A Pupil of Chestnut Ridge Page #5

"A Pupil of Chestnut Ridge" is a novella by Bret Harte, set against the backdrop of the American West during the Gold Rush era. The story follows a young, aspiring student at a remote school in a rugged mountain town, where he and his classmates navigate the challenges of frontier life, friendships, and personal growth. Harte's characteristic wit and keen observation of human nature shine through as he explores themes of youth, ambition, and the impact of environment on character. Through his vivid storytelling, Harte captures both the harsh realities and the endearing moments of life in a small community, revealing the resilience and dreams of those striving for a better future.

• Short story

								

will not let me read it at the ranch. They would take it from me. And
now YOU!"

"You may read it when and where you like, except when you should be
studying your lessons," returned the master quietly. "You may keep it
here in your desk and peruse it at recess. Come to me for it then. You
are not fit to read it now."

The girl looked up with astounded eyes, which in the capriciousness of
her passionate nature the next moment filled with tears. Then dropping
on her knees she caught the master's bitten hand and covered it with
tears and kisses. But he quietly disengaged it and lifted her to her
seat. There was a sniffling sound among the benches, which, however,
quickly subsided as he glanced around the room, and the incident ended.

Regularly thereafter she took her prayer book back at recess and
disappeared with the children, finding, as he afterwards learned, a seat
under a secluded buckeye tree, where she was not disturbed by them until
her orisons were concluded. The children must have remained loyal to
some command of hers, for the incident and this custom were never told
out of school, and the master did not consider it his duty to inform Mr.
or Mrs. Hoover. If the child could recognize some check--even if it were
deemed by some a superstitious one--over her capricious and precocious
nature, why should he interfere?

One day at recess he presently became conscious of the ceasing of those
small voices in the woods around the schoolhouse, which were always
as familiar and pleasant to him in his seclusion as the song of their
playfellows--the birds themselves. The continued silence at last
awakened his concern and curiosity. He had seldom intruded upon or
participated in their games or amusements, remembering when a boy
himself the heavy incompatibility of the best intentioned adult intruder
to even the most hypocritically polite child at such a moment. A sense
of duty, however, impelled him to step beyond the schoolhouse, where to
his astonishment he found the adjacent woods empty and soundless. He was
relieved, however, after penetrating its recesses, to hear the distant
sound of small applause and the unmistakable choking gasps of Johnny
Stidger's pocket accordion. Following the sound he came at last upon a
little hollow among the sycamores, where the children were disposed in
a ring, in the centre of which, with a handkerchief in each hand, Concha
the melancholy!--Concha the devout!--was dancing that most extravagant
feat of the fandango--the audacious sembicuaca!

Yet, in spite of her rude and uncertain accompaniment, she was dancing
it with a grace, precision, and lightness that was wonderful; in spite
of its doubtful poses and seductive languors she was dancing it with the
artless gayety and innocence--perhaps from the suggestion of her tiny
figure--of a mere child among an audience of children. Dancing it alone
she assumed the parts of the man and woman; advancing, retreating,
coquetting, rejecting, coyly bewitching, and at last yielding as lightly
and as immaterially as the flickering shadows that fell upon them from
the waving trees overhead. The master was fascinated yet troubled.
What if there had been older spectators? Would the parents take the
performance as innocently as the performer and her little audience? He
thought it necessary later to suggest this delicately to the child. Her
temper rose, her eyes flashed.

"Ah, the slipper, she is forbidden. The prayer book--she must not. The
dance, it is not good. Truly, there is nothing."

For several days she sulked. One morning she did not come to school,
nor the next. At the close of the third day the master called at the
Hoovers' ranch.

Mrs. Hoover met him embarrassedly in the hall. "I was sayin' to Hiram
he ought to tell ye, but he didn't like to till it was certain. Concha's
gone."

"Gone?" echoed the master.

"Yes. Run off with Pedro. Married to him yesterday by the Popish priest
at the mission."

"Married! That child?"

"She wasn't no child, Mr. Brooks. We were deceived. My brother was
a fool, and men don't understand these things. She was a grown
woman--accordin' to these folks' ways and ages--when she kem here. And
that's what bothered me."

There was a week's excitement at Chestnut Ridge, but it pleased the
master to know that while the children grieved for the loss of Concha
they never seemed to understand why she had gone.
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