The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys Part 24

Little Jim heard, though he did not seem to be listening, being intent on making things uncomfortable for Barney and Tommie as far as he could in a quiet way.

It was a pa.s.sion with little Jim to prove things--not by his mother's method, but by his own. So far his disputes had been with boys of his own size and larger, and if they doubted what he said he was in the habit of proving his a.s.sertions with his fists. The result was that other boys either dodged him or agreed with him with suspicious readiness. His mother had given him a fair trial at the housework. He would prove to her that it was not because he could not, but because he would not, that he succeeded no better. He washed the dishes with care and put them s.h.i.+ning on their shelves, and, a little later, poked his head out of the bedroom door into the kitchen.

"Mother," he said, "you think I can't make a bed good, don't you?"

The widow smiled. "I think you _don't_ make it good," was her answer.

Jim's face darkened with resolution. "She thinks I can't," he said to himself. "I will, I guess."

With vim he set to work, and the bed was made in a trice. Little Jim stood off as far as he could and sharply eyed his work. "'Tain't done good," he snapped. And he tore it to pieces again. It took longer to make it the next time, for he was more careful, but still it didn't look right. He tore the clothes off it again, this time with a sigh. "Beds is awful," he said. "It's lots easier to lick a boy than to make a bed."

And then he went at it again. The third time it was a trifle more presentable, and the school bell was ringing.

"I've got to go, and I hain't proved it to her," he said. "But I'll work till I do, see if I don't. And then when I have proved it to her I won't make no more beds."

Jim was no favorite at school, where he had fallen a whole room behind the cla.s.s he had started with. His teacher usually wore a long-suffering air when she dealt with him.

"She looks like she thought I didn't know nothin' and never would," he said to himself that morning when he had taken his seat after a decided failure of a recitation. "I'll show her." And he set to work. His mind was all unused to study, and--that day he didn't show her.

"Who'd 'a' thought it was so hard to prove things?" he said at night.

"There's another day a-comin', though."

Now some people are thankful for showing. To little Jim, showing was degrading. Suddenly his mother perceived this, and felt a relief she had not known before.

"Whativer else Jim's got or not got," she said, "he's got a backbone of his own, so he has. Let him work things out for himsilf. Will I be showin' him how to make a bed? I won't that. I've been praisin' him too much, intoirely. I see it now. Praise kapes Pat and Moike and Andy doin'

their best to get more of it. But it makes little Jim aisy in his moind and scornful loike, so his nose is in the air all the toime and nothin'

done. A very little praise will do Jim. And still less of fault-findin'," she added.

"B'ys," she announced that evening "Jim's took a turn. We'll stand off and watch him a bit. If he'll do roight for his own makin', sure and that'll be better than for us to be havin' a hand in it. Give him his head and plinty of chances to prove things, and when he has proved 'em, own up to it."

The two brightened. "I couldn't believe little Jim was so bad, mother,"

said Mike.

"Bad, is it? Sure and he ain't bad yet. And now's the toime to kape him from it. 'Tis little you can be doin' with a spoiled anything. Would you belave it? He made his bed three toimes this mornin' and done his best at it, and me a-seein' him through the crack of the door where it was open a bit. But I can't say nothin' to him nor show him how, for showin's not for the loike of him. And them that takes iverything hard that way comes out sometimes at the top of the hape. Provin' things is a lawyer's business. If Jim iver gets to be a lawyer, he'll be a good wan."

Mike, when he went to bed that night, looked down at the small red head of the future lawyer, snuggled down into the pillow, with the bedclothes close to his ears. "I'll not believe that Jim will ever come to harm,"

he said.

CHAPTER XX

"There's another day comin'," little Jim had said when he lay down in acknowledged defeat on the night that followed his first day of real trying. The other day came, and after it another and another, and still others till the first of March was at hand. In the three months, which was the sum of those "other days," Jim had made good progress. For many weeks he had been perfect in the art of bed-making, but instead of giving up the practice of that accomplishment, as he had declared he would do so soon as he could prove to his mother that he could make a bed, he had become so cranky and particular that n.o.body else could make a bed to suit him. And as for studying--he was three cla.s.ses ahead of where the first of December had found him. He could still whip any boy rash enough to encounter him, but his days and even his evenings, in great part, were given to preparing a triumph over his mates in his lessons, and a surprise for his teacher.

The widow used to lean back in her husband's chair of an evening and watch him as he sat at the table, his elbows on the pine and his hands clutching his short hair, while the tiny, unshaded lamp stared in his face, and he dug away with a pertinacity that meant and insured success.

"And what book is that you've got?" she would ask when he occasionally lifted his eyes. He would tell her and, in a moment, be lost to all surroundings. For little Jim was getting considerable enjoyment out of his hard work.

"Pat nor Moike niver studied loike that," thought Mrs. O'Callaghan. "Nor did even Andy. Andy, he always jist loved his book and took his larnin'

in aisy loike. But look at that little Jim work!" As for little Jim, he did not seem to observe that he was enjoying his mother's favorable regard.

