CHAPTER XXVIII
ON the first Wednesday that Tommy Finnemore abandoned Latin Composition he made his way to the book-store, passed the time agreeably in looking over the small stock of books on magic, and walked home with the girls as usual. On the second Wednesday, he went to the railway station and watched the engines switching. Then just before he decided to leave there to avoid the South Paulding crowd and stroll along the turnpike until the girls should overtake him, he recollected an errand his father had bidden him do at one of the shops. Fearful of losing time, he ran from the platform all the way to the main street.
Forgetting the need of caution, he struck into a lane that could be seen from the school-house windows. Unhappily he wore a conspicuous red knitted wool cap. One ear had been nipped by the frost a week earlier and he had worn the cap since. And when Meadowcroft, glancing out the window five minutes before the close of school, caught sight of a tuft of scarlet at the top of a long, awkward figure loping along like a kangaroo, he couldn’t do otherwise than recognize him. He was taking his turn at breaking rules, it would appear.
To avoid any chance of error, he went into the classroom to make sure Tommy wasn’t there. He discovered more—or less—than he had expected. For not only was Tommy a truant, but neither Rose nor Betty, who had left the main room with the others forty minutesearlier, was anywhere to be seen. As he returned to his desk to dismiss the school, it seemed to the man as if an avalanche had fallen.
It was certainly like an avalanche next day to the three concerned when they were called to an accounting—almost like an avalanche falling upon those who are unaware of the existence in nature of such forces. They had had no inkling of the fact that their absence had been detected. Even if any of the South Paulding children had realized the significance of Mr. Meadowcroft’s standing at the door of the recitation room for less than half a minute, the three companions had no chance to be warned by them. The walking was not good, and as they ran the greater part of the way home, they were all thoroughly tired. Even Tommy did not leave the house that night.
Meadowcroft spent the night at the hotel in Paulding, having remained at school deep in thought until after the last train had gone. He had learned from Miss Cummings that the girls hadn’t been in the Latin Composition class for a number of weeks and that Tommy had been absent twice. He tried to look at the matter dispassionately—tried to consider it as a manifestation of the high spirits of healthy children in winter weather. But he couldn’t see it in that light. Neither Tommy nor Betty was irresponsible. Both stood to him in a relationship different from that between himself and the rest of the school; and he couldn’t but feel that such conduct amounted to a sort of conspiracy against him, a deliberate attempt upon the part of those two (for he didn’t count Rose) to discredit his incumbency of the position of school-master, to make it a sorry failure.It was a stiff indictment, he acknowledged, to make against those of their tender years; but he was ready and eager to be set right. They should have ample opportunity to clear their skirts.
Again, on another Thursday morning, he held back the classes after the opening exercises. But on this occasion he rather icily requested Miss Pogany and Finnemore to take seats on a bench directly in front of the desk. The meaning was plain, but the fact itself was so startling that he had to repeat the order before it was obeyed.
It was truly an awful journey thither. Betty could scarcely drag herself across the room and Tommy’s knees trembled so that he expected to hear the windows rattle. But Rose Harrow sprang to her feet unabashed and followed blithely after. She hadn’t been summoned, but she didn’t mean to be left out. And Meadowcroft, who didn’t fancy her taking it upon herself thus indirectly to criticize him, was ready to order her back, when a little uncertain groping about for the bench on her part reminded him of her blindness and dissipated his indignation. Towards the real culprits, however, his wrath held.
“Am I right in thinking you were all three absent from your class in Latin Composition yesterday?” he asked. Apparently, it wasn’t at all with the purpose of shielding them he had ordered them to the pillory: for he spoke so distinctly and impressively that even if it hadn’t been so appallingly quiet throughout the big room, his voice would have reached the furthermost corners.
Rose’s voice was the only clear one in the general affirmation.
“And the same the week before?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you two girls have missed more lessons than that?”
Something in Betty’s face seemed to apprise him of the shocking truth.
“You haven’t attended that class once since I came here in January to take Mr. Appleton’s place during his critical illness, in short?” he asked cuttingly.
