Cartwheeling in Thunderstorms

by Katherine Rundell

“He did not. But I’m quicker in the brain than I look. This creaking old body is deceptive.”

  “Oh. How did you know?”

  “I can tell when my boy’s lying. It’s a talent the old acquire. One of the few compensations for being rickety.” The old woman led Will through the scrubby back garden and into the kitchen. “This way; up on that stool. You sit yourself comfortably. Now, let’s have a look at that ankle.”

  Will stared blankly. “How did you know—” She hadn’t told the woman about her foot.

  “I told you, love. I know how important it is to notice things. You know that too, I would guess. It takes one to know one. Boots off, girl.”

  When Will was wedged in a chair with one foot in a bucket of warm water, the woman said, “Keep eating, child. Do you want jam on the next? Good.” With her back to Will and her hands busy with the bread knife, she added, “Can I give you a piece of advice, Will?”

  Will looked at the floor.

  “No? No, chickadee? I can’t give you advice?”

  “I—I don’t want to be rude, ja. Please don’t think it’s rude—” The warmth in Will’s skin was coming back.

  “But? There’s a but coming, is there not?”

  “It’s just . . . I don’t think you can say anything I haven’t thought of, ja. You’ll tell me to go back to the school.”

  “Ah.”

  “But you can’t understand—” Will reached up to pull at her hair, but there was only air, and so she scrubbed instead at her face with sharp brown knuckles. “You can’t understand, what the sun was like.” She didn’t know if she could explain—what it was like when crickets sang every day, and you couldn’t feel where you stopped and the sunshine began.

  “I don’t . . . I can’t describe it. Imagine if there’s just trees, ja, and grass and boys and bats, ja, and warthogs, and dragonflies. And nobody hates you. And you could run, ja, or ride, for miles, and if you got lost, the women just gave you mangoes and aspirin and directions—and once, I fell out of a tree, and they gave me a ridgeback, to keep, ja. You can’t know.” Will discovered her face was turning red with the rubbing, and sat on her hands. “It was like living in pure blue.”

  The woman said nothing, just stared and smiled and nodded.

  Will’s body felt suddenly limp and helpless. “I won’t go back to school. Those girls . . . they weren’t real, ja. . . . It was like they were afraid they’d break themselves. They weren’t like the boys on the farm.”

  “But, sweet Will— Is strawberry jam all right, child? Good. No, sit down. I’ll make it. I was going to say, my dear one, are you sure? Because, you know, people are more different than we give them credit for. Kindness comes in so many different disguises.” The old woman smiled. “If you can find your way here with a sprained ankle and an A to Z, surely you can find some goodness in those girls?”

  “No! You don’t understand. That’s not how school works.”

  “Don’t I? Are you sure?”

  “Yes! And I’m not pretty like they are—I’d just make them feel prettier, and I’d get uglier, and I’d stop believing, ja, that life was beautiful.”

  “Oh, my dear—”

  “Ja. So,” Will interrupted. “So I can’t take advice. If I can’t stay here, I’ll run again.” She kicked at the water in the bowl and tried to smile. “But—ma’am—I don’t want to be rude.”

  The old woman smiled and said, “Don’t worry about that. You be as rude as you like.”

  Will stared at the jam pot. She wouldn’t look the old woman in the face. She didn’t know what would happen if she did.

  “You’re right, Will. I was going to say you have to go back. Much as I would love to keep you for my own. I was going to say, I and my Daniel could visit you, at the weekends. You could adopt us, if you so wanted. But you do have to go back. In fact, you don’t have a choice. This is a land of compulsory education, my love. Do you know what that means?”

  “Ja. But—ach. It’s a land of compulsory everything.”

  “What?”

  “Rules . . .” Will could barely talk through her mouthful of sadness. “You only have rules.”

  The old woman lifted Will’s foot out of the bowl and set it on her lap. “You must say if this hurts; it’s an antiseptic. It should only sting a little. Listen, sweet Will. Here’s the advice I was going to give. Go back to your school— I know, it hurts.” Because Will had given a dry hard sob that had nothing to do with the disinfectant. “Can I tell you why I have to send you back?”

