But Sube was uneasy. And he had reason to be; for Miss Lester was his Sunday School teacher.
A dark pall hung over him all through the church service; and when at the conclusion he sought to bring up reinforcements before moving on Sunday School, he learned to his dismay that Gizzard was confined to his home with a slight attack of Sunday-sickness from which he was unlikely to recover until nearly dinner time. So he faced the dragon alone.
But in common with other dragons Miss Lester's terrors waned on closer acquaintance. As he shuffled guiltily into his seat she wished him a pleasant good morning. But some little time elapsed before Sube could bring himself to believe that his sense of hearing was not playing him false. Then it occurred to him that she was going to arraign him before the entire Sunday School. And he lived over this volcano until the session was dismissed. The possibility that Miss Lester did not know the identity of her "Two Friends" never entered his mind.
Once or twice during the afternoon he wondered vaguely why she had refrained from "bawling him out," but by the next day he had forgotten all about Miss Lester and her troubles. They were completely blotted out of his mind by the relentless pressure of education; for school had begun again.
One day dragged along after another. At last a week had gone. Then a month. And spring was pretty well under way when Sube came home from school one noon, to all appearances quite bowed down with grief. Mag Macdougall, the family laundress, was dead.
The news was fittingly broken to those at the table, but seemed to occasion no great concern. His father remarked in what Sube considered a most unfeeling way that he hoped she hadn't taken with her the two shirts that failed to come back with his linen that week; and his mother's only comment was that she had decided to send the things to the laundry anyway.
Sube was shocked; but he was not discouraged. He took the position that the community's great loss was not fully appreciated, and at once launched into a eulogy of Mag's imaginary virtues that gave to her a character quite unlike that which she had borne in the flesh. And in conclusion he announced that the funeral would take place that afternoon at the Baptist Church, to which he felt he must go on account of poor little Lizzie Macdougall's being in the same room with him at school.
And although Mr. Cane cultivated the attitude of always expecting the unexpected to happen, this came as something of a surprise to him. For a moment he was at a loss for words; then he had more than he knew what to do with, out of which Sube managed to grasp the sentiment that any old day when he was allowed to remain out of school to attend one of Mag Macdougall's funerals would of necessity be a very cold one. And this was a warm spring day.
Sube remonstrated. He whined. He argued until his father forbade another word on the subject. Then in a highly rebellious and dangerous state of mind he started for school, brooding anarchistically over the element of paternalism that still survives in the American family. He would have been an easy convert for any kind of soap-box heresy, but fortunately no apostles of new thought chanced to cross his path.
However, when he had gone a short distance on his way he discovered that he was being followed. A rather rangy dog with a white background heavily sprinkled with black spots, and wearing a thick, stumpy tail which a railroad train had thoughtlessly docked to half-length, was sauntering along at a safe distance behind, apparently making no effort to get any nearer.