“It wasn’t exactly easy,” he said slowly, “not at first. I fought a good deal until I learned better. After that it was not so hard—only at times, perhaps. Even now, I rebel occasionally, but not for long.”
Which was as near a complaint as any one had ever heard from Doctor Jimmy Burton.
“Jimmy,” said Marta earnestly, “I think that you are the most wonderful man that ever was—that ever could be.”
Saint Jimmy shrugged his shoulders, and waved a protesting hand.
“But you are,” she insisted, “and you know how I love you, don’t you? Not merely because you have helped me as you have, but because you are you. You do know, don’t you, Jimmy?”
There was an odd note in Jimmy’s voice now—it might have been gladness—it might have been protest—or perhaps it was both—with a hint of pain.
“Marta! I——“
He stopped as if he found himself suddenly unable to finish whatever it was that he had started to say. It may be that this was one of the times when Saint Jimmy was not wholly reconciled to the part that life had assigned to him.
Apparently Marta did not notice her teacher’s manner. Her thoughts must have been centered elsewhere because she said, quite as if she had been considering it all the time:
“I feel sure that Mr. Edwards has been hurt some way, just as you have, Jimmy. I mean that he has been to school, and had a world of nice friends and good times, and then started his real work and all that, and, now for some reason, has had to give up his work and home and friends and everything, and come out here. He didn’t tell us much, but you could sort of feel that he was that kind of a man. You can feel those things about men, can’t you, Jimmy?”