CHAPTER XXIX
THAT night when Meadowcroft alighted from the train at South Paulding, he found Tommy waiting.
“I didn’t mean to be so fresh this morning, honest and true,” the boy burst forth breathlessly. “I’m just no end cut up about it, Mr. Meadowcroft. I don’t see—gee! I wish you had given me one good licking.”
“That’s all right, Tommy,” Meadowcroft assured him warmly. “I realized afterwards it was nothing but bluster. We are too good friends to let anything come between us now.” And he rested on one crutch so that they could shake hands.
“I wish you’d flung a book at my head,” Tommy exclaimed as they went on up into the avenue.
“Your slamming the door made sufficient commotion,” Meadowcroft remarked with a smile. “And then, too, don’t forget you’ve got something more coming to you Monday.”
Tommy grinned. Meadowcroft waited a little, hoping the boy would have something to say of the real matter at issue. Tommy’s reticence confirmed his recent conclusion that he wasn’t the culprit he had believed him. His participation in the mischief had been, like the falsehood he had told, solely for the sake of shielding Betty Pogany, who had apparently suddenly been seized with an impulse to be as naughty as she could be to see what it was like. So instead of blaming Tommy, Meadowcroft felt like showing his appreciation of his loyalty. Andas the surest way to Tommy’s heart was through magic, he asked the boy if he had succeeded in getting the red, white, and blue layers in a jar of water.
“Not yet,” said Tommy, “nor soon either, for that matter.”
“What do you mean?” Meadowcroft demanded.
“No magic for yours truly till school’s out in June,” Tommy returned, grinning.
“Tommy Finnemore, what do you mean?” cried Meadowcroft. Had he sent the boy home to set the house afire or do something equally destructive with his magic?
“Dad was fierce when he heard I’d been sassing you, so he handed me out that sentence,” returned the boy coolly.
“How did he hear? Who told him?”
“I did. He wanted to know why I was home at that time o’ day and I said I was sent home for talking back.”
Which proved that Tommy wouldn’t lie to serve himself. Meadowcroft’s heart sank. He wished he had done anything rather than bring that punishment upon the boy. It began to look as if it had been a mistake—a huge error for him to take the school. He had brought this upon one of his friends and had apparently alienated the other. And yet, had he wished to refuse to help out Mr. Appleton he could hardly have done so. And having gone so far, he couldn’t retreat now.
“I am right sorry about that. Tommy. I wish with all my heart I could do something about it,” he said earnestly.
“You needn’t be sorry. It was just right. For oncein his life dad did the correct thing,” the boy declared staunchly.
Reaching the house, Meadowcroft asked Tommy to come in, but Tommy was due at home. Meadowcroft hesitated.
“Shall you see Betty?” he asked. And Tommy said that he should.
“You might say to her that I shall be right here to-night and to-morrow after school and all day Saturday and Sunday,” he said. “If she should feel like talking things over, it might be easier and simpler here.”
Tommy delivered the message immediately. Betty heard it indifferently. Indeed, it failed to penetrate her wretchedness sufficiently to make any impression. Terrible as the experience of that morning had been, it already seemed to the girl far, far in the past. Her one thought was of Rose and of the weekly visits to Dr. Vandegrift. If the latter were over, if Rose was condemned to perpetual blindness, what did anything matter?
All day, the girl’s heart had been like a stone. Never in her life had she known such wretchedness. She had proposed to Rose that they should take the train home. It wasn’t that she wouldn’t have preferred to walk, but that she knew she couldn’t possibly keep up her courage with Rose for so long a period. Rose apparently hadn’t suffered greatly yet; but that was because she hadn’t yet realized the import of it all. Betty, convinced against her will that all was lost, wouldn’t, nevertheless, give up yet. But she wanted to have forced some hope out of the situation before she should see Rose again.
