CHAPTER V.
VALHALLA
That was the name Nan gave to the little winter home.
"Valhalla is the place where the dead warriors go, and that is what weall of us are after the day's work is done."
Commuting at first was very tiring for both Nan and Lucy. Catchingtrains was hard on their nerves and the trip seemed interminable, but ina few weeks they fell into the attitude of mind of all commuters andjust accepted it as part of the daily routine. It became no more irksomethan doing one's hair or brushing one's teeth.
The girls made many friends on the train and before the winter was overreally enjoyed the time spent going to and from school. Billy Sutton wasNan's devoted cavalier. He managed, if possible, to sit by her andtogether they would study. He helped her with her mathematics, and she,quick at languages, would correct his French exercises. Those were sadmornings for Billy when the seat by Nan was taken before they reachedPreston. He cursed his luck that Preston should not have been beyondGrantly instead of a station nearer to town. Coming home he always sawto it that no "fresh kid" got ahead of him in the choice of seats. Hewould get to the station ahead of time and watch with eagle eye forNan's sedate little figure; then he would pounce on her like a veritableeagle and possess himself of her books and parcels. Thereafter no powercould have separated him from her short of the brakeman who cruellycalled out: "P-errr-reston!"
Billy's younger sister Mag was of great assistance to her big brother inhis manoeuvres. She struck up a warm friendship with Lucy, and sincethe two younger girls were together, what more natural than that he andNan should be the same?
"How would you like me to run you over to see Lucy for a while thisafternoon?" he would ask in the lordly and nonchalant manner of bigbrothers, and Mag would be duly grateful, all the time laughing in hersleeve, as is the way with small sisters.
The only person who ever got ahead of Billy on the homeward voyagewas Count de Lestis. That man of the world with lordly condescensionpermitted Billy to carry all the books and parcels and then quietlyappropriated the seat by Nan. That was hard enough, but what was harderwas to see how Nan dimpled under the compliments the count paid her, andhow gaily she laughed at his wit, and how easily she held her own in thevery interesting conversation into which they plunged. Billy, boilingand raging, could not help catching bits of it. Actually Nan was quotingpoetry to the handsome foreigner. With wonder her schoolboy friendheard her telling the count of how she had gone up in an aeroplane thepreceding summer and what her sensations were. She had never told himall these things.
"And why is it you like so much to fly?" the count asked. "Is it merelythe physical sensation?"
"Oh no, there is something else. I'll tell you a little bit of poetry Ilearned the other day from a magazine. That is the way I feel, somehow:
"'Well, good-by! We're going! Where? Why there is no knowing Where! We've grown tired, we don't know why, Of our section of the sky, Of our little patch of air, And we're going, going! Where?
"'Who would ever stop to care?-- Far off land or farther sea Where our feet again are free, We shall fare all unafraid Where no trail or furrow's made-- Where there's room enough, room enough, room enough for laughter! And we'll find our Land o' Dreaming at a long day's close, We'll find our Land o' Dreaming--perhaps, who knows? To-morrow--or the next day--or maybe the day after!
"'So good-by! We're going! Why? O, there is no knowing Why! Something's singing in our veins, Something that no book explains. There's no magic in your air! And we're going, going! Where?
"'Where there's magic and to spare! So we break our chains and go. Life? What is it but to know Southern cross and Pleiades, Sunny lands and windy seas; Where there's time enough, time enough, time enough for laughter! We'll find our Land o' Dreaming, so away! Away! We'll find our Land o' Dreaming--or at least we may-- Tomorrow, or the next day, or maybe the day after!'"
Nan Carter was a very charming girl at any time, but Nan Carter recitingpoetry was irresistible. So the count found her. Her eyes looked morelike forest pools than ever and the trembling Billy was very much afraidthe handsome nobleman was going to fall into said pools. He gritted histeeth with the determination to be on the spot ready to pull him out byhis aristocratic and well-shod heels if he should take such a tumble.
"Ah, you have the wanderlust, too! I'd like to go with you to your Lando' Dreaming." Fortunately Billy did not hear this remark, as thebrakeman opened the door at this juncture and shouted the name of astation.
For once Billy was glad when the brakeman finally called:"P-err-reston!" If he had to get out, so had the hated count. He neverhad taken as much of a fancy to de Lestis as the other members of theneighborhood had, anyhow, and now he knew why he had never liked him.
"He is a selfish, arrogant foreigner," he raged on in his boyish way."He might have let me sit with Nan part of the way, anyhow."
Nan went home quite pleased with the interesting conversation she hadhad on the train. The count was rapidly becoming a warm friend of thefamily. Everybody liked him but Lucy, and she had no especial reason fordisliking him.
"He's got no time for me and I guess that's the reason," she said whenquestioned. "Mag doesn't cotton to him much, either."
"Well, I should think you would be glad for Father to have somebody totalk to," said Helen. "You and Mag are too young to have much in commonwith a grown-up gentleman."
"Pooh, Miss Grandmother! I'm most as old as Nan and he cottons to herfor fair. I know why he doesn't think much of Mag and me--it is becausehe knows we know he is nothing but a Dutchman."
"Dutchman! Nonsense! Dutchmen proper come from Holland and Count deLestis is a Hungarian."
