and before a crowded audience, in
which there was a fair sprinkling of strangers, she regretted her rash
suggestion. For when the pupils had gone through certain calisthenic
exercises--admirably taught and arranged by him--and "spoken their
pieces," he arose, and, fixing his eyes on her, began Othello's defense
before the Duke and Council. Here, as on the previous occasion, she felt
herself personally alluded to in his account of his wooing.
Desdemona, for some occult reason, vicariously appeared for her in the
unwarrantable picture of his passion, and to this was added the absurd
consciousness which she could not put aside that the audience, following
with enthusiasm his really strong declamation, was also following his
suggestion and adopting it. Yet she was also conscious, and, as she
thought, as inconsistently, of being pleased and even proud of his
success. At the conclusion the applause was general, and a voice added
with husky admiration and familiarity:--

"Brayvo, Johnny Walker!"

Twing's face became suddenly white as a Pierrot mask. There was a dead
silence, in which the voice continued, "Give us 'Sugar in the Gourd,'
Johnny."

A few hisses, and cries of "Hush!" "Put him out!" followed. Mrs. Martin
raised her eyes quickly to where her assistant had stood bowing his
thanks a moment before. He was gone!

More concerned than she cared to confess, vaguely fearful that she was
in some way connected with his abrupt withdrawal, and perhaps a little
remorseful that she had allowed her personal feelings to interfere with
her frank recognition of his triumph, she turned back to the schoolroom,
after the little performers and their audience had departed, in the hope
that he might return. It was getting late, the nearly level rays of the
sun were lying on the empty benches at the lower end of the room, but
the desk where she sat with its lid raised was in deep shadow.
Suddenly she heard his voice in a rear hall, but it was accompanied by
another's,--the same voice which had interrupted the applause. Before
she could either withdraw, or make herself known, the two men had
entered the room, and were passing slowly through it. She understood at
once that Twing had slipped out into a janitor's room in the rear,
where he had evidently forced an interview and explanation from his
interrupter, and now had been waiting for the audience to disperse
before emerging by the front door. They had evidently overlooked her in
the s