CHAPTER XI.
The hurrying, scurrying, scrambling stream of boys was once more leaping and pushing, running and walking up the schoolhouse-stairs, where Tom had waited so long in vain hope that Hal would “move on.” There were not so very many of them, not more than thirty-five or forty at the most; but there was something in the way they were getting up stairs that would have made any one who wasn’t used to it sure there were legs and boots enough for fifty or a hundred. They subsided considerably at the schoolroom-door, though not altogether, as the bell had not yet rung, but one by one, as they passed in, they seemed struck into dumb astonishment at what they saw. It was only Creepy standing by his desk while the professor looked over his books, and talked pleasantly of the place he had better take in the classes. But the queer, twisted little form, the great head with its high, white forehead and brilliant eyes, and the color coming and going like a living thing in the pale cheeks, seemed to put a spell on the boys, and held their eyes as if they had seen a hobgoblin, until the professor turned his own upon them with such a flash and frown as sent them off to their seats and their own affairs in a twinkling. But Creepy hardly heard what the professor was saying; the rush had taken his breath away, and though he had not dared look up as it came, he felt every step that passed near him, and his heart was throbbing again as it had not since the day when he crept out to his little room after the first visit from the doctor.
And it would not be quiet after the bell had rung, and every one was so busy that he had ventured as many glances as he liked about the room. Was this school? Were these the boys he was to know and call his schoolmates and companions? But so many! Such a great crowd! He had not thought so many boys ever got together in one school; he had hardly thought there were as many in the city! How should he ever come to know one from the other? how would he ever dare to speak to any of them? Oh, why did he come away from the doctor and Joan? He felt happy, and remembered that he was one of the princes when he was with them; and the professor, too, he did not mind; the doctor and he had had such a pleasant talk when the doctor came to introduce him, and he had said so many kind things already. No, he should never be afraid of him, but there were too many of these boys, and still more in the next room.
His head felt dizzy and he laid it down upon his desk, and listened to the hum a while with his eyes shut. How was he ever going to study in the midst of it?
But somehow, after the first half hour, it did not seem quite so much, and by the time the bell struck ten o’clock, Creepy was going on with his lessons with a steadier pulse and almost a feeling of pleasure warming up in his heart again. What if he were to like it, after all! What if some of the boys were even to like him, and they should come to be friends, as the doctor wished! At any rate, he should see their games at recess! The doctor had told him about them, and given him a great many directions not to run too much until he got a little used to it; he couldn’t understand very well yet, but it would all come right if he once saw.
Hum, hum, went the schoolroom, and on went the routine of lessons. If any of the other boys had been told the new-comer thought it exciting, they would have called it about the strangest thing they ever heard of. Carter and Davis were busy at that very moment in the next room over an illustrated almanac they had been getting up, to show how many days and hours still remained before it would all be over, and the long vacation come on. How many hours said almanac had taken from their studies, and how much care had been necessary to conceal it from proper authorities, were questions they did not vex their souls about; it was trouble enough to Davis to furnish the plan, the leading ideas, and the plain work, while Carter designed the illustrations, and a pretty good thing they had made of it altogether, they thought.
It lay open now on Carters desk, just inside his astronomy, and he made a sign to Davis to look at the last and crowning design just completed.
Davis signalled “Tip-top” with telegraphic taps of his pencil upon his slate, and then the astronomy-class was called.
The boys filed past the open door that led from the small room into the one where Creepy sat, with a quiet, regular step until Aleck reached it, and his eyes wandering through, caught sight of the face that had looked in at the conservatory-window with such rapture two or three times, but had been missing now so long that he and Nelly had feared they should never meet it again. Without knowing he did it, he came to such a sudden halt that Carter, who was behind him, was “brought up all standing,” his astronomy knocked from his hand, and the almanac went skimming away until at last it fluttered down directly before the professor’s feet.
“Thank you,” said the professor, with a nod and a bow to Carter; “yes, I will look at it with pleasure,” and picking it up he turned leaf after leaf, and studied one after another of the chefs-d’œuvres.