  Will set her jaw. “You just said. Laws.”

  “No, dear heart. Laws can always be gotten round. It is because, Will, I think you’re too brave to be a runaway.”

  That wasn’t what Will had expected. She said, “I—what?”

  “It is real life that takes the real courage, little wildcat. School is very difficult. But that’s because it takes toughness and patience. It’s what life is, my love. Although life is very beautiful, it is also very difficult.”

  Will blinked, surprised. “That’s what Captain Browne used to say. He used to say, ja, ‘Life isn’t all mangoes and milk tarts.’ ”

  “Then he was a clever man, though it sounds like he had terrible taste in wives.”

  Will felt the corners of her mouth twitch.

  “If you keep running like this, you’ll exhaust your own heart. I promise you—I swear it on the lives of my grandchildren—that life is best when you’re not trying to hide. Hiding and panic go together. There is nothing in this world that is worse than panic.”

  That, Will knew was true. She stopped staring at the jam pot.

  “I do know how difficult school can be, my love. I hated it myself. If you go back, it won’t be like cartwheeling in sunshine. It would be more like cartwheeling into the wind.”

  “Into a hurricane,” said Will. “Into a tempest.”

  “Yes, sometimes. But it would be the best possible training. It would make your arms strong.”

  Will said, “Oh. Ja. I see.”

  “And your heart. You could build a cartwheeling wildcat heart.”

  “Ja.” Will swallowed.

  “Wouldn’t that be worth fighting for? Wouldn’t that be worth going back for?”

  “I don’t know. I think so.” Will felt her heart straining against her ribs. “Yes. Ja. I do.”

  “I think so too. Pass me the Dettol—beside you—no, that’s maple syrup—thank you. May I have a look at that hand? We need to get you in shape for cartwheeling.”

  WILL’S DESK AT THE FRONT of the classroom was like a bruise. Nobody dared touch it. Superstitious, a few girls left peace offerings—a pen that wrote in four different colors, a new pencil case, a handful of notes. “She’s not dead,” said Samantha. “We didn’t kill her. You’re being ridiculous.” But she found herself looking at icy silence.

  Louisa added a handful of chocolate coins. She didn’t meet anyone’s eye. Joanna said, “It should be Sam, really, who leaves something. She started it.”

  Samantha tinkled out her laugh.

  Zoe said, “For goodness’ sake, laugh properly.”

  “What did you say?”

  “That’s a false laugh. Like a false mustache,” Zoe said, and Hannah added, “Only stupider. I’m going outside. Come on, Zoe.”

  The twins went outside to practice cartwheels. After a while, the rest followed them.

  • • •

  The girls were watching from the radiators by the upstairs window when the car drew up. They saw a tiny, bald child climb out, holding in one hand what looked like the last bite of a jam sandwich. They saw the child turn to the old woman at the steering wheel—a woman, they could see, whose nose barely reached above the steering wheel—and kiss her many times.

  “Who is that?” said Samantha. “Are they letting boys into Leewood?”

  The child shook out its legs—dressed in boy’s jeans several sizes too large—swallowed the bite of the sandwich, scrubbed at its eyes with the knuckles of its bandaged
hand, waved with the unbandaged one, turned away—grinned, shouted something, waved again—and started to limp toward the headmistress’s office.

  Just as the figure reached the main door, the girls upstairs saw it burst open, and Miss Blake fly out. The child’s body was swept off its feet and swung in a circle, so that its legs fanned out like the brim of a hat. Sobs of laughter flew up to the window. Then the child was set down and kissed, hard, on the forehead; shaken, hard, by the elbows: swept up again; and carried bodily inside.

  Samantha dragged her lips back from where they had hung, limp with shock, near her chin. “Was that the savage?”

  “Can’t be.”

  “It was,” said Zoe.

  “Can’t be. It had no hair.”

  “It was,” said Hannah.

  “Can’t be. They said she wasn’t coming back.”

  “It was.”

