Harry Fenimore's Principles

by Isabel Thompson Hopkins

But somehow, after the first half hour, it did not seem quite so much, and by the time the bell struck ten o’clock, Creepy was going on with his lessons with a steadier pulse and almost a feeling of pleasure warming up in his heart again. What if he were to like it, after all! What if some of the boys were even to like him, and they should come to be friends, as the doctor wished! At any rate, he should see their games at recess! The doctor had told him about them, and given him a great many directions not to run too much until he got a little used to it; he couldn’t understand very well yet, but it would all come right if he once saw.

Hum, hum, went the schoolroom, and on went the routine of lessons. If any of the other boys had been told the new-comer thought it exciting, they would have called it about the strangest thing they ever heard of. Carter and Davis were busy at that very moment in the next room over an illustrated almanac they had been getting up, to show how many days and hours still remained before it would all be over, and the long vacation come on. How many hours said almanac had taken from their studies, and how much care had been necessary to conceal it from proper authorities, were questions they did not vex their souls about; it was trouble enough to Davis to furnish the plan, the leading ideas, and the plain work, while Carter designed the illustrations, and a pretty good thing they had made of it altogether, they thought.

It lay open now on Carters desk, just inside his astronomy, and he made a sign to Davis to look at the last and crowning design just completed.

Davis signalled “Tip-top” with telegraphic taps of his pencil upon his slate, and then the astronomy-class was called.

The boys filed past the open door that led from the small room into the one where Creepy sat, with a quiet, regular step until Aleck reached it, and his eyes wandering through, caught sight of the face that had looked in at the conservatory-window with such rapture two or three times, but had been missing now so long that he and Nelly had feared they should never meet it again. Without knowing he did it, he came to such a sudden halt that Carter, who was behind him, was “brought up all standing,” his astronomy knocked from his hand, and the almanac went skimming away until at last it fluttered down directly before the professor’s feet.

“Thank you,” said the professor, with a nod and a bow to Carter; “yes, I will look at it with pleasure,” and picking it up he turned leaf after leaf, and studied one after another of the chefs-d’œuvres.

“Ah,” he said, after what seemed to the two boys an eternity of suspense, “I really was not aware I had such an artist in the school. Modesty is a virtue, and shrinks from having its work exhibited, but such masterpieces as these I must beg to hold up for one moment to the admiration of the class,” and mounting the platform he took his seat at the desk, and holding up the almanac to the view of the whole room, he turned the pages and exhibited one after another of the grand designs for the five weeks remaining, in every one of which a caricature of himself formed a prominent figure.

A suppressed murmur arose as the pictures met the devouring eyes of the boys, beginning with a bonfire of compositions at which the professor was trying to warm his icy heart, and ending with the Fourth of July in the shape of a spread eagle with wings of stars and stripes, the school bell in one talon and the blackboard brush in the other, flying away with the professor bodily, while a pile of books like a small haystack was heaped upon its back, geographies, Virgils, philosophies and grammars, helter-skelter, and hanging together no one could tell how.

Carter looked as if he would sink, or at least as if he would give all he expected to die possessed of, if a knot-hole would open and let him escape, but Davis made a tremendous effort and kept so unmoved a face that no one suspected him of having anything to do with the affair.

“Allow me to congratulate you,” said the professor, as he returned the almanac, “not only is such talent worthy of commendation, but the faithful use of time, and the expenditure of precious moments upon work of genuine importance, will if formed into a habit, become of life-long value, and I must congratulate myself that accident has brought the indication of such promise to my notice;” and with another bow he placed the fated subject of discussion in Carter’s hands, which would far sooner have reached themselves out for a flogging than to acknowledge such an ownership.