Matthew was about to shrug again, dismissing the old man's complaint; but he was aware of the fierce gaze that was levelled at him, and he had some idea that he might be doing himself future harm not to respond. He nodded, and then he turned away from the headmaster to once more direct his full attention to the window's glass. He ran his fingers over it, feeling the undulating ripples and swells of its surface.
'How old are you?' Staunton asked. 'Seven? Eight?'
''Tween 'em,' Matthew said.
'Can you read and write?'
'I know some numbers. Ten fingers, ten toes. That makes twenty Double that's forty. Double again's . . .' He thought about it. His father had taught him some basic arithmetic, and they'd been working on the alphabet when the horse's hoof had met skullbone. 'Forty and forty,' he said. 'I know a-b-c-d-e-f-g-h-i-j-n-l-o-p-k too.'
'Well, it's a beginning. You were given a name by your parents, I presume?'
Matthew hesitated; it seemed to him that telling this headmaster his name would give the man some power over him, and he wasn't ready to do that. 'This here window,' he said. 'It don't let the rain in?'
'No, it doesn't. On a windy day, it allows sunlight but turns away the wind. Therefore I have more light to read by, but no fear of my books and papers being disturbed.'
'Damn!' Matthew said with true wonder. 'What'll they think of next?'
'Watch your language, young man,' Staunton cautioned, but not without a hint of amusement. 'The next profanity will raise a blister on your hide. Now, I want you to know and remember this: I want to be your friend, but it is your choice whether we are friends or adversaries. Enemies, I mean to say. In this almshouse there are sixty- eight boys, ages seven to seventeen. I do not have the time nor resources to coddle you, nor will I overlook bad manners or a troublesome attitude. What the lash does not cure, the dunking barrel remedies.' He paused to let that pronouncement sink to its proper depth. 'You will be given studies to achieve, and chores to perform, as befits your age. You will be expected to learn to read and write, as well as calculate arithmetic. You will go to chapel on the Sabbath and learn the holy writ. And you shall comport yourself as a young gentlemen. But,' Staunton added in a gentler tone, 'this is not a prison, and I am not a warden. The main purpose of this place is to prepare you for leaving it.'
'When?' Matthew asked.
'In due time, and not before.' Staunton plucked the quill from the inkwell and poised it over the open ledgerbook. 'I'd like to know your name now.'
Matthew's attention had wandered back to the window's glass once more. 'I sure would like to see how this is made,' he said. 'It's a puzzle how it's done, ain't it?'
'Not such a puzzle.' Staunton stared at the boy for a moment, and then he said, 'I'll strike a deal with you, son. The glazier has a workshop not far from here. You tell me your name and your circumstances, and—as you're so interested in the craft—I'll ask the glazier to come and explain it. Does that sound reasonable?'
Matthew considered it. The man, he realized, was offering him something that set a spark to his candle: knowledge. 'Rea-son'ble,' he repeated, with a nod. 'My name's Matthew Corbett. Two t's and two t's.'
Headmaster Staunton entered the name into the ledger in small but precise handwriting, and thus was Matthew's life greatly altered from its previous muddy course.
Given books and patient encouragement, Matthew proved to be a quick study. Staunton was true to his word and brought the glazier in to explain his craft to the assembly of boys; so popular was the visit that soon followed a shoemaker, a sailmaker, a blacksmith, and other honest, hardworking citizens of the city beyond the almshouse walls. Staunton—a devoutly religious man who had been a minister before becoming headmaster—was scrupulously fair but set high goals and expectations for his charges. After several encounters with the lash, Matthew's use of profanity ended and his manners improved. His reading and writing skills after a year were so proficient that Staunton decided to teach him Latin, an honor given only to two other boys in the home, and the key that opened for Matthew many more volumes from Staunton's library. Two years of intense Latin training, as well as further English and arithmetic studies, saw Matthew leave the other scholars behind, so sharp and undivided was his power of concentration.