  • • •

  At second break, Samantha came looking for Will. Will was crouched under the form tutor’s desk. A letter had come from Simon the day before. Will had to be alone to read it properly. Her hands fumbled with the joy of it as she unfolded the earth-stained paper.

  Samantha’s voice said, “Will? Are you in here?”

  Part of Will was tempted to stay still and say nothing. Nobody was as good as she was at staying still. But she hadn’t come back to hide, she told herself. “Ja. Just a second.” Will cracked her head against the desk. “Ow. Sha.” She pushed the letter into the waistband of her skirt for later. As she crawled out, injured foot first, Will tried to summon up every inch of courage she had, up into her chest.

  Samantha was standing in the doorway, stony-faced and awkward. “I’ve been told to say I’m sorry.”

  Will wasn’t sure what she had been expecting. “Oh. Ja.” Part of her—the same part that would have liked to have stayed under the desk—would have liked to have held on to her resentment. Part of her would have liked to have spat. But carrying resentment, Will told herself, would be like carrying a pocket full of broken glass. It was a good image, and she grinned, and thought, You can’t cartwheel in broken glass.

  To her astonishment, Samantha smiled back. “Not just about the bath. I’m sorry about everything.”

  “What?”

  “Your dad, and all that. We didn’t know.”

  Will said, “Ja. Oh. Ja.” Perhaps forgiving people was easier than it looked. But then, so was breaking into a zoo. Perhaps things were easier once you tried them, Will thought.

  • • •

  Mrs. Robinson hunted the headmistress down in her office. She stood in front of Miss Blake, her nostrils clenched shut with determination. She had come to see that justice was done. “What are you going to do about Wilhelmina, Angela?”

  “Do?”

  “With any other runaway child, Angela, we would be seriously considering expulsion. I understand her circumstances are unusual, but—”

  “Exactly, Roz. She is unusual.”

  “Not so very extraordinary, Angela.”

  “Have you ever seen her smile?”

  Mrs. Robinson didn’t answer directly. “She seems a sullen child.”

  “Does she?”

  “She is astonishingly ignorant for her age. She seems spectacularly underdeveloped mentally. I have been wondering if she would not do better in a special school.”

  “I see. Yes, Roz, she is young for her age. In some ways. In other ways, I’d say she’s very old. Could you have survived on your own? In the African bush? Or sleeping rough in London? That’s the stuff of warriors, surely?”

  Mrs. Robinson didn’t answer directly. “I’ve been wondering if we should look into psychotherapy.”

  “Mm . . .”

  “Mm? What’s that supposed to mean, Angela? A yes or a no?”

  “You haven’t seen her smile, have you?”

  “What’s your point, Angela?”

  “Her smile. It could burn holes through ice.” Miss Blake ran a hand through her hair, thinking. The girl’s smile was like a love letter to the world. “Will’s not sullen, Roz.”

  “I beg to differ. She is stubborn, and silent to the point of rudeness. I find her extremely difficult to like.”

  “It is possible that the feeling is mutual. Personally, I find her beautiful.”

  “Beautiful?”

  “Beautiful, yes.”

  “The child was never going to win Little Miss Greater London, Angela, but now! That hair.”

  “Mm.”

  “What is that noise supposed to mean?”

  “I was thinking, Roz, how astonishingly blind humans can be. I recommend you book an appointment with your optician.” Mrs. Robinson’s spectacles were made of clear glass. She wore them to give herself an air of authority. It was perhaps because of this, Miss Blake realized later, that her deputy’s reply was hissed with such venomous politeness.

  “I must remind you, Angela, that you do not own this school. A headmistress is not a proprietor. I have been here more than twice your time, and if you are suggesting I have been negligent at any point in my care of Wilhelmina, I would ask you to make a complaint in writing to the board of governors. Immediately! I will not”—and her voice became shrill—“I will not bear the innuendo and calumny.”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake, Roslyn! It wasn’t personal. I was just saying—hold the front page and send out a news bulletin!—school is a lonely place to be.” Angela Blake sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound juvenile. Will is not sullen. She is miserable. A common complaint, after all.”

  “You make it sound like a disease.”

  “Do I? My hope, Roz, is that the girl’s soul will prove contagious.”

