"What haven't you done? is more like it." She shook her head and looked down at me from the height of her contempt. "Right from the start, from the background on you that your stepmother so frankly confessed, from the arrogance and disdain you exhibited during our initial conference, from your attitude about our rules, violating the off-grounds restrictions almost immediately, from the manner in which you defied my wishes, I knew your attendance at Greenwood was a mistake of gargantuan proportions and destined for horrible failure.
"Punishments, warnings, even friendly advice did little or no good. Your kind rarely changes for the better. It's in your blood to fail."
"Exactly what am I being accused of doing?" I fired back defiantly.
Instead of replying immediately, she cleared her throat and put on her pearl-framed reading glasses. Then she lifted the papers under her hands to read from them.
"This is to formally commence step one of the expulsion procedure as outlined in the governing bylaws of Greenwood School as set down by the board of directors. ′The student under question,′ " she read, and looked over her glasses at me, ″ ′one Ruby Dumas, has, on the date described herein, been summoned to be informed of her hearing and to hear the charges levied against her by the administration of Greenwood Schools.
" 'Number one,′ " she began in an even more authoritative voice, " ′she has willfully and knowingly trespassed on a well-designated off-limits location on the Greenwood campus and remained at this location after curfew.′ "
"What?" I cried, looking again at Mrs. Randle, who had her head lowered and was scribbling rapidly on her notepad. "What location?"
" ′Number two, she has willfully and knowingly participated in immoral behavior on school property while under school supervision. ′ "
"Immoral behavior?"
" ′The above charges will be levied and adjudicated at a formal expulsion hearing this afternoon at four P.M. in this office.′ ″
She lowered the papers and then her glasses.
"I am to instruct you as to our procedure. A panel consisting of two faculty members and your student body president, Deborah Peck, will hear the charges and the proofs and render judgment. I will oversee the proceedings, of course."
"What charges? What proofs?"
"I've read you the charges," she said.
"I haven't heard anything specific. Where am I supposed to have gone that's off-limits on the campus? The mansion? Is that what this is about?" I demanded. Her cheeks reddened as she shot a quick glance at Mrs. Randle and then looked at me.
"Hardly," she replied. "You were seen at the boathouse after hours."
"Boathouse?"
"Where you went to have an illicit rendezvous with an employee, Buck Dardar."
"What? Who saw me?"
"A member of this faculty, a well-respected, long-time member of this faculty, I might add."
"Who? Can't I know the name of my accuser?" I demanded when she hesitated.
"Mrs. Gray, your Latin teacher. So there is no question she would be able to recognize you," she concluded.
I shook my head. "When?"
She looked at the papers as if it was a great effort to do so and said, "You were seen entering the boathouse at seven-thirty last night."
"Last night?"
"And you remained after curfew," she added. "The remaining details of Mrs. Gray's testimony will be given at the formal hearing."
"It's a mistaken identity. I couldn't have been in the boathouse at seven-thirty last night. Just call Buck in here and ask him," I advised.
She smirked. "Don't you think I had enough sense to do just that? He was called in here first thing this morning, and he did write out a confession," she said, holding up another document, "corroborating what our eyewitness saw."
"No," I said, shaking my head. "He's mistaken or he's lying. You'll see when he comes to the hearing and sees me and realizes . . ."
"Buck Dardar is no longer on these grounds. He has been relieved of his duties and he has already left the school," she said.
"What? He's been fired because of these false charges against me? But that's not fair."
"I assure you," she said, smiling coldly, "he thought my offer to him was quite fair. You girls are all under age. If not for the potential scandal, I would have turned him over to the police."
"But this isn't true. Just ask your aunt where I was last night."
"My aunt?" She pulled herself in like an accordion. "You want me to involve Mrs. Clairborne in this loathsome and vulgar affair? How dare you suggest such a thing. Is there no bottom to the depth of your immorality?"
"But I was at the mansion last night, and I was back in the dorm well before the curfew."
