Tom replied, in that sneering, contemptuous tone which Harold knew so
well, and which always made his blood boil and his fingers tingle with a
desire to knock the speaker down:
'Oh, that's Hal Hastings, a poor boy, who does chores for us and the St.
Claires. His grandmother used to work at the park house, and so uncle
Arthur pays for his schooling, and Hal allows it, which I think right
small in him. I wouldn't be a charity student, anyway, if I never knew
anything. Besides that, what's the use of education to chaps like him.
Better stay as he was born. I don't believe in educating the masses, do
you?'
Of himself Tom could never have thought of all this, but he had heard it
from his mother, who frequently used the expression 'not to elevate the
masses,' forgetting that she was once herself a part of the mass which
she would now keep down.
Just what Fred said in reply Harold did not hear. There was a ringing in
his ears, and he felt as if every drop of blood in his body was rushing
to his head as he sat down, dizzy and bewildered, and smarting cruelly
under the wound he had received this time. He had more than once been
taunted with his poverty and dependence upon Mr. Tracy, but the taunts
had never hurt him so before, and he could have cried out in his pain as
he thought of Tom's words, and knew that in himself there was the making
of a far nobler manhood than Tom Tracy would ever know.
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