第42章 CHAPTER IX(1)

WHEREIN ELNORA DISCOVERS A VIOLIN,AND BILLY DISCIPLINES MARGARETElnora missed the little figure at the bridge the following morning.She slowly walked up the street and turned in at the wide entrance to the school grounds.She scarcely could comprehend that only a week ago she had gone there friendless,alone,and so sick at heart that she was physically ill.To-day she had decent clothing,books,friends,and her mind was at ease to work on her studies.

As she approached home that night the girl paused in amazement.Her mother had company,and she was laughing.

Elnora entered the kitchen softly and peeped into the sitting-room.Mrs.Comstock sat in her chair holding a book and every few seconds a soft chuckle broke into a real laugh.Mark Twain was doing his work;while Mrs.Comstock was not lacking in a sense of humour.

Elnora entered the room before her mother saw her.

Mrs.Comstock looked up with flushed face.

"Where did you get this?"she demanded.

"I bought it,"said Elnora.

"Bought it!With all the taxes due!"

"I paid for it out of my Indian money,mother,"said Elnora.

"I couldn't bear to spend so much on myself and nothing at all on you.I was afraid to buy the dress I should have liked to,and I thought the book would be company,while I was gone.I haven't read it,but I do hope it's good.""Good!It's the biggest piece of foolishness I have read in all my life.I've laughed all day,ever since Ifound it.I had a notion to go out and read some of it to the cows and see if they wouldn't laugh.""If it made you laugh,it's a wise book,"said Elnora.

"Wise!"cried Mrs.Comstock."You can stake your life it's a wise book.It takes the smartest man there is to do this kind of fooling,"and she began laughing again.

Elnora,highly satisfied with her purchase,went to her room and put on her working clothes.Thereafter she made a point of bringing a book that she thought would interest her mother,from the library every week,and leaving it on the sitting-room table.Each night she carried home at least two school books and studied until she had mastered the points of her lessons.She did her share of the work faithfully,and every available minute she was in the fields searching for cocoons,for the moths promised to become her largest source of income.

She gathered baskets of nests,flowers,mosses,insects,and all sorts of natural history specimens and sold them to the grade teachers.At first she tried to tell these instructors what to teach their pupils about the specimens;but recognizing how much more she knew than they,one after another begged her to study at home,and use her spare hours in school to exhibit and explain nature subjects to their pupils.Elnora loved the work,and she needed the money,for every few days some matter of expense arose that she had not expected.

From the first week she had been received and invited with the crowd of girls in her class,and it was their custom in passing through the business part of the city to stop at the confectioners'and take turns in treating to expensive candies,ice cream sodas,hot chocolate,or whatever they fancied.When first Elnora was asked she accepted without understanding.The second time she went because she seldom had tasted these things,and they were so delicious she could not resist.After that she went because she knew all about it,and had decided to go.

She had spent half an hour on the log beside the trail in deep thought and had arrived at her conclusions.

She worked harder than usual for the next week,but she seemed to thrive on work.It was October and the red leaves were falling when her first time came to treat.

As the crowd flocked down the broad walk that night Elnora called,"Girls,it's my treat to-night!Come on!"She led the way through the city to the grocery they patronized when they had a small spread,and entering came out with a basket,which she carried to the bridge on her home road.There she arranged the girls in two rows on the cement abutments and opening her basket she gravely offered each girl an exquisite little basket of bark,lined with red leaves,in one end of which nestled a juicy big red apple and in the other a spicy doughnut not an hour from Margaret Sinton's frying basket.

Another time she offered big balls of popped corn stuck together with maple sugar,and liberally sprinkled with beechnut kernels.Again it was hickory-nut kernels glazed with sugar,another time maple candy,and once a basket of warm pumpkin pies.She never made any apology,or offered any excuse.She simply gave what she could afford,and the change was as welcome to those city girls accustomed to sodas and French candy,as were these same things to Elnora surfeited on popcorn and pie.

In her room was a little slip containing a record of the number of weeks in the school year,the times it would be her turn to treat and the dates on which such occasions would fall,with a number of suggestions beside each.

Once the girls almost fought over a basket lined with yellow leaves,and filled with fat,very ripe red haws.

In late October there was a riot over one which was lined with red leaves and contained big fragrant pawpaws frost-bitten to a perfect degree.Then hazel nuts were ripe,and once they served.One day Elnora at her wits'end,explained to her mother that the girls had given her things and she wanted to treat them.Mrs.Comstock,with characteristic stubbornness,had said she would leave a basket at the grocery for her,but firmly declined to say what would be in it.All day Elnora struggled to keep her mind on her books.For hours she wavered in tense uncertainty.What would her mother do?Should she take the girls to the confectioner's that night or risk the basket?Mrs.Comstock could make delicious things to eat,but would she?