  • • •

  Will sat silently through the morning’s lessons. She could feel that every eye was watching her. Possibly, she thought, they were expecting her to attack them. To prove she wouldn’t, she sat as still as possible. They were like impala, she thought. She mustn’t frighten them away.

  When lunchtime came, she slipped quietly into her old seat at the empty end of the lunch table. Five girls stared hard at their laps as she slid by.

  Will smelled her soup. It was something tasteless and indeterminate. Potato, she thought—and dipped in a finger, stirred it with a spoon, blew on it. She found her mouth wouldn’t open enough for her to eat it.

  There was a crash; two crashes. Will looked up just as the twins put down their trays, one on either side of her.

  “Can we sit here?”

  “Oh.” Will looked up at them. They had long, clever, complicated faces. “Ja. I mean, yes. Of course.”

  They sat, awkwardly, tripping over their chairs.

  “So . . . ,” said one twin, and the other added, “I,” just as Will said, “Did you—” Together all three said, “Oh, go ahead. . . .”

  “So you came back, then?” That was Zoe, Will thought—the one with slightly longer hair, and more bitten fingernails.

  “Ja.”

  “Obviously she did, Zoe.”

  Will sunk lower into her chair, wondering whether they were waiting for her to speak. She felt her heart writhe, and wished she could think of something to say—anything at all. But all her words (English, Shona, just noises, even) had left her.

  The silence grew louder.

  Then—“Did you know there was an assembly about you?”

  “No.” Will wasn’t sure she knew what an assembly was.

  “Yeah! They thought you might’ve been kidnapped. They called the police, and then Louisa said you might have run away—”

  “And Miss Blake said, Why would you have done that?—and then—”

  “You could hear her shouting from the north block—”

  “From the north pole. She went purple.”

  “We thought maybe you’d gone back to Africa—”

  “On a boat, or something—”

  “Or hidden in those overhead lockers on a plane—”

  “And Sam said, that’s ridiculous—and we said, it
wasn’t, actually, because you were the sort of girl who might do anything—”

  “I said that.”

  “Ja,” said Will. “I wanted to—I would’ve—but—”

  “We’re glad you didn’t, Will.” And the other one said, “That’s all we wanted to say, really. That we’re glad.” And then before Will could reply, they added together, “Really glad—ja.”

  They must have planned it. “Oh,” said Will. “Oh. Ndatenda hangu. I mean—ja. Tatenda, ja? Thank you. I—ja. Thanks.”

  There weren’t words.

  Will grinned. “Sha.”

  All three girls became intensely interested in their soup spoons. Will’s chest felt oddly swollen, too big for her body.

  “Um . . . I like the soup,” she said. It was a lie, but it was something to say.

  “Yes. I mean, ja,” said Hannah.

  Zoe said, “Leek, I think. . . .”

  “Ja. Or potato.”

  “Or carrot.”

  “It could be anything, really,” said Zoe. “It tastes like pond water.”

  “Ja!” Will grinned. “Nice pond water, though. Top-quality pond water.”

  “Zoe reckons we had cat soup, once.”

  “Really?” said Will.

  “We did! Seriously, Will. It was definitely cat. There were bits of fur in it.”

  “She’s making it up, Will. Don’t listen to her.”

  There was a grumbling, growling noise from Will’s chair. The twins thought it was Will’s stomach. They smiled at her, sideways, but said nothing. They were probably too polite to mention it.

  Will could feel that it wasn’t that. It was the sound of her heart, she thought. It was hope, coughing and stuttering into life.

  WILL READ AND REREAD SIMON’S letter in snatched moments throughout the day. It was written on lined paper covered in red dust. She grinned, and rubbed it between her fingers. He must have used the path to the farmhouse as a desk.

  Dear Wildcat,

  I’ve put in this soil so that you know that all is well. It’s farm soil, because I’m still at the farm. Lazarus and Tedias and eight of the men put together their money to buy it. I don’t think they had enough. But the captain sold it to them anyway. Cynthia almost killed him with a saucepan lid. I don’t think he cared.