A Perfect Gentle Knight

by Kit Pearson

Mrs. Cooper dropped them off at the Orpheum to see Old Yeller. When she picked them up afterwards, Meredith was in floods of tears.

  “I will never, ever go to another movie again,” she sobbed. “That was awful! The poor, poor dog!”

  “Darling, it was just a story!” said Mrs. Cooper. But Meredith cried all the way home in the car. “Why is she always like this with movies?” her mother asked Corrie. “You seem to have survived it. Can you explain to Meredith what’s real and what isn’t?”

  Corrie shook her head. If only she could … especially to Sebastian.

  THE NEXT SATURDAY Corrie put on her blue dress, plus an old straw hat of Mum’s she had found in a closet, because Meredith wanted to play “Anne of Green Gables.”

  Meredith was Diana. She was obviously relishing her role, telling Corrie how glad she was that the two of them were “bosom friends.” She poured real tea into the cups and saucers she had set up on a table in the back yard. Paisley, enjoying the sunshine in his cage, practised saying “Hello there” endlessly. Meredith picked up the sugar tongs. “One or two lumps?” she asked in a mincing voice

  “Two, please,” muttered Corrie. She couldn’t get involved in this stupid game. It was so boring—there was nothing to it. At least Mrs. Cooper’s cookies were as delicious as usual. She brought them out more tea and complimented them on their hats. Then she told Meredith she and Mr. Cooper were going out for a few hours.

  “Let’s play another game now,” Corrie suggested.

  Meredith looked disappointed. “Don’t you want to keep having tea? I know, we could make some Kool-Aid and pretend it’s raspberry cordial. Then I could get drunk, like Diana does in the book!”

  “Can’t we play Robin Hood?”

  Meredith shrugged. “I guess so.” They put the tea things back in the kitchen and went upstairs to change. Meredith lent Corrie a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. Corrie was worried. Why was Meredith suddenly so reluctant about playing Robin Hood? She had been totally absorbed when they had started this new game a few weeks ago. Corrie had given plenty of time to Meredith’s silly tea; shouldn’t she have a turn now?

  Back in the yard, they tidied up the fort they had made behind the garage and picked up the bows they had made out of branches and string. They had glued Paisley’s discarded feathers to the bamboo arrows; the tips were covered with points modelled out of Plasticine.

  Corrie was Robin Hood. “Well, Little John, are you ready to track down the sheriff’s men?” she asked.

  To her relief, Meredith answered properly. “Yes, Robin. I think I saw some tracks under the greenwood tree.”

  The sun beat down. “It’s so hot—let’s take off our tops!” suggested Meredith.

  Corrie felt shy. But after Meredith had stripped off her T-shirt, she did the same. They glanced at each other. Corrie was flatter than Meredith, but both were starting to develop. At least neither was ready for a bra yet, thought Corrie. Only one girl in their class, Sharon, had a bra—she had boasted about it for a whole day.

  Corrie slung a quiver over her shoulder and came out of the fort. It was delightful to feel the sun all over her bare top. She poked her friend. “John—can you hear voices? Let’s spy on them.”

  Clutching their bows, the outlaws crept up to the fence and peeked through knotholes at Meredith’s neighbours. A woman was weeding with her back to them, and her teenaged son was talking to her. He was trying to persuade her to let him use the car.

  “An arrow would go through here,” whispered Corrie. She fitted an arrow into her bow and poked it into the hole.

  “You wouldn’t really!” giggled Meredith.

  “Of course not. But look how easy it would be.” Corrie drew the string as taut as she could and aimed the arrow at the head of the young man.

  “I know this man, John. It’s the sheriff of Nottingham himself! If I aim carefully I can finish him off, the dastard.”

  “Do it, Robin! It would be a brave deed, and all the poor people would thank you for it.”

  Corrie didn’t mean to let her arrow go. She really didn’t. But somehow, Meredith’s words had fuzzed the line between what was real and what was pretending. And somehow the arrow flew through the hole.

  There was a loud, horrible screech.

  “Oh, no! Corrie, what have you done!”

  Corrie sank to the ground, choking with fear. Had she killed him? Would she go to jail?

  “What’s going on here?” A very red and angry face appeared over the fence. “Do you realize you’ve just hit my cat?”

