CHAPTER XI
AT THE SCHOOLHOUSE
It was scarcely dusk on Saturday when Lucas drove into the side yardat Hillcrest with the ponies hitched to a double-seated buckboard.Entertainments begin early in the rural districts.
The ponies had been clipped and looked less like animated cowhide trunksthan they had when the Bray girls had first seen them and their youngmaster in Bridleburg.
"School teacher came along an' maw made Sairy go with him in his buggy,"exclaimed Lucas, with a broad grin. "If Sairy don't ketch a feller 'forelong, an' clamp to him, 'twon't be maw's fault."
Lucas was evidently much impressed by the appearance of Lyddy and 'Phemiewhen they locked the side door and climbed into the buckboard. Because oftheir mother's recent death the girls had dressed very quietly; but theirblack frocks were now very shabby, it was coming warmer weather, and theonly dresses they owned which were fit to wear to an evening function ofany kind were those that they had worn "for best" the year previous.
But the two girls from the city had no idea they would create such asensation as they did when Lucas pulled in the ponies with a flourishand stopped directly before the door of the schoolhouse.
The building was already lighted up and there was quite an assemblage ofyoung men and boys about the two front entrances. On the girls' porch,too, a number of the feminine members of the Temperance Club were grouped,and with them Sairy Pritchett.
Her own arrival with the schoolmaster had been an effective one and shehad waited with the other girls to welcome the newcomers from HillcrestFarm, and introduce them to her more particular friends.
But the Bray girls looked as though they were from another sphere. Notthat their frocks were so fanciful in either design or material; but therewas a style about them that made the finery of the other girls look bothcheap and tawdry.
"So _them_ stuck-up things air goin' to live 'round here; be they?"whispered one rosy-cheeked, buxom farmer's daughter to SairyPritchett--and her whisper carried far. "Well, I tell you right now Idon't like their looks. See that Joe Badger; will you? He's got tohelp 'em down out o' Lucas's waggin'; has he? Well, I declare!"
"An' Hen Jackson, too!" cried another girl, shrilly. "They'd let airy oneof us girls fall out on our heads."
"Huh!" said Sairy, airily, "if you can't keep Joe an' Hen from shinin'around every new gal that comes to the club, I guess you ain't caught 'emvery fast."
"He, he!" giggled another. "Sairy thinks she's hooked the school teacherall right, and that he won't get away from her."
"Cat!" snapped Miss Pritchett, descending the steps in her most statelymanner to meet her new friends.
"Cat yourself!" returned the other. "I guess you'll show your claws, Miss,if you have a chance."
Perhaps Sairy did not hear all of this; and surely the Bray girls didnot. Sairy Pritchett was rather proud of counting these city girls asher particular friends. She welcomed Lydia and Euphemia warmly.
"I hope Lucas didn't try to tip you into the brook again, Miss Bray,"Sairy giggled to 'Phemie. "Oh, yes! Miss Lydia Bray, Mr. Badger; Mr.Jackson, Miss Bray. And this is Miss Euphemia, Mr. Badger--_and_ Mr.Jackson.
"Now, that'll do very well, Joe--and Hen. You go 'tend to your own girls;we can git on without you."
Sairy deliberately led the newcomers into the schoolhouse by the boys'entrance, thus ignoring the girls who had roused her ire. She introducedLyddy and 'Phemie right and left to such of the young fellows as were nottoo bashful.
Sairy suddenly arrived at the conclusion that to pilot the sisters fromHillcrest about would be "good business." The newcomers attracted thebetter class of young bachelors at the club meeting and Sairy--heretoforesomething of a "wall flower" on such occasions--found herself the verycentre of the group.
Lyddy and 'Phemie were naturally a little disturbed by the prominentposition in which they were placed by Sairy's manoeuvring; but, ofcourse, the sisters had been used to going into society, and Lyddy'sexperience at college and her natural sedateness of character enabledher to appear to advantage. As for the younger girl, she was so muchamused by Sairy, and the others, that she quite forgot to feel confused.
Indeed, she found that just by looking at most of these young men, andsmiling, she could throw them into spasms of self-consciousness. Theywere almost as bad as Lucas Pritchett, and Lucas was getting to be such agood friend now that 'Phemie couldn't really enjoy making him feel unhappy.
She was, indeed, particularly nice to him when young Pritchett struggledto her side after the girls were settled in adjoining seats, half-way upthe aisle on the "girls' side" of the schoolroom.
These young girls and fellows had--most of them--attended the districtschool, or were now attending it; therefore, they were used to beingdivided according to the sexes, and those boys who actually had notaccompanied their girlfriends to the club meeting, sat by themselveson the boys' side, while the girls grouped together on the other sideof the house.
There were a few young married couples present, and these matrons madetheir husbands sit beside them during the exercises; but for a young manand young girl to sit together was almost a formal announcement in thatcommunity that they "had intentions!"
All this was quite unsuspected by Lyddy and 'Phemie Bray, and the latterhad no idea of the joy that possessed Lucas Pritchett's soul when sheallowed him to take the seat beside her.
Her sister sat at her other hand, and Sairy was beyond Lyddy. No otheryoung fellow could get within touch of the city girls, therefore, althoughthere was doubtless many a swain who would have been glad to do so.
This club, the fundamental idea of which was "temperance," had graduallydeveloped into something much broader. While it still demanded apledge from its members regarding abstinence from alcoholic beverages,including the bane of the countryside--hard cider--its semimonthlymeetings were mainly of a literary and musical nature.
The reigning school teacher for the current term was supposed to takethe lead in governing the club and pushing forward the local talent.Mr. Somers was the name of the young man with the bald brow and theeyeglasses, who was presiding over the welfare of Pounder's DistrictSchool. The Bray girls thought he seemed to be an intelligent andwell-mannered young man, if a trifle self-conscious.
And he evidently had an element that was difficult to handle.
Soon after the meeting was called to order it became plain that a groupof boys down in the corner by the desk were much more noisy than wasnecessary.
The huge stove, by which the room was overheated, was down there, itssmoke-pipe crossing, in a L-shaped figure, the entire room to the chimneyat one side, and it did seem as though none of those boys could movewithout kicking their boots against this stove.
These uncouth noises interfered with the opening address of the teacherand punctuated the "roll call" by the secretary, who was a small, almostdwarf-like young man, out of whose mouth rolled the names of the membersin a voice that fairly shook the casements. Such a thunderous tone fromso puny a source was in itself amazing, and convulsed 'Phemie.
"Ain't he got a great voice?" asked Lucas, in a whisper. "He sings bass inthe church choir and sometimes, begum! ye can't hear nawthin' but ElbertHooker holler."
"Is _that_ his name?" gasped 'Phemie.
"Yep. Elbert Hooker. 'Yell-bert' the boys call him. He kin sure hollerlike a bull!"
And at that very moment, as the bombastic Elbert was subsiding and thewindow panes ceased from rattling with the reverberations of his voice,one of the boys in the corner fell more heavily than before against thestove--or, it might have been Elbert Hooker's tones had shaken loose thejoints of stovepipe that crossed the schoolroom; however, there was ayell from those down front, the girls scrambled out of the way, the smokebegan to spurt from between the joints, and it was seen that only thewires fastened to the ceiling kept the soot-laden lengths of pipe fromfalling to the floor.