"And hers shall be the breathing balm, And hers the silence, and the calm Of mute, insensate things." CHAPTER II In a week Tom was going away to school. It should not come as a surprise, Ellen repeatedly told him, for she had from time to time apprised him of the approaching fulfilment of her plans; but Tom had rested, like Hertha, in the present moment, believing, too, that Ellen's plans might go astray. This, however, was little likely to take place, for in his older sister he dealt with a general, intelligent, resourceful, and with a contempt for the enemy, poverty. Her efforts had at length secured a scholarship, and four years of savings were to be expended for traveling and necessary clothes. The rest depended upon Tom who would be equipped to go out and do his share in gaining an education. "Surely," Ellen said at the supper-table when the announcement of the final arrangements was made, "you know I'm right, Tom, and that a colored boy needs an education more than a white boy." Aunt Maggie wiped her eyes. "We sure need Tom," she said. The older sister looked around the table, at Hertha's sad face, at Tom's sullen one, at her mother's tears, and for a moment felt the severity of the coming catastrophe; but for a moment only. Emotion soon gave place to reasoned thought. "Tom has a right to an education," she said solemnly. "If he doesn't learn a trade at school he never will learn one, and we shouldn't keep him here no matter how much we shall need him and miss him." Aunt Maggie rose. "You don' know what it means," she said, "to part a mudder f'om her only son." Her rich voice sounded with a certain finality as though, while appreciating Ellen's power, she wished her to understand her responsibility. "You's taken a deal upon you'self." And she left her children and went into her room. Tom and Hertha slipped out of doors. In time of trouble they always got away from the house, and now in silence they made their way to the river. It was a hot night in late September with a wind blowing from the east. In the summer, unless held home by some imperative need, all the people of the plantation, black and white, came in the evening to the wharf to taste the fresh breeze. But the wharf was long and seclusion possible, so the two slipped to their favorite place at the far end, and leaning against a post dangled their feet over the water. "If it would do any good," Tom said morosely, "I'd run away." Hertha laughed. "Ellen thinks she can boss the whole of us," he went on, "but the time am coming when she can't boss me." "'Is,' Tom." "Yes, ma'am." Tom's speech was a queer mixture of good English acquired from his sisters, who had been drilled by northern teachers, and colloquial speech picked up from his surroundings. "It does seem too bad," Hertha declared, "to leave just now when Mr. Merryvale has come back and you can have work with some pay." "I ain't going for more'n a year," Tom declared.