A
Girl of The Limberlost
by Gene Stratton Porter
TO ALL GIRLS OF THE LIMBERLOST IN GENERAL AND ONE JEANETTE HELEN
PORTER IN PARTICULAR
CHARACTERS
ELNORA, who collects moths to pay for her education, and lives
the Golden Rule.
PHILIP AMMON, who assists in moth hunting, and gains a new conception
of love.
MRS. COMSTOCK, who lost a delusion and found a treasure.
WESLEY SINTON, who always did his best.
MARGARET SINTON, who "mothers" Elnora.
BILLY, a boy from real life.
EDITH CARR, who discovers herself.
HART HENDERSON, to whom love means all things.
POLLY AMMON, who pays an old score.
TOM LEVERING, engaged to Polly.
TERENCE O'MORE, Freckles grown tall.
MRS. O'MORE, who remained the Angel.
TERENCE, ALICE and LITTLE BROTHER, the O'MORE children.
A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST
CHAPTER I
WHEREIN ELNORA GOES TO HIGH SCHOOL AND LEARNS MANY LESSONS NOT
FOUND IN HER BOOKS
Elnora Comstock, have you lost your senses?" demanded the
angry voice of Katharine Comstock while she glared at her daughter.
"Why mother!" faltered the girl.
"Don't you `why mother' me!" cried Mrs. Comstock. "You
know very well what I mean. You've given me no peace until you've
had your way about this going to school business; I've fixed you
good enough, and you're ready to start. But no child of mine walks
the streets of Onabasha looking like a play-actress woman. You
wet your hair and comb it down modest and decent and then be off,
or you'll have no time to find where you belong."
Elnora gave one despairing glance at the white face, framed in
a most becoming riot of reddish-brown hair, which she saw in the
little kitchen mirror. Then she untied the narrow black ribbon,
wet the comb and plastered the waving curls close to her head,
bound them fast, pinned on the skimpy black hat and opened the
back door.
"You've gone so plumb daffy you are forgetting your dinner,"
jeered her mother.
"I don't want anything to eat," replied Elnora.
"You'll take your dinner or you'll not go one step. Are you
crazy? Walk almost three miles and no food from six in the morning
until six at night. A pretty figure you'd cut if you had your
way! And after I've gone and bought you this nice new pail and
filled it especial to start on!"
Elnora came back with a face still whiter and picked up the lunch.
"Thank you, mother! Good-bye!" she said. Mrs. Comstock
did not reply. She watched the girl follow the long walk to the
gate and go from sight on the road, in the bright sunshine of
the first Monday of September.
"I bet a dollar she gets enough of it by night!" commented
Mrs. Comstock.
Elnora walked by instinct, for her eyes were blinded with tears.
She left the road where it turned south, at the corner of the
Limberlost, climbed a snake fence and entered a path worn by her
own feet. Dodging under willow and scrub oak branches she came
at last to the faint outline of an old trail made in the days
when the precious timber of the swamp was guarded by armed men.
This path she followed until she reached a thick clump of bushes.
From the debris in the end of a hollow log she took a key that
unlocked the padlock of a large weatherbeaten old box, inside
of which lay several books, a butterfly apparatus, and a small
cracked mirror. The walls were lined thickly with gaudy butterflies,
dragonflies, and moths. She set up the mirror and once more pulling
the ribbon from her hair, she shook the bright mass over her shoulders,
tossing it dry in the sunshine. Then she straightened it, bound
it loosely, and replaced her hat. She tugged vainly at the low
brown calico collar and gazed despairingly at the generous length
of the narrow skirt. She lifted it as she would have cut it if
possible. That disclosed the heavy high leather shoes, at sight
of which she seemed positively ill, and hastily dropped the skirt.
She opened the pail, removed the lunch, wrapped it in the napkin,
and placed it in a small pasteboard box. Locking the case again
she hid the key and hurried down the trail.
She followed it around the north end of the swamp and then entered
a footpath crossing a farm leading in the direction of the spires
of the city to the northeast. Again she climbed a fence and was
on the open road. For an instant she leaned against the fence
staring before her, then turned and looked back. Behind her lay
the land on which she had been born to drudgery and a mother who
made no pretence of loving her; before her lay the city through
whose schools she hoped to find means of escape and the way to
reach the things for which she cared. When she thought of how
she appeared she leaned more heavily against the fence and groaned;
when she thought of turning back and wearing such clothing in
ignorance all the days of her life she set her teeth firmly and
went hastily toward Onabasha.
