by Iacopo Bruno
I’d be doing both.
Chapter Three
A rat-faced teacher, a pinchy-faced toad, and a bosom friend
The schoolhouse smelled like mold and sweat and felt a month or two hotter than mid-September, despite all the windows being open for air. Stepping inside made me feel like I’d just been squeezed into another dress. Five rows of eight small desks were mostly filled with students quietly talking, their backs to me and Sid. I couldn’t rightly tell, but the size of folks seemed to range from about age six to fourteen or so.
“Where’s your brother?” I whispered.
Sid pointed. “Half-brother. There he is.”
Tom was sitting two rows from the teacher’s desk and the big front chalkboard. He was red-necked from the back. Most likely he’d given himself a nice school-day scrubbing. Even from behind, that boy looked like a tattletale, from the way he sat stiff as a board to the cowlick sticking up on his poop-brown hair.
Through a window on the left, I saw a short man walking toward the back door of the schoolhouse with a newspaper under his arm. His ugly tweed jacket was the color of a fungus that sprouted on my foot last summer.
“Dob-head,” Sid confirmed. “Coming back from the outhouse, like every morning.”
Mr. Dobbins’s head was a rat-shaped thing. Instead of just his huge nose pointing out, all his features kind of jutted forward, like they were trying to get away from him. Slicked-down black hair topped his head and fell past his ears. He marched inside and slapped his hand on a girl’s desk. “Mary Green, you go and ring the late bell.”
“I’m Alice,” said the girl. “That’s Mary.” She pointed to an identical sister across the room.
“Just go.”
Alice Green scampered out the door as Sid scooted into an empty seat behind his brother. Unsure if I had an assigned seat, I felt I had no choice but to go stand near Mr. Dobbins until he gave me instruction as to where I needed to plant myself. But instead of telling me where to sit, he ignored me and walked over to the coal stove. He sifted through the bucket that held the fire tools.
“Need help starting a fire, sir?” Tom asked, rising slightly from his seat.
Mr. Dobbins snorted. “It’s hot as hellfire in here, Tom. You really think I’m about to start a fire?”
Tom sank back down amid muffled taunting, and I nearly felt bad that even the person he was sucking up to didn’t pay him any mind. Then I remembered that I owed him a lick or two.
It looked like Mr. Dobbins was thinking about handing out licks as well. Leaning beside all sorts of sharp, pokey fire things was another pokey thing. It looked to be a good-size hickory switch. He wouldn’t switch girls, would he? Especially not girls with bleeding knees and a sore eye.
“Sid Sawyer, join me up front, won’t you?”
“Yes, sir.”
The room murmured while he got up (flicking his brother on the ear first, I was pleased to see). When Sid reached the front of the classroom, Mr. Dobbins seemed to notice me for the first time. He shot me a real irritable look, like I was a fly or something he found upside his fat nostrils.
The bell rang out four times.
“You must be the new girl,” he said. He looked over my shoulder. “Thank you, Miss Green. You may sit down.” His beady eyes returned to me and Sid. “I hate to make an example of you, but that was the late bell, and you two are the only ones out of your seats.”
“What about Alice?” I pointed out.
“Don’t you be smart in my schoolhouse. She was outside on my doing.” He had a real slimy look on his face. “This being your first day, I simply can’t abide by you being late. You’re already a week late to the school year, so I take this negligence as a particular and personal insult. And, as this is Sid’s third offense, he’s due for a triple thwap. Sid and . . .” He looked at me.
“Becky Thatcher,” I mumbled.
His eyes lit up, the meanie. “Why, that’s right. Becky Thatcher, daughter of our new Judge. I would think the daughter of a town official might have a little more respect for authority.” He leaned down, revealing a large set of gums and not-so-sweet breath. “Tell me, did they use a hickory or a ruler on girls where you’re from?”
Neither, you weasel-faced grease head. If I were Jon, I would’ve been clear to the river by now. Unfortunately, though, I wasn’t Jon and I could see that my new teacher aimed to punish me unless I could give him a reason not to. “Mr. Dobbins,” I said in a steady voice, “it wasn’t our fault we were late. You see, this ball came out of nowhere, and—”
That mean old teacher put his finger right in my face. “Playing ball on the way to school? And you want to be excused?”
Desperately scanning the faces of the classroom, I searched for a savior. But they all looked away or put their heads down. “Sir, I—”
He held a hand up and sniffed the air. “And are those cookies?” He snatched the paper bag from my hand and stuck his fat red nose right in it, then opened the bottom drawer of his desk and shoved them inside. Sid let out a little whimper of disappointment, and I knew those cookies were lost for good.
