CHAPTER IV.
A BRAVE HEART

“There,” said the widow, when Ben finished eating and sat back, flushing as he realized he had left not a morsel before him, “now I know y’u feel better. It jest done me good to see you eat. It sort of reminded me of the way Joel used to stow victuals away. He was a marster hand to eat, but it never seemed to do him no good. Even when he was in purty good health, which was seldom, he never could eat all he wanted to without feelin’ oppressed arterwards an’ havin’ to lay down and rest. He was a good one at restin’,” she added, with a slight whimsical touch.

Once more Ben tried to find words to express his thanks, and once more Mrs. Jones checked him.

“It ain’t been no trouble,” was her declaration, “an’ it was wuth a good deal to me to see you enjoy it so. What’re y’u doin’ with your trunk pulled out this way?”

This question reminded him again of his determination to leave Oakdale directly; and, knowing the good woman had regarded the room as engaged by him for the time of the fall term of school, and also feeling that to leave her thus and so deprive her of the rent money she expected to receive for weeks to come would be a poor return for her kindness, he hesitated in confusion and reluctance to tell her the truth.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, noting his manner. “Has anything happened? I noticed you was pale, an’ didn’t look jest well, when you come in. Is there anything wrong?”

“Yes, Mrs. Jones,” he forced himself to say; “everything is wrong with me.”

“At the academy? Why,” she exclaimed, as he nodded in answer to her question, “I thought y’u passed the exammernation all right? Didn’t y’u?”

“It’s not that; but I must leave school just the same.”

“Land of goodness! Do tell! It can’t be possible!” Mrs. Jones was completely astounded and quite shocked.

“It is not because I have failed in any of the requirements of the school,” Ben hastened to say. “I can’t explain just why it is, Mrs. Jones. It’s a long story, and I don’t wish to tell it. But I have an enemy in the school. I didn’t know he was here; I saw him for the first time to-day.”

This explanation did not satisfy her. “Why,” she said, “I was thinkin’ y’u told me when y’u took this room that you didn’t know a livin’ soul in this place.”

“I did tell you so, and I thought at the time that it was the truth; but since then I have found out I was mistaken. There is one fellow in the school whom I know – and he knows me! He will make it impossible for me to attend school here.”

“I don’t see how,” said the widow, greatly puzzled. “How can anybody make y’u leave the school if y’u don’t want to?”

“He hates me – he and his father, too. I am sure his father is a man of influence here.”

“Now I don’t want to be curi’s an’ pry inter nobody’s affairs,” declared the widow; “but I do think you’d better trust me an’ tell me about this business. I don’t b’lieve you ever done no great wrong or bad thing to make y’u afraid of nobody. Anybody that can be good an’ kind to a little lame boy, same as you’ve been to my Jimmy, ain’t bad.”

“Perhaps if you knew all about it you would change your opinion of me,” said the boy a trifle huskily, for he was affected by her confidence in him.

She shook her head. “No I wouldn’t. I b’lieve you’re makin’ a mountain out of er molehill. You’re deescouraged, that’s what’s the matter. But somehow you don’t look like a boy that’s easy deescouraged an’ quick to give up. Now, you jest tell me who your enemy is. You ain’t got no mother here to advise y’u, an’ perhaps I can help y’u some.”

Her insistent kindness prevailed upon him, and he yielded.

“My enemy’s name is Bernard Hayden,” he said.

“Land! You don’t tell! Why, he’s the son of Lemuel Hayden, who come here an’ bought the limestone quarries over south of th’ lake. He ain’t been here a year yet, but he’s built buildin’s an’ run a branch railroad from the main road to the quarries, an’ set things hummin’ in great shape. Next to Urian Eliot, who owns ’most all the mill business in the place, he’s said to be the richest man in town.”

“I knew it!” cried Ben; “I knew he would be a man of influence here. I knew him in Farmington, the place where I was born. Mrs. Jones, if I do not leave the school and Oakdale at once, Lemuel Hayden will try to make me do so.”

He could not bring himself to disclose to her his fear that Mr. Hayden might again seek to commit him to the State Reformatory. That secret was the shame of his soul, and when he was gone from Oakdale he was certain it would be a secret no longer. Already Bern Hayden had told the boys on the football field, and in a small place gossip of such nature flies quickly.