“Ah,” he said, after what seemed to the two boys an eternity of suspense, “I really was not aware I had such an artist in the school. Modesty is a virtue, and shrinks from having its work exhibited, but such masterpieces as these I must beg to hold up for one moment to the admiration of the class,” and mounting the platform he took his seat at the desk, and holding up the almanac to the view of the whole room, he turned the pages and exhibited one after another of the grand designs for the five weeks remaining, in every one of which a caricature of himself formed a prominent figure.
A suppressed murmur arose as the pictures met the devouring eyes of the boys, beginning with a bonfire of compositions at which the professor was trying to warm his icy heart, and ending with the Fourth of July in the shape of a spread eagle with wings of stars and stripes, the school bell in one talon and the blackboard brush in the other, flying away with the professor bodily, while a pile of books like a small haystack was heaped upon its back, geographies, Virgils, philosophies and grammars, helter-skelter, and hanging together no one could tell how.
Carter looked as if he would sink, or at least as if he would give all he expected to die possessed of, if a knot-hole would open and let him escape, but Davis made a tremendous effort and kept so unmoved a face that no one suspected him of having anything to do with the affair.
“Allow me to congratulate you,” said the professor, as he returned the almanac, “not only is such talent worthy of commendation, but the faithful use of time, and the expenditure of precious moments upon work of genuine importance, will if formed into a habit, become of life-long value, and I must congratulate myself that accident has brought the indication of such promise to my notice;” and with another bow he placed the fated subject of discussion in Carter’s hands, which would far sooner have reached themselves out for a flogging than to acknowledge such an ownership.
The lesson went on, but a more vivid picture filled Aleck’s mind than any Carter’s pencil could produce. That face at the desk in the other room! Their eyes had met, and Creepy had recognized him at the same instant and with a great bound of joy, and was over his book now without seeing a word, with no room for anything but the thought that he was here; and Aleck himself had to take good care that he did not stumble in his recitation, he was so busy thinking what Nelly would say when he told her whom he had found, and how she would delight to surprise him with a handful of flowers on his desk now and then.
But the recitation was over at last and with it the first division of the morning session; the bell rang for recess and the stream poured out once more, though soberly as a funeral procession compared with the way it had passed in a few hours before.
This was what Creepy had been longing for, and yet when the moment fairly came, it seemed to him he could not stir. If he could only see that face that had looked in at the door! But he saw only one strange one after another, and each glancing curiously at him as it passed.
But the professor caught sight of him just then and divined the difficulty.
“Don’t you feel like going out? I think I would try if I were you,” he said with the same smile that had been so reassuring in the morning. “Here, Haggarty,” he added to Tom, who had hung behind as usual, to keep clear of something he knew Hal had on his tongue’s end, “take this boy along with you, can’t you, and see that he makes a good time out of it somehow. It don’t do to sit here too long without a breath of air.”
They went down stairs together, and though Creepy thought Tom seemed to be casting sidelong glances at him, it never occurred to him that he saw anything peculiar beyond his being a stranger, and the shouts coming up from the playground had such a tempting sound, that he hurried over the stairs in a way that astonished Tom beyond measure.
“This is the way,” said Tom, pushing open the door, and leading Creepy out, with a feeling that he would do anything in the world if he only knew what was the right thing, but that he really didn’t, he took refuge in a corner close at hand, and a little off the common track of the players.
“Hurrah for Carter and his almanac!” was the shout just now coming up, “Carter’s almanac, the newest thing out!”
“I say, old fellow, is it time to look out for storms?” cried Hal Fenimore’s voice.
“And I say, what quarter of the moon is best for sowing winter wheat?” said another.
“You don’t give away those almanacs, do you?” cried a third; “if you do I want the first chance.”
“Come, come,” said Aleck, who had been distressed enough at being the unlucky cause of all the trouble, “what’s the use of harping for ever on one string. Let’s have a game of ball, or time will be up before we know it.”
