Leonard was fighting hard to keep his little school alive. He had less than twenty students the first year, and less than thirty the second. From an income of not more than $3,000 he had to pay Miss Amy, who had left a high school position to help him, a small salary. The old house on its fine wooded hill was full of outmoded plumbing and drafty corridors: he had leased it at a small rental. But the rough usage of thirty boys demanded a considerable yearly restoration. The Leonards were fighting very stubbornly and courageously for their existence.
The food was scant and poor: at breakfast, a dish of blue, watery oatmeal, eggs and toast; at lunch, a thin soup, hot sour cornbread, and a vegetable boiled with a piece of fat pork; at dinner, hot biscuits, a small meat loaf, and creamed or boiled potatoes. No one was permitted coffee or tea, but there was an abundance of fresh creamy milk. John Dorsey always kept and milked his own cow. Occasionally there was a deep, crusted pie, hot, yolky muffins, or spicy gingerbread of Margaret’s make. She was a splendid cook.
Often, at night, Guy Doak slid quietly out through the window on to the side porch, and escaped down the road under the concealing roar of the trees. He would return from town within two hours, crawling in exultantly with a bag full of hot frankfurter sandwiches coated thickly with mustard, chopped onion, and a hot Mexican sauce. With a crafty grin he unfoiled two five-cent cigars, which they smoked magnificently, with a sharp tang of daring, blowing the smoke up the chimney in order to thwart a possible irruption by the master. And Guy brought back, from the wind and the night, the good salt breath of gossip in street and store, news of the town, and the brave swagger of the drugstore gallants.
As they smoked and stuffed fat palatable bites of sandwich into their mouths, they would regard each other with pleased sniggers, carrying on thus an insane symphony of laughter:
“Chuckle, chuckle!—laugh of gloatation.”
“Tee-hee, tee-hee, tee-hee! … laugh of titterosity.”
“Snuh-huh, snuh-huh, snuh-huh! … laugh of gluttonotiousness.”
The vigorous warmth of burning wood filled their room pleasantly: over their sheltered heads the dark gigantic wind howled through the earth. O sheltered love, nooked warmly in against this winter night. O warm fair women, whether within a forest hut, or by the town ledged high above the moaning seas, shot upon the wind, I come.
Guy Doak toyed gently at his belly with his right hand, and stroked his round chin slowly with his left.
“Now let me see,” he whined, “what he gives on this.”
Their laughter rang around the walls. Too late, they heard the aroused stealthy footfalls of the master, creaking down the hall. Later—silence, the dark, the wind.
Miss Amy closed her small beautifully kept grade book, thrust her great arms upward, and yawned. Eugene looked hopefully at her and out along the playing court, reddened by the late sun. He was wild, uncontrollable, erratic. His mad tongue leaped out in class. He could never keep peace a full day. He amazed them. They loved him, and they punished him piously, affectionately. He was never released at the dismissal hour. He was always “kept in.”
John Dorsey noted each whisper of disorder, or each failure in preparation, by careful markings in a book. Each afternoon he read the names of delinquents, amid a low mutter of sullen protest, and stated their penalties. Once Eugene got through an entire day without a mark. He stood triumphantly before Leonard while the master searched the record.
John Dorsey began to laugh foolishly; he gripped his hand affectionately around the boy’s arm.
“Well, sir!” he said. “There must be a mistake. I’m going to keep you in on general principles.”
He bent to a long dribbling suction of laughter. Eugene’s wild eyes were shot with tears of anger and surprise. He never forgot.
Miss Amy yawned, and smiled on him with slow powerful affectionate contempt.
“Go on!” she said, in her broad, lazy accent. “I don’t want to fool with you any more. You’re not worth powder enough to blow you up.”
Margaret came in, her face furrowed deeply between smoke-dark eyes, full of tender sternness and hidden laughter.
“What’s wrong with the rascal?” she asked. “Can’t he learn algebra?”
“He can learn!” drawled Miss Amy. “He can learn anything. He’s lazy—that’s what it is. Just plain lazy.”
She smacked his buttock smartly with a ruler.
“I’d like to warm you a bit with this,” she laughed, slowly and richly. “You’d learn then.”
“Here!” said Margaret, shaking her head in protest. “You leave that boy alone. Don’t look behind the faun’s ears. Never mind about algebra, here. That’s for poor folks. There’s no need for algebra where two and two make five.”
Miss Amy turned her handsome gypsy eyes on Eugene.
“Go on. I’ve seen enough of you.” She made a strong weary gesture of dismissal.
Hatless, with a mad whoop, he plunged through the door and leaped the porch rail.
“Here, boy!” Margaret called. “Where’s your hat?”
Grinning, he galloped back, picked up a limp rag of dirty green felt, and pulled it over his chaotic hair. Curly tufts stuck through the gaping crease-holes.
“Come here!”