  The girls stood up. “I’m awfully s-sorry, Mrs. Patrick,” stuttered Meredith. “It was just a game. Is Boodles all right?”

  “I don’t know yet—he’s taken off into the bushes and Malcolm can’t get him to come out.” The woman glared at them. “What do you think you’re doing, Meredith Cooper, shooting arrows through fences? Are your parents home?”

  “They’re out,” whispered Meredith.

  “Well, when they get back they are certainly going to hear about this. Running around half-naked, injuring poor little cats … You’re a pair of hooligans!”

  “We’re really, really sorry,” gulped Corrie, but Mrs. Patrick had stomped off.

  Corrie and Meredith ran into the house. Meredith put on a T-shirt and Corrie got into her dress again. Then they peeked from behind the curtains in Mr. and Mrs. Cooper’s bedroom and tried to see if the cat was all right. Malcolm was still calling him, a tin of cat food in his hand. Finally a large ginger-and-white cat ambled out of the shrubs. Malcolm picked him up and went into the house.

  “He looks okay,” said Corrie. “Oh, Meredith, what if I hurt him?” She felt like throwing up.

  “But why did you let go of your arrow?” Meredith asked, her face ashen.

  “I don’t know,” said Corrie miserably. “You said do it and I just … I just did.”

  “But you know I didn’t mean to really shoot!”

  “I know. But I … forgot, I guess.” Corrie hung her head.

  Meredith sat beside her, patting her back awkwardly. She grimaced. “Mum and Dad are going to be really mad.”

  They were sitting glumly in the kitchen drinking Kool-Aid when Meredith’s parents arrived home.

  “Why such long faces?” asked Mr. Cooper, chucking Meredith under the chin. Meredith couldn’t answer. He kissed the top of her head and took out the garbage. Then the phone rang.

  Corrie and Meredith stared at the floor while Mrs. Cooper listened to the angry voice coming out of the receiver. Her pretty face grew more and more astonished. “They what? Is he all right? Yes, I agree … I’ll talk to them … All right … Goodbye.”

  She hung up the phone and called Meredith’s father back into the kitchen. Then they all sat down. “That was Mrs. Patrick, girls,” she said quietly. “Can you tell me what happened?”

  Corrie and Meredith stumbled out their tale. By the time they finished Meredith was sobbing.

  “Do you realize how dangerous it is to play with weapons?” Mr. Cooper said seriously. “You could have hit a person, not a cat!”

  “Is the cat all right?” whispered Corrie.

  “Yes, the cat is apparently fine,” said Meredith’s mother, “but you are very lucky he is.”

  “You are never to play that game again, Meredith and Corrie,” Mr. Cooper told them sternly. “I want to see you break all your bows and arrows, all right?”

  They nodded.

  “You’re far too old to be playing boys’ games anyhow,” said Mrs. Cooper. “What happened to your nice tea party? And Mrs. Patrick said you had taken off your T-shirts! You can’t do that any more, you know—you’re both growing into young ladies.”

  They had to go next door and apologize. Mrs. Patrick hadn’t softened. She stood in her doorway and ranted at them for an eternity while they stood there with hanging heads. Her brittle words were like sharp pebbles she was pouring over them.

  As Corrie trudged home, Mrs. Cooper’s soft words rankled just as much. “Young lad
ies”—yech! Silly teenagers, like Roz and Jennifer. She was never going to be like that!

  But now a whole private game had been banned. It was all her fault, of course, but she still felt betrayed, as if the grown-ups had made them break far more than their bows and arrows.

  15

  “Out of His Wit”

  As the long, slow spring grew greener and more fragrant, Corrie’s world became grey. Meredith suddenly no longer wanted to pretend anything.

  “I know we can’t be Robin Hood and Little John, but why don’t we pretend we’re in the Narnia books?” argued Corrie. “Or we could play with the animals again.”

  But Meredith only wanted to play catch, or roller skate or explore on their bikes. All of these things were fun, but they weren’t magic. Meredith was just as nice a friend as ever—but she was just Meredith, not Sir Perceval or Raccy or Edward.

