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“Oh, well, don’t chatter. Let me go on.”

It was a very happy fortnight to Maggie, this visit to Tom. She was allowed to be in the study while he had his lessons, and in time got very deep into the examples in the Latin Grammar.

Mr. Stelling liked her prattle immensely, and they were on the best of terms. She told Tom she should like to go to school to Mr. Stelling, as he did, and learn just the same things. She knew she could do Euclid, for she had looked into it again, and she saw what ABC meant–they were the names of the lines.

“I’m sure you couldn’t do it, now,” said Tom, “and I’ll just ask Mr. Stelling if you could.”

“I don’t mind,” said she. “I’ll ask him myself.”

“Mr. Stelling,” she said, that same evening when they were in the drawing-room, “couldn’t I do Euclid, and all Tom’s lessons, if you were to teach me instead of him?”

“No, you couldn’t,” said Tom indignantly. “Girls can’t do Euclid–can they, sir?”

“They can pick up a little of everything, I dare say,” said Mr. Stelling; “but they couldn’t go far into anything. They’re quick and shallow.”

Tom, delighted with this, wagged his head at Maggie behind Mr. Stelling’s chair. As for Maggie, she had hardly ever been so angry. She had been so proud to be called “quick” all her little life, and now it appeared that this quickness showed what a poor creature she was. It would have been better to be slow, like Tom.

“Ha, ha, Miss Maggie!” said Tom, when they were alone; “you see it’s not such a fine thing to be quick. You’ll never go far into anything, you know.”

And Maggie had no spirit for a retort.

But when she was fetched away in the gig by Luke, and the study was once more quite lonely for Tom, he missed her grievously.

Still, the dreary half-year did come to an end at last. How glad Tom was to see the last yellow leaves fluttering before the cold wind! The dark afternoons, and the first December snow, seemed to him far livelier than the August sunshine; and that he might make himself the surer about the flight of the days that were carrying him homeward, he stuck twenty-one sticks deep in a corner of the garden, when he was three weeks from the holidays, and pulled one up every day with a great wrench, throwing it to a distance.

But it was worth buying, even at the heavy price of the Latin Grammar–the happiness of seeing the bright light in the parlour at home as the gig passed over the snow-covered bridge–the happiness of passing from the cold air to the warmth, and the kisses, and the smiles of home.

Chapter XI.

THE NEW SCHOOLFELLOW.

“Father,” said Tom one evening near the end of the holidays, “Uncle Glegg says Lawyer Wakem is going to send his son to Mr. Stelling. You won’t like me to go to school with Wakem’s son, will you, father?”

“It’s no matter for that, my boy,” said Mr. Tulliver; “don’t you learn anything bad of him, that’s all. The lad’s a poor deformed creatur. It’s a sign Wakem thinks high o’ Mr. Stelling, as he sends his son to him, and Wakem knows meal from bran, lawyer and rascal though he is.”

It was a cold, wet January day on which Tom went back to school. If he had not carried in his pocket a parcel of sugar-candy, there would have been no ray of pleasure to enliven the gloom.

“Well, Tulliver, we’re glad to see you again,” said Mr. Stelling heartily, on his arrival. “Take off your wrappings and come into the study till dinner. You’ll find a bright fire there, and a new companion.”

Tom felt in an uncomfortable flutter as he took off his woollen comforter and other wrappings. He had seen Philip Wakem at St. Ogg’s, but had always turned his eyes away from him as quickly as possible, for he knew that for several reasons his father hated the Wakem family with all his heart.