On the bridge crossing a deep culvert at the suburbs she glanced
around, and then kneeling she thrust the lunch box between the
foundation and the flooring. This left her empty-handed as she
approached the big stone high school building. She entered bravely
and inquired her way to the office of the superintendent. There
she learned that she should have come the previous week and arranged
about her classes. There were many things incident to the opening
of school, and one man unable to cope with all of them.
"Where have you been attending school?" he asked, while
he advised the teacher of Domestic Science not to telephone for
groceries until she knew how many she would have in her classes;
wrote an order for chemicals for the students of science; and
advised the leader of the orchestra to hire a professional to
take the place of the bass violist, reported suddenly ill.
"I finished last spring at Brushwood school, district number
nine," said Elnora. "I have been studying all summer.
I am quite sure I can do the first year work, if I have a few
days to get started."
"Of course, of course," assented the superintendent.
"Almost invariably country pupils do good work. You may enter
first year, and if it is too difficult, we will find it out speedily.
Your teachers will tell you the list of books you must have, and
if you will come with me I will show you the way to the auditorium.
It is now time for opening exercises. Take any seat you find vacant."
Elnora stood before the entrance and stared into the largest room
she ever had seen. The floor sloped to a yawning stage on which
a band of musicians, grouped around a grand piano, were tuning
their instruments. She had two fleeting impressions. That it was
all a mistake; this was no school, but a grand display of enormous
ribbon bows; and the second, that she was sinking, and had forgotten
how to walk. Then a burst from the orchestra nerved her while
a bevy of daintily clad, sweet- smelling things that might have
been birds, or flowers, or possibly gaily dressed, happy young
girls, pushed her forward. She found herself plodding across the
back of the auditorium, praying for guidance, to an empty seat.
As the girls passed her, vacancies seemed to open to meet them.
Their friends were moving over, beckoning and whispering invitations.
Every one else was seated, but no one paid any attention to the
white-faced girl stumbling half-blindly down the aisle next the
farthest wall. So she went on to the very end facing the stage.
No one moved, and she could not summon courage to crowd past others
to several empty seats she saw. At the end of the aisle she paused
in desperation, while she stared back at the whole forest of faces
most of which were now turned upon her.
In a flash came the full realization of her scanty dress, her
pitiful little hat and ribbon, her big, heavy shoes, her ignorance
of where to go or what to do; and from a sickening wave which
crept over her, she felt she was going to become very ill. Then
out of the mass she saw a pair of big, brown boy eyes, three seats
from her, and there was a message in them. Without moving his
body he reached forward and with a pencil touched the back of
the seat before him. Instantly Elnora took another step which
brought her to a row of vacant front seats.
She heard laughter behind her; the knowledge that she wore the
only hat in the room burned her; every matter of moment, and some
of none at all, cut and stung. She had no books. Where should
she go when this was over? What would she give to be on the trail
going home! She was shaking with a nervous chill when the music
ceased, and the superintendent arose, and coming down to the front
of the flower-decked platform, opened a Bible and began to read.
Elnora did not know what he was reading, and she felt that she
did not care. Wildly she was racking her brain to decide whether
she should sit still when the others left the room or follow,
and ask some one where the Freshmen went first.
In the midst of the struggle one sentence fell on her ear. "Hide
me under the shadow of Thy wings."
Elnora began to pray frantically. "Hide me, O God, hide me,
under the shadow of Thy wings."
Again and again she implored that prayer, and before she realized
what was coming, every one had arisen and the room was emptying
rapidly. Elnora hurried after the nearest girl and in the press
at the door touched her sleeve timidly.
"Will you please tell me where the Freshmen go?" she
asked huskily.
The girl gave her one surprised glance, and drew away.
"Same place as the fresh women," she answered, and those
nearest her laughed.
Elnora stopped praying suddenly and the colour crept into her
face. "I'll wager you are the first person I meet when I
find it," she said and stopped short. "Not that! Oh,
I must not do that!" she thought in dismay. "Make an
enemy the first thing I do. Oh, not that!"
