Jonas laughed tantalizingly. The little lad looked at him with a hopeless rebuke. And then, tossing his head, he moved to the bureau and began to brush his hair. His hair seemed to grow awry, to shoot out in a dozen directions from his scalp. So Quincy’s task was always a fairly hard one since his mother insisted on a part; and since, when he did not succeed, she would brush it for him and invariably hurt him. So Quincy fell to. Jonas stood smiling at him still. Suddenly, he began to speak.
“I guess I will tell you. I’m going away to school—right off.”
The child leaped around. “Jonas!”
“Next week. To Exeter.”
Quincy’s head worked fast. Then, with effort: “Can’t I go, too?”
It was a fatal question. Jonas took it sneering. He was nearly seventeen and he had the sense of age and independence that ordinary boys are prone to.
“You? I guess not. I don’t want you ’round any more. You stay at home, where you belong—if you belong anywhere.” He smiled.
He would have said more in this great need of establishing his power and independence through attack on some one immeasurably weaker, in these things, than himself. But just then a flying brush hurled against his forehead. He looked up, not understanding. And then, he smiled through his pain. For it was not to be admitted that this infuriated child could hurt him.
“You little sinner!—” he stepped back instinctively. Then, again, he smiled.
And at this last smile, Quincy became an unaccountable demon. He saw what he had done. It moved him strangely. A need swept over him to rush up to Jonas, to fling arms about his neck, to kiss him, to implore him, to cry out: “Take me too. Please, please stop despising me!” This was all his need. And yet, out of the fullness of his love he had flung his brush. And out of his love again, there he was, leaping upon his brother, biting him, scratching him, tearing his face. And all that became articulate of his beseechment was a liquid “Oh! Oh! Oh!”