A SPRINGTIME SANTA CLAUS
As May crept up the calendar the little schoolhouse became the center of
increased activity: commencement exercises were under daily rehearsal
and the light of excited interest shone in every face.
It was a heterogeneous flock which had answered the call of Jane's horn
eight months before: twenty-nine in all, ranging from children of eight
to a woman of thirty-five. Nor were their characteristics less diverse.
The tobacco-chewing, profane boy was there, with a stolen dirk thrust
into his trousers' band, suggesting a turbulent future; and the girl,
with the narrow forehead and close, deep-set eyes, was there,
pathologically indicating tendencies to kleptomania. But far outweighing
these were the straight, courageous bearing and the tender faces of
normal promise. Sturdy manhood and womanhood was written across the
countenances of many who had answered the call of Jane's horn!
Nancy was not one of this wholesome medley. She was being especially
taught aside;--and now, on this mid-May day, Jane sat with her beneath
the trees while the room within was wrapped in the unrestful silence of
tedious thought. Occasionally the teacher glanced at her when she
happened to sigh and bend more intently over the knotty problem on her
lap. Dale might have been here with them, for he had made strides during
the past four weeks which put him far in the van, and Jane was
satisfying this bewildering pace with extra work for the afternoons at
home. For his was, indeed, a bewildering pace, spurred by an insatiable
ambition that had become brutal in its determination to absorb every
lesson, every fact and figure, every little jot of information which her
schoolhouse and the Colonel's library contained. His time, from early
morning until late at night, was divided between these places; but he
advanced with so much greater speed in the seclusion of Arden that Jane
had lately persuaded him to work there, rather than be subjected to the
schoolroom noises which were as multitudinous as they were unavoidable.
Thus it was that she and Nancy now sat alone beneath the trees.
The morning was warm and without a breath of air. A two weeks' drought,
unusual at this season, had parched the country, bringing the wheat
prematurely to head and causing anxiety about the hemp. But since
tobacco, the most important crop, would not be set out till June, this
agricultural unrest permeated little farther than impolite remarks about
the weather. True, some of the springs were going dry, and all low
verdure beside the pike was bedraggled and bowed beneath a coat of
white dust. Out across the meadows of tired grass, and above the
yellow fields prepared and waiting in sultry patience for their Lady
Nicotiana,--everywhere along the level stretches that eye could
sweep--were tormenting, dancing heat waves. Sleepy-eyed cattle spent
their inert hours standing in the pasture pools with the water about
their knees, or mingling with groups of sweaty brood mares clustered in
the shady places. Dogs could not lie quiet; in the coolest corners of
the kennel they drooled and panted. Nor were the creatures of the air
immune; for directly above the girls a bird listlessly hopped from
branch to branch, its wings drooping, and its beak apart. Jane
sympathetically raised her eyes to it and began to fan herself with the
cover of a book--although it was not unbearably warm in the grove, and
the bird might have come from a long flight.
A child appeared in the doorway, hesitated and came out to her. Excusing
this approach was the desire for help with a certain sum, but the true
reason later became manifest when the little one, with dancing eyes,
whispered something to the teacher's inclined ear.
"That is nice," Jane smiled.
Happily, with the noiselessness of unshod creatures, she ran and skipped
back to the school room.
"Julia says that she's been promised a pair of shoes for commencement,"
Jane glanced over at Nancy. "I fear it's a case of sweeter anticipation
than realization."
"She'll suffer moh agonies than shoes that night," Nancy laughed.
"Hasn't she a piece to recite?"
Jane was about to answer when another youngster standing in the doorway
held her attention. He, too, came timidly forth for assistance; but, as
with Julia, his true reason was to impart in the same excited way a
confidence. When this had been accomplished with much mysterious
whispering, and he had again gone indoors, Jane looked at Nancy with a
broader smile.
"More agony," she said. "Jimmy is promised boots, mind you! This is a
gratifying proof that rural schools improve the understanding--but what
on earth they will do without toes to wiggle is beyond me!"
The girls were still laughing over the thought of Jimmy's direful future
when a third child appeared. It was a word in her reader now that
furnished the conventional stumbling block on which to mount to her
teacher's confidence.
"What?" that young woman exclaimed. "More shoes? Mercy! But it's very
nice! And now run back and finish the page before I ring the bell."
This time, turning to Nancy, Jane sighed: "More shoes! All of this
suffering humanity will surely not survive that night. Really, Nan, I
think it's the most extraordinary thing I ever encountered the way these
children's parents are shoeing them for commencement! Mark my words,
before the exercises are half over we'll be hearing shoes drop all over
the room. They simply won't keep them on! It'll be awful." She was about
to say more, when Mrs. Owsley appeared in the door.
Mrs. Owsley was the thirty-five-year-old scholar; and the only one,
until Dale came, who might strictly have been termed of the mountains.
She was, moreover, the mother of nine smaller Owsleys--the smallest of
whom she brought each day and laid in a box prepared for the purpose
near the teacher's desk. The previous autumn she had left "Bill an' the
other eight brats" back in their remote home, and moved down to Mother
Owsley's, four miles from school, to which she walked each day,
bare-footed, and carrying the infant. It was an enthusiasm for
education, characteristic of these mountaineers, which might not be met
anywhere else in a country termed civilized.
