The teaching progressed, for Hazel was unusually apt for a child at her profession; and if Scip failed at times as a pupil it was not for lack of application on his part. At least four afternoons in the week he found it possible to slip away from the fields or the dirty cabin to the house, as Hazel liked to call it, among the pines. She had made it look like a dwelling-place, bringing two boxes for seats and a third for a table. One day Scipio brought her some early violets and she flew down to Granny’s for a tin can which she filled with water. In this she placed the flowers, setting the can in a corner against the pines. After that the tin vase was often filled. When her pupil could not come she tidied her pine-needle carpet, or, armed with the two-pronged stick Scip had given her, walked bravely among the cows and the grunting pigs. Some days teacher and scholar found it too cold to sit still long and raced one another through the trees, or teased the turkeys whose “gobble, gobble” always amused Hazel. But usually they worked hard at the task of learning to read. Hazel wisely gave up for the present the effort to teach the boy’s clumsy fingers to guide the pencil to write. One afternoon he was late and seemed unusually slow in responding to his teacher’s questionings. “Oh, Scip, you must remember that word,” Hazel said impatiently. “Look down and study the letters again,” and she pointed to the H O R S E plainly printed on the copy in her lap. As the boy bent over she saw that his hair was matted with blood, and that blood was oozing from a gash in his forehead. “Scip,” she cried, “what has happened?” “Don’t you mind Sister,” he answered. “I can read the letters,” he went on--“H O R S E”--studying it, “but I can’t rightly remember what they done spell.” “Scip, how did your head get that way?” “It ain’t nothing.” “I’m going right to the house to get some water to wash the blood off for you.” “Don’t you do that, Hazel,” he said earnestly. “It ain’t much, and you’d mind the blood. My father’s been drunk again,” he added sullenly. “Oh, Scip, dear, I’m so sorry,” Hazel cried, “I’m so sorry,” and longing to give such comfort as she could she put her arms about his neck and kissed him. The tears came to the boy’s eyes. His child’s face, grown dull and expressionless from neglect and cruelty, quivered in every muscle. Hazel moved back shyly, startled at her own impulsiveness. He looked down at the copy in her lap, at her slender brown hands, and said gently, “Don’t you mind, Hazel. I don’t mind no more.” Then placing his black finger on the word over which he had been puzzling, “It’s ‘Horse,’ ain’t it? H o r s e, Horse. Reckon you thought I was a mule!” CHAPTER IX LOST “Granny, it was as cold as Boston in my room this morning. It doesn’t seem as though it would ever be warm again. It’s freezing cold!” “It’s freezing, indeed, honey, but eat breakfast and you’ll be warmer.”