“I don’t know how they do things over there where you’re from, Miss Thatcher,” Mr. Dobbins continued, “but you’re in St. Petersburg now. If you insist on talking back, I do believe I’ll recommend that you miss the annual picnic next month.”
There was a collective gasp around the classroom, and I felt the threat slam into me. The picnic was likely a most-sought-after place to be, especially if there were embarrassments to be seen like Tom Sawyer peeing himself. I couldn’t miss it.
“I am not talking back, sir.”
“Enough, young lady. Stick out your wrist.” His index finger tapped the hickory twice before he set it down and dug through his top desk drawer, coming up with a flat wooden stick. “Girls get the ruler,” he said, smiling.
Good Lord, that man was about to strike me!
Sid finally got the frog outta his throat and spoke up. “Mr. Dobbins, she’s right about us having a good reason, sir.”
“And you, Sid Sawyer, can bend over. You’ll be next.”
I watched, terrified. Just as Mr. Dobbins was raising the ruler above my wrist, one of the cowards proved himself otherwise.
“What are you waving your hand for, Daniel Boggs?”
“She . . . well, she fell on the way to school. Preacher’s wife helped her out and made Sid wait for her, and that’s why they’re late. Mrs. Sprague will tell you. I believe she’s become partial to Becky.”
Thank you, Danny Boggs. I no longer aim to hit you with a rock during the lunch break.
Mr. Dobbins seemed to have himself a head battle between Mrs. Sprague’s partialness and the satisfaction he’d get from smacking me a good one. After a long moment, he put away the ruler. “It’s bad form to cross a preacher’s wife, I suppose.” With a disappointed sigh, he walked the switch back to the corner. “Get back to your desk,” he said to Sid. “Take a seat, Miss Thatcher. Your book will be under the desk lid.”
I could hardly breathe after that business. We’d been set free from punishment, but it was Mrs. Sprague’s name, not the truth, that had done it. Mr. Dobbins hadn’t given a rat’s tail about truth when I’d told it to him. Maybe that’s why Jon usually lied his way into lesser punishments when Mama and Daddy caught him in a piece of mischief. I tapped my satchel pocket, feeling the outline of the marbles while making a mental note to be wary of the trouble that came from being honest with grown-ups.
“How do I know where to sit, sir?” I made sure to ask real polite, and even turned my toes out, which was straight from the Bible, I was pretty sure.
“Try a spot where nobody is, Miss Thatcher. The spots with people in them are mighty inconvenient to learning.”
I felt my face go hot while the boys in class snickered and the girls covered their mouths with their hands to hide smiles. “I hate you,” I mumbled.
“What, Miss Thatcher?”
“Thank you,” I said, sliding into a s
eat behind Sid.
Mr. Dobbins straightened his horrible jacket and paced around the room, looking for someone to embarrass. “Today we’re doing spelling. How many of you know how to spell the word ‘knee’? Rose Hobart, how about you?”
A petite girl with a brown braid down to her waist stood and cleared her throat. “Knee. N-E . . . E.”
“Wrong,” Dobbins said. He pointed to two students. “You next, then you when he gets it wrong.”
Two more boys misspelled “knee” before a nice-looking girl stood and gave it a try. She was in my row, all the way over to the right.
“That’s correct, Amy,” Mr. Dobbins said in a real snotty voice. “I must say, you’ve got excellent spelling skills for being the daughter of the town drunk.”
Immediately, I felt real bad for her. I knew what it was like to be stuck in a box because of who your daddy was.
Two seats in front of me, Tom Sawyer gave a nervous twittery chuckle at Mr. Dobbins’s mean words, like he wasn’t sure if it was a joke that required someone to acknowledge it. Nobody joined him, though, which meant he alone was laughing at that Amy girl.
I wadded up a tiny piece of paper and wet it with my tongue the way Jon had showed me, then tucked my index finger around it. Raising my hand to my mouth real casual, I leaned to the left to avoid Sid and made it look like maybe I was just scratching my chin while I took in a solid breath and blew hard.
I got Tom Sawyer right on the ear. He howled like that tiny wad of paper was the sharpest thing in the world. It was so satisfying that I made a note to search for a stinkbug to put in his desk. The spitball was for that girl. I still owed Tom Sawyer for tattling on me.
I must’ve let a laugh escape, because Amy leaned forward and smiled at me, kinda shy. She had wonderful auburn hair, part red and part brown, and it was brushed ever so