The mousers scattered again, and drew off for their game, while another set were establishing bounds for a run of tag. All this had been Greek to Creepy; he hadn’t understood a word, but it would all come to him in time, he supposed, if he could ever get through this business of being acquainted. Aleck had watched for him when the stream first poured out, but had given him up before now, and moved off, and poor little Tom, feeling more and more awkward every moment, made a great effort at last to say, “They’re going to have a game; don’t you want to come?”
Creepy hesitated a moment, trying to find voice.
“What a plague! He isn’t going to answer at all,” thought Tom, and in a fit of desperation, dreading above all lest Hal should get a sight of the situation, plunged his hands into his pockets, and walked away to join the players. A sudden thought sent Aleck back into the school-room, and Creepy, who had caught one glimpse of him, felt his last hope depart.
“However nobody seems to be taking any notice,” he thought, “and I can look on, at any rate, I suppose, of course.”
So this was a real game of ball, that he had so longed to see ever since the doctor first described it to him! He couldn’t understand it yet, any better than the talk about the almanac, but the shouts and the quick runs and the eager contest took hold of him in a moment, and he forgot himself and his embarrassment together.
“Oh what sport that must be,” he thought, as the game went on; “and how strong they are, and how swift, and what throws they make! I wonder if I shall ever learn? Of course I shall, the doctor said I should;” and his cheek warmed again, not as it had when the boys rushed into the school-room, but with as spirited a glow as the swiftest runner felt in his.
“Hurrah!” shouted the chorus, at an extra toss, and “hurrah,” echoed Creepy, silently to be sure, but with none the less gusto for all that.
“Oh how I should like to try! I wonder when they’ll ask me;” and suddenly the thought that no one noticed him, which had been such a refuge at first, rushed on him with a very disagreeable suggestion and brought the old “all but me” nearer to his lips than it had been for months. But just then he saw that they were noticing him; the game was halting and more than one group were putting their heads together and glancing towards his corner with whispers that must have something to do with him.
“You ought to ask him to play,” said Tom, whose feeling of responsibility in the matter had made him decidedly uncomfortable all the time—only, as he had declared at first, he really didn’t know what to do.
“Humph,” said Carter, who, still smarting under his own humiliation, felt that it would be a relief to put somebody else in his place, “ask him to play! A bright idea that would be. What’s a fellow like him going to do?”
The words floated over to Creepy’s ears, though they were not really intended to do so, and sent the blood tingling to his fingers’ ends, and the thought of the doctor seemed as far off as if a whole world lay between them.
The boys laughed and the game began again, but a feeling like ice was gathering around Creepy’s heart. He was not to play! They would not ask him! “Why not you?” Perhaps he did not hear, perhaps he had made a mistake. Oh, where was the doctor? Why had he ever come here at all?
“I say, you ought to do it,” began Tom again, uneasily; “the professor said he was to have a good time out of it somehow.”
“Suppose you mind your own business,” said Carter; but it seemed to Davis, who felt himself “just on the brink” with the professor about the almanac, that he might lay an anchor to windward, and he made his way across to where Creepy stood.
“Hallo, can you pitch a ball?” he asked.
“I don’t know, I never tried,” said Creepy, forcing the words from between his lips.
“Well, take this,” said Davis, falling back a little, “and stand about where you are, and let me have it the best you know how.”
Creepy took the ball and threw it with a trembling hand; it struck the ground some distance from Davis’ feet.
“Ha, ha,” shouted Carter, “how’s that for high?”
“How is that for Humpy?” answered Hal Fenimore, in a rather low tone, but heard well enough for all that.
“Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.”
Half a dozen voices in the crowd took up the chorus, and it rang across the playground until Tom looked up at the professor’s window in agony.
Ah, those words! The lame child understood it all now! In one instant the veil his good angel had hung for all those years between his eyes and his deformity was taken away and an evil demon seemed to be chuckling the whole truth in his ear.
