“Yes, sir, I have. I—I don’t seem to understand it, sir,” he added pathetically.
“Because you don’t try to!” said Kilts with a trace of asperity. “You’ve just made up your mind that algebra is something you don’t need and that you’ll just fiddle through it the easiest way; just learn enough to get your marks. I know. Half you fellows think that. You don’t any of you understand that mathematics is a grand study. Why, you talk about romance, my boy! Here it is, right here!” And he thumped the open book with the back of one big hand. “The Romance of Figures! Why, ’tis a wonderful, marvelous thing, my lad, this mathematics. ’Tis as full of romance and beauty as a garden of flowers! You don’t look beyond the surface; you don’t think! An’ ye go at it right, laddie, with open eyes and an open heart ye’ll love it!”
Kilts stopped and shook his head patiently.
“But ye won’t believe me. I know. You’re like the rest. You think I’m just an old fool with a hobby for figures, a dried-up old curmudgeon with no feelings, and no manners—”
“Oh, please, sir!” begged Gerald miserably.
“There, there, laddie! ’Twas ill said! Think no more of it!” Kilts patted the boy’s shoulder and smiled down kindly at his distressed face. “Now show me what you don’t understand.” He looked around for a chair, and Dan, anticipating his want, placed one for him. Kilts produced his glasses from his pocket, unceremoniously pushed the litter of books and papers away from in front of him so that several would have fallen to the floor had not Dan rescued them in time and drew the algebra toward him. “What is it that’s puzzling that young brain of yours, my boy?”
Dan went quietly to his chair across the table and bent over his French. But he didn’t do much studying. The voices of Kilts and Gerald broke the silence at intervals, Gerald’s apologetic, inquiring, Kilts’ patient, persuasive. Half an hour went by. Then:
“What did I say?” exclaimed Mr. McIntyre triumphantly. “Concentrate, concentrate, Pennimore! Put your mind on what you’re doing. There’s not an example in that whole book that won’t come just as easy as that one has, if you put your mind to it. Look now, laddie, that’s not just a mess of little figures; ’tis a story, a little romance waiting for you to translate it. Remember that, lad, and maybe ’twill come easier.”
“Thank you very much, sir,” said Gerald gratefully. “I—I don’t think I’ll have so much trouble after this, sir. Anyhow, I’m going to try very hard, sir.”
“That’s right, that’s right,” answered Kilts, patting him on the arm as he lifted his long length out of the chair. “Put your mind on it; concentrate, concentrate! You’ll do finely yet. Good-night, good-night, boys.”