"And what book is it you loike the best?" she asked one evening when Jim was about to go to bed.

"The history book," was the answer.

"And why?"

"'Cause there's always a lot about the big foightin' men in it."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'Look at that little Jim work!'"]

"Ah!" said the widow. "Andy, he loiked the history book best, too. But I didn't know before 'twas for the foightin'."

"'Tain't," briefly replied little Jim. And seeing his mother's questioning look he went on: "The history book's got a lot in it, too, about the way the people lived, and the kings and queens, and them that wrote poems and things. 'Tis for that Andy loikes the history book.

He'll be writin' himself one of these days, I'm thinkin'. His teacher says he writes the best essays in the school already."

And having thus artlessly betrayed Andy's ambition, little Jim went to bed.

"Ah!" thought the widow, getting out her darning, for only one could use the lamp at a time, and if Jim was of a mind to study she was of no mind to hinder him. "And is that what Andy'd be at? I wonder now if that's a good business? I don't know none of them that has it, and I can't tell."

She drew one of Jim's stockings over her hand and eyed ruminatingly the prodigious hole in the heel. "That b'y do be gettin' through his stockin's wonderful," she said dismissing Andy from her thoughts. "Well, if he niver does no worse than that I'll not be complainin', but sure and he can make more darnin' than Pat and Moike and Andy put together."

Why are the winds of March so high? This spring they blew a gale. As they roared around corners and through tree tops and rushed down the streets with fury they made pedestrians unsteady. But they did not disturb little Jim, who b.u.t.toned up his coat tight, drew down his hat and squared his shoulders as he went out to meet their buffets. There was that in little Jim that rejoiced in such weather.

One day those frantic winds reached down the big schoolhouse chimney and drew up a spark of fire from the furnace in the bas.e.m.e.nt. They lodged it where it would do the most harm, and, in a short time, the janitor was running with a white face to the princ.i.p.al's office. As quietly as possible each teacher was called out into the hall and warned. And, in a few moments more, the pupils in every room were standing in marching order waiting for the word to file out. Something was wrong each room knew from the face of its teacher. And then came the clang of the fire bell, and the waiting ranks were terrified.

Little Jim's teacher on the second floor was an extremely nervous young woman. In a voice that trembled with fright and excitement she had managed to give her orders. She had stationed most of the boys in a line running north and south and farthest from the door. Nearest the door were the girls and some of the smaller boys. And now they must wait for the signal that should announce the turn of their room to march out. As it happened, little Jim stood at the head of the line of boys, with the girls not far from him. The fire bell was ringing and all the whistles in the town screaming. Below them they could hear the little ones hurried out; above them and on the stairs the third-floor pupils marching; and then in little Jim's room there was panic. The girls huddled closer together and began to cry. The boys behind little Jim began to crowd and push. The nearest boy was against him when little Jim half turned and threw him back to place by a vigorous jerk of his elbow.

"Boys! Boys!" screamed the teacher. "Standstill!"

But they did not heed. Again they struggled forward, while the teacher covered her face with her hands in horror at the thought of what would happen on the crowded stairways if her boys rushed out.

And then little Jim turned his back on the door and the girls near him and made ready his fists. "The first boy that comes I'll knock down!" he cried. And the line shrank back.

"We'll be burned! We'll be burned up!" shrieked a boy, one of the farthest away.

"You won't be burned nayther," called back little Jim. "But you'll wish you was to-morrow if wan of you gets past me. Just you jump them desks and get past me and I'll lick you till you'll wish you was burnt up!"

Little Jim's aspect was so fierce, and the boys knew so well that he would do just as he said, that not one moved from his place. One minute little Jim held that line of boys. Then the door opened and out filed the girls. When the last one had disappeared little Jim stepped aside.

"Go out now," he said with fine contempt, "you that are so afraid you'll get burned yourselves that you'd tramp the girls down."

The last to leave the room were the teacher and little Jim. Her grasp on his arm trembled, but it did not let go, even when they had reached the campus which was full of people. Every business man had locked his doors and had run with his clerks to the fire. For this was no ordinary fire.

The children of the town were in danger. At a distance Jim could see Pat with Larry in his arms and Barney and Tommie close beside him, and here and there, moving anxiously through the crowd, he saw General Brady and Mike and Andy. But the teacher's grasp on his arm did not relax. The fire was under control now and no damage had been done that could not be repaired. And the teacher was talking. And everybody near was listening, and more were crowding around and straining their ears to hear. Those nearest were pa.s.sing the story on, a sentence at a time, after the manner of interpreters, and suddenly there was a shout, "Three cheers for little Jim O'Callaghan!"

[Ill.u.s.tration "'Three cheers for little Jim O'Callaghan.'"]

And then Mike came tearing up and gave him a hug and a pat on the back.

And up came Andy with a look in his eyes that made little Jim forgive him on the spot for being first in that housework team in which he himself had been placed second by his mother. And the General had him by the hand with a "Well done, Jim!" At which Jim appeared a trifle bewildered. His fighting propensities had been frowned on so long.