"Heavens!" gasped Jane. "I thought it was another child coming to tell
me about shoes!"
"Did you ever see how Mrs. Owsley does with her shoes?" Nancy asked,
being careful not to smile while the impassive woman's eyes were turned
in her direction.
"You mean across her shoulder?"
Nancy nodded, giggling a little.
"The poor, poverty stricken dears, all of them," Jane tenderly
exclaimed. "But that's a common custom in some parts of the mountains,
Nan. I've seen it when a circuit-rider had come through, and was going
to hold church somewhere; nearly all who possessed shoes would carry
them across their shoulders that way during their long walk to attend,
and then sit on the meetinghouse steps and put them on. Shoes have to
last a long time up there," she added wistfully. "They mustn't be worn
out by walking on them."
"I thought it was awful funny when I saw her do it," Nancy whispered.
"You don't look like you ever went barefoot, Miss Jane!"
"I never did," Jane laughed. "I hated it so that I used to pick
blackberries and sell them to keep myself supplied. My poor old Dad
thought it a wicked extravagance, but I'd rather have gone without
clothes than shoes."
"I hated it, too," Nancy quietly replied, "but never thought of makin'
money. I wish I had!"
Mrs. Owsley stepped down from the doorway and crossed to them. In
approaching her teacher she scorned any subterfuge, and spoke directly
to the point.
"What'd ye git, ef yeou wuz me, Miss Jane? I got shoes, a'ready--these
here'n; but this ole gingham's the onlies' dress I got, an' hit's a
sorry lookin' thing! Mr. Bowser sez ef I don't hanker arter shoes I
don't hev ter hev 'em;--he sez his store'll leave me take their wu'th
outen sumthin' else. I reckon hit'll be all right ter the trustee!"
"What trustee do you mean?" Jane asked. There was a pucker of
mystification between her eyes as she looked up at Mrs. Owsley.
But that countenance did not change. It never changed. The same
yellowish face, rather long and horse-like, beneath the same hair
plainly brushed back, looked at Jane now as it had looked at the world's
multitude of privations and pittance of joys, this last score of years.
"The trustee," she answered, "what sees as how we-uns goin' ter school
gits shoes--outen the school fund, I reckon 'twuz he said, or sumthin'
that a-way. He's a-stayin' down thar by the Cunnel's, some-un says, so
mebbe ye knows 'im. Not as I allow ter be beholden ter no one:--but
commencement's commencement!"
"Why, Mrs. Owsley!" an accusing voice cried from the window. "He made
us promise not to tell who he was!"
"'N' I don't kyeer what he done!" the imperturbable one answered. "I
want ye-all ter know I don't take nuthin' underhand from nobody, less'n
hit's my man, Bill!"
The accuser ducked from sight.
"Do you mean," Jane asked, "a man about twenty-four, or five, or six, or
maybe seven--with sort of brown or grayish eyes, and--and rather
handsome?"
"I don't know nuthin' 'bout all them colors in his eyes. I don't know
nuthin' 'bout that," she repeated, "but I do 'llow he smoked them vile
cigarettes till a body couldn't breathe!"
Jane's eyes left the mother of nine, swept past Nancy whom she saw still
bending over her work, and finally rested in the shadows of some cool
ferns. This somewhat unexpected announcement sent a wave of
pleasure--evanescent, perhaps hardly perceptible--sweeping over her.
Rather abruptly she said:
"I think your gingham looks very well, but you might get a nice
print--if you'll have time to make it!"
"That's jest what I war a-thinkin' t'other day," the impassive face
replied. "Red, with white dots on hit, sez I ter Mother Owsley, is jest
the nicest thing! 'N' I sez ter Mister Bowser as how I hankered fer a
dress like that; but he sez he done quit keepin' hit no moh. He sez he
did hev a sight of hit onct, but so many of the wimmin folks come in ter
buy hit, 'n' hit war sech a sight of trubble gittin' up 'n' settin' down
agin, cuttin' off pieces 'n' waitin' on 'em, that he jest th'owed out
what he had left 'n' allowed he wouldn't buy no moh."
This was all very serious to Mrs. Owsley and Jane replied in the same
vein:
"Then a blue polka dot. I know he has that, and maybe I can help you
make it up."
"Thank-ee," she turned to go back, "but I reckon Mother Owsley's Cyantha
kin help some." She stood a moment, hesitating, then faced around,
asking: "Ye hain't got a primer, or sumthin', I kin take ter Mother
Owsley, hev ye? She's been hankerin' so ter larn a mite of readin' 'n'
writin' since I went thar, 'n' can't git out ter come down hyar!"
"Is she too feeble?" Jane sympathetically asked.
"No, she hain't feeble; but she's got the craps ter look arter. Mother
Owsley's right peert, but with sech a sight ter do 'tween sun-up 'n'
dark holds her 'round home right tight. Her man's been crippled 'n'
pohly fer a spell."
