Chapter 10

His father opened the door for him when he reached home, —his father in his shirt sleeves, encircled with an odor of tobacco. With an eye keener than usual, the boy noted particularly, as if seen for the first time, things to which he had been accustomed all his life—the well-worn oil-cloth on the hall, the kerosene lamp flaring dismally in its bracket. How different it all was from the refinement of Miss Theodora’s home, —for although Miss Theodora’s carpets were worn and even threadbare, and, except in the hall, she was as sparing of gas as Mr. Bruce himself, the odor of cooking never escaped from Diantha’s domain. The indefinable between comfort and discomfort made the Bruce’s economy very unlike that practised by Miss Theodora.

“You are late,” said Mrs. Bruce querulously as Ben entered the dining-room.

“Am I? I met Miss Theodora and walked home with them.”

“Yes, and went into the house with them, I dare say!” interrupted Mr. Bruce.

“Why not?” asked Ben.

“You always seem taken up with those people. I don’t see how you can be, all so patronizing as they are.”

“Patronizing!” repeated Ben to himself. “Miss Theodora patronizing!” How far from the truth this seemed!

“You do not mean Miss Theodora?”

“Why not Miss Theodora? She walks along the street, never looking to the right or left, as if she were quite too good to speak to ordinary people.”

“But she is terribly near-sighted. She does not see people unless they are right in front of her.”

“I guess she could see well enough if she tried. I’ve noticed her cross the street almost on a run to speak to some little black boy. She’s ready enough to take up with people like that; and she’s able to see you. Ben, —but—”

Ben flushed a little. He did not like being put on a level with Miss Theodora’s black proteges. Nor was this all. Mr. Bruce, taking up his wife’s words, continued:

“Yes, it’s just as your mother says; all those people think themselves a great way above the rest of us that are just as good as they are. I don’t blame Miss Theodora so much, for her father really was a great man. But those Digbys! Who are they? Why, Mrs. Stuart Digby’s grandfather, they say, was a tailor in New York when my grandfather was one of General Washington’s staff officers. We didn’t have to buy that sword in our parlor second-hand in a Cornhill shop, where some people get their family relics.”