He rose and bowed, and resumed his seat and his book.

The room was quite small, and we were very near each other. How I could
possibly have missed seeing him as I entered, now surprised me. I longed
to go away, but did not dare do anything that would seem rude. He
appeared very much engrossed with his book, but I, for my part, could
not read a word, and was only thinking how I could get away. Possibly he
guessed at my embarrassment, for after about ten minutes he arose, and
coming up to the table by which I sat, he took up a card, and placed it
in his book for a mark, and shut it up, then made some remark to me
about the day.

The color was coming and going in my face.

He must have felt sorry or curious, for he did not go directly away, and
continued to talk of things that did not require me to answer him.

I do not know what it was about his voice that was so different from the
ordinary voices of people. There was a quality in it that I had never
heard in any other. But perhaps it was in the ear that listened, as well
as the voice that spoke. And apart from the tones, the words I never
could forget. The most trivial things that he ever said to me, I can
remember to this day.

I believe that this was not of my imagination, but that others felt it
in some degree as I did. It was this that made him such an invaluable
teacher; he impressed upon those flesh-and-blood boys, in that one
summer, more than they would have learned in whole years from ordinary
persons. It was not very strange, then, that I was smitten with the