She followed with her eyes as the young people separated in the
hall, some climbing stairs, some disappearing down side halls,
some entering adjoining doors. She saw the girl overtake the brown-eyed
boy and speak to him. He glanced back at Elnora with a scowl on
his face. Then she stood alone in the hall.
Presently a door opened and a young woman came out and entered
another room. Elnora waited until she returned, and hurried to
her. "Would you tell me where the Freshmen are?" she
panted.
"Straight down the hall, three doors to your left,"
was the answer, as the girl passed.
"One minute please, oh please," begged Elnora: "Should
I knock or just open the door?"
"Go in and take a seat," replied the teacher.
"What if there aren't any seats?" gasped Elnora.
"Classrooms are never half-filled, there will be plenty,"
was the answer.
Elnora removed her hat. There was no place to put it, so she carried
it in her hand. She looked infinitely better without it. After
several efforts she at last opened the door and stepping inside
faced a smaller and more concentrated battery of eyes.
"The superintendent sent me. He thinks I belong here,"
she said to the professor in charge of the class, but she never
before heard the voice with which she spoke. As she stood waiting,
the girl of the hall passed on her way to the blackboard, and
suppressed laughter told Elnora that her thrust had been repeated.
"Be seated," said the professor, and then because he
saw Elnora was desperately embarrassed he proceeded to lend her
a book and to ask her if she had studied algebra. She said she
had a little, but not the same book they were using. He asked
her if she felt that she could do the work they were beginning,
and she said she did.
That was how it happened, that three minutes after entering the
room she was told to take her place beside the girl who had gone
last to the board, and whose flushed face and angry eyes avoided
meeting Elnora's. Being compelled to concentrate on her proposition
she forgot herself. When the professor asked that all pupils sign
their work she firmly wrote "Elnora Comstock" under
her demonstration. Then she took her seat and waited with white
lips and trembling limbs, as one after another professor called
the names on the board, while their owners arose and explained
their propositions, or "flunked" if they had not found
a correct solution. She was so eager to catch their forms of expression
and prepare herself for her recitation, that she never looked
from the work on the board, until clearly and distinctly, "Elnora
Comstock," called the professor.
The dazed girl stared at the board. One tiny curl added to the
top of the first curve of the m in her name, had transformed it
from a good old English patronymic that any girl might bear proudly,
to Cornstock. Elnora sat speechless. When and how did it happen?
She could feel the wave of smothered laughter in the air around
her. A rush of anger turned her face scarlet and her soul sick.
The voice of the professor addressed her directly.
"This proposition seems to be beautifully demonstrated, Miss
Cornstalk," he said. "Surely, you can tell us how you
did it."
That word of praise saved her. She could do good work. They might
wear their pretty clothes, have their friends and make life a
greater misery than it ever before had been for her, but not one
of them should do better work or be more womanly. That lay with
her. She was tall, straight, and handsome as she arose.
"Of course I can explain my work," she said in natural
tones. "What I can't explain is how I happened to be so stupid
as to make a mistake in writing my own name. I must have been
a little nervous. Please excuse me."
She went to the board, swept off the signature with one stroke,then
rewrote it plainly. "My name is Comstock," she said
distinctly. She returned to her seat and following the formula
used by the others made her first high school recitation.
As Elnora resumed her seat Professor Henley looked at her steadily.
"It puzzles me," he said deliberately, how you can write
as beautiful a demonstration, and explain it as clearly as ever
has been done in any of my classes and still be so disturbed as
to make a mistake in your own name. Are you very sure you did
that yourself, Miss Comstock?"
"It is impossible that any one else should have done it,"
answered Elnora.
"I am very glad you think so," said the professor. "Being
Freshmen, all of you are strangers to me. I should dislike to
begin the year with you feeling there was one among you small
enough to do a trick like that. The next proposition, please."
When the hour had gone the class filed back to the study room
and Elnora followed in desperation, because she did not know where
else to go. She could not study as she had no books, and when
the class again left the room to go to another professor for the
next recitation, she went also. At least they could put her out
if she did not belong there. Noon came at last, and she kept with
the others until they dispersed on the sidewalk. She was so abnormally
self- conscious she fancied all the hundreds of that laughing,
throng saw and jested at her. When she passed the brown-eyed boy
walking with the girl of her encounter, she knew, for she heard
him say: "Did you really let that gawky piece of calico get
ahead of you?" The answer was indistinct.
