That did settle the matter. Marcia might talk if she wanted to talk; she might keep her mouth shut if she so desired. It was patent that she was perfectly capable, honest, and attractive in appearance. Very shortly Nancy Bodkin worshipped her as she never had worshipped any human being in all her life. These feelings broadened and deepened because she realized, whenever she walked abroad attractively clothed and with all of her best points pronouncedly intensified, that people showed her a deference and a kindliness that she never before had experienced. In a bewildered way, Nancy slowly figured out the situation. If she had spent a small share of the time on herself that she had been accustomed to spending on hats for her townspeople, a larger share of their respect would have been bestowed upon her. It was a new viewpoint for Nancy. She had been thinking that she might earn the highest esteem by spending herself upon her profession to the exclusion of everything else, and now she was forced to learn, by overwhelming evidence, that the degree of respect she received from the village was going to depend very largely upon the height of the degree to which she respected herself. CHAPTER VII “FIELD MICE AMONG THE WHEAT” It is a truism that time is fleeting, while never does it flee on such rapid feet as during school days. When Mahala became convinced that it might be best for Jason’s self-respect and for his chances in life not to attempt further attendance in a school subjected to the cruelties of Martin Moreland, she undertook, in her own way, to superintend his education. While in her classes, Jason easily had stood foremost; it had not been in her power to surpass the grade of the work that he did. In his absence, she found it possible to attain higher marks than Susanna or the most ambitious of the boys. The thing that Mahala never realized was, that whether her work was the best in her class or not, so long as her father was on the board it was so graded by a line of teachers who were accustomed to seeing her in the lead in every other activity among the children of her own age in Ashwater. What Mahala did for Jason was simple enough, possibly not vital to him. With a firm determination, candles, and kerosene, he might have equalled what the other pupils were accomplishing in school, working in the room over the grocery at night. Faithful to his promise, Peter walled off a room of generous dimensions for Jason, papered its walls and ceiling freshly, while the boy himself put a coat of new paint on the woodwork.