Dawn Eleanor Porter (free novels to read txt) 📖

damning figures were there,and he suspected what they were, though he could see only a blurredmass of indistinct marks. With one last effort he attempted still tocling to his subterfuge.

"What—what is it?" he stammered.

"'What is it?'—and in the face of a record like that!" cried hisfather sternly. "That's exactly what I want to know. What is it? Isthis the way, Keith, that you're showing me that you don't want to goto school? I haven't forgotten, you see, that you tried to beg offgoing this fall. Now, what is the matter?"

Keith shifted his position miserably. His face grew white andstrained-looking.

"I—I couldn't seem to get my lessons, dad."

"Couldn't! You mean you wouldn't, Keith. Surely, you're not trying tomake me think you couldn't have made a better record than this, ifyou'd tried."

There was no answer.

"Keith!" There was only pleading in the voice now—pleading with anunsteadiness more eloquent than words. "Have you forgotten so soonwhat I told you?—how now you hold all the hopes of Jerry and Ned andof—dad in your own two hands? Keith, do you think, do you reallythink you're treating Jerry and Ned and dad—square?"

For a moment there was no answer; then a very faint, constrained voiceasked:

"What were those figures, dad?"

"Read for yourself." With the words the card was thrust into his hand.

Keith bent his head. His eyes apparently were studying the card.

"Suppose you read them aloud, Keith."

There was a moment's pause; then with a little convulsive breath thewords came.

"I—can't—dad."

The man smiled grimly.

"Well, I don't know as I wonder. They are pretty bad. However, I guesswe'll have to have them. Read them aloud, Keith."

"But, honest, dad, I can't. I mean—they're all blurred and runtogether." The boy's face was white like paper now.

Daniel Burton gave his son a quick glance.

"Blurred? Run together?" He reached for the card and held it a momentbefore his own eyes. Then sharply he looked at his son again. "Youmean—Can't you read any of those figures—the largest ones?"

Keith shook his head.

"Why, Keith, how long—-" A sudden change came to his face. "You mean—is that the reason you haven't been able to get your lessons, boy?"

Keith nodded dumbly, miserably.

"But, my dear boy, why in the world didn't you say so? Look here,

Keith, how long has this been going on?"

There was no answer.

"Since the very first of school?"

"Before that."

"How long before that?"

"Last spring on my—birthday. I noticed it first—then."

"Good Heavens! As long as that, and never a word to me? Why, Keith,what in the world possessed you? Why didn't you tell me? We'd have hadthat fixed up long ago."

"Fixed up?" Keith's eyes were eager, incredulous.

"To be sure. We'd have had some glasses, of course."

Keith shook his head. All the light fled from his face.

"Uncle Joe Harrington tried that, but it didn't help—any."

"Uncle Joe! But Uncle Joe is—-" Daniel Burton stopped short. A newlook came to his eyes. Into his son's face he threw a glance at oncefearful, searching, rebellious. Then he straightened up angrily.

"Nonsense, Keith! Don't get silly notions into your head," he snappedsharply. "It's nothing but a little near-sightedness, and we'll havesome glasses to remedy that in no time. We'll go down to theoptician's to-morrow. Meanwhile I'll drop a note to your teacher, andyou needn't go to school again till we get your glasses."

Near-sightedness! Keith caught at the straw and held to it fiercely.Near-sightedness! Of course, it was that, and not blindness, likeUncle Joe's at all. Didn't dad know? Of course, he did! Still, if itwas near-sightedness he ought to be able to see near to; and yet itwas just as blurred—But, then, of course it WAS near-sightedness. Dadsaid it was.

They went to the optician's the next morning. It seemed there was anoculist, too, and he had to be seen. When the lengthy and arduousexaminations were concluded, Keith drew a long breath. Surely now,after all that—

Just what they said Keith did not know. He knew only that he did notget any glasses, and that his father was very angry, and very much putout about something, and that he kept declaring that these old idiotsdidn't know their business, anyway, and the only thing to do was to goto Boston where there was somebody who DID know his business.

They went to Boston a few days later. It was not a long journey, butKeith hailed it with delight, and was very much excited over theprospect of it. Still, he did not enjoy it very well, for with hisfather he had to go from one doctor to another, and none of themseemed really to understand his business—that is, not well enough tosatisfy his father, else why did he go to so many? And there did notseem to be anywhere any glasses that would do any good.

Keith began to worry then, for fear that his father had been wrong,and that it was not near-sightedness after all. He could not forgetUncle Joe—and Uncle Joe had not been able to find any glasses thatdid any good. Besides, he heard his father and the doctors talking agreat deal about "an accident," and a "consequent injury to the opticnerve"; and he had to answer a lot of questions about the time when hewas eleven years old and ran into the big maple tree with his sled,cutting a bad gash in his forehead. But as if that, so long ago, couldhave anything to do with things looking blurred now!

But it did have something to do with it—several of the doctors saidthat; and they said it was possible that a slight operation now mightarrest the disease. They would try it. Only one eye was badly affectedat present.

So it was arranged that Keith should stay a month with one of thedoctors, letting his father go back to Hinsdale.

It was not a pleasant experience, and it seemed to Keith anything buta "slight operation"; but at the end of the month the bandages wereoff, and his father had come to take him back home.

The print was not quite so blurred now, though it was still far fromclear, and Keith noticed that his father and the doctors had a greatdeal to say