This was outrageous fibbing, but nobly done in a good cause. It was of no avail, however, for Absalom Butts promptly called out importantly, “It ain’t either no botany class; it’s a picnic. She made us put our books away when we didn’t want to and come out here.” And he made an impudent grimace at me, accompanied with the usual taunting grin.
Right here I had another surprise of my young life. No sooner had the craven Absalom turned state’s evidence when there rose from the masses an unexpected champion. As Elijah Butts began to express his opinion of my “carryin’s on” in no veiled terms, his daughter Clarissa, developing a hitherto undreamed of amount of spirit, suddenly threw her arms around my waist and stood there stamping her feet with anger.
“She ain’t a lunatic, she ain’t a lunatic,” she shrilled above her father’s gruff tones, “she’s nice and I love her!” After which astounding confession she melted into tears and stood there sobbing and hugging the breath out of me. To my greater astonishment all the other girls immediately followed suit and gathered around me with shielding caresses, turning defiant faces to the upbraiding school board members. The boys made themselves very inconspicuous in the rear, but I caught more than one glowering look cast in the direction of Absalom.
Before this demonstration of affection, Mr. Butts paused in astonishment, and, having hesitated, was lost. He felt he was no longer cock of the walk, and in dignified silence led the way to the surrey standing in the road, with the rest of the school board members and the visitors stalking after. I watched them climb in and drive away, and then the reaction set in and I sat down on the ground and laughed until I cried, while the girls, not sure whether I was laughing or crying, alternately giggled convulsively and soothingly bade me “never mind.” I sat up finally and shook the hair out of my eyes and then I discovered that Justice Sherman had not departed with the rest of the delegation, but was sitting on the ground not far away, still shaking with laughter and wiping his eyes on a red-bordered napkin that had strayed out of a lunch basket. A sudden suspicion seized me.
“Justice,” I cried severely, “did you do it?”
“Did I do what?” he asked in a startled tone.
“Find out I was off on a picnic and bring the Board down to visit me?”
Justice threw out his hands in a gesture of denial. “‘Thou canst not say I did it, never shake thy gory locks at me,’” he declaimed feelingly. “Where did they come from? They dropped, fair one, like the gentle rain from heaven, upon the place beneath. They came first to my humble dispensary of learning, anxious to show the visiting Solons what a bargain they had captured, and listened feelingly while I conducted a Latin lesson, which impressed them so much they invited me to come along while they gave you the ‘once over.’ You never saw such an expression in your life as there was on the face of Mr. Butts when he arrived at your place and found it empty. I will remember it to my dying day.
“But what on earth were you doing when we found you in the woods?” he finished in a mystified tone.
Then I told him about Sahwah’s goat that ate the two red shirts right off the line, and again he laughed until he was weak.