Chapter 10: School
Roy had hesitated too long: the other pupils were already seated when he entered. Three dozen pairs of eyes riveted onto him, eager to see who had come late.
The room was no different from any one of a hundred rural schools dotting the eastern frontiers, though Roy had no real basis for comparison. There were four rows of six desks, each of which could accommodate two students. The back of each bench formed the desk of the row behind it, and so the front row had no table, and the littlest pupils were obliged to balance their slates and books on their laps. The wall facing the class was painted black, and a wooden ledge was nailed to it to hold the chalk and erasers. A wood stove occupied the corner farthest from the entrance, and next to it was the broad table that served as the teacher's desk.
The woman in the plain dress was seated at the table, and she turned to look at Roy. "Good morning," she said. "You're new."
Roy nodded, watching the crowd of children out of the corner of his eye. The boys sat in the two rows nearest the door, and the girls in the other two. There were three pupils, a girl and two boys, in the front row. They were not much older than Riza. The biggest boys were eleven or twelve years old. The girls at the very back of the room looked almost the same age as the lady who had spoken to him.
"What's your name?" the woman asked.
"Roy," he breathed shyly.
"Well, come here so I can enter you in the register." She opened a red book, and uncapped a fountain pen.
Roy stepped nearer the desk, but was careful not to get too close. He ran over Mrs. Hawkeye's hurried instructions again. "Where's the teacher?" he asked timidly.
Somebody giggled, and the lady gave him a strange look. "I'm the teacher," she said, almost condescendingly.
That wasn't right: Mrs. Hawkeye had said "he" and "him" when talking about the teacher. "I—I thought you were a man," Roy protested softly.
Snickers rippled through the room, and Roy flushed a little. He had said something stupid, but he didn't know what.
"No," the teacher said. "Mr. Martins left last term. I'm Miss Strueby. Now, what's your last name?"
"Mustang," Roy whispered.
"And how old are you?"
"Seven."
She made a note of it in the book before her. "What's your father's name?"
Roy had no answer: it wasn't a question for which Mrs. Hawkeye had prepared him. His lips quivered a little, and he glanced over his shoulder, wondering if he could make it to the door before she could grab him.
"Don't you have a father?" the teacher asked. One of the bigger boys snorted in amusement, but Roy shook his head gratefully.
One of the girls in the back raised her hand.
"Yes?" Miss Strueby said.
"I'll bet he's the boy staying with Hawkeye-sensei," the girl told her.
The teacher looked at Roy. "Is that true?"
He nodded.
"Fine. What class are you in?"
Roy didn't know the answer to this, either. He had never been to school, and he didn't understand how the pupils were organized. He looked at the girl who had raised her hand before, but either she had no answer, or she wasn't willing to share it. "I... I don't know," he said helplessly.
To his surprise, none of the other pupils seemed to find this comment stupid or funny. The teacher tilted her head to look at the book in his arms.
"All right," she said. "Put your dinner pail on the shelf at the back, and sit next to Dexter in the second row. Once I have a chance to hear you recite, you can always move up if you're ready."
Roy didn't know what she meant by that, but there was only one vacant place in the second row. He followed the teacher's instructions and sat down next to the sturdy blond boy, whom he presumed was Dexter. The seat was too high for him, and his feet dangled three inches over the floor, weighed down by the shoes.
The teacher went to the blackboard and started to write out lesson assignments for the day. "Mary, Lawrence and Tom, I want you to write out your big and small letter 'T's for me, and each of you should think of three words that starts with the t-t-t-'T' sound. First Reader, first class, please read page 25, 'There Was A Little Turtle'. First Reader, second class, I need you to read page 62 through 65 and answer the questions on page 66 on your slates. Second Reader, please start on grammar lesson 8. Third and Fourth Reader, continue with the arithmetic problems you were working on yesterday. Girls—" She smiled almost conspiratorially at the three eldest pupils. "—come up to the front, and I'll hear your history lessons."
Two of the big girls giggled a little, and chorused, "Yes, Miss Strueby."
All around him, the other pupils were opening books and licking slate pencils, but Roy didn't know what to do. He looked around desperately, but no one seemed to notice his confusion. The teacher's instructions were meaningless, except for the part about words with a t-t-t-'T' sound ('turnip', 'trouble' and 'train', he thought to himself).