He was a cripple, a hunchback, an ugly thing to look upon! He should never be like other people, and other people would never forget that he was unlike them. Wherever he went he was to be marked, ridiculed, and avoided! A prince indeed! Ah, the doctor had been mocking him, mocking him, with all the rest! The lonely life he had thought ended to-day, had in reality only begun, for “what was a fellow like him going to do?” Who wanted a humpback to take a share in their games, much less to be counted among their friends? What was there for him but to shrink away and hide from scornful eyes for ever?
His eager, glowing face had turned white as marble; the great eyes dilated and flashed. He drew himself up for a moment, quite beyond his poor shrunken height, and then with a wild cry, started from the grounds and fled away down the street. Away, away! Anywhere that his flying feet could carry him, only away from everybody and everything!
The boys stood and looked in each others’ faces without a word. “I guess you’ve done it now,” said Davis, turning to where Carter stood.
“I didn’t do it,” said Carter, too near being really terrified to retort as warmly as he might another time. “Better aim where it belongs if you’ve got anything to say.”
At this moment Aleck ran down the steps, looking as if in search of some one.
“I say, Tom,” he began, “where’s that little fellow that came this morning? I thought he was up stairs, but the professor says he made him over to you. What have you done with him?”
Tom’s tongue was fast to the roof of his mouth, and Aleck looked at the tell-tale faces of the other boys.
“Look here!” and his eyes flashed as the boys had never seen them, “don’t tell me there’s a coward among you dastardly enough to touch a helpless little fellow that’s carrying a burden like that!”
“We didn’t touch him,” muttered Hal Fenimore. “I suppose he didn’t like what we had to say, and he stepped out.”
“Didn’t touch him! You’d better have touched him, better have struck him in the face a hundred times over, than—which way did he go?”
Tom pointed to one of the gates, and Aleck followed through it in a flash, and was looking up and down the street; but in vain—only brisk, erect walkers were passing on as far as his eye could reach. He ran a little way past one corner and then another, but no crooked, dwarfed little figure was in sight; and burning with indignation, he came hastily back, to find the bell had rung and the boys had taken seats some time before.
And was that the professor standing in the desk, his eyes flashing fire, his face white, and his voice so terrible that half the boys had got their heads hidden behind one thing or another, as if they thought it was going to strike them?
“Didn’t think, and didn’t touch him!” he was thundering, in answer to the excuses offered; “you did think; you thought it would be a pleasure to see a suffering little life crushed down still farther under your taunts! And you did touch him; you touched him with words that were sharper than a serpent’s tooth, and may rankle like poisoned arrows in his heart to the latest day of his life! No one could ever have made me believe that I had such a school; and I could give it up now, and give my whole time to one little fellow like that you have driven away, with more hope of reward than I feel with you to-day.”
There was no reprimand for Aleck’s tardiness; the professor understood too well. He had missed the two boys together, and on inquiring for them the truth had come out. It seemed as if the rest of that morning never would take itself away, but it was gone at last, and the boys filed out under the still scornful glances of the master.
But as Aleck passed he beckoned him to the desk with a different look.
“You are a friend of that little fellow?” he asked.
“I’d like to be,” said Aleck; “but though I’ve seen him two or three times, I didn’t know his name or even where he lives.”
“You know where Dr. Thorndyke’s is?”
Aleck nodded assent.
“Well, he belongs there, and I want to send our apologies to the doctor; excuses I have none. Will you go and see how much harm has been done, and say whatever can be said? And assure the doctor, if he will try once more, not only shall there be no more trouble, but every possible reparation shall be made.”
Aleck took the commission gladly, but at the same time doubtfully enough. Now he should be able to tell Nelly that he had really found him; but to “say whatever was to be said,” was not so easy, by a long mark. Still he must know the worst of what had been done, and perhaps it might not be so very bad, after all, and it would certainly be some comfort to the little fellow to hear what a towering wrath the professor was in about it.