The Steadfast Heart/Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Bishwhang and Jake Schwartz had overheard the conversation and now, embarrassed, big with clumsy sympathy, they approached Angus. Bishwhang spoke anxiously, for the answer to his question meant much to him.
“Be—be you goin’ away, Angus?”
“I—I guess so.”
“What fur?”
“To learn.”
“Jest to learn?”
Angus nodded.
“That hain’t no reason,” expostulated Bishwhang.
“Mr. Wilkins said so,” Angus replied, as one who invoked deity.
“’Tain’t no reason, is it, Jake?”
“Wa-al, now, Bishwhang, I hain’t prepared offhand to give no final opinion; there might be reason for it, and there might not. I hain’t one to say learnin’ hain’t got no value.”
“Why can’t Angus git learnin’ here?”
“You know ’s well as I do,” said Jake, resorting to his warlike tones. “It’s ’cause these here hymn-singin’, prayer-lettin’ folks in Rainbow won’t let him. ’Cause the kids pick on him.”
Bishwhang bristled. “They better not when I’m around.”
“It ’ud fix things so Angus was better able to stick up for himself in the world,” said Jake, reasoning the matter out.
“Jake,” Angus’s voice was anxious. “Will this school learn me that? Will they learn me to—stick up for myself?”
"“I calc’late so.”
“I got to stand up for myself, ain’t I?”
“Bet your life.”
Here was corroboration. It appeared that to go away would really be standing up for himself—but there was still some doubt. The matter of self-respect and of taking his own part in the matter of life was not exactly clear to him—and he felt he must know for certain. He turned it over and over in his mind until he saw a way out—a way to determine finally: he would go to his original source of knowledge, to a sure authority on the abstruse subject—to the person who first set the idea to moving in his brain. He would ask her. Abruptly he turned, and, hatless, left the shop. Bishwhang and Jake watched him in astonishment. “What’s got into him?” wondered the older man.
“Angus is goin’ away…. He’s goin’ away from us. What’s a-goin’ to become of us now?” Tears stood in Bishwhang’s pale eyes.
“I’m a-goin’ to find what he’s up to now,” said Jake, as he thrust on a disreputable hat and started for the door. “I’m goin’ to foller him. No tellin’ what he’s took into his head.”
Angus plodded across the bridge and up the hill. Jake Schwartz followed unseen.
“She'll know,” Angus said over and over again as his eyes sought the Canfield residence, scanning its porches and yard for the spot of animated color which would denote Lydia’s presence. “If she hain’t outdoors I’ll set—sit—down and wait.”
Presently, from the rear of the house Lydia went dancing across the lawn and out of the gate, a tiny basket over her arm, and skipped off briskly toward the fields and wood which lay beyond. Angus got up slowly and followed doggedly, moving fast enough to keep her in view. For perhaps a mile he plodded on behind; then, where the road ran between wheatfield and woodlot, Lydia threw herself down on the grass to rest. Propping her face on her hand she reclined, her face away from Angus.
He accelerated his step and stood awkwardly, bashfully, but determinedly by her side, his heart thumping, his cheeks flushed, his fingers plucking nervously at the seams of his trousers. He was afraid to speak, so he waited until she should turn and see him…. Presently she sensed a presence and moved her head with a little, startled jerk.
“Oh,” she breathed in relief, “It’s you.”
He nodded.
“What for did you come here? Where ’re you going?”
“Now’eres…. I come—to see—you.”
“I told you,” she said severely, “that I wasn’t allowed to play with you, or have anythin’ to do with you—on account of because you’ve been in jail and—”
“I didn’t come to play with you.” There was a hint of dignity in his reply. “I come to find out.”
“To find out what?”
“About standin’ up for myself—like you said.”
“Oh!” She waited for him to go on. He stood swaying from foot to foot in confusion, striving to put his thoughts into speech. It was she who uttered the first word.
“You did stand up for yourself…. I liked it. Don’t you like it—better than always running away?”
“Yes,” he said, and then, “but maybe anyhow I’d of run away if you hadn’t been there.” Here, unconsciously, he stated one of the great ingredients of heroic action—that man is more afraid of being seen to run away than he is to face his danger. Fear of ridicule has made many a man a hero.
“You won’t ever run again,” she said with conviction.
“Is other things besides not runnin’ standin’ up for yourself?” She considered carefully. “Yes,” she said after a moment, “I guess lots of different things.”
“Is goin’ away to school?”
It required a minute for her to make up her mind. Then she nodded. “Yes. It isn’t standin’ up for yourself to be ig’orant. Folks that’s ig’orant is just as bad as runnin’ away.”
He sighed.
“But if it was goin’ away—if it was leavin’ him?”
Lydia had been much with adults; perhaps some of her perceptions were in advance of her years. “They want you should go away to school?” she asked.