"I assure you," Mrs. Ironwood said slowly, "Mrs. Clairborne would never consent to give such testimony." She looked so confident and smug about it.
"But then just call Louis . . . ″
"A blind man? You want to bring him into this too? Are you out to disgrace this distinguished family? Is that your motive? Some sort of sick Cajun jealousy?"
"Of course not, but this is all a mistake," I cried.
"That's for our panel to decide at four o'clock. Be here on time." She closed her eyes and then opened them. "You can bring someone to speak in your defense." She paused and leaned forward, a curt smile on her lips. "Of course, if you want to avoid all this unpleasantness, you can confess and admit to these charges and accept your expulsion."
"No," I said, infuriated. "I want to face my accusers. I want everyone who is party to these lies to have to look into my eyes and understand what they're doing."
"Suit yourself." She sat back again. "I knew you would be defiant to the end, and I had little hope of making things easier for your family, even after the tragedy your stepmother has just recently endured. I feel sorry for you, but you are probably better off returning to your own kind."
"Oh, there's no question I'm better off doing that, Mrs. Ironwood," I said. "My kind doesn't look down on people just because they don't happen to be rich or descendants of some noble family. My kind don't plot and connive," I snapped. My tears were hot under my lids, but I kept them locked in my eyes so as not to give her the satisfaction of seeing me brought down. "But I won't be paddled out of here in a canoe built out of fabrications and hateful deceit."
She gazed at Mrs. Randle, who quickly looked down at her notepad again.
"For the record," Mrs. Ironwood dictated, "let it be noted that the student, Ruby Dumas, denies all charges and wishes to go forward with the formal hearing. She has been informed of her rights—"
"Rights? What rights do I have here?" I said with a sarcastic laugh.
"She has been informed of her rights," Mrs. Ironwood repeated pointedly. "Do you have all this, Mrs. Randle?"
"Yes," she replied quickly.
"Let her sign the notes as prescribed by the bylaws," Mrs. Ironwood said. Mrs. Randle turned her pad toward me and pushed it closer, handing me a pen at the same time.
"You sign right here," she instructed, pointing to a line drawn at the bottom of the page. I plucked the pen out of her fingers and started to sign.
"Don't you want to read it first?" Mrs. Ironwood asked.
"What for?" I said. "This is all a well-rehearsed play, with the outcome predetermined."
"Then why continue it?" she demanded quickly.
Yes, I wondered, why continue it? Then I thought about Grandmère Catherine and about all the times she was called to face the hardest of challenges, the unknown, the dark; and how she always went willingly to do battle for what was right and what was good, no matter how terrible the odds against her success were.
"I will continue it so that all those who are part of this conspiracy can face me and have me lay heavy on their consciences," I replied.
Mrs. Randle's eyes widened with surprise and a little appreciation, appreciation she was sure Mrs. Ironwood did not see.
"You can return to your classes now," Mrs. Ironwood said. "You have be
en told to appear at four. If you should fail to appear, you will be judged in absentia."
"I have no doubt of that," I said and got up. My legs wanted to wobble, but I closed my eyes and willed a stream of hard, cold strength from my proud heart down through my veins and to the bottoms of my feet. With my shoulders straight and my head high, I turned and walked out of Mrs. Ironwood's office, not faltering until I set myself down in my desk in my first class and realized just what it was that was about to happen now. A kind of paralyzing numbness gripped me.
I moved like a zombie throughout the day. I told no one about my meeting with Mrs. Ironwood and what I had been accused of and what that meant, but I didn't have to whisper a word to a living soul. As soon as Deborah Peck was informed she would be sitting in on an expulsion hearing, the news wove its way through every corridor and every classroom faster than an eel in the swamp going after its supper. By midafternoon, everyone knew and everyone was talking about me. Just before my last class period, Gisselle cornered me in the hallway, first to chastise me for not coming directly to her with my problem, and then to express her pleasure because if I were forced out of Greenwood, so was she.