Finally, it came to her that they could get Dr. Vandegriftto see them on Wednesday at three o’clock or a quarter of an hour before. His time was all taken, she knew, but he might be able to manage it by changing another patient. Then they could go directly after school. That would make them very late in getting home and it would be very difficult to arrange with Aunt Sarah and Mrs. Harrow. Tommy could probably contrive something to satisfy the latter; but Aunt Sarah seemed hopeless. And yet, Betty couldn’t let her block Rose’s cure—couldn’t let her ruin Rose’s whole future. Over Sunday Betty debated appealing to her father. On Monday morning she decided to go to him that night and ask his permission to come home late for one night a week, explaining that Rose wished it very much. By the time she reached school, the girl was full of hope.
But hope was suddenly and finally quenched very shortly after the opening of school. Again, the three offenders were summoned to the bench before the desk that was like the prisoner’s cage—a refinement of cruelty which even Tommy admitted to be “piling it on.” But for Betty the walking the length of the room with everyone staring at her and sitting in that conspicuous place was so terrible that it acted rather as an anæsthetic rendering her less sensitive to the trial and verdict. Perhaps, however, it would be nearer fact to liken it to suffering with a severe tooth-ache the while a broken arm is being set. For certainly her sensibility wasn’t deadened.
Meadowcroft’s manner was different to-day. He was quiet, seemed rather sad than indignant, and his voice was weary—almost discouraged. He asked whether anyone had any explanation to offer or any extenuatingcircumstances to submit. But nothing was forthcoming.
“I confess that I hardly know how to deal with such flagrant insubordination,” he admitted, “nor understand how young people can be so unmoved after sufficient time to meditate upon deliberate wrong-doing. It makes me regret for the first time that another than I did not take Mr. Appleton’s place during his absence, one who would have been more skilful to handle such an affair—or better yet, one whom pupils would have liked and respected too well to defy in such fashion.”
Rose caught her breath quickly as if in protest. Tommy flushed so deeply that his freckles were swallowed up, and Betty, whose face couldn’t have been whiter, unconsciously wrung her hands.
“Of course all that is beside the point,” Meadowcroft was going on. “Here I am in the master’s chair, with the duty before me of dealing with the case as best I can. I can’t help doubting whether the two of you who offended a second time, who having been held up for breaking a rule and warned deliberately, broke it again—I rather doubt whether such rebels against duly-constituted authority belong in the school or ought to be allowed to remain longer in this law-abiding body.”
The silence was appalling. Glancing at Betty, Tommy wished with all his heart, he had followed her sooner so that he could share the worst with her. Meadowcroft glanced at the girl, too, and made a final appeal.
“Perhaps, Miss Pogany, even though you acted deliberately, you wouldn’t do it again? Perhaps you regret it now?” he asked very kindly.
Betty looked at him almost wildly. If only he knew!And she strove to cling to the remembrance that he didn’t know, lest she begin to hate him. He thought the look defiant.
“Then I am to infer that you acted deliberately and that you have no regrets?” he concluded. And her silence gave consent.
Tommy raised his hand. Meadowcroft noticed the stains on it and even at the moment realized that when they had worn off there would be no others for many weary weeks.
“Yes, Finnemore?” he said kindly.
“It was just the same for me. Mr. Meadowcroft, as for the girls.” Tommy said quietly. “I heard what you said the first time and of course I understood.”
“I daresay. Well, then none of you would seem to belong to the school whose discipline you have flouted. However, in the absence of the regular master, I am not going to put you out. I shall see to it, nevertheless, that so long as we all remain, you shall break no further rules. Also, penitent or impenitent, you shall do what is possible towards making up what you have lost. There are three weeks before the Easter holidays. During that period you are not to leave the school-grounds after you arrive in the morning until you go to the station at night. And beginning to-day the three of you are to remain after school every day until quarter-past four o’clock. The extra time is to be devoted solely to Latin Composition with a daily recitation beginning at half-past three. I shall do my best to prepare you to take the examination with the others on the last day of the term. Prepare the first lesson in the book for to-day, please.”
Tommy, who couldn’t help admiring the neatness ofthis arrangement even as he groaned within himself, raised his hand.
“That will make sixteen or seventeen lessons for us, and the rest of the class only gets about twelve in all, and Miss Cummings has a roomful to teach and you’ll only have us three,” he remarked ingenuously.
“A little extra drill won’t do any harm,” remarked Meadowcroft dryly. “I am hoping, indeed, to make the course thorough. That will do. You may go to your seats.”