Elnora hurried from the city. She intended to get her lunch, eat
it in the shade of the first tree, and then decide whether she
would go back or go home. She knelt on the bridge and reached
for her box, but it was so very light that she was prepared for
the fact that it was empty, before opening it. There was one thing
for which to be thankful. The boy or tramp who had seen her hide
it, had left the napkin. She would not have to face her mother
and account for its loss. She put it in her pocket, and threw
the box into the ditch. Then she sat on the bridge and tried to
think, but her brain was confused.
"Perhaps the worst is over," she said at last. "I
will go back. What would mother say to me if I came home now?"
So she returned to the high school, followed some other pupils
to the coat room, hung her hat, and found her way to the study
where she had been in the morning. Twice that afternoon, with
aching head and empty stomach, she faced strange professors, in
different branches. Once she escaped notice; the second time the
worst happened. She was asked a question she could not answer.
"Have you not decided on your course, and secured your books?"
inquired the professor.
"I have decided on my course," replied Elnora, "I
do not know where to ask for my books."
"Ask?" the professor was bewildered.
"I understood the books were furnished," faltered Elnora.
"Only to those bringing an order from the township trustee,"
replied the Professor.
"No! Oh no!" cried Elnora. "I will have them to-
morrow," and gripped her desk for support for she knew that
was not true. Four books, ranging perhaps at a dollar and a half
apiece; would her mother buy them? Of course she would not--could
not.
Did not Elnora know the story of old. There was enough land, but
no one to do clearing and farm. Tax on all those acres, recently
the new gravel road tax added, the expense of living and only
the work of two women to meet all of it. She was insane to think
she could come to the city to school. Her mother had been right.
The girl decided that if only she lived to reach home, she would
stay there and lead any sort of life to avoid more of this torture.
Bad as what she wished to escape had been, it was nothing like
this. She never could live down the movement that went through
the class when she inadvertently revealed the fact that she had
expected books to be furnished. Her mother would not secure them;
that settled the question.
But the end of misery is never in a hurry to come; before the
day was over the superintendent entered the room and explained
that pupils from the country were charged a tuition of twenty
dollars a year. That really was the end. Previously Elnora had
canvassed a dozen methods for securing the money for books, ranging
all the way from offering to wash the superintendent's dishes
to breaking into the bank. This additional expense made her plans
so wildly impossible, there was nothing to do but hold up her
head until she was from sight.
Down the long corridor alone among hundreds, down the long street
alone among thousands, out into the country she came at last.
Across the fence and field, along the old trail once trodden by
a boy's bitter agony, now stumbled a white-faced girl, sick at
heart. She sat on a log and began to sob in spite of her efforts
at self-control. At first it wasphysical breakdown, later, thought
came crowding.
Oh the shame, the mortification! Why had she not known of the
tuition? How did she happen to think that in the city books were
furnished? Perhaps it was because she had read they were in several
states. But why did she not know? Why did not her mother go with
her? Other mothers-- but when had her mother ever been or done
anything at all like other mothers? Because she never had been
it was useless to blame her now. Elnora realized she should have
gone to town the week before, called on some one and learned all
these things herself. She should have remembered how her clothing
would look, before she wore it in public places. Now she knew,
and her dreams were over. She must go home to feed chickens, calves,
and pigs, wear calico and coarse shoes, and with averted head,
pass a library all her life. She sobbed again.
"For pity's sake, honey, what's the matter?" asked the
voice of the nearest neighbour, Wesley Sinton, as he seated himself
beside Elnora. "There, there," he continued, smearing
tears all over her face in an effort to dry them. "Was it
as bad as that, now? Maggie has been just wild over you all day.
She's got nervouser every minute. She said we were foolish to
let you go. She said your clothes were not right, you ought not
to carry that tin pail, and that they would laugh at you. By gum,
I see they did!"
"Oh, Uncle Wesley," sobbed the girl, "why didn't
she tell me? "
"Well, you see, Elnora, she didn't like to. You got such
a way of holding up your head, and going through with things.