"I didn't tell you just because of the way you're acting right now, Gisselle," I said. "I knew how you would gloat and be pleased."
"Why are you bothering with the hearing? Let's just call Daphne and tell her to send the limousine."
"Because it's a pack of lies, that's why, and I don't intend to let the Iron Lady get away with it, if I can help it," I replied. "I won't be driven out of here on a rail, tarred and feathered."
"Well you can't stop it, and you're just being Cajun stubborn and Cajun stupid. You don't go to that hearing, Ruby," she ordered. "Did you hear what I said? You don't go"
"Let me go to my class, Gisselle. I don't want to add a lateness to everything else and give her any more reason to pick on me," I said, starting around the wheelchair.
She seized the sleeve of my blouse. "Just don't go, Ruby."
I pulled my arm free.
"I'm going," I said, my eyes so full of fire my cheeks felt singed.
"You're wasting your time," she called after me. "And it's not worth it! This place isn't worth it!" she screamed. I walked faster and entered the art room just at the bell. One look at Miss Stevens's face told all: She knew and she was very upset for me. She was so upset she put the others to busy work and pulled me aside at the rear of the room, where she asked me to tell her everything.
"I'm not guilty, Miss Stevens. These are trumped-up charges. I couldn't have been at the boathouse last night. Mrs. Gray is mistaken."
"Why couldn't you be?" she asked.
I told her about my visit with Louis.
"Only they say Mrs. Clairborne won't testify for me and they won't let Louis do it either," I explained.
She shook her head, her eyes dark with troubled thoughts. "I can't see Mrs. Gray as part of any underhanded conspiracy to have you thrown out of Greenwood. She's a fine woman, a very kind person. Don't you get along with her in class?" she asked.
"Oh yes. I think I have an A-plus in her class."
"She's been like a mother to me," Miss Stevens said, "advising me, helping me right from the start. She's a churchgoing lady too."
"But I wasn't there, Miss Stevens! Honest. She has to be mistaken."
Miss Stevens nodded, thoughtful.
"Maybe she'll realize that and recant her testimony."
"I doubt it. Mrs. Ironwood looked too pleased and too assured of herself, and with Buck already fired and gone, it's going to be my word against Mrs. Gray's and that fiction they made Buck sign," I moaned.
"Why is Mrs. Ironwood so adamantly against you?" Miss Stevens wondered.
"Because of Louis, mainly, but she never liked me from the start and made that perfectly clear the first time we met in her office. My stepmother put a dark cloud over me here immediately. I don't know why she would do that, except to make sure my stay here would be horrible. She wants me to fail, to look bad, just so she will have reason to get rid of me . . . and Gisselle," I said.
"You poor dear. Do you want me to come to the hearing with you and testify about your talents and success?"
"No. That won't matter, and it would only bring you into this dirty mess. I just want to go there and spit back in all their faces."
Miss Stevens's eyes filled with tears. She hugged me and wished me well and then returned to the front of the class to give instruction, but I heard nothing and saw nothing. After school I returned to the dorm, floating in a daze and not even remembering the walk. As soon as I was back in my room, I began to pack some of my things. When Gisselle arrived, she was ecstatic.
"You've decided to take my advice and give up? Good. When is the limousine coming?"
"I'm just preparing for what I know is inevitable, Gisselle. I'm still attending the hearing, which will begin in an hour. Do you want to come along?"
"Of course not. Why would I do such a thing?"
"To be with me."
"You mean to be embarrassed with you. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll wait here and start packing my things too. Thank goodness we'll be able to tell this place and everyone in it good riddance," she said, not caring that some of the girls would overhear.
"I won't be so happy about it, Gisselle. Daphne will have some other torment awaiting us. You'll see. We'll be shipped off to another school, a worse place, just as she threatened."
"I won't go. I'll tie myself to my bed!"
"She'll have the movers pack the bed too. She's determined."