  Home was worse. Something was wrong with Sebastian. Now he went straight to his room after school, appearing for meals and secluding himself again right after them. He spoke only when he was answering a question and then it was in a stifled voice, as if he could barely form the words. He didn’t even call meetings of the Round Table.

  Corrie tried to assemble everyone one Saturday morning, but the meeting seemed thin and boring without Sebastian there. “Because of Sir Lancelot’s absence, we will cancel Round Table meetings for the time being,” she told them.

  “But we’ll have another one soon, right?” asked Harry anxiously.

  Corrie tried to smile at him. “Of course we will. We’re just taking a break until Sir Lancelot returns.”

  Juliet looked confused. “But Sir Lancelot is here! He’s in his room!”

  “As a knight he’s not here,” Corrie explained. “He’s … he’s off on a quest, on a quest for the Holy Grail. Let’s pretend we’re with him on the quest. That’s why we won’t meet in Camelot or Joyous Gard for a while.”

  By the next day, the younger ones seemed to have forgotten they were ever knights. Orly and Juliet became cowboys, and Harry began going to his friend Peter’s every day after school when he was free of the twins.

  Corrie wandered around the house as if she were lost in it. She tried to be Sir Gareth on her own, but Sir Gareth was as lost as Sir Lancelot. All she could do was read. At least in books she could still escape into another world. Every day she wasn’t at Meredith’s she lay on her bed and found solace in a novel.

  She couldn’t escape from Sebastian’s miserable, tense face, however. One afternoon she knocked on his door and asked him if anything was wrong.

  “Nothing’s wrong,” he mumbled.

  “Why aren’t we having the Round Table any more?”

  “I haven’t got time,” said Sebastian. “I have too much homework.”

  He wasn’t doing homework, though. Corrie was glad to see he was reading The Boy’s King Arthur.

  “How’s Jennifer?” she made herself ask.

  “I wot not how Guinevere is,” Sebastian said dully. His tragic voice made Corrie wince.

  So that was it—they must have “broken up,” as Roz would call it. She forgot how much she had wanted this. Sebastian was so anguished, Corrie now wished it hadn’t happened.

  “Did you … did you tell Jennifer about her being Guinevere and you being Sir Lancelot?” she whispered.

  “That I did,” said Sebastian. “But she was not ready to know it. I told her too soon and she did not believe me.”

  Corrie wondered if Jennifer had mocked Sebastian. “Do you still believe it?” she asked him.

  Sebastian turned back to his desk. “Would you please go, Corrie? I have a lot to do.”

  Corrie sat on the hall stairs, trying to think clearly. When Sebastian had been with Jennifer he’d been strange, but happy. Now he was just strange—and so distant, as if she were neither his sister nor his fellow knight. He had never seemed this far away.

  The sun coming through the bevelled windows made soft prisms on the carpet and walls. When Corrie was little she had thought the stripes of light were fairies. Hamlet slept peacefully on the landing, his fur dotted with colour. Corrie envied his utter oblivion.

  She had to find out what had happened. Roz was home for dinner that night, and while they were doing the dishes Corrie asked her if Sebastian and Jennifer had stopped seeing each other.

  “It looks like it. She’s going out with Terry, of all people! How could she stand him?”

  “Terry! Oh, poor Sebastian! Roz, I think there’s something wrong with him. He won’t talk to me, and he spends all his time in his room. He doesn’t tell us what to do any more.”

  Roz shrugged. “So what else is new? He’s been like that for ages, ever since he started going out with Jennifer.”

  “But now we don’t even have Round Table meetings!”

  “Sebastian will be okay. He’ll get over it. And I’m glad he’s finally stopped that game. It wasn’t good for him—it wasn’t good for any of us. I’m in love now, Corrie, with Ronnie! Do you want me to tell you how it started?”

  “No!” Corrie strode out of the kitchen. Roz was hopeless. And Corrie had a dreadful feeling that Sebastian wouldn’t “get over it.” Instead he seemed to be sinking into a place where no one could reach him.

  THEN SEBASTIAN STOPPED coming home after school. They had all become so used to him hiding in his room that at first no one noticed he wasn’t even in the house. Sometimes Harry or Juliet or Orly would ask where he was. Roz didn’t seem to care, and she was often out herself, anyway. Sebastian would turn up for dinner, eat silently, then retreat to his room. It was just like when he was in love, but now he was silent and miserable instead of in a happy daze.

