The Smuggled Atom Bomb

Eleanor’s eyes were shadowy. She sighed. “Of course, it’s all right, Duff. It’s just too bad, somehow that you have to tutor my—”

He pushed the tip of her nose with his forefinger fraternally, fondly. “Tutor your suitor? Glad to. Three bucks a week comes in right handy.”

She looked away. “And Scotty can sure afford it. Goodness, he’s rich!”

“Pretty nice guy,” Duff nodded. “The dough doesn’t seem to dizzy him any. And he’s a bright lad, besides. It’s only that he and trig aren’t soul mates. Still he’s coming along. I taught him what trig was for. That interested him. Once Scotty got onto the fact that there’s a practical angle, he did real well.”

Eleanor smiled. “He’s a practical sort of boy, Duff, in spite of the gay-blade exterior.”

“Yeah.” Duff felt suddenly very much outside Eleanor — her life, her friends and the places where her life would undoubtedly lead her. “Yeah. He’s nice.”

That was when she kissed him. She kissed him hurriedly, almost in confusion, certainly impulsively, and she missed his cheek, getting his chin instead. But when she did it her eyes were shiny. And she said, “Duff, you’re a love!”

Then she ran out to the barn and drove away. Duff heard Scotty’s car hoot as they passed each other; the pink convertible came crackling up the drive. But during that time Duff stood where he was, beside the front door, even when he heard Scotty Smythe’s feet on the worn porch boards. She kissed me, Duff thought. And he thought, She kissed me because she feels sorry for me. It was the kind of idea that made a man want to kick walls down, even in sandals, such as he had on. Nobody wants to be felt sorry for by a girl. By anyone.

But when Scotty reached the door, Duff had recovered. His smile was hospitable; he took in Scotty’s new, herringbone-Angora sports jacket, and said, “Hello, Pythagoras.”

Scotty replied in the gravest tone, “Good evening, Euclid.”

After Scotty had paid gay respects to Mrs. Yates and briefly teased the younger children, who were studying, they went up to Duff’s room and settled down to work.

Duff possessed the second most important faculty of a true teacher, as well as the first — which is to present new knowledge lucidly. The second is the ability to perceive the mental gaps and blocks in a student — the points at which, for individual reasons, he fails to grasp the subject. Often it is not stupidity, but a particular shape of a special personality or a bad background in previous teaching which causes a student to appear unintelligent. In Scotty’s case it was both; no previous teacher had ever given him the feel, the sense and excitement of mathematics. Under Duff’s tutelage, Scotty’s attitude changed; he learned to appreciate the reasons behind die symbols.

Their hour went quickly and was extended to a second hour. Finally, however, Scotty broke up the session, “Getting late, pal. And we’re already a week ahead of my class.

Wouldn’t my old man be startled if I got good marks in trig!”

“You will.”

“Darned if I don’t believe you’re right!” Scotty went down the stairs, looked into Mrs. Yates’ room to say good night, and opened the front door. “Tell Eleanor I couldn’t wait for her. Omega meeting in the a.m. Tell her”—his eyes lighted up—“that any time she wants to shop for jewelry suits me.”

Two red taillights swept down the drive. Duff stayed on the porch. An old moon had risen; it threw shadows across the silver nebula of lawn. An automatic smile on Duff’s long, earnest face slowly faded. He imagined the excitement with which Eleanor might “shop” with Scotty, or some other boy, for a diamond ring. He would have been less than human if he had not also reflected that any diamond he could buy would be almost invisible. Yet no purposeful thought of himself and Eleanor and an engagement ring entered his head.

He sighed into the moonglow and noticed the glint of it on the lily pool he’d built the year before — partly in pursuance of a hobby and partly to embellish the Yates’ lawn, which, at the time of his arrival, had been unkempt.

Years before, in Indiana, Duff had become interested in aquariums. He’d built several of wood and window glass, stocked them from local brooks, and sold a few. In Florida he had soon observed that pools could be dug in the underlying limestone; they needed only a little cement to waterproof them, and frost never heaved the ground. He had also found that tropical fish could be raised outdoors, that some species were native, and that colored water lilies of many varieties could be obtained at no cost when the university was separating its plants. So he had built a pool some twenty feet long and fifteen feet wide, trapped mollies in a nearby canal and bought a pair of wagtails.

Having noticed, some days before, that a new crop of mollies was due — and not feeling in a mood to sleep — Duff now went back to the house, procured a flashlight and walked down to the pond.