CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

TEACHER REVOLUTIONIZES

Surprising things happened the following Monday morning in the little log schoolhouse. After leaving the theater on the Saturday previous, Miss Bayley, who had been told by the one having authority to procure whatever she might need for her little classes, had returned with Dixie to the book department of the emporium, and had purchased several graded readers from the first to the eighth. The light of a new resolve shone in her eyes as she called upon Dixie Martin to lead in the Good-Morning song.

When this was done, Miss Bayley looked about her at her little straggling group of mountain pupils and made a startling announcement.

“Girls and boys,” she said brightly, “I have decided to change the old régime, which means that we are going to desert the former way of doing things and start in on a new. To begin with, I am going to give you all an examination in reading and place you in the grades where I believe you belong.”

Jessica Archer was on her feet in an instant, saying: “My pa wouldn’t let you do that. He says nothin’ is ever to be done diff’rent in this here school unless he tells the teacher to do it.”

“Kindly be seated, Jessica, and hereafter do not speak without first raising your hand and receiving permission to do so.” The teacher’s tone was firm, and, although the little “sheep-princess” pouted and looked her defiance, she said no more just then.

“I have here,” Josephine Bayley continued, “eight new graded readers, that are very attractively illustrated. I will begin with the first, and you may each read one of the little stories; then we will progress to the second, and so on, and, when you have reached the book which is too difficult for you, we will know exactly in which grade you belong. Does this method seem fair to you? Ira Jenkins, what do you think?”

The long, lank, overgrown son of the burly blacksmith flushed to the roots of his hair, but he managed to uncurl his ungainly length from the much-carved desk that was too small for him, and say stutteringly: “Yes’m, Miss Bayley. Seems like ’tis to me. I should say ’twas fair enough.”

“Do any of you, except Jessica Archer, object to being regraded according to your ability to read?” There was no dissenting voice, and so the first book was handed to Dixie Martin, who, with an amused smile, read the tiny story that told the adventures of a pussy-cat. When the book had been passed from pupil to pupil, it was found that even those simple words had been too difficult for the two little children of Mr. Archer’s Mexican overseer, and so Franciscito and Mercedes were classed as “first readers.”

The six-year-old twins of the trapper, Sage Brush Mullet, poor, forlorn little Maggie and Millie, stopped at the second.

Jessica Archer did well enough in the third, but could not read many of the words in the new fourth, and was so graded. With her was Carol Martin, but to the very evident indignation of the little daughter of Mr. Sethibald Archer, Dixie, Ken, and Ira Jenkins were placed above her.

Each was asked to read one of the last three stories in the fifth book. Ken and Dixie hesitated not at all, but Ira did stumble over the longer words, and the first story in the sixth proved quite beyond him, and so he was placed there.

Ken, although two years older than his sister, had a more mathematical mind, and found the seventh reader rather difficult, but Dixie reached the last, and was declared by the teacher to be in the eighth grade.

Miss Bayley purposely avoided looking in the direction of the irate little girl in the much-be-ruffled dress as she said: “You are now each placed in the grade where you should be, and I am sure that we shall in the future make real progress.” Then, glancing at the clock, she smilingly added: “Ten already, and time for recess. Dixie, you may collect the new books please, and Ken, will you lead the line to the playground?”

But Jessica Archer did not wait to go out with the others. Catching her hat from its hook on the wall, she darted out, and when, fifteen minutes later, Miss Bayley rang the bell, recalling the pupils to their lessons, she was not at all surprised to find that the rebellious little “sheep-princess” was not among them.

Miss Bayley was not long kept in doubt as to what the absence of Jessica Archer meant. Having decided to carry her new method of grading through all the subjects,—reading, writing, and arithmetic,—the teacher had sent Ira Jenkins and Ken to the board to work out rather advanced sums, when the sound of hurrying wheels was heard without, and a moment later the short, stocky Mr. Sethibald Archer burst into the room, his face flushed, his small gimlet-like eyes blinking very fast.