  The twins got wilder and wilder. Orly broke a window at school and Juliet bit a boy in her class. Corrie had no control over them, and they were becoming dirtier and ruder every day. All three of the younger kids ignored Corrie’s orders to go to bed. Harry refused to take his turn with the twins after school and spent all his time at Peter’s—they were making a rocket, he told Corrie.

  Meredith kept asking Corrie to come over, but she started to say no most days, and she discouraged Meredith from coming to her house. She didn’t have the heart or strength to do anything but try to hold her disintegrating family together.

  She tried to make a schedule for June, but it was so difficult when Sebastian and Roz weren’t home to do things. Harry ignored her when she begged him to take out the garbage, and Juliet stuck her tongue out when Corrie asked her to dry the dishes. “You aren’t my boss!” she called, scampering up the stairs. Most nights Corrie had to do all the meals and cleaning up herself, with a little help from Orly when she bribed him with bubble gum.

  Fa, of course, didn’t even notice. He told them his book was almost ready to be sent to the typist. Now that classes were over at the university, he was retreating to his study whenever he could. They had his full attention only on Sundays.

  CORRIE FELT SO HELPLESS that she devised a plan. She would spy on Sebastian again and find out what he was doing after school. A knight is loyal. She had to try to keep on being Sir Gareth, to be loyal to Sir Lancelot and not give up on him.

  The next day she forced Harry to take the twins home by riding away from him on her bike. She pedalled fast to Laburnum school and hid behind the same shrubs she had with Meredith.

  The first people she recognized were Jennifer and Terry. Jennifer was laughing that same false laugh she had used with Sebastian. She had cut off her braid and now she wore make-up. Her sweater stretched tightly over her pointy bra—she looked like a teenager in a magazine. Terry couldn’t keep his eyes off her. His friends looked at her just as avidly.

  The two of them were so disgusting they deserved each other, Corrie decided. No matter how unhappy Sebastian was, at least Jennifer was out of his life.

  Roz appeared with Joyce and they quickly walked away, deep in conversation. At least Roz wasn’t with Ronnie.

  Finally Sebastian emerged. He pushed through the
crowd and everyone parted, as if he were a plague. Even Terry and his gang ignored him—they were too enthralled by Jennifer.

  Sebastian mounted his bike and Corrie followed. He rode towards Kerrisdale. Corrie swerved in and out of cars, panting with concentration. It was so difficult to stay close to the side of the street.

  Finally Sebastian drew up in front of the Kerrisdale library. Corrie locked up her bike and followed him in.

  Hiding behind a stack of books, she got back her breath. She found her brother sitting at a table in the adult non-fiction section. He was surrounded by stacks of books, his hand on his forehead while he leaned over one.

  Corrie watched him for a long time. Sebastian looked exhausted. There were deep circles under his eyes. His hair was unwashed and hung greasily behind his ears. His fingernails were lined with dirt. He turned a page and sighed, then looked up. Corrie drew back quickly. She could still see his face. It was so full of pain that she felt as if she’d been stabbed.

  Sebastian got up and she saw him go into the men’s washroom. Darting over to the table, she glanced at the books and then flew back to her hiding place.

  Knights and King Arthur … Books by Malory and Tennyson and Pyle. The book he was reading was open to a page depicting a drawing by Howard Pyle labelled “The Lady Guinevere.” Corrie had only a few seconds to notice how much her snooty expression resembled Jennifer’s.

  Corrie slipped out of the library, got on her bike, and rode slowly home. Sebastian seemed to be just as obsessed with Guinevere as he had been before, even though Jennifer was now out of his life. Did he still think he was the reincarnation of Sir Lancelot?

  That night Corrie re-read the story of how, when Guinevere was angry at Lancelot, he became “out of his wit,” existing for two years on fruit and water and running around half-naked. Was Sebastian going as mad as Lancelot?

  Sebastian continued to stay away until dinnertime, but at least Corrie now knew where he was.

  “Seb, how long has it been since you’ve washed?” Roz asked one weekend. “Your hair and clothes are disgusting, and you stink!”

  “Mind your own business,” he muttered, and went upstairs.