"Psst! Page 25," hissed the boy sitting next to him. He pointed at his own reader, which was open to a page with a line drawing of a turtle sitting on a round stone.
Roy looked at it, and then at his own book. He opened it carefully, and turned to the first page, but it was covered in writing. He turned the page again, and then again, but there were no pictures. He felt a thrill of panic. He had the wrong book! He wouldn't be able to do what the teacher asked: he didn't have the book with the pictures in it.
Dexter was looking at him with annoyed disbelief on his face. "It's upside-down, dummy," he said, taking the tome from Roy's hands and turning it around. He grabbed a fistful of pages, and turned to the beginning of the book.
Roy almost cried with relief: there were pictures in this part of it. He quickly flipped through until he found the page with the turtle on it. "Thank you," he whispered.
From the front of the room, Miss Strueby cleared her throat. "Roy, you can get to know your fellow pupils at recess," she said reproachfully. "We don't talk during lessons."
A hot flush visited Roy's cheeks, and he bowed his head over the book. He studied the turtle with care. It was sitting on the rock, stretching its neck towards a little bug that was flying in loops through the air. There was a pond lapping against the stone, and a small fish was swimming under the water. It was a nice picture, and Roy decided that he had to remember to show it to Riza when he got back to the house.
There were words on the page, but the black glyphs were meaningless to Roy, so he looked at the other page instead. It, too, had words, and they were surrounded by a drawing of wildflowers with long, skinny stalks. A butterfly was perched on one of the flowers.
Time passed. At the front of the room, the big girls were taking it in turns to recite long passages about Fuhrers and battles and other things that Roy didn't really understand. Presently they finished, and moved on to what Miss Strueby called "spelling". This meant that she would say a very long, hard word that Roy had never heard before, and then the girls would take turns saying things like "ay-en-ay-see-aech-are-oh-en-eye-ess-tee-eye-see". Then the big girls sat down, and the teacher called up the littlest pupils, who showed her their slates and told her their t-t-t-'T' words ('tall', 'trunk', 'two', 'tie', 'turtle', 'tap', 'troll', 'turnip' and 'top').
The teacher then explained about the letter "U", and how little "u" and big "U" looked the same, except that little "u" was shorter. She made the "uh-uh-uh" sound, like "under" and "umbrella", and the "yoo-yoo-yoo" sound like "unicorn". After that, she sat beside each of the youngest pupils in turn, helping them draw the letter "U" on their slates.
Curious, Roy balanced the reader against his chest, and picked up the skinny white slate pencil. He didn't know how to hold it, so he closed his fist around it. The sharpened tip made a wobbly white line on the slate. He frowned. That was no good: he had no control at all. He closed the book, and drew the slate closer. Using his left hand, he adjusted the slate pencil so that his right index finger was crooked around it the way Riza had taught him to hold a spoon. That was better. He tried again. This time, the line he drew was almost straight.
He studied the prototype on the blackboard. Two straight lines, up and down next to each other, and a curvy piece joining them on the bottom. He scrutinized his work. It was very lopsided, and it bore no more than a passing resemblance to the letter the teacher had written. He tried again, this time using a single line that dipped down, curved across, and then ascended. It was better, but still not very good. A third attempt produced more acceptable results. The fourth was almost perfect.
"If you're bored, Roy, I can always hear the class's lesson now," said Miss Strueby. Roy looked up to see her standing over him, frowning down at his slate. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. The teacher returned to the front of the classroom. "First Reader, first class," she said.
The other children in the second row groaned, and Dexter dug his elbow into Roy's side. "Thanks a lot, dummy," he growled under his breath.
There were seven pupils, Roy included, who moved to the front of the room. Miss Strueby sat down and regarded them with raised eyebrows. "Now, Roy, since you were so tired of studying the lesson, perhaps you would like to go first."
"G-go where?" Roy stammered. The other children laughed.
"Order, please," said the teacher. "Recite the lesson, please, Roy," she clarified. "'There was a little turtle...' Go on."
"T-there was a little turtle?" Roy repeated. There was a cavernous silence.
"By?" prompted Miss Strueby.
