Part 9 (1/2)

What could be the answer? There could be but one; he had been sent to make trouble. If Black Blevens could break up the summer school he could all the more easily convince doubtful voters that these girls from the outside were unqualified to handle the school.

For a moment she wavered. She could refuse to admit him. The control of the summer school was in her hands. Yet there was no real reason to offer. Bud was larger and older than most of the other children, yet there were a few older than he.

”And besides,” she told herself as she set her lips tight, ”to refuse to admit him is to surrender without a battle. I won't surrender.”

All this thinking took but a half dozen seconds. At the end of that time she favored the boy with her very best smile and said:

”All right, Bud, you may have the seat by the back window on the right side.”

For a moment the boy stared at her in silence. A seat by a back window is at once a much coveted place and a spot quite advantageous for mischief making. Bud knew this; yet this girl teacher gave him this place. Just what his conclusions were regarding this move Florence could not even guess.

Every hour of that day seemed the hour before a thunder storm. Every child in the room knew why Bud was there; and while as a whole they were friendly to their teachers, they were at the same time normal children.

And where is the child who does not long for excitement.

The day pa.s.sed as others had. The slow drone of bees outside, the murmur of voices reciting lessons, loud shouts of play at noon and recess, then the glad burst of joy as the sixty children went racing home.

”Bud was just like the rest,” Florence said to Ransom Turner that evening. ”Perhaps there's nothing wrong after all.”

”Just you wait!” Ransom said with a shake of his head. ”Old Black Blevens ain't sendin' that boy to school fer book larnin'. Hit's time for layin'

by of the corn. Took him right outen' the field, he did. Don't make sense, that ar don't, unless he hopes Bud'll make trouble.”

Florence went to bed with a headache. Doubtless Ransom was right. She was tempted to wish that they had never started the fight, that they had left Black Blevens and Al Finley to collect their ill gotten school money.

”And the children without an education!” she whispered fiercely. ”No!

Never! Never! We'll fight, and by all that's good, we'll win!”

A whole week pa.s.sed and nothing unusual happened. If Bud Wax and Black Blevens meant any harm they were taking a long time to tamp powder and lay fuse. All Ransom would say was:

”Jest you mind what I say. That Black Blevens is a plumb quare worker, but he's always at hit.”

Two little rumors came to Florence. A small child had told her that Bud carried his pistol to school. An older boy had said that Bud was trying to pick a quarrel with Ballard Skidmore. Ballard was larger and older than Bud, a big, slow-going, red-headed fellow who somehow reminded Florence of a St. Bernard dog. She put little faith in either of these rumors, and as for picking a quarrel with this slow-going fellow, she did not believe it could be done.

On Sat.u.r.day something vaguely disturbing occurred. There were many squirrels on the upper slopes of Little Black Mountain. Ralph had taught Florence how to shoot with his long barreled .22 pistol. She decided to try her hand at hunting. Had it not been Marion's day for helping with the work she would have asked her to go along. As it was, she struck away alone over the tortuous cow path that led to the upper reaches of the mountain.

Having donned a pair of canvas knickers, high boots and an old hunting coat, she was prepared for a free, rough time of it. Free and rough it was, too. Brambles tore at her, rocks slid from beneath her feet to send her sprawling, a rotten tree trunk over which she was climbing suddenly caved in and threatened to send her rolling down the mountain. She enjoyed it all. A typical American girl, strong and brave, born for the out-of-doors, she took the buffets of nature and laughed in its face.

As she reached a higher elevation the slope became gentler. Here she found an abundance of beach and chestnut trees, and higher up a grove of walnut.

Hardly had she reached the edge of the walnut grove when she caught a flash of red, then a scolding chatter from a tall tree.

”A squirrel,” she breathed as she silently lifted the hammer of her long pistol. ”I wonder-I just wonder-”

Her wonderings were cut short by a sudden thud close by, then another.

Two frisking squirrels had come to the ground within a dozen paces of her. Like a flash of light they were away over the moss and up another tree. This tree was not large and the leaves were scanty. On tip-toe she stalked it.

Gazing intently upward, she discovered a pair of small black eyes looking down at her.

”There's one.”

She lifted the s.h.i.+ny barrel, but at that instant the eyes vanished.