.
Polk rose to answer it while Steve began at once to put on again the new clothes in unconscious ratification of his solemn life-promise to Mr. Polk.
It was Mrs. Colton at the phone and she learned with great relief that Steve had been found. She insisted that Mr. Polk and the boy must come over to supper, after which there would be a little impromptu party of Raymond"s friends for Steve.
The boy looked very sober when this announcement was made to him, but Mr. Polk smiled and said heartily, as he had already done to Mrs.
Colton:
"Of course we will go!" And they went.
There was just a bit of awkwardness when the boys came into the Coltons" that evening and met Steve once more, but Mr. Polk, with an adroit question, started him to telling them about trapping rabbits, chasing foxes and treeing c.o.o.ns while the boys became so interested, including Steve himself, that all unpleasantness was forgotten. Upon leaving, each boy took Steve"s hand with real respect and liking, and Raymond expressed the general sentiment when he exclaimed, "You"re a brick!"
Next day Mr. Polk and Steve started for the mountain school. As they sat together on the train Steve said: "I"ll be larnin" to do things jes" like mammy said fer me ter do. I wonder ef she will know."
"I think so," said Mr. Polk simply, but with a gentle sympathy in his voice, which, whenever expressed by look or tone, seemed to bring the boy close to the heart of the man. Resting a moment in this embrace, Steve asked a question which had come to him several times. His father and all the mature men he had known had been married,--for bachelors are rare in the mountains,--why had Mr. Polk no wife?
"Is ye woman dead, Mr. Polk?" was the question he asked.
"No," answered Mr. Polk, with a smile that flitted quickly, "she did not marry me at all, and so has left me lonely all my life. I would have been a far better man had she done so. As it is," and the bitterness crept into his voice again, "I stopped half-way up the hill of success as I told you, and threw my prospects away. That is why you are to live my life over for me and bring success whether or no."
VIII
OPPORTUNITY
Mr. Polk and Steve made their railroad trip by night, and the sleeper with its rows of shelf-like beds was a fresh experience for the boy, but he climbed to the upper berth and slept the sleep of healthy youth. They reached L---- about seven o"clock in the morning, and the sight of mountain and valley spread out before them in purple beauty gave a strange thrill of joy to Steve. The mountaineer"s love of the mountains rushed upon him after all his new, pleasant experiences with a first consciously defined emotion.
"Well," said Mr. Polk, "now the problem is how we can cover that forty miles which lies between us and our school." But just at that moment he spied an old man helping a woman into a wagon, and at once he stepped up, found they were fortunately going to the same point, and would gladly take in two pa.s.sengers with the ready accommodation of mountain people.
They travelled leisurely on and on, Steve seeing things of a familiar type and Mr. Polk much that was fresh and interesting. They stopped over night at a little settlement and journeyed on again next day, reaching their destination early in the evening. When the group of school buildings came into view, the old mountaineer pointed out the main building with its tower, and told them which was the "gals"
sleepin" place," and which "the boys" sleepin" place," as he termed the two dormitories. He drove directly to the president"s home, a little unpainted frame house. They were cordially received, entertained at supper and taken afterwards to the boys" dormitory, where Steve was given a room with several other boys. Then they walked over to "The Hall," as it was called, and were introduced to the teachers, who were gathering there for the study hour. They had met several when a young woman"s trim, slender figure, with a decided air of the city about it, appeared in the doorway, and the light from within lit up a pair of clear, steady brown eyes, a pleasant mouth with firmness lurking in the corners, and fluffy brown hair put back in a roll from a very attractive face.
She stood a moment there in the doorway with a casual glance for the strangers, then suddenly caught her breath and went white, but instantly recovered herself as the president, oblivious of any tragic moment for her, turned and said:
"This is Miss Grace Trowbridge; she came down here all the way from New York City to teach mountain boys and girls,--and she knows how to do it, too."
Miss Trowbridge bowed and pa.s.sed quickly within the hall.
Mr. Polk acknowledged the introduction with a look on his face that Steve had never seen before, and the boy felt somehow that his good friend had become a stranger as they walked back to the boys"
dormitory for the night. Next morning, too, something had come between them, and when Mr. Polk said he would leave that day instead of staying several days, as he had intended, Steve could make no reply.
Before Mr. Polk left, however, in giving final instructions to his charge, the old kindly manner returned, and as he said, "I hope you will like it here, son," the boy replied with his old freedom:
"I knows I"m a-goin" to like it, and that thar Miss Grace Trowbridge is the nicest one of "em all. She used ter live in New York City, the president said, whar you used ter live. Didn"t you nuver know her thar?" he asked innocently, not yet comprehending in the least city conditions.