"I don't care. Anything is better than this," she insisted, and spun away to begin her packing. I returned to my own packing and then took the time to fix my hair so I would look as presentable and as self-assured as I could.
I started back to the school at a quarter to four. Many of the girls in the dorm were downstairs in the lounge talking about me. They grew silent when I appeared and watched me leave, some going to the windows to stare out as I paraded up the path, my head high. I had taken nothing with me, but I made sure Nina's good gris-gris, the dime on a string, was around my ankle.
The sky had turned ominously gray, the thick overcast moving quickly to block out any sight of blue until the world looked dark and dreary, reflecting the way I felt in my heart. There was even a surprising chill in the air, so I hurried into the building.
At this time of the day, there were few students wandering about the halls. Those who were there stopped whatever they were doing to stare and then whisper as I made my way down the corridor toward Mrs. Ironwood's office. The door to her inner office was closed and Mrs. Randle was not at her desk. I took a seat and waited, watching the clock tick closer and closer toward four. At exactly four the door to the inner office was opened. Mrs. Ironwood herself stood there, a look of both disappointment and disgust on her face when she saw me waiting.
"Come in and take your seat," she ordered, and pivoted to return to her desk.
The room furniture had been rearranged so that it appeared more like a courtroom. A chair for witnesses had been placed to the left of Mrs. Ironwood's desk. Mrs. Randle, who was there to record the hearing, sat at a small table to the right of the desk. To the left of what would be the witness chair sat the panel of judges: Mr. Norman, my science teacher; Miss Weller, the librarian; and Deborah Peck, who wore a smirk of satisfaction that made my stomach churn with anger. I was sure she would be on the phone to her brother the moment this had ended. Mrs. Gray sat to the left on the settee, looking very unhappy and very troubled.
There was a seat for me, the accused, facing the desk, which Mrs. Ironwood indicated with a nod for me to take. I did so quickly, my eyes fixed on the panel. I was determined not to look frightened or guilty, but my chest felt as if I had swallowed a clump of swamp mosquitoes, all of which buzzed and bit around my pounding heart.
"This formal hearing to determine whether or not to expel student Ruby Dumas will commence," Mrs. Ironwood began. She put on her glasses to read th
e charges once again. While she read, I felt everyone's eyes on me, but I didn't change expression. I kept my eyes fixed on her, my back straight, my hands comfortably in my lap. "Do you plead guilty or not guilty to these charges?" she asked in conclusion.
"Not guilty," I said. My voice threatened to crack, but I held it together. Mrs. Ironwood straightened up.
"Very well. We shall continue then. Mrs. Gray," she said, turning to the small-framed, dark-brown-haired lady with soft blue eyes. I knew that up until now she had been very fond of me, often complimenting me on my class work. She looked like she had a broken heart and was doing something terribly painful to her, but she stood up, took a deep breath, and went to the witness chair.
"Please describe to the panel what you know and what you have seen, Mrs. Gray," Mrs. Ironwood instructed.
Mrs. Gray glanced at me quickly and then directed herself to the three who were to pass judgment. "Last night at approximately seven-twenty, seven twenty-five, I was returning from having dinner with Mrs. Johnson, the dorm mother at Waverly. I had left my car in the faculty parking lot and walked. When I rounded the turn, I saw someone hurrying toward the lake and the boathouse, moving surreptitiously through the shadows. Curious because I knew it had to be one of our students, I turned down the path to the lake."
She paused to take a deep breath and swallow.
"I heard the door of the boathouse open. I heard what was definitely female laughter, and then I heard the door close. I went down to the dock and continued. When I reached the boathouse, I paused because the window was open and I had a clear view of what was going on inside."
"And what was going on inside?" Mrs. Ironwood asked when Mrs. Gray hesitated. She closed her eyes, bit down on her lower lip, and then took another breath and resumed.
"I saw Buck Dardar wearing only his briefs, embracing a girl. When he pulled back a bit, I had a full view of the girl."
"And who was this girl?" Mrs. Ironwood demanded quickly.
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