"Could she leave him to come here to a moonlight school?" Jane asked; an
idea that had been forming for sometime now suddenly receiving fresh
impetus. "Maybe even your Bill could come, and the children, too!"
Mrs. Owsley's hesitation showed her to be on unfamiliar ground, and
Jane, who had spoken impulsively, added: "I'll talk to you about it this
afternoon," whereupon the mountain woman this time went in.
"Now!" Nancy exclaimed, holding up her paper of long division. "It's
come out even!"
"Good!--it's a hard one, too!"
"You bet it's a hard one," Nancy straightened her shoulders.
"We won't work any more today," Jane said and, after a pause, asked:
"Did you hear what Mrs. Owsley and I were talking about?"
"I was tryin' to," Nancy laughed. "But this last old thing wouldn't come
out even so I had to bring down two moh noughts, an' that sort of mixed
me up! Is her husband out of the pen?"
"Mercy! I didn't know he was there!"
"I don't either, but she said somethin' 'bout a trusty, an' I just
supposed it was him."
Jane began to laugh, somewhat immoderately for a teacher, and several
heads appeared at the window in giggling surprise. She had become quite
suddenly and thoroughly happy.
"She said trustee, Nan,--a school officer. But the only trustee for this
school is the Colonel. There's a hitch somewhere," her eyes were
dancing. "Did Brent tell you to buy something, too?"
Had Nancy not already been sitting on the ground, this unexpected
question might have toppled her over. She gasped once, turned furiously
red, and sat staring.
"Why, no, Miss Jane!"
"With his usual discretion he left you and Dale out," she mused. "I
really think it was downright decent of him--the shoes, I mean!"
"I'm beginnin' to think those shoes have got on yoh brain," Nancy cried,
and both again screamed with laughter.
"Nan, I don't understand how he succeeded, but he's palmed himself off
as a trustee to give authority to the act and, after making arrangements
with Mr. Bowser, sent all these children there to buy shoes, or
something they're in need of, for our commencement. Don't you honestly
think that's splendid? Who would have thought of it?"
"I wouldn't," Nancy murmured, looking at the ground. But the subject was
becoming a bit perilous, and she asked:
"Are you goin' to start a moonlight school, Miss Jane?"
"I hadn't really thought of it seriously until just now. Would you help
me with it if I did?"
"Good land, Miss Jane, I'd love that better'n anythin'! I'll drive 'em
in, an' you stuff 'em with these sums! I bet they'll know somethin'
then!"
"How many are there around here who can't read, do you suppose?"
"Well, old Hod Fugit can't; an' there's Willis--I forget his name, but
down at the mill, you know! I don't think the sheriff can, either."
"Can your father--I mean Tom Hewlet?"
"Well, he sort of pokes along at it, but it ain't just what you'd call
readin'. Sometimes, when he's right drunk, he gets a piece of old
newspaper an' moves his mouth around. Oh, he did the funniest thing
once!" she clapped her hands and bent over merrily. "He was workin'
himself up into an awful spree, but misplaced his demijohn an' had us
lookin' everywhere for it. I'd hid it, but never let on! He groaned
around a lot, an' I think sort of suspected me; but after 'while
settled down with the Bible. It was upside down, so that's how I don't
think he can read!"
"Then what?"
"Just guess!" Nancy went into more convulsions of laughter. "He began,
talkin' right loud an' rockin' his chair right fast: 'An' Solomen, the
wise man, says to his Democrats that if a step-darter treats her Pappy
mean, an' hides things, she'll go down--down--down--down--' an' all this
time, Miss Jane, his voice was gettin' lower an' lower till, when it
couldn't go no lower, he gurgled: 'ter hell!' Then he'd wait awhile,
lookin' sort of sneakin' at me, turn some pages an' do it all over
again--only each time he'd begin in a higher pitch so's he could get moh
'downs' in it, an' make it sound scarier. When I wouldn't pay any
attention, he threw the Bible at me an' stomped out!"
"Is he back yet?" Jane seemed to lose some of her gaiety when asking
this.
"No'm; an' I hope he won't never come back!"
"Have you any idea where he is?"
"Only he said he an' Tusk Potter were goin' in the mountains after
ginseng. They go most every yeah. You can't guess the peace there's been
at home this last month, Miss Jane!"
"I think I can," she murmured. "Nancy, suppose you were to work hard on
those sums, and be more careful in the way you speak, and the school
should grow enough for you to be my assistant, and Mr. McElroy should
run his railroad through your house--where would Tom Hewlet and his
wife go? Would they stay around here?"
"What a bully fairy-tale," the girl delightedly clasped one of Jane's
hands. "No'm, I reckon he'd go out to Missouri an' live with his
brother. He's always wantin' to. Why, Miss Jane? Is there any chance of
all that?"
"I don't know, Nan. Maybe I was just dreaming."
"Then dream some more," she murmured.
The morning had worn on without a bell for recess. The room had become
restive, and now Jane realized that the youngest of the Owsleys was
lustily bawling. She glanced at the little watch in her belt, crying:
"Heavens!" Then dashed toward the door to rescue her neglected charges;
leaving Nancy under the trees to patch up the interrupted dream.