The Flight of Pony Baker | Page 6

called
the large town twenty miles away from the Boy's Town, he might get
Pony a present or he might not, but he would not promise, because
once when he promised, he forgot it, and then Pony's mother scolded
him.
There were some boys' fathers in the Boy's Town who were good
fathers, and let their children do whatever they pleased, and Pony could
not help feeling rather ashamed before these boys. If one of that sort of
fellows' fathers passed a crowd of boys, they would not take any notice
of their boys; but if Pony's father came along, he would very likely say,

"Well, Pony!" or something like that, and then all the fellows would
hollo, "Well, Pony! Well, Pony!" and make fun of his father, when he
got past, and walk like him, or something, so that Pony would be so
mad he would hardly know what to do. He hated to ask his father not to
speak to him, or look at him, when he was with the fellows, but it
seemed to him as if his father ought to know better without asking.
There were a great many things like that which no good father would
have done, but the thing that made Pony lose all patience, and begin
getting ready to run off right away, was the way his father behaved
when Pony got mad at the teacher one day, and brought his books home,
and said he was not going back to that school any more. The reason
was because the teacher had put Pony back from third reader to the
second and made him go into a class of little fellows not more than
seven years old. It happened one morning, after a day when Pony had
read very badly in the afternoon, and though he had explained that he
had read badly because the weather was so hot, the teacher said he
might try it in the second reader till the weather changed, at any rate;
and the whole school laughed. The worst of it was that Pony was really
a very good reader, and could speak almost the best of any of the boys;
but that afternoon he was lazy, and would not pay attention.
At recess, after the teacher had put him back, all the fellows came
round and asked him what he was going to do now; and he just shut his
teeth and told them they would see; and at noon they did see. As soon
as school was dismissed, or even before, Pony put all his books
together, and his slate, and tied them with his slate-pencil string, and
twitched his hat down off the peg, and strutted proudly out of the room,
so that not only the boys but the teacher, too, could see that he was
leaving school. The teacher looked on and pretended to smile, but Pony
did not smile; he kept his teeth shut, and walked stiffly through the
door, and straight home, without speaking to any one. That was the
way to do when you left school in the Boy's Town, for then the boys
would know you were in earnest; and none of them would try to speak
to you, either; they would respect you too much.
Pony's mother knew that he had left school as soon as she saw him

bringing home his books, but she only looked sorry and did not say
anything. She must have told his father about it when he came to dinner,
though, for as soon as they sat down at the table his father began to ask
what the trouble was. Pony answered very haughtily, and said that old
Archer had put him back into the second reader, and he was not going
to stand it, and he had left school.
"Then," said his father, "you expect to stay in the second reader the rest
of your life?"
This was something that Pony had never thought of before; but he said
he did not care, and he was not going to have old Archer put him back,
anyway, and he began to cry.
It was then that his mother showed herself a good mother, if ever she
was one, and said she thought it was a shame to put Pony back and
mortify him before the other boys, and she knew that it must just have
happened that he did not read very well that afternoon because he was
sick, or something, for usually he read perfectly.
His father said, "My dear girl, my dear girl!" and his mother hushed up
and did not say anything more; but Pony could see what she thought,
and he accused old Archer of always putting on him and always trying
to mortify him.
"That's all very well," said