FullReads

When the wagon rattled into the acacias west of the vineyard, he got up and sauntered toward the barn. John Dysart saw him coming, and took two or three steps toward him with his hand at the side of his mouth.

“He’s deaf,” he whispered with a violent facial enunciation which must have assailed the stranger’s remaining senses like a yell. “I think you’ll like him; he’s a wonderful talker.”

The newcomer was a large, seedy-looking man, with the resigned, unexpectant manner of the deaf. Dysart went around the wagon, and the visitor put up his trumpet.

“Professor Brownell,” John called into it. “I want to make you acquainted with Mr. Palmerston. Mr. Palmerston is a young man from the East, a student at Cambridge–no, Oxford”–

“Ann Arbor,” interrupted the young man, eagerly.

Dysart ignored the interruption. “He’s out here for his health.”

The stranger nodded toward the young man approvingly, and dropped the trumpet as if he had heard enough.

“How do you do, Mr. Palmerston?” he said, reaching down to clasp the young fellow’s slim white hand. “I’m glad to meet a scholar in these wilds.”

Palmerston blushed a helpless pink, and murmured politely. The stranger dismounted from the wagon with the awkwardness of age and avoirdupois. John Dysart stood just behind his guest, describing him as if he were a panorama:–

“I never saw his beat. He talks just like a book. He’s filled me chuck-full of science on the way up. He knows all about the inside of the earth from the top crust to China. Ask him something about his machine, and get him started.”

Palmerston glanced inquiringly toward the trumpet. The stranger raised it to his ear and leaned graciously toward him.

“Mr. Dysart is mistaken,” called Palmerston, in the high, lifeless voice with which we all strive to reconcile the deaf to their affliction; “I am a Western man, from Ann Arbor.”

“Better still, better still,” interrupted the newcomer, grasping his hand again; “you’ll be broader, more progressive–‘the heir of all the ages,’ and so forth. I was denied such privileges in my youth. But nature is an open book, ‘sermons in stones.'” He turned toward the wagon and took out a small leather valise, handling it with evident care.

Dysart winked at the young man, and pointed toward the satchel.

“Jawn,” called Mrs. Dysart seethingly, from the kitchen door, “what’s the trouble?”

John’s facial contortions stopped abruptly, as if the mainspring had snapped. He took off his hat and scratched his head gingerly with the tip of his little finger. He had a round, bald head, with a fringe of smooth, red-brown hair below the baldness that made it look like a filbert.

“I’m coming, Emeline,” he called, glancing hurriedly from the two men to the vicinity of his wife’s voice, as if anxious to bisect himself mentally and leave his hospitality with his guest.

“I’ll look after Professor Brownell,” said Palmerston; “he can step into my tent and brush up.”

Dysart’s countenance cleared.

“Good,” he said eagerly, starting on a quick run toward the kitchen door. When he was half-way there he turned and put up his hand again. “Draw him out!” he called in a stentorian whisper. “You’d ought to hear him talk; it’s great. Get him started about his machine.”

Palmerston smiled at the unnecessary admonition. The stranger had been talking all the time in a placid, brook-like manner while he felt under the wagon-seat for a second and much smaller traveling-bag. The young man possessed himself of this after having been refused the first by a gentle motion of the owner’s hand. The visitor accepted his signal of invitation, and followed him toward the tent.

“Our universities and colleges are useful in their way; they no doubt teach many things that are valuable: but they are not practical; they all fail in the application of knowledge to useful ends. I am not an educated man myself, but I have known many who are, and they are all alike–shallow, superficial, visionary. They need to put away their books and sit down among the everlasting hills and think. You have done well to come out here, young man. This is good; you will grow.”