She thought some way that you'd make it, till you got started,
and then she begun to see a hundred things we should have done.
I reckon you hadn't reached that building before she remembered
that your skirt should have been pleated instead of gathered,
your shoes been low, and lighter for hot September weather, and
a new hat. Were your clothes right, Elnora?"
The girl broke into hysterical laughter. "Right!" she
cried. "Right! Uncle Wesley, you should have seen me among
them! I was a picture! They'll never forget me. No, they won't
get the chance, for they'll see me again to-morrow!
"Now that is what I call spunk, Elnora! Downright grit,"
said Wesley Sinton. "Don't you let them laugh you out. You've
helped Margaret and me for years at harvest and busy times, what
you've earned must amount to quite a sum. You can get yourself
a good many clothes with it."
"Don't mention clothes, Uncle Wesley," sobbed Elnora,
"I don't care now how I look. If I don't go back all of them
will know it's because I am so poor I can't buy my books."
"Oh, I don't know as you are so dratted poor," said
Sinton meditatively. "There are three hundred acres of good
land, with fine timber as ever grew on it."
"It takes all we can earn to pay the tax, and mother wouldn't
cut a tree for her life."
"Well then, maybe, I'll be compelled to cut one for her,"
suggested Sinton. "Anyway, stop tearing yourself to pieces
and tell me. If it isn't clothes, what is it?"
"It's books and tuition. Over twenty dollars in all."
"Humph! First time I ever knew you to be stumped by twenty
dollars, Elnora," said Sinton, patting her hand.
"It's the first time you ever knew me to want money,"
answered Elnora. "This is different from anything that ever
happened to me. Oh, how can I get it, Uncle Wesley?"
"Drive to town with me in the morning and I'll draw it from
the bank for you. I owe you every cent of it."
"You know you don't owe me a penny, and I wouldn't touch
one from you, unless I really could earn it. For anything that's
past I owe you and Aunt Margaret for all the home life and love
I've ever known. I know how you work, and I'll not take your money."
"Just a loan, Elnora, just a loan for a little while until
you can earn it. You can be proud with all the rest of the world,
but there are no secrets between us, are there, Elnora?"
"No," said Elnora, "there are none. You and Aunt
Margaret have given me all the love there has been in my life.
That is the one reason above all others why you shall not give
me charity. Hand me money because you find me crying for it! This
isn't the first time this old trail has known tears and heartache.
All of us know that story. Freckles stuck to what he undertook
and won out. I stick, too. When Duncan moved away he gave me all
Freckles left in the swamp, and as I have inherited his property
maybe his luck will come with it. I won't touch your money, but
I'll win some way. First, I'm going home and try mother. It's
just possible I could find second-hand books, and perhaps all
the tuition need not be paid at once. Maybe they would accept
it quarterly. But oh, Uncle Wesley, you and Aunt Margaret keep
on loving me! I'm so lonely, and no one else cares!"
Wesley Sinton's jaws met with a click. He swallowed hard on bitter
words and changed what he would have liked to say three times
before it became articulate.
"Elnora," he said at last, "if it hadn't been for
one thing I'd have tried to take legal steps to make you ours
when you were three years old. Maggie said then it wasn't any
use, but I've always held on. You see, I was the first man there,
honey, and there are things you see, that you can't ever make
anybody else understand. She loved him Elnora, she just made an
idol of him. There was that oozy green hole, with the thick scum
broke, and two or three big bubbles slowly rising that were the
breath of his body. There she was in spasms of agony, and beside
her the great heavy log she'd tried to throw him. I can't ever
forgive her for turning against you, and spoiling your childhood
as she has, but I couldn't forgive anybody else for abusing her.
Maggie has got no mercy on her, but Maggie didn't see what I did,
and I've never tried to make it very clear to her. It's been a
little too plain for me ever since. Whenever I look at your mother's
face, I see what she saw, so I hold my tongue and say, in my heart,
`Give her a mite more time.' Some day it will come. She does love
you, Elnora. Everybody does, honey. It's just that she's feeling
so much, she can't express herself. You be a patient girl and
wait a little longer. After all, she's your mother, and you're
all she's got, but a memory, and it might do her good to let her
know that she was fooled in that."
