Never had Penrod been so glad to greet his mother. Never was he more boisterous in the expression of happiness of that kind. And the tokens of his appetite at dinner, a little later, were extraordinary. Mr. Schofield began to feel reassured in spite of himself; but Mrs. Schofield shook her head.
"Don't you see? It's abnormal!" she said, in a low, decisive voice.
That night Penrod awoke from a sweet, conscienceless slumber--or, rather, he was awakened. A wrappered form lurked over him in the gloom.
"Uff--ow--" he muttered, and turned his face from the dim light that shone through the doorway. He sighed and sought the depths of sleep again.
"Penrod," his mother said softly, and, while he resisted feebly, she turned him over to face her.
"Gawn lea' me 'lone," he muttered.
Then, as a little sphere touched his lips, he jerked his head away, startled.
"Whassat?"
Mrs. Schofield replied in tones honeysweet and coaxing: "It's just a nice little pill, Penrod."
"Doe waw 'ny!" he protested, keeping his eyes shut, clinging to the sleep from which he was being riven.
"Be a good boy, Penrod," she whispered. "Here's a glass of nice cool water to swallow it down with. Come, dear; it's going to do you lots of good."
And again the little pill was placed suggestively against his lips; but his head jerked backward, and his hand struck out in blind, instinctive self-defense.
"I'll BUST that ole pill," he muttered, still with closed eyes.
"Lemme get my han's on it an' I will!"
"Penrod!"
"PLEASE go on away, mamma!"
"I will, just as soon as you take this little pill."
"I DID!"
"No, dear."
"I did," Penrod insisted plaintively. "You made me take it just before I went to bed."
"Oh, yes; THAT one. But, dearie," Mrs. Schofield explained, "I got to thinking about it after I went to bed, and I decided you'd better have another."
"I don't WANT another."
"Yes, dearie."
"Please go 'way and let me sleep."
"Not till you've taken the little pill, dear."
"Oh, GOLLY!" Groaning, he propped himself upon an elbow and allowed the pill to pass between his lips. (He would have allowed anything whatever to pass between them, if that passing permitted his return to slumber.) Then, detaining the pill in his mouth, he swallowed half a glass of water, and again was recumbent.
"G'-night, Mamma."
"Good-night, dearie. Sleep well."
"Yes'm."
After her departure Penrod drowsily enjoyed the sugar coating of the pill; but this was indeed a brief pleasure. A bitterness that was like a pang suddenly made itself known to his sense of taste, and he realized that he had dallied too confidingly with the product of a manufacturing chemist who should have been indicted for criminal economy. The medicinal portion of the little pill struck the wall with a faint tap, then dropped noiselessly to the floor, and, after a time, Penrod slept.
Some hours later he began to dream; he dreamed that his feet and legs were becoming uncomfortable as a result of Sam Williams's activities with a red-hot poker.
"You QUIT that!" he said aloud, and awoke indignantly. Again a dark, wrappered figure hovered over the bed.
"It's only a hot-water bag, dear," Mrs. Schofield said, still labouring under the covers with an extended arm. "You mustn't hunch yourself up that way, Penrod. Put your feet down on it."
And, as he continued to hunch himself, she moved the bag in the direction of his withdrawal.
"Ow, murder!" he exclaimed convulsively. "What you tryin' to do?
Scald me to death?"
"Penrod--"
"My goodness, Mamma," he wailed; "can't you let me sleep a MINUTE?"
"It's very bad for you to let your feet get cold, dear."
"They WEREN'T cold. I don't want any ole hot-wat--"
"Penrod," she said firmly, "you must put your feet against the bag. It isn't too hot."
"Oh, isn't it?" he retorted. "I don't stpose you'd care if I burned my feet right off! Mamma, won't you please, pul-LEEZE let me get some sleep?"
"Not till you--"
She was interrupted by a groan that seemed to come from an abyss.
"All right, I'll do it! Let 'em burn, then!" Thus spake the desperate Penrod; and Mrs. Schofield was able to ascertain that one heel had been placed in light contact with the bag.
"No; both feet, Penrod."
With a tragic shiver he obeyed.
"THAT'S right, dear! Now, keep them that way. It's good for you.
Good-night."
"G'-night!"
The door closed softly behind her, and the body of Penrod, from the hips upward, rose invisibly in the complete darkness of the bedchamber. A moment later the hot-water bag reached the floor in as noiseless a manner as that previously adopted by the remains of the little pill, and Penrod once more bespread his soul with poppies. This time he slept until the breakfast-bell rang.
He was late to school, and at once found himself in difficulties.
Government demanded an explanation of the tardiness; but Penrod made no reply of any kind. Taciturnity is seldom more strikingly out of place than under such circumstances, and the penalties imposed took account not only of Penrod's tardiness but of his supposititious defiance of authority in declining to speak. The truth was that Penrod did not know why he was tardy, and, with mind still lethargic, found it impossible to think of an excuse his continuing silence being due merely to the persistence of his efforts to invent one. Thus were his meek searchings misinterpreted, and the unloved hours of improvement in science and the arts made odious.
"They'll SEE!" he whispered sorely to himself, as he bent low over his desk, a little later. Some day he would "show 'em". The picture in his mind was of a vast, vague assembly of people headed by Miss Spence and the superior pupils who were never tardy, and these multitudes, representing persecution and government in general, were all cringing before a Penrod Schofield who rode a grim black horse up and down their miserable ranks, and gave curt orders.
"Make 'em step back there!" he commanded his myrmidons savagely.
"Fix it so's your horses'll step on their feet if they don't do what I say!" Then, from his shining saddle, he watched the throngs slinking away. "I guess they know who I am NOW!"