“Say, Miss Bayley,” he blurted out, waiving the formality of a greeting, “what’s this here my gal’s been tellin’ me ’bout you upsettin’ methods which I started and makin’ out she’s a numskull alongside of those—those no-account Martins? I’ll not have it, I tell you,” he blustered. “I’m governin’ board of this here school, and things have got to be done as I say, or you can pack and leave this here locality on to-morrow mornin’s stage. D’ye hear?”

Miss Bayley did not take advantage of his pause to defend her action, and, still further angered by her calm, he went on, his high-pitched voice growing louder, if that were possible. “I’d like to know where from you got your authority,—_you_, an upstart teacher we don’t know nothin’ about. Who was it told you to spend money that’s not yours buying new books that we don’t need for this here school?”

So indignant had been the self-important little man, and so loud his voice, that he had not heard the arrival of a horse and buggy without, nor was he aware that another listener had stopped in the doorway to await the end of the tirade. When the speaker paused to take a breath, the newcomer stepped into the school-room, saying in a voice, the calm, even tones of which did not betray the just anger that he felt: “Mr. Archer, may I answer the question you have just put to Miss Bayley? I, Samuel Clayburn, head of the governing board of education in this district, gave our teacher full authority to purchase whatever she believed was needed to further the interests of this little district school, and I am indeed glad to find that she is now introducing progressive methods.” Then he added, in a pleasanter tone, for it was hard for the portly banker to be unkindly severe: “Mr. Archer, I regret that the delivery of mail in the mountain sections is so dilatory, otherwise you would have known by now that I have decided to devote more of my time to the schools in the outlying districts, and so will no longer require your aid. I will bid you good-morning.”

The stocky, florid man was clenching and unclenching his hands, and almost bursting with indignation. When the quiet voice ceased speaking, he blurted out with: “It’s an outrage, that’s what it is! A cooked-up scheme of this here new teacher’s to oust me from a place that’s rightfully mine. But I’ll get even. I’ll take my darter out of this here school. Come along, Jessie, I won’t have you pizened by no such corruptin’ influence.”

With a toss of her curls, the little girl flounced out of the door, closely following her irate father, and they were soon heard to drive away.

“Miss Bayley,” the banker said, “I regret this most unfortunate incident. Last Saturday, immediately after your departure from the bank, I wrote Mr. Archer that I would no longer need his services, but the stage probably has not as yet passed his place. Realizing that something of this very nature might occur when he did receive the letter, I decided to drive over, knowing that otherwise you would have to bear alone the brunt of his wrath.”

“Thank you,” Josephine Bayley said simply. “I am indeed sorry to have been the cause of this unpleasantness, but really, Mr. Clayburn, I do believe that the other pupils can now have a much better chance.”

The banker nodded, “I am sure of it,” he said, as he smiled about at the solemn faces.

“My pupils,” Miss Bayley said to them, “this gentleman is Mr. Samuel Clayburn, of the board of education, and he it is who made us a gift of those attractive new readers that have pleased you all so much.”

Carol and Dixie arose at once, and the others shyly and stragglingly followed. Then curtsying, as Miss Bayley had taught them to do when she introduced a visitor, in a faltering chorus they piped, “Good-morning, Mr. Clayburn.” But it was Dixie who thought to add, “And thank you for the books.”

“You are very welcome, and I’m sure you’ll make good use of them,” was the genial reply. Then, turning again to the girl-teacher, he added: “I hope no further unpleasantness will result from this, Miss Bayley, but if there does, report to me at once. You can telephone to me from the inn.”

Later, as he was driving down the pine-shaded cañon road, the good man was thinking, “How I do wish my Sylvia could attend this mountain school. She seems to be making very little headway with her French governess. If only she could live awhile the simple, healthful life that the little Martins are living, how much good it would do her.”