Mr. Polk set his lips grimly and answered sternly: "Yes," as he mounted a mule to ride back the forty miles to the nearest railroad station.
What was the matter again? The boy did not know, and he felt as though a sudden chill had come upon him. But a moment later Mr. Polk looked down at him kindly, reached over, pressed his hand, and said: "Be a good boy," as he rode away on the ambling mule.
So Steve began his school life. He went into the second reader cla.s.s, his opportunities at the Follets" having put him beyond the beginners.
In his cla.s.s were children of all ages and mature men and women, who were just getting their first opportunity to learn. Steve was bright and quick, had a good mind, and made rapid progress.
With the superior social advantages which he had found along the way from Hollow Hut to the school, the boy became a great ally of the teachers in the battle for nightgowns, combs, and brushes for the hair and teeth, also for white shirts, collars and neckties on Sunday, which most of the boys thought "plum foolishness anyways."
"Here, fellows," Steve would say when he found them turning in at night with soiled feet, coats and trousers, "this ain"t the way ter git ter be president." He organized a company of "regulators" in the boys" dormitory, and when any fellows turned in with soiled feet, coats and trousers, Steve"s shrill whistle summoned the army and a lively pillow fight ensued which was hard on the pillows but always brought victory for nightgowns. And when a boy refused to brush his hair in the morning the regulators invariably caught him, and the penalty was a thorough brushing down of his rebellious locks by at least twenty-five st.u.r.dy young arms. Under such methods the cause of nightgowns and brushes was made to thrive.
There was another cause which was more difficult, but which enlisted all Steve"s best endeavour. Mountain children are apt to know the taste of liquor from babyhood, but Steve had never liked it and neither had his mother. Occasionally parents, especially fathers, when they visited the school would bring the children bottles of "moonshine" to hide and drink from as they pleased, and the teachers found Steve a great helper, though his corps of "regulators" could not always be relied upon.
In the midst of his interesting, new surroundings Steve"s mind often went back to the rock where Tige lay and to the grave of his "mammy."
How pleased she would be, he thought again and again,--maybe she was--that he was where he could "larn things."
He soon began to write letters to Mr. Polk, and a steady improvement was noted all winter in these letters. There was always a great deal in them about Miss Grace, for she seemed to make him her special charge and the two were great friends. She loved to walk in the woods and talk with Steve, hearing him tell many interesting things which he had learned from intimate a.s.sociation with birds and animals.
Sometimes she would take his hand at the top of a hill and together they would race down, laughing and breathless to the bottom. After such a run, one day, they halted by the bank of a stream beneath one of the grand old beeches for which Kentucky is famous.
"Oh, Steve," she exclaimed enthusiastically, "what a beautiful old beech this is. How symmetrical its giant trunk, how perfect its development of each branch and twig, while it pushes up into the sky higher than all its fellows, gets more sunshine than all the rest, has the prettiest growth of ferns and violets at its base,--and I just know the birds and squirrels love it best!"
Miss Grace had a bubbling, contagious enthusiasm, and Steve followed her expressive gestures as she pointed out each detail of perfection with answering admiration.
"Steve!" She turned suddenly and bent her eyes upon him with still more radiant emphasis. "I want you to be just such a grand specimen of a man! Big and strong and well developed,--pushing up into the sky further than all the rest about you, getting more sunshine than any one else--making little plants to grow and blossom all about you and drawing to you the sweetest and best in life!"
He smiled back into her shining eyes, somewhat bewildered, but with an earnest:
"I sh.o.r.e will try, Miss Grace, but I don"t know just what you mean."
"I mean I want you to study hard, to develop every power of mind and body you have, and then,--give your life for the uplift of the children of the mountains."
She did not press him for a promise, nor linger upon the subject, but the first dim outline of that mystic height of the boy"s vision had been traced.
Upon another walk which they took together Steve asked Miss Grace how she happened to come from her home way up in New York down to Kentucky to teach mountain boys and girls, and she was silent a moment, a look which he could not fathom coming over her bright face. At last she said, "I was very foolish; I threw away happiness. Then I heard of this work and came here that I might redeem my life by making it useful."
There was something about this boy of the mountains that made the telling of the simple truth the natural thing; but startled at even so vague a revealing of her bruised heart, she turned the talk quickly to other things.
IX
A STARTLING APPEARANCE