Darrel of the Blessed Isles Part 25

"If you'll watch my feet, you'll see how I do it," said she; and lifting her skirt above her dainty ankles, glided across the floor on tiptoe, as lightly as a fawn at play. But Sidney Trove was not a graceful creature. The muscles on his lithe form, developed in the school of work or in feats of strength at which he had met no equal, were untrained in all graceful trickery. He loved dancing and music and everything that increased the beauty and delight of life, but they filled him with a deep regret of his ignorance.

"Hard work," said he, breathing heavily, "and I don't believe I'm having as much fun as you are."

The small company of spectators had been laughing with amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Reminds me of a story," said the teacher. "'What are all the animals crying about?' said one elephant to another. 'Why, don't you know?--it's about the reindeer,' said the other elephant; 'he's dead. Never saw anything so sad in my life. He skipped so, and made a noise like that, and then he died.' The elephant jumped up and down, trying the light skip of the reindeer and gave a great roar for the bleat of the dying animal, 'What,' said the first elephant, 'did he skip so, and cry that way?' And he tried it.

'No, not that way but this way,' said the other; and he went through it again. By this time every animal in the show had begun to roar with laughter. 'What on earth are you doing?' said the rhinoceros. 'It's the way the reindeer died,' said one of the elephants.

"'Never saw anything so funny,' said the rhinoceros; 'if the poor thing died that way, it's a pity he couldn't repeat the act.'

"'This is terrible,' said the zebra, straining at his halter. 'The reindeer is dead, and the elephants have gone crazy.'"

"Sidney Trove," said the teacher, as he was walking away that evening, "you'll have to look out for yourself. You're a teacher and you ought to be a man--you must be a man or I'll have nothing more to do with you."

XIX

Amus.e.m.e.nt and Learning

There was much doing that winter in the Linley district. They were a month getting ready for the school "exhibition." Every home in the valley and up Cedar Hill rang with loud declamations. The impa.s.sioned utterances of James Otis, Daniel Webster, and Patrick Henry were heard in house, and field, and stable. Every evening women were busy making costumes for a play, while the young rehea.r.s.ed their parts. Polly Vaughn, editor of a paper to be read that evening, searched the countryside for literary talent. She found a young married woman, who had spent a year in the State Normal School, and who put her learning at the service of Polly, in a composition treating the subject of intemperance. Miss Betsey Leech sent in what she called "a piece" ent.i.tled "Home." Polly, herself, wrote an editorial on "Our Teacher," and there was hemming and hawing when she read it, declaring they all had learned much, even to love him. Her mother helped her with the alphabetical rhymes, each a couplet of sentimental history, as, for example:--

"A is for Alson, a jolly young man, He'll marry Miss Betsey, they say, if he can."

They trimmed the little schoolhouse with evergreen and erected a small stage, where the teacher's desk had been. Sheets were hung, for curtains, on a ten-foot rod.

A while after dark one could hear a sound of sleigh-bells in the distance. Away on drifted pike and crossroad the bells began to fling their music. It seemed to come in rippling streams of sound through the still air, each with its own voice. In half an hour countless echoes filled the s.p.a.ce between them, and all were as one chorus, wherein, as it came near, one could distinguish song and laughter.

Young people from afar came in cutters and by the sleigh load; those who lived near, afoot with lanterns. They were a merry company, crowding the schoolhouse, laughing and whispering as they waited for the first exhibit. Trove called them to order and made a few remarks.

"Remember," said he, "this is not our exhibition. It is only a sort of preparation for one we have planned. In about twenty years the Linley School is to give an exhibition worth seeing. It will be, I believe, an exhibition of happiness, ability, and success on the great stage of the world. Then I hope to have on the programme speeches in Congress, in the pulpit, and at the bar. You shall see in that play, if I mistake not, homes full of love and honour, men and women of fair fame. It may be you shall see, then, some whose names are known and honoured of all men."

Each performer quaked with fear, and both sympathy and approval were in the applause. Miss Polly Vaughn was a rare picture of rustic beauty, her cheeks as red as her ribbons, her voice low and sweet. Trove came out in the audience for a look at her as she read. Ringing salvos of laughter greeted the play and stirred the sleigh-bells on the startled horses beyond the door. The programme over, somebody called for Squire Town, a local pettifogger, who flung his soul and body into every cause. He often sored his knuckles on the court table and racked his frame with the violence of his rhetoric. He had a stock of impa.s.sioned remarks ready for all occasions.

He rose, walked to the centre of the stage, looked sternly at the people, and addressed them as "Fellow Citizens." He belaboured the small table; he rose on tiptoe and fell upon his heels; often he seemed to fling his words with a rapid jerk of his right arm as one hurls a pebble. It was all in praise of his "young friend," the teacher, and the high talent of Linley School.

The exhibition ended with this rare exhibit of eloquence. Trove announced the organization of a singing-school for Monday evening of the next week, and then suppressed emotion burst into noise.

The Linley school-house had become as a fount of merry sound in the still night; then the loud chorus of the bells, diminis.h.i.+ng as they went away, and breaking into streams of music and dying faint in the far woodland.

One Nelson Cartright--a jack of all trades they called him--was the singing-master. He was noted far and wide for song and penmans.h.i.+p.

Every year his intricate flourishes in black and white were on exhibition at the county fair.

"Wal, sir," men used to say thoughtfully, "ye wouldn't think he knew beans. Why, he's got a fist bigger'n a ham. But I tell ye, let him take a pen, sir, and he'll draw a deer so nat'ral, sir, ye'd swear he could jump over a six-rail fence. Why, it is wonderful!"

Every winter he taught the arts of song and penmans.h.i.+p in the four districts from Jericho to Cedar Hill. He sang a roaring ba.s.s and beat the time with dignity and precision. For weeks he drilled the cla.s.s on a bit of lyric melody, of which a pa.s.sage is here given:--

"One, two, three, ready, sing," he would say, his ruler cutting the air, and all began:--

Listen to the bird, and the maid, and the b.u.mblebee, Tra, la la la la, tra, la la la la, Joyfully we'll sing the gladsome melody, Tra, la, la, la, la.

The singing-school added little to the knowledge or the cheerfulness of that neighbourhood. It came to an end the last day of the winter term. As usual, Trove went home with Polly. It was a cold night, and as the crowd left them at the corners he put his arm around her.

"School is over," said she, with a sigh, "and I'm sorry."

"For me?" he inquired.

"For myself," she answered, looking down at the snowy path.

There came a little silence crowded with happy thoughts.

"At first, I thought you very dreadful," she went on, looking up at him with a smile. He could see her sweet face in the moonlight and was tempted to kiss it.

"Why?"

"You were so terrible," she answered. "Poor Joe Beach! It seemed as if he would go through the wall."

"Well, something had to happen to him," said the teacher.

"He likes, you now, and every one likes you here. I wish we could have you always for a teacher."

"I'd be willing to be your teacher, always, if I could only teach you what you have taught me."

"Oh, dancing," said she, merrily; "that is nothing. I'll give you all the lessons you like."

"No, I shall not let you teach me that again," said he.

"Why?"

"Because your pretty feet trample on me."

Then came another silence.

"Don't you enjoy it?" she asked, looking off at the stars.

"Too much." said he. "First, I must teach you something--if I can."

He was ready for a query, if it came, but she put him off.

"I intend to be a grand lady," said she, "and, if you do not learn, you'll never be able to dance with me."

"There'll be others to dance with you," said he. "I have so much else to do."

"Oh, you're always thinking about algebra and arithmetic and those dreadful things," said she.

"No, I'm thinking now of something very different."

"Grammar, I suppose," said she, looking down.