"It would kill her!" cried the girl swiftly. "Uncle
Wesley, it would kill her! What do you mean?"
"Nothing," said Wesley Sinton soothingly. "Nothing,
honey. That was just one of them fool things a man says, when
he is trying his best to be wise. You see, she loved him mightily,
and they'd been married only a year, and what she was loving was
what she thought he was. She hadn't really got acquainted with
the man yet. If it had been even one more year, she could have
borne it, and you'd have got justice. Having been a teacher she
was better educated and smarter than the rest of us, and so she
was more sensitive like. She can't understand she was loving a
dream. So I say it might do her good if somebody that knew, could
tell her, but I swear to gracious, I never could. I've heard her
out at the edge of that quagmire calling in them wild spells of
hers off and on for the last sixteen years, and imploring the
swamp to give him back to her, and I've got out of bed when I
was pretty tired, and come down to see she didn't go in herself,
or harm you. What she feels is too deep for me. I've got to respectin'
her grief, and I can't get over it. Go home and tell your ma,
honey, and ask her nice and kind to help you. If she won't, then
you got to swallow that little lump of pride in your neck, and
come to Aunt Maggie, like you been a-coming all your life."
"I'll ask mother, but I can't take your money, Uncle Wesley,
indeed I can't. I'll wait a year, and earn some, and enter next
year."
"There's one thing you don't consider, Elnora," said
the man earnestly. "And that's what you are to Maggie. She's
a little like your ma. She hasn't given up to it, and she's struggling
on brave, but when we buried our second little girl the light
went out of Maggie's eyes, and it's not come back. The only time
I ever see a hint of it is when she thinks she's done something
that makes you happy, Elnora. Now, you go easy about refusing
her anything she wants to do for you. There's times in this world
when it's our bounden duty to forget ourselves, and think what
will help other people. Young woman, you owe me and Maggie all
the comfort we can get out of you. There's the two of our own
we can't ever do anything for. Don't you get the idea into your
head that a fool thing you call pride is going to cut us out of
all the pleasure we have in life beside ourselves."
"Uncle Wesley, you are a dear," said Elnora. "Just
a dear! If I can't possibly get that money any way else on earth,
I'll come and borrow it of you, and then I'll pay it back if I
must dig ferns from the swamp and sell them from door to door
in the city. I'll even plant them, so that they will be sure to
come up in the spring. I have been sort of panic stricken all
day and couldn't think. I can gather nuts and sell them. Freckles
sold moths and butterflies, and I've a lot collected. Of course,
I am going back to-morrow! I can find a way to get the books.
Don't you worry about me. I am all right!
"Now, what do you think of that?" inquired Wesley Sinton
of the swamp in general. "Here's our Elnora come back to
stay. Head high and right as a trivet! You've named three ways
in three minutes that you could earn ten dollars, which I figure
would be enough, to start you. Let's go to supper and stop worrying!"
Elnora unlocked the case, took out the pail, put the napkin in
it, pulled the ribbon from her hair, binding it down tightly again
and followed to the road. From afar she could see her mother in
the doorway. She blinked her eyes, and tried to smile as she answered
Wesley Sinton, and indeed she did feel better. She knew now what
she had to expect, where to go, and what to do. Get the books
she must; when she had them, she would show those city girls and
boys how to prepare and recite lessons, how to walk with a brave
heart; and they could show her how to wear pretty clothes and
have good times.
As she neared the door her mother reached for the pail. "I
forgot to tell you to bring home your scraps for the chickens,"
she said.
Elnora entered. "There weren't any scraps, and I'm hungry
again as I ever was in my life."
"I thought likely you would be," said Mrs. Comstock,
"and so I got supper ready. We can eat first, and do the
work afterward. What kept you so? I expected you an hour ago."
Elnora looked into her mother's face and smiled. It was a queer
sort of a little smile, and would have reached the depths with
any normal mother.
"I see you've been bawling," said Mrs. Comstock. "I
thought you'd get your fill in a hurry. That's why I wouldn't
go to any expense. If we keep out of the poor- house we have to
cut the corners close. It's likely this Brushwood road tax will
eat up all we've saved in years. Where the land tax is to come
from I don't know. It gets bigger every year. If they are going
to dredge the swamp ditch again they'll just have to take the
land to pay for it. I can't, that's all! We'll get up early in
the morning and gather and hull the beans for winter, and put
in the rest of the day hoeing the turnips."
