"Ladies and gentlemen," he would say, in his deep round voice, "as our revered preceptor will bear me witness" (here he would bow to Mr. Tayloe, who would bow and smile), "I told him six months ago that our fair young friend here would prove herself the most intelligent and industrious of his pupils. He is proud of her, ladies and gentlemen, and you and I, and indeed everybody in this county is—(or would 'are' sound better?)—justly proud of our distinguished citizen, Miss Felicia Jean Grigsby."
Then she would courtesy very low and gracefully, and say, in a voice mellow with emotion (another bookish phrase she had picked up), "You do me too much honor, I assure you, sir."
A tremendous roar of thunder awoke her. At the ripping and rending of the laden clouds the rain rushed down in a volume, washing out the view of everything in the landscape except the nearest bushes and the aspen-trees.
CHAPTER II.
Flea was a hardy, country-bred child, and as little afraid of thunder, lightning, and flood as of the loneliness of the deserted school-house. She laughed low and gleefully as she drew her skirt up to her knees and stuck out both thin brown legs in the warm rain, wriggling her toes contentedly in the shower-bath. A broad reddish pool was spread out in front of the door in three minutes, and the heavy drops plashing into it raised tiny bobbing bubbles.
"They are fairies dancing at a ball!" ejaculated Flea. "How featly they foot it!"
The rain poured on, the dull rumble on the roof stirring up hollow echoes in the room behind her; the fairies danced more and more wildly as a sharp shower of hail mixed with the rain-drops. The falling pellets stung Flea's legs, and she drew them in, still laughing, drying them imperfectly with a blue cotton handkerchief she took from her pocket. Sitting further back out of the spray, she doubled her legs under her to warm them.
The rain streamed steadily, beating the wind down; the sky darkened slowly, with no alternations of lighter glimpses. In happy unconsciousness of the lapse of time, Flea waited patiently for the "holding-up" that could not be far away.
"When it rains so hard, it doesn't last long," she thought, surprised to find herself yawning.
The monotonous patter upon the roof, the dash and drip from the unguttered eaves, had made her drowsy. She would take a short nap, and find it clear upon awakening. Then there would be a merry tramp through the puddles, and pines, and wet old-field broom-straw, to her supper at sunset.