Even Harry, who
held throughout the note on which his voice first fastened, never failed to
sing; and, though it added little to the harmony, it spoke volumes for the
spirit of the school and the devotion to the chorister.
But if Gertrude was doing much for the boys, they were doing much for
Gertrude; and in obeying her orders to rest, exercise, and grow strong, she
could not have had better helpers. From the time when the first pale
blossoms of the bloodroot showed beside the snow, through the seasons of
violets and wild strawberries and goldenrod, to the time when the frost had
spread the ground with the split shucks of the hickory-nuts, the spoil of
all the woodland was brought to her.
Their class-meetings became long tramps, during which Gertrude told them
interesting things about insects, birds, and flowers, and they told as much
that was strange to her. Every one of them had become a conspirator in the
plot to keep her out of doors, away from her books; hardly a day passed
that she did not go somewhere with one or more of them. And as the healthy
color began to show beneath the tan, as strength came back, and every pulse
beat brought the returning joy of life, she often felt that all her work
for class number four had been repaid a hundredfold.
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