All eyes on the boys’ side turned toward William as we chanted the Lord’s prayer; then Graybeard made his usual supplication, during which the big girls twisted their necks to look at their hero.
The exit from the schoolroom was quite orderly, but as soon as the groups of boys passed into the hall, they set up a shouting and singing, and made off to their different resorts for play. We, the Middle Five, were the last to go; and, as had been hastily arranged between us, I went to Graybeard and asked some trivial question in order to give time for Brush to go and advise Sherman as to what answers to make if he was asked as to his being guilty of swearing.
“When he asks you if you been swearing, say, ‘No, sir, I don’t know what swear is,’ ” said Brush to Sherman.
“All right.”
“Then tell him you been saying what you heard Agency man say to horses; but you don’t know what those words mean, maybe they’re swear words, you don’t know.”
Graybeard went up to his room, followed by William T. Sherman, who for the first time entered that apartment. Boys who committed serious offences were disciplined in that place. I was taken there for fighting Andrew Johnson; Brush took his punishment there when he nearly cut Jonathan’s ear off with a wooden sword. Most of us had had peculiar experiences in that room.
William T. Sherman had come to us direct from a tent; our bare schoolroom and playroom were all that he had seen of the furnishings of a civilized dwelling, so when he was suddenly ushered into Graybeard’s room he was quite dazzled by the bright draperies, pictures, and the polished furniture. He stood with hands in his pockets, mouth and eyes wide-open staring at the things, although twice requested by his host to sit down.
William timidly took the chair assigned him. It rocked backwards, and up went his feet; he clutched wildly at the arms, and the chair rocked forward; he got his footing, then sat perfectly still, fearing the chair would fall over with him.
Graybeard took a seat facing the boy, and began to question him, “I was told that you had been swearing; is it true?”
Bewilderment at new sights, and the flight of the rocking-chair had put Brush’s promptings out of Sherman’s head, and in his confusion he answered, “Yes, sir—ma’am.”
“It is wicked to swear, and you must be taught to know that it is. Now say what I say,” and Graybeard repeated the third commandment, until Sherman could say it without assistance, and then bade him to keep on until told to stop.
Poor William sat in the treacherous rocking-chair repeating this commandment, while Graybeard wrote at his desk. William might as well have sat there imitating the cry of some animal or bird, for his mind was not dwelling upon the words he was uttering, but following his eyes as they moved from one strange object to another—the pictures, the gilt frames, the seashells, the clock on the mantelpiece, then something hanging near the window absorbed his attention, and his tongue and lips ceased to move as he drew with his finger on his knee the figure 1, adding to it a number of aughts. Graybeard noted the pause, and said, “Go on, William, don’t stop.” After some little prompting, the boy resumed, but his finger kept moving, making the figure 1 and a string of aughts after it.
When Graybeard and William T. Sherman left the schoolroom, Brush and I and the rest of the five went toward the spring and sat under the large elm. Brush lay down on the grass and read a book he had borrowed from the superintendent, while the rest of us talked.
“I’d like to see that boy who told on William T. Sherman; I’d give him a licking,” said Warren.
“I’d kick him hard,” added Edwin.
“I bet it’s that telltale Edson; he ought to be thumped!” I suggested.
While we were talking, William came and sat down with us. Every now and then a quivering sigh would escape him, although he tried not to show that he had been crying. Little Bob, believing as we did that William had been whipped, and, desiring to express sympathy, said, “Say, did it hurt?” William did not answer; nobody ever answered Bob.
“What did Graybeard do to you?” I asked, turning to William.
“He made me sit down and say a commandment one hundred times.”
“Which one was it? Say it to us.”
“I don’t want to say it; I said it enough.” After a pause he asked, “What is swear?”
“When you call God names, that’s swear,” said Warren.
“I don’t do that. I know God, it’s the same Omahas call Wa-kon-da; but I don’t know what means lord.”
“It’s a man just like big chief,” explained Lester; “he has plenty of horses and lots of money. When he tells anybody to do anything, he got to do it; that’s a lord.”
“Is Graybeard lord?”
“No, Graybeard isn’t lord.”
“Say, boys, a one and six aughts is one million, ain’t it?”
“Yes,” we answered in chorus.
“Graybeard is lord. He’s got one million dollars. I saw it on a book hanging by his window; it had a name, I can’t say it, then Bank and Cap’tal, and then a one and six aughts—that’s a million. He’s got one million dollars!”
Brush threw his book down, raised himself on his elbow and looked at us with a smile; then he said, “I know that book William T. Sherman saw, it’s the book Graybeard counts the days by, and it’s got on it what they call advertisement. That bank wants
