“Teacher doesn’t know everything!” snapped Serena Wetherbee.
With assurances and molasses cookies, the two women comforted the child. She left the house with a watery smile, but Jacob lingered to say:
“And do you think he’ll come to Hardscrabble, for all she said?”
A few moments later, when Doctor Peavey passed through the open door to the living-room, she found Justine seated with a book at the table.
“What were they crying for?” asked Justine.
“Miss Nash, who teaches the school at Hardscrabble, where the little ones go, told them that there was no Santa Claus.”
“To tell a child that at Christmas time!” flashed Justine. “She ought to be whipped!”
“That wouldn’t help the children much,” said Doctor Peavey, mildly, “or her, either.”
To Justine Doctor Peavey said no more, but she took counsel with Serena. That evening, after Justine had gone thoughtfully to bed, Doctor Peavey made out a list of the names and ages of the eighteen children who went to the little school at Hardscrabble. On the same sheet she made some tentative calculations—so much for oranges, so much for crinkly Christmas candy, so much for gifts, to be bought at the ten-cent store at Hanscomville. It was only a small sum, but, small as it was, it meant that Doctor Peavey would go without the evenings at the opera which were the one luxury of her winter.
The next morning, December 22d, Doctor Peavey tucked her list into her pocket and started afoot for Hardscrabble, where she planned to hire a horse and pung from Cephas Tooke. She had bidden Justine good-by for the day without explanation. A little wholesome neglect would be tonic for Justine, she believed; and she believed also that you may sometimes attain your goal, like Alice in the Looking-Glass country, by walking away from it.