Elnora again smiled that pitiful smile.
"Do you think I didn't know that I was funny and would be
laughed at?" she asked.
"Funny?" cried Mrs. Comstock hotly.
"Yes, funny! A regular caricature," answered Elnora.
"No one else wore calico, not even one other. No one else
wore high heavy shoes, not even one. No one else had such a funny
little old hat; my hair was not right, my ribbon invisible compared
with the others, I did not know where to go, or what to do, and
I had no books. What a spectacle I made for them!" Elnora
laughed nervously at her own picture. "But there are always
two sides! The professor said in the algebra class that he never
had a better solution and explanation than mine of the proposition
he gave me, which scored one for me in spite of my clothes."
"Well, I wouldn't brag on myself!"
"That was poor taste," admitted Elnora. "But, you
see, it is a case of whistling to keep up my courage. I honestly
could see that I would have looked just as well as the rest of
them if I had been dressed as they were. We can't afford that,
so I have to find something else to brace me. It was rather bad,
mother!"
"Well, I'm glad you got enough of it!"
"Oh, but I haven't" hurried in Elnora. "I just
got a start. The hardest is over. To-morrow they won't be surprised.
They will know what to expect. I am sorry to hear about the dredge.
Is it really going through?"
"Yes. I got my notification today. The tax will be something
enormous. I don't know as I can spare you, even if you are willing
to be a laughing-stock for the town."
With every bite Elnora's courage returned, for she was a healthy
young thing.
"You've heard about doing evil that good might come from
it," she said. "Well, mother mine, it's something like
that with me. I'm willing to bear the hard part to pay for what
I'll learn. Already I have selected the ward building in which
I shall teach in about four years. I am going to ask for a room
with a south exposure so that the flowers and moths I take in
from the swamp to show the children will do well."
"You little idiot!" said Mrs. Comstock. "How are
you going to pay your expenses?"
"Now that is just what I was going to ask you!" said
Elnora. "You see, I have had two startling pieces of news
to-day. I did not know I would need any money. I thought the city
furnished the books, and there is an out-of-town tuition, also.
I need ten dollars in the morning. Will you please let me have
it?"
"Ten dollars!" cried Mrs. Comstock. "Ten dollars!
Why don't you say a hundred and be done with it! I could get one
as easy as the other. I told you! I told you I couldn't raise
a cent. Every year expenses grow bigger and bigger. I told you
not to ask for money!"
"I never meant to," replied Elnora. "I thought
clothes were all I needed and I could bear them. I never knew
about buying books and tuition."
"Well, I did!" said Mrs. Comstock. "I knew what
you would run into! But you are so bull-dog stubborn, and so set
in your way, I thought I would just let you try the world a little
and see how you liked it!"
Elnora pushed back her chair and looked at her mother.
"Do you mean to say," she demanded, "that you knew,
when you let me go into a city classroom and reveal the fact before
all of them that I expected to have my books handed out to me;
do you mean to say that you knew I had to pay for them?"
Mrs. Comstock evaded the direct question.
"Anybody but an idiot mooning over a book or wasting time
prowling the woods would have known you had to pay. Everybody
has to pay for everything. Life is made up of pay, pay, pay! It's
always and forever pay! If you don't pay one way you do another!
Of course, I knew you had to pay. Of course, I knew you would
come home blubbering! But you don't get a penny! I haven't one
cent, and can't get one! Have your way if you are determined,
but I think you will find the road somewhat rocky."
"Swampy, you mean, mother," corrected Elnora. She arose
white and trembling. "Perhaps some day God will teach me
how to understand you. He knows I do not now. You can't possibly
realize just what you let me go through to-day, or how you let
me go, but I'll tell you this: You understand enough that if you
had the money, and would offer it to me, I wouldn't touch it now.
And I'll tell you this much more. I'll get it myself. I'll raise
it, and do it some honest way. I am going back to-morrow, the
next day, and the next. You need not come out, I'll do the night
work, and hoe the turnips."
It was ten o'clock when the chickens, pigs, and cattle were fed,
the turnips hoed, and a heap of bean vines was stacked beside
the back door.