Roy shook his head. He didn't know what she meant at all!
"Don't be shy," she said, almost kindly. "Try again, from the beginning."
"'There was a little turtle.'" It was hardly more than a whisper now. Roy knew that the teacher wanted him to say something else, but he had no idea where to begin.
The teacher waited expectantly. Someone tittered. Finally, Miss Strueby sighed. "You didn't learn the lesson, did you, Roy?" she asked.
He shook his head helplessly. He didn't even know what the lesson was supposed to be.
"I'm sorry to do this on your first day," said the teacher; "but I have no choice but to punish you. Go and stand in the corner."
She pointed to the corner opposite the wood stove. Roy obeyed her meekly.
"Turn against the wall," the teacher instructed. "Now, Elsa, please recite the lesson."
"'There was a little turtle,'" said one of the girls. "By Vachel Lindsay. 'There was a little turtle. He lived in a box. He swam in a puddle. He climbed on the rocks. He snapped at a moekisto, he snapped at a flea, he snapped—'"
"Just a moment, Elsa," said the teacher. Roy heard her rise and move to the blackboard. The chalk squeaked against it. "What is this word?"
"Moekisto?" the girl tried.
"No, don't guess," Miss Strueby said. "Can anybody tell me what this word is?" No one answered. "Well, let's sound it out together."
"Mmm," said the First Reader class. "MMosss..."
"Remember, 'Q-U' makes a sound like a 'K'," said Miss Strueby.
"Mosssskeet-t-t-toe!" the children said.
"Mosquito, that's right," said the teacher. "Em-oh-ess-cue-yoo-eye-tee-oh spells 'mosquito'. Elsa?"
"Mosquito," the girl repeated. "Em-oh-ess-cue-yoo-eye-tee-oh."
"Very good. Now, again from the first 'he snapped'."
As the girl went on, Roy realized what she was saying. It was a rhyme, like the ones that Riza liked to make. He was confused. The lesson was a rhyme? Had the teacher wanted them to make up a little song about the picture of the turtle?
But no, the next girl recited the same rhyme, and this time the teacher did not interrupt. The next pupil was a boy, and he skipped the part about living in a box. He had to repeat the whole thing over from the beginning. Then came Dexter, who trailed off halfway through and had to be prompted. The next girl started giggling in the middle of "but he didn't catch me!" The last one to recite, also a girl, did so perfectly. Then the teacher sent them back to their seats.
Roy remained in the corner, looking at the grain of the wall and fighting tears of frustration. He knew the rhyme now, having heard it six times. He just didn't understand how the other children had learned it while sitting so quietly. It had something to do with the writing on the page, he was sure. People read the writing, and it told them words to say, like when Riza's grandfather read stories. He wasn't sure, though, exactly what "reading" meant, or how he could do it.
His legs were very tired, and he was starting to feel a little ill when at last Miss Strueby told the students that they were dismissed for something called recess. He could hear the others rising from their seats and migrating towards the exit, and he turned around, wondering if that meant that the day was over and he could go back to the Hawkeye house.
"Roy, come here, please," the teacher said soberly. Roy approached her desk. "I understand it isn't always easy to focus and work hard," she told him; "but you must pay attention and study your lessons. Do you understand?"
"No," Roy confessed. He didn't understand at all. If "lessons" meant "reading", then he couldn't do it. It was a magical thing that adults seemed to do as easily as speaking or eating, but he had no idea where to begin. Even Riza, he thought defensively, couldn't read.
The teacher frowned. "Very well," she said. "Then you can go back to the corner and stand there until you're ready to focus on your work instead of doodling on your slate."
Roy wanted to protest, but he did not dare. He moved back into the corner, and turned his face into it. He leaned one shoulder against the wall, trying to make it easier to stay on his feet.
The big girls gathered around the teacher's desk, and he could hear them talking about an Examination, and about something called algebra. There was a lot of giggling, too, and even Miss Strueby laughed. Roy wondered how the big girls knew how to make the teacher happy. He wanted to, but he couldn't.
