Sally was glad when the bell called her to a class downstairs; and she sat as if in a trance and watched Jane Spencer gravely fishing in the aquarium tank with a bent pin on the end of a thread. He kept on fishing all through the class hour, unhindered. The single little fish in the tank tugged at the pin occasionally, without result; and, when the bell sounded again, Jane folded up his line and put it in his book.
"No luck," he observed, bowing to the teacher.
"Too bad!" said the teacher sympathetically.
"Yes, isn't it?" said Jane; and he withdrew in good order, leaving the teacher smiling to himself. What was he smiling at, I wonder?
Jane never descended to such behavior as sitting with his feet in his desk, as Oliver Pilcher did. No doubt he considered it undignified and generally bad form, which unquestionably it was. Moreover he would thereby run the risk of getting caught in a situation which he regarded as unprofessional. Oliver Pilcher was caught several times, for it is somewhat difficult to get one's feet out of one's desk as quickly as is necessary to avoid that humiliation. If you do not believe it, try it.
Jane may have tried it or he may not. He preferred a different sort of misbehavior; it was especial balm to his soul to be thought to be misbehaving and then to prove that he was not, for that was a joke on the teacher which was apt, for reasons unknown, to make him hopping mad, and Jane's end seemed to have been attained when he had made the teacher hopping mad. He was apt to appear to be very inattentive in class, thinking—but I do not know what he was thinking. Even Mr. MacDalie was deceived occasionally. Jane would be sitting, looking out of the window, perhaps, with his book face down beside him, while the Latin translation dragged by painful jerks along the other end of the class. Mr. MacDalie would have noted Jane's attitude, as he noted everything, and would call upon him suddenly and, as he supposed, unexpectedly. And Jane would take up his book, deliberately, and, rising, begin at the very word and give a beautiful and fluent translation until he was stopped. Sally saw that happen four times that half-year.
The last time, the principal smiled broadly and lowered his book.
"Well, Eugene," he said,—he almost called him "Jane,"—"you fooled me nicely. That translation was very nearly perfect."
"Thank you, sir," Jane replied gravely; and he sat down and placed his book, face down again, upon the bench beside him and resumed his gazing out of the window.
One day during Dick's Christmas vacation there was a great sleighing party. There was no reason in the world why Sally should have expected to be asked or wanted to be. She told herself so, many times; but she was disappointed, grievously. Mr. Hazen saw it,—any one could see it plainly,—and, because he could not bear that Sally should feel so, he asked her if she wouldn't oblige him by going sleighing with him. And because she couldn't bear to disappoint Uncle John, Sally went. She was grateful to him, too. So it happened that two people, who would have much preferred going anywhere on their own feet, were wrapped in a buffalo robe,—one of the last of them; a robe of which Mr. Hazen was very proud,—and, thus protected against the cold, were being drawn easily behind the stout horse.