“Now let me talk to you a little,” said Mrs. Jones, sitting down on the trunk, which threatened to collapse beneath her weight. “I stick to it that I don’t b’lieve you ever done northing very bad, an’ if you’re poor that ain’t your fault. You’ve got a right to have an eddercation, jest the same as Lemuel Hayden’s boy has. Jest because, mebbe, you got inter some foolish boy scrape an’ got this Hayden boy down on you, be y’u goin’ to let him keep y’u from gittin’ an eddercation, to make a man of y’u, an’ take you through the world?

“As I said before, you don’t look like a boy to be scart or driv easy, an’ I shall be disapp’inted in you if y’u are. I ain’t goin’ to pry inter the affair; if y’u want to tell me about it some time, y’u can. But I’m goin’ to advise y’u to stay right here in this school an’ hold your head up. Joel, my late departed, he alwus said it warn’t no disgrace to be poor. That passage in the Bible that says it’s harder f’r a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven then f’r a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, alwus was a great conserlation to Joel.

“An’ there’s rich people in this very town that should be ashamed to hold their heads up, knowin’, as ev’rybody does, how they come by their riches; but to-day I’d ruther be a-earnin’ my daily bread by sweatin’ at the wash-tub than to be in their shoes an’ have on my mind what they must have on their minds. Ev’ry day I live I thank the Lord that he’s been so good to me an’ let me have so many pleasures an’ enjoyments.”

Here she paused a moment to take breath, having digressed without intending to do so; and once more Ben found himself wondering at her splendid courage and the cheerful heart she maintained in spite of troubles and afflictions that might well have crushed and broken the spirit of an ordinary woman. She laughed in the face of misfortune, and she positively refused to be trampled on by bitter fate.

She was right in thinking Ben was not a weak boy nor one to be easily frightened; but had she known that over him hung the dark, chilling shadow of the reformatory, she could not have wondered at the course he had contemplated pursuing, and she might have hesitated about so freely giving him advice. Knowing nothing of this, however, she continued to urge him to reconsider his determination to give up school and leave Oakdale.

“Now promise me that you’ll stay till y’u have to leave school,” she entreated. “An’ I don’t b’lieve you’ll have to at all.”

“Mrs. Jones, I’ll think it over,” he said. “I have almost decided to take your advice and stay, no matter what comes.”

“That’s what I like to hear!” she laughed, rising from the trunk. “Don’t you never back down an’ run f’r nobody nor northin’. If Joel hed had more of the stand-up-an’-stick-to-it sperrit, I’m sartin it would ‘a’ been better f’r us all – but I ain’t complainin’, I ain’t complainin’.

“Goodness! I’ve been spendin’ a lot of time here when I’ve jest got loads of things to do before I can git a blessed wink of sleep this night. I’ve got to go. But you jest make up your mind to stick, enermies or no enermies. Good night.”

She had gathered up the dishes and was going. Ben held the lamp, to light her down the stairs, calling a grateful good night after her.

For two hours, at least, he walked the floor of that poor little room, fighting the inward battle with himself. Finally he paused, his hands clenched and his head thrown back. His square jaw seemed squarer and firmer than ever, and the determination on his plain face transfigured it.

“I am going to stay, Bernard Hayden!” he said quietly, as if speaking face to face with his enemy. “Whatever happens, I’ll not show the white feather. Do your worst!” He felt better when he had fully settled on this resolution.

Opening his window, he looked out on the quiet village that seemed winking sleepily and dreamily with its twinkling lights. Even as he lifted his eyes toward the overcast sky, the pure white moon burst through a widening rift and poured its light like a benediction upon the silent world. Still with his face upturned, his lips moving slightly, the boy knelt at the window, and the hush and peace of the night filled his heart.

CHAPTER V.
ONE MORE CHANCE

Although he was certain he would be compelled to undergo an unpleasant ordeal at school the following day, he did not falter or hesitate. With determination in his heart, and his face grimly set, he turned in at the gate shortly after the ringing of the first bell, and walked up the path.

Several boys in a group near the academy steps saw him approaching. He distinctly heard one of them say, “Here he comes now”; and then a hush fell upon them as they watched him draw near. In spite of himself, he could not refrain from giving them a resentful and defiant glance. In return they looked on him in silent scorn, and he felt that not one of them held an atom of sympathy in his heart.

In the coat-room, where he went to hang his hat, he found Roger Eliot, who saw him, but did not speak. Ben’s lips parted, but Roger’s manner chilled him to silence, and he said nothing.

Bernard Hayden looked in. “Hey, Roger,” he called. “I want to see you a moment.” Then his eyes fell on Ben, and his proud lips curled a bit.

“All right, Bern,” said Eliot, walking out. Hayden took his arm, and they turned toward the outer door, talking in low tones.