He took it from her hand, and stood for a moment, running his eyes down the calculation that resembled an irregular staircase, his rugged face relaxing as he marked the erasures and smears telling of a weary fight with the task. He was at the door when Bea's prim pert tone arrested him,
"Mr. Tayloe will ask me to-morrow if anybody helped her, pa."
"I never knew you to be backward in tale-telling," rejoined her father, and went on his way.
Flea was in the dining-room, already half comforted. Her father had listened sympathizingly to the story of her hour's labor over the formidable sum, and encouraged her to persevere by predictions of her final success. He now lighted another candle and established her comfortably on one side of the table.
"I will read my newspaper over here," he said, cheerily. "Nobody shall disturb you. I am sorry to tell you, lassie, that there are mistakes in the work on that slate. I cannot tell you what they are, but I advise you to wash the slate clean and try to forget how you did the sum before. 'Rub out and try again,' is one of the best rules in such cases."
He copied upon the margin of his newspaper the figures written by the teacher before he gave back the slate, and when she had washed it, set down the sum again for her.
"You make prettier figures than Mr. Tayloe does," said Flea, gratefully, laying her cheek against the brawny hand.
She fell to work with fresh zeal. Now and then her father stole a pitying glance at her intent face, but he did not interrupt her. At half past ten Mrs. Grigsby's disapproving visage appeared at the door. Her husband shook his head authoritatively; she shut her teeth down upon the exclamation that was between them, and vanished. At eleven o'clock the premises were still, except for the occasional rustle of the newspaper and the continuous scratch of Flea's pencil. At half past eleven she laid down the pencil and rubbed her cramped fingers.
"Father, would it be helping me if you were to look at it, and tell me if it is right now?"