encounter. He was reviewing some primary school work in order to pass a
teacher's examination that would be held in Jonesboro, the county seat,
in about three weeks.

To the uninitiated it may seem strange to behold a Harvard graduate
stuck down day after day poring over a pile of dog-eared school-books--
third arithmetics, primary grammars, beginners' histories of Tennessee,
of the United States, of England; physiology, hygiene. It may seem
queer. But when it comes to standing a Wayne County teacher's
examination, the specific answers to the specific questions on a dozen
old examination slips are worth all the degrees Harvard ever did confer.

So, in his newspapered study, Peter Siner looked up long lists of
questions, and attempted to memorize the answers. But the series of
missteps he had made since returning to Hooker's Bend besieged his brain
and drew his thoughts from his catechism. It seemed strange that in so
short a time he should have wandered so far from the course he had set
for himself. His career in Niggertown formed a record of slight
mistakes, but they were not to be undone, and their combined force had
swung him a long way from the course he had plotted for himself. There
was no way to explain. Hooker's Bend would judge him by the sheer
surface of his works. What he had meant to do, his dreams and altruisms,
they would never surmise. That was the irony of the thing.

Then he thought of Cissie Dildine who did understand him. This thought
might have been Cissie's cue to enter the stage of Peter's mind. Her
oval, creamy face floated between Peter's eyes and the dog-eared primer.
He thought of Cissie wistfully, and of her lonely fight for good
English, good manners, and good taste. There was a pathos about Cissie.