It was not a bad life. He did such chores as were required of him and then returned to his studies with a passion that bordered on religious fervor. As some of the boys with whom he'd entered the almshouse left to become apprentices to craftsmen, and new boys were brought in, Matthew remained a fixed star—solitary, aloof— that directed his light only toward the illumination of answers to the multitude of questions that perplexed him. When Matthew turned twelve, Staunton-—who was now in his sixty-fourth year and beginning to suffer from palsy —began to teach the boy French, as much to sow a language he himself found fascinating as well as to further cultivate Matthew's appreciation of mental challenges.
Discipline of thought and control of action became Matthew's purpose in life. While the other boys played such games as slide groat and wicket, Matthew was likely to be found dredging through a Latin tome on astronomy or copying French literature to improve his handwriting. His dedication to the intellectual—indeed his slavery to the appetite of his own mind—began to concern Headmaster Staunton, who had to encourage Matthew's participation in games and exercise by limiting his access to the books. Still, Matthew was apart and afar from the other boys, and had grown gangly legged and ill-suited for the rough-and-tumble festivities his compatriots enjoyed, and so even in their midst he was alone.
Matthew had just seen his fourteenth birthday when Headmaster Staunton made a startling announcement to the boys and the other almshouse workers: he had experienced a dream in which Christ appeared, wearing shining white robes, and told him his work was done at the Home. The task that remained for him was to leave and travel west into the frontier wilderness, to teach the Indian tribes the salvation of God. This dream was to Staunton so real and compelling that there was no question of disobedience; it was, to him, the call to glory that would assure his ascent into Heaven.
Before he left—at age sixty-six and severely palsied—Headmaster Staunton dedicated his library of books to the almshouse, as well as leaving to the Home's fund the majority of the money he'd banked over his service of some thirty years. To Matthew in particular he gave a small box wrapped in plain white paper, and asked the boy not to open it until he'd boarded a wagon and departed the following morning. And so, after wishing every boy in his charge good fortune and a good life, Headmaster Staunton took the reins of his future and travelled to the ferry that would deliver him across the Hudson River into his own personal promised land, a Bible his only shield and companion.
In the solitude of the Home's chapel, Matthew unwrapped the box and opened it. Within it was a palm-sized pane of glass, especially made by the glazier. Matthew knew what Headmaster Staunton had given him: a clear view unto the world.
A short time later, however, the Home had a new headmaster by the name of Eben Ausley, who in Matthew's opinion was a rotund, fat-jowled lump of pure vileness. Ausley quickly dismissed all of Staunton's staff and brought in his own band of thugs and bullies. The lash was used as never before, and the dunking barrel became a commonplace item of dread employed for the slightest infraction. Whippings became beatings, and many was the night that Ausley took a young boy into his chambers after the dormitory's lamps were extinguished; what occurred in that chamber was unspeakable, and one boy was so shamed by the deed that he hanged himself from the chapel's belltower.
At fifteen, Matthew was too old to attract Ausley's attentions. The headmaster left him alone and Matthew burrowed ever deeper into his studies. Ausley didn't share Staunton's sense of order and cleanliness; soon the place was a pigsty, and the rats grew so bold they seized food off the platters at suppertime. Several boys ran away; some were returned, and given severe whippings and starvation diets. Some died and were buried in crude pinewood boxes in a cemetery beside the chapel. Matthew read his books, honed his Latin and French, and in a deep part of himself vowed that someday, somehow, he would bring justice to bear on Eben Ausley, as a grinding wheel on a piece of rotten timber.
There came the day, toward the midst of Matthew's fifteenth year, that a man arrived at the Home intent on finding a boy to apprentice as his clerk. A group of the five eldest and best educated were lined up in the courtyard, and the man went down the line asking them all questions about themselves. When the man came to Matthew, it was the boy who asked the first question: 'Sir? May I enquire as to your profession?'
'I'm a magistrate,' Isaac Woodward said, and Matthew glanced at Ausley, who stood nearby with a tight smile on his mouth but his eyes cold and impassive. 'Tell me about yourself, young man,' Woodward urged.
It was time to leave the Home. Matthew knew it. His view upon the world was about to widen further, but
