SCHOOL DAYS
The morning was cloudy and threatened rain; besides, it was autumn weather, and the winds were getting harsh, and rustling among the tree-tops that shaded the house most dismally. I did not dare to listen. If, indeed, I were to stay by the bright fires of home, and gather the nuts as they fell, and pile up the falling leaves to make great bonfires, with Ben and the rest of the boys, I should have liked to listen, and would have braved the dismal morning with the cheerfullest of them all. For it would have been a capital time to light a fire in the little oven we had built under the wall; it would have been so pleasant to warm our fingers at it, and to roast the great russets on the flat stones that made the top.
But this was not in store for me. I had bid the town boys good-by the day before; my trunk was all packed; I was to go away—to school. The little oven would go to ruin—I knew it would. I was to leave my home. I was to bid my mother good-by, and Lilly, and Isabel, and all the rest; and was to go away from them so far that I should only know what they were all doing—in letters. It was sad. And then to have the clouds come over on that morning, and the winds sigh so dismally; oh, it was too bad, I thought!
It comes back to me as I lie here this bright spring morning as if it were only yesterday. I remember that the pigeons skulked under the eaves of the carriage-house, and did not sit, as they used to do in summer, upon the ridge; and the chickens huddled together about the stable doors, as if they were afraid of the cold autumn. And in the garden the white hollyhocks stood shivering, and bowed to the wind, as if their time had come. The yellow musk-melons showed plain among the frost-bitten vines, and looked cold and uncomfortable.
—Then they were all so kind, indoors! The cook made such nice things for my breakfast, because little master was going; Lilly would give me her seat by the fire, and would put her lump of sugar in my cup; and my mother looked so smiling, and so tenderly, that I thought I loved her more than I ever did before. Little Ben was so gay, too; and wanted me to take his jackknife, if I wished it—though he knew that I had a brand new one in my trunk. The old nurse slipped a little purse into my hand, tied up with a green ribbon—with money in it—and told me not to show it to Ben or Lilly.
And cousin Isabel, who was there on a visit, would come to stand by my chair, when my mother was talking to me; and put her hand in mine, and look up into my face; but she did not say a word. I thought it was very odd; and yet it did not seem odd to me that I could say nothing to her. I dare say we felt alike.
At length Ben came running in, and said the coach had come; and there, sure enough, out of the window, we saw it—a bright yellow coach, with four white horses, and band-boxes all over the top, with a great pile of trunks behind. Ben said it was a grand coach, and that he should like a ride in it; and the old nurse came to the door, and said I should have a capital time; but, somehow, I doubted if the nurse was talking honestly. I believe she gave me an honest kiss though—and such a hug!
But it was nothing to my mother’s. Tom told me to be a man, and study like a Trojan; but I was not thinking about study then. There was a tall boy in the coach, and I was ashamed to have him see me cry; so I didn’t, at first. But I remember, as I looked back and saw little Isabel run out into the middle of the street to see the coach go off, and the curls floating behind her, as the wind freshened, I felt my heart leaping into my throat, and the water coming into my eyes, and how just then I caught sight of the tall boy glancing at me—and how I tried to turn it off by looking to see if I could button up my greatcoat a great deal lower down than the buttonholes went.