He took me by the shoulder one evening in the
dusk, and walked me round and round the big clump of rhododendrons
that stood in the drive in front of the school. I did not understand
half he said, but to my great astonishment I heard him confessing
that he had always been unhappy at school, although at the end he
was captain in lessons, in games, in everything. I was, of course,
highly flattered that this giant should speak to me as an equal, and
admit me to his confidences. But I was even more delighted with the
encouraging light he threw on school life. "You're only here for a
little spell, you know; you'll be surprised how short it is. And
don't be miserable just because you're different. I'm different; it's
a jolly good thing to be different." I was not used, to people who
took this wide view of circumstance, and his voice in the shadows
sounded like some one speaking in a story-book. Yet although his
monologue gave me an entirely new conception of life, no more of it
lingers in my mind, save his last reflective criticism. "All the
same, I don't see why you should always have dirty nails." He never
confided in me again, and I would have died rather than have reminded
him of his kindly indiscretion; but when he passed me in the
playground he seemed to look at me with a kind of reticent interest,
and it occurred to me that after all my queerness might not be such a
bad thing, might even be something to be proud of.
The value of this discovery to me can hardly be exaggerated.
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