CHAPTER II—WHERE THE SHOE PINCHED
WHEN Anne Branstone set her hand to the plough she ploughed deep, and it was not her fault if the harvest was not immense. But she did not misdirect her energy; she made certain that the seed was good seed before she harnessed her plough. To drop metaphor, she let young Sam prove that he was worth troubling over before she took trouble—trouble, that is, as Anne understood the word. Of course, she sent him “decent” to the Grammar School, and if that meant that she and Madge went without new spring hats that year, well, last year’s hats must do. It was no great matter, and the greater pride swallowed up the less. Mr. Travers paid the fees, so that her son could associate with his, and Anne saw to it thoroughly that, in externals, Sam should be worthy to associate with Lance.
That was the beginning, and Sam, so far, was untried metal. Then, at the end of his first term, he came out top of his form at the July examinations, and, after that, Anne began to take things seriously.
It was not pure ability which brought Sam to that proud eminence so much as the fact that he had been put in a form whose standard was really too low for him, and he had not worked over hard at lessons, being naturally preoccupied, in a first term, with finding his feet. Nor had that been too difficult. The Manchester Grammar School was a democratic institution. Schoolboys, anyhow, are not all snobs, and, in this instance, the presence amongst the paying boys of a leaven of Foundation Scholars, often from homes as poor as Sam’s, made acclimatization easy for him.
But his feat impressed Anne, though all she said, when the lists came out with the name of “Branstone, S.” at the head of II. Alpha, was, “Of course!” as if any other place were impossible for a son of hers; and it decided her that Sam would “pay for” taking trouble. She proceeded to take trouble.
Tom Branstone’s first real inkling of what was passing in Anne’s mind came to that good, easy man when he mentioned that his holidays were due in a fortnight.
“You’ll take a holiday at home this year, my lad,” she informed him.
“But why’s that, Anne?” he asked. “Blackpool’s in the same place as it was, and I get privilege passes on the line.”
“Sam’s not in the same place, though,” she said. “He’s at the Grammar School. It’s a place where other boys wear decent clothes, and I’ll see that Sam shan’t fall behind them.”
Tom took a holiday at home, varied with trips on the foot-plates of friendly engine-drivers, and fortified his soul with the consolations of tobacco. They were consolations which were not to be vouchsafed to him much longer. Tobacco cost money, and Anne had need of it.