“Uh-huh.”
“Why don’t you go to school here?”
He hesitated, blushed. “It’s—like playin’ with you,’ he said. “Folks don’t calc’late to let me. Nobody’ll let me.”
She flushed angrily, quick to rise in defense of the oppressed. Lydia Canfield possessed a fiery sense of justice. “Then they ought to be ’shamed of theirselves. Playin’ with and goin’ to school is diff’runt things. You haven’t got a right to play with me, but you got a right to go to school.”
“But I dassent,” he said simply.
She said nothing. He waited and presently asked again, “Be you certain-sure goin’ away to school is standin’ up for myself?”
“Yes,” she said, “I’m certain-sure of it.”
He sighed and his shoulders drooped. “Then,” he said wearily, “I’ll have to tell him I’ll go.”
As he spoke a man, bearded, haggard, vicious of face, slouched out of the woods and stood leering down at the children. He was a squalid figure, one to shrink from with disgust. He cackled with jeering laughter.
“There you be, hey?” he said in a tone he meant to be humorous. “Wa-al now. Who’d ever thought I’d find you handy way out here! How be ye, Angy? Hain’t ye glad to see your ol’ pa that’s took sich resks jest to come after ye?”
Angus stood as though turned to stone, his eyes staring, his voice paralyzed in his throat. Titus Burke cackled again. “I heard you was bein’ took care of,” he said fawningly, “so I waited a spell till things quieted down ’fore comin’ after you…. Then I got sort of lonesome, and besides I got a use for you, so I come to git you.”
Angus gave back a step, but his father strode forward and clutched his arm roughly. “None of that, young feller…. So you hain’t glad to see your pa, eh? I’ll make ye glad to see him when I git time, see if I don’t. Gittin’ proud, eh? I’ll proud ye, I will.” He grinned evilly. “Come on,” he ordered.
“I ain’t comin’,” Angus panted, struggling to break free. “I’m a-goin’ back to him…. I hain’t a-comin’ with you.”
“You hain’t, hain’t you? We’ll see after that, young feller…. Now you come a-hustlin’.” He shifted his grip from Angus’s arm to his collar and began to propel the boy across the road and into the woods. Lydia screamed.
“Shet up,” barked Titus.
“I sha’n’t,” she snapped, and screamed again.
Titus Burke glowered at her venomously, half turned, but thought better of it, and commenced to drag Angus away—but around a turn of the road thirty feet away came panting Jake Schwartz. He bawled to Titus to let go of that there kid…. Angus, hope twinkling in his heart, dragged back. His father cuffed him and cursed. Jake bore down upon him vengefully, wrenched Angus free, and with a savage blow sent Titus Burke headlong into the ditch.
“What’s this here? What’s a-goin’ on here?” Jake demanded as he stood over the man.
“He’s my kid,” whined Titus, “and I got a right to my own flesh and blood.”
Jake was startled. He turned to Angus. “Is this here critter your pa?”
Angus nodded, still trembling with terror.
“Now ain’t that hell!” said Jake with conviction. He scrutinized Burke, who was now scrambling to his feet. “So you’re Titus Burke, eh?” He leaned closer to make a more careful examination. “Titus Burke…. Titus Burke…. Maybe so, but that name kind of don’t fit into my mind as belongin’ to your face.” He scratched his head and rumbled in his throat. “I don’t forgit faces, pardner, and I hain‘’t seen yourn these ten-fifteen year…. Back in Springfield, that’s where it was, and your name wasn’t Burke, not by a darn sight…. Now what was it that set you in my mem’ry?”
Jake drew Angus behind him and his manner changed. “Now you git—whatever your name is,” he said in a businesslike way. “Git and git quick; and if ever I ketch you botherin’ this kid agin, I’m a-goin’ to take these two hands and yank you to pieces…. Git!”
Titus Burke slunk into the woods, swearing.
“Come along, Angus,” Jake said, with something in his raucous voice which might have passed for gentleness. “Nothings goin’ to hurt ye now.”
Lydia Canfield followed them silently. At her grandfather’s gate they halted briefly. She regarded Angus with cold eyes, with a haughtiness which seemed to proclaim that she was drawing back from the defilement of his touch even the skirts of her thoughts.
“Was—was that your really, truly father?” she asked.
“Yes.”
With deliberation she turned her back upon him and went into the yard. Her manner was elaborate and eloquent. No words could have so expressed to Angus her disdain, or the fact that she was definitely and forever withdrawing from any contact with him or with his problems…. He stared after her piteously. In a moment he said under his breath, “I got to go away to school…. I got to go ’way.”
Another reflection was occupying Jake Schwartz. “Now what in blazes,” he said, “was the name that fellow used when I knowed him in Springfield?”