Presently, the teacher went outside to ring the bell, and the students came back in. The recitations resumed, and then the teacher gave more assignments and started to write out things that she called "arithmetic problems" on the blackboard for the Second Reader class. Roy grew progressively more weary, and his head began to feel lighter and lighter. He was feeling quite ill when the teacher finally announced that it was time for dinner. The students again got up, and this time there was the clattering of dinner pails as they gathered their meals on their way out the door. Roy didn't move. He didn't want the teacher to call him to her desk and ask him more impossible questions.
"Roy, you may sit at your desk and eat your dinner," Miss Strueby said. "I trust that you will be more attentive this afternoon."
Roy gratefully stepped away from the wall and made his way shakily to the back shelf, where Mrs. Hawkeye's tin pail was the only one still waiting to be claimed. He carried it carefully with both hands, and sat down on the hard wooden seat with a tiny sigh of relief. He was very dizzy, had been so afraid that he would fall over.
There was a piece of bread and a hunk of cheese to eat, a little jar of milk to drink, and a lime cut into slices and wrapped in waxed paper. Roy took the lime first. He had to eat one every day, because Doctor Bella had said so. Out of curiosity, Riza had one day taken a bite, spitting it out almost at once and complaining that it was too sour, but Roy didn't care about that. He liked the limes, and even woke up sometimes, craving them in the middle of the night. He took one of the segments and sucked on it, swallowing all of the tart juice before he started nibbling at the pulp.
"Hey, look!" one of the big girls said, pointing at him. Roy froze, wondering if he was doing something wrong.
"Lucky," said another. She turned back to her friends. "They're really expensive, you know. You have to get them all the way from South City: they don't even grow in Central!"
"Awfully spoiled for a runaway, isn't he?" whispered the third. "I heard he killed his parents."
"Oh, Mandy, what an awful thing to say!" the second girl squealed.
"I heard they had to get another kid," the first one murmured. "'Cause Mrs. Hawkeye's going crazy. After their boy died, she just went right out of her mind! So Hawkeye-sensei bought a boy from an eastern trader."
"Why'd they get such a skinny one?" asked Mandy. "Wouldn't they want another fat boy?"
"That's not nice to say, either," the second girl reproached. "You know he was sick."
"Right, so sick that he was fat like a mother bear. No wonder he fell: I'll be the branches couldn't hold his weight," Mandy snickered.
Roy wasn't sure who they were talking about, but he knew it wasn't him. He wasn't healthy, but he definitely wasn't fat like a bear. He was a skinny, scrawny runt: Mrs. Hawkeye often said so.
The food made him feel better, and when the teacher rang the bell to call the pupils back inside, he was able to return his dinner pail to the shelf without any fear of stumbling. Again, the students were given lessons to work on, but the teacher didn't give one to the class that Roy was in. Instead, they worked on "arithmetic", doing things called "plus" and "minus". "Plus" meant that two numbers made a bigger number, and "minus" meant that one number made the other one smaller. This was not so hard, because Roy knew the words for the numbers, and he could count seven and seven in his mind and know that it was fourteen.
After a while, though, the teacher told them to study page 26 in the reader. Then Roy was left to stare helplessly at the picture of the little boy with his fishing pole and his dog, and wonder what words the mysterious black shapes signified. He was terrified that the teacher would call on him again, and find that he did not know the lesson, and make him stand in the corner once more, but she did not. At last, she rose and told the class that they were dismissed for the day. Roy waited, lest he should receive some different instruction, and then gathered up Davell's slate and the book and the slate pencil. He picked up the tin dinner pail, and went outside.
The other students were already scattering, racing home to houses or farms. The big girls walked sedately together, watching the little ones with an air that clearly communicated that such behaviour was beneath them. Everyone was happy to be free, excited at the prospect of an evening of play. Roy was anything but. He had misbehaved in school: the teacher had had to punish him for his inattentiveness. Now, Mrs. Hawkeye would be angry, and she would punish him. She had promised to wear him out with a wooden spoon if he didn't behave.
His homeward steps were made heavy not only by the constrictive shoes, but by a gnawing dread. He wanted to cry, but he didn't. It wouldn't help. Today had been a terrible day, and school was a terrible place, and tears couldn't change that.
NOTE: Many thanks to Vachel Lindsay, the turn-of-the-century poet whose work is cited above. --Stoplight Delight