Had Betty been responsible for Mr. Appleton’s illness or even for his death, she could scarcely have looked more appalled—more guilty.
“No, Mr. Meadowcroft,” she gasped. With all her heart the girl longed to tell him that her action had nothing to do with him, that she had done the same thing before Mr. Appleton left; but she couldn’t have framed the sentence even if her promise to Dr. Vandegrift didn’t forbid her to make any admission or confession that wasn’t forced from her.
“It is certainly time to call a halt,” he remarked. “But first will one of you three kindly explain this unusual conduct on the part of pupils at school?”
The long silence, he had himself to break.
“Well, Miss Pogany, what have you to say?” he asked, his voice less stern, more patient.
Alas! what was there she could say! “Nothing,” she returned desperately.
“Miss Harrow?”
“Nothing, Mr. Meadowcroft,” Rose rejoined promptly and rather pertly.
“Finnemore?”
“No, sir,” said Tommy weakly.
Mr. Meadowcroft stared at them incredulously. Still he wouldn’t give up hope.
“Perhaps one of you has a word of regret for the past or of assurance for the future?” he asked in a lower tone.
With all her heart Betty regretted that it had been necessary—imperative for them thus to steal away from school; yet she didn’t, she couldn’t regret that they had done so—only that they had been caught. That she might have cause to regret to the very last day of her life. There was nothing, therefore, to say, and she sat white and rigid with downcast eyes. As for Tommy, for the nonce he seemed conscious only of a desire for the support and shelter of his own seat in the back of the room. He didn’t know what to do with his hands. He dared not drop them lest they indicate how absurdly his knees were shaking; but holding them as he did made him feel like a kangaroo. But even if he had felt like himself he couldn’t express any regrets or assurances while Betty was dumb.
Meadowcroft continued to look from one to another. He hadn’t expected anything like this. It seemed incredible that any one of the three should be so hardened as to feel no compunction, to be unwilling to express even perfunctory regret. And to have them all dumb! He didn’t know how to proceed.
“Am I to conclude that it has been a wilful disregard of rules—a sort of brazen disobedience, as I can’t help terming it?” he demanded with a hint of bitterness, for he was terribly hurt.
No one denied even that extreme statement. Suddenly Meadowcroft turned rather fiercely to Tommy.
Am I to conclude it has been a wilful disregard of rules?“Am I to conclude it has been a wilful disregard of rules?”
“Am I to conclude it has been a wilful disregard of rules?”
“Am I to conclude it has been a wilful disregard of rules?”
“Finnemore, what did you mean when you told me a fortnight since that Miss Pogany and Miss Harrow had remained away from class because it was slippery and they wished to start home early?” he demanded sharply. “Was that the truth?”
Tommy had his tongue between his teeth to keep them from chattering. By all the signs, he seemed in the throes of an ague, but the other fellows wouldn’t understand that and would think he was scared. Unable to speak, he shook his head jauntily.
“Did Miss Pogany tell you to make that excuse?”
“O no, sir, she didn’t know anything about it,” the boy cried emphatically.
“Then why did you say such a thing?” Meadowcroft demanded very sternly.
Afterwards, Tommy could scarcely believe it. And at the time it didn’t seem to be himself that was speaking. Even as he pronounced the words he seemed to be hearing someone else repeat them.
“It was a fish story, sir,” he said, grinning in sickly fashion, “a—er—Finnyfishstory, don’t you know.”
“Tommy,” said Mr. Meadowcroft quietly, then corrected himself.
“Finnemore, you may get your books and go home and remain until Monday. At that time I will talk to you further.”
It seemed hours to Betty that she sat before that stern, pale judge while Tommy stalked to his seat, pulled the books from his desk, dropping one and another and still a third upon the floor, and finally stalked across the room and out slamming the door behind him. Still nothing happened. Was she to sit all day in that terribleplace? And O, what of Rose? What of their visits to Dr. Vandegrift?
Meadowcroft struck the bell for the first classes, and one of them passed into the recitation room. Then he turned to the girls.
“You can go to your seats and to your classes now. I will talk to you, also, further on Monday,” he said rather wearily.