"Well, he can talk Dutch like a Prussian, anyhow. You oughter hear himjabbering with that German family that live over near Preston. He bringsold Mr. Blitz newspapers all the time and they laugh and laugh overjokes in them; at least, they must be jokes to make them laugh so."
"Of course the count speaks German. He speaks a great many languages,"declared Helen with the dignified air that she thought necessary toassume when she and Lucy got in a discussion.
"Well, what's the reason he ain't fighting for his country? Tell methat! Mag says that Billy says that if his country was at war youwouldn't catch him buying farms in strange countries, like this deLestis. He says he'd be in the fight, if he couldn't do anything butbeat a drum."
"But you see he is not in sympathy with the cause, child. All of theAustrians and Hungarians are not on the Kaiser's side. A whole lot ofthem believe in a more democratic form of government than EmperorWilliam wants. The count explained all that to Father. He says hecould not conscientiously fight with Prussia against democracy."
"All that sounds mighty fine but I like men that fight," and Lucytossed her head. "Me and Mag both like men that fight."
"Mag and I," admonished Helen.
The gentleman in question had just been off on a business trip. He hadmuch business in New York and Washington and sometimes made flyingvisits to Chicago. He was interested in a land agency and was hoping toimport some Hungarian and Serbian families to the United States. He hadbought up quite a tract of land in Virginia, making cash payments thatshowed he had unlimited means.
"They make excellent servants," he told the Misses Grant, "far superiorto your negroes. The Serbs are especially fine farmers. It is really anation of yeomen. They could make the barren tracts of Virginia blossomlike the rose."
"Well, bring them over then." The sisters almost agreed about this butthey had a diverging point in that Miss Ella thought she would ratherhave a family of Hungarians, since that was the count's nationality;while Miss Louise fancied some Serbs, because they were at leastfighting on the side of the Allies.
But to return to "Valhalla."
Douglas did not at all approve of the name Nan had given the littlehome. "I
am not a dead warrior when the day is over nor do I mean to beone ever," she declared.
She started in on her winter of teaching with all the energy and vim ofthe proverbial new broom. She gloried in the fact that she was able toturn her education to some account; and while the remuneration of acountry school teacher is certainly not munificent, it helped a greatdeal towards the family expenses.
The rent from the Carters' pretty home in Richmond was all they had tolive on now, except for a small sum in bank left over from the campearnings. It would be possible to manage if no clothes had to be bought,and one and all promised to do with last year's suits.
Only a born teacher could make a real success of a country school wherethirty children must be taught in all grades up to high-school standing.It took infinite patience, boundless good humor, and a systematic savingof time, together with a keen sense of fun to get Douglas over each day.She found the school in a state of insurrection, due to having provedtoo much for the first teacher, who had found urgent businesselsewhere, and then for a series of substitutes until the presentincumbent, Miss Douglas Carter, was installed.
She made a little speech the first morning, telling the pupils quitefrankly that this was her first year of teaching but that it was notgoing to be her last; that she was determined to make good and she askedtheir help; that she was willing to give them all she had in the way ofknowledge and strength but that they must meet her half-way and do theirbest. She gave them to understand from the very first that she intendedto have good order and that obedience was to be the first lesson taught.
Most of the children fell into her plans with enthusiasm. Of coursethere were the reactionaries who had to be dealt with summarily. Bobbywas one of them. He was very difficult to manage in school. Never havingbeen under the least restraint before in all of his seven years, it washard on him to have to sit still and pretend to study, and he made itharder on Douglas. The faction opposed to government in any form eggedhim on. They laughed at his impertinent remarks to the teacher andbribed him to do and say many outrageous things.
Poor Douglas was tempted to confess herself beaten as far as her littlebrother was concerned and give up trying to teach him. He was ratheryoung for school, she almost fooled herself into believing; but therewas a sturdiness and determination in Douglas Carter's make-up thatwould not let her succumb to difficulties.
"I will succeed! He shall learn! My pupils must respect me, and if Ican't make my own little brother obey me, how can I expect to controlthe rest of them?"
She asked herself what she would do with any other pupil, not herbrother, who gave her so much trouble.
"Write a note to his mother or father, of course," she answered.
"But I can't bear to bother Father, and Mother would blame me and nodoubt pet Bobby. I'll write a note to Dr. Wright and his disapprovalwill hurt Bobby more than anything that could happen."
And so she wrote the following letter to Bobby's employer:
_Preston, Va., R. F. D. Route 1. November 1, 1916._
DEAR DR. WRIGHT:
I am sorry to inform you that your chauffeur, Robert Carter, Jr., is misbehaving at school in such a way that his teacher is afraid he will have to be expelled. She has done everything in her power to make him be more considerate but he is very, very naughty and tries to worry his teacher all the time.
Very sincerely, DOUGLAS CARTER.
Dr. Wright telephoned that he would be down to see them on Saturdayafter receiving Douglas's note; but the message was sent via Grantly,as the Carters had no telephone, and Miss Ella and Miss Louise couldnot agree just what his name was or when he said he was coming. So thematter was lost sight of in the wrangle that ensued and the word wasnot delivered until too late.