SAMMY GRADUATES.
The next day when young Stewart came, the books were all back on the
shelf in the main room of the cabin, and Sammy, dressed in a fresh gown
of simple goods and fashion, with her hair arranged carefully, as she
had worn it the last two months before Ollie’s coming, sat at the
window reading.
The man was surprised and a little embarrassed. “Why, what have you
been doing to yourself?” he exclaimed.
“I have not been doing anything to myself. I have only done some things
to my clothes and hair,” returned the girl.
Then he saw the books. “Why, where did these come from?” He crossed the
room to examine the volumes. “Do you—do you read all these?”
“The shepherd has been helping me,” she explained.
“Oh, yes. I understood that you were studying with him.” He looked at
her curiously, as though they were meeting for the first time. Then, as
she talked of her studies, his embarrassment deepened, for he found
himself foundering hopelessly before this clear-eyed, clear-brained
backwoods girl.
“Come,” said Sammy at last. “Let us go for a walk.” She led the way to
her favorite spot, high up on the shoulder of Dewey, and there, with
Mutton Hollow at their feet and the big hills about them, with the long
blue ridges in the distance beyond which lay Ollie’s world, she told
him what he feared to learn. The man refused to believe that he heard
aright. “You do not understand,” he protested, and he tried to tell her
of the place in life that would be hers as his wife. In his
shallowness, he talked even of jewels, and dresses, and such things.
“But can all this add one thing to life itself?” she asked. “Is not
life really independent of all these things? Do they not indeed cover
up the real life, and rob one of freedom? It seems to me that it must
be so.”
He could only answer, “But you know nothing about it. How can you? You
have never been out of these woods.”
“No,” she returned, “that is true; I have never been out of these
woods, and you can never, now, get away from the world into which you
have gone.” She pointed to the distant hills. “It is very, very far
over there to where you live. I might, indeed, find many things in your
world that would be delightful; but I fear that I should lose the
things that after all are, to me, the really big things. I do not feel
that the things that are greatest in your life could bring happiness
without that which I find here. And there is something here that can
bring happiness without what you call the advantages of the world to
which you belong.”
“What do you know of the world?” he said roughly.
“Nothing,” she said. “But I know a little of life. And I have learned
some things that I fear you have not. Beside, I know now that I do not
love you. I have been slow to find the truth, but I have found it. And
this is the one thing that matters, that I found it in time.”
“Did you reach this conclusion at the mill yesterday?” he asked with a
sneer.
“No. It came to me here on the rock last evening after you were gone. I
heard a strange story; the story of a weak man, a strong man, and a God
who was very kind.”
Ollie saw that further persuasion was of no avail, and as he left her,
she watched him out of sight for the last time—along the trail that is
nobody knows how old. When he was gone, in obedience to an impulse she
did not try to understand, she ran down the mountain to the cabin in
the Hollow—Young Matt’s cabin. And when the shepherd came in from the
hills with his flock he found the house in such order as only a woman’s
hand can bring. The table was set, and his supper cooking on the stove.
“Dad,” she asked, “Do you think I know enough now to live in the city?”
The old man’s heart sank. It had come then. Bravely he concealed his
feelings, as he assured her in the strongest terms, that she knew
enough, and was good enough to live anywhere.
“Then,” said Sammy; “I know enough, even if I am not good enough, to
live in the hills.”
The brown eyes, deep under their shaggy brows, were aglow with
gladness, and there was a note of triumph in the scholar’s voice as he
said, “Then you do not regret learning the things I have tried to teach
you? You are sure you have no sorrow for the things you are losing.”
“Regret? Dad. Regret?” The young woman drew herself up and lifted her
arms. “Oh, Dad, I see it all, now; all that you have been trying in a
thousand ways to teach me. You have led me into a new world, the real
world, the world that has always been and must always be, and in that
world man is king; king because he is a man. And the treasure of his
kingdom is the wealth of his manhood.”
“And the woman, Sammy, the woman?”
“‘And they twain shall be one flesh.’”
Then the master knew that his teaching had not been in vain. “I can
lead you no farther, my child,” he said with a smile. “You have passed
the final test.”
She came close to him, “Then I want my diploma,” she said, for he had
told her about the schools.
Reverently the old scholar kissed her brow. “This is the only diploma I
am authorized to give—the love and homage of your teacher.”
“And my degree?” She waited with that wide, questioning look in her
eyes.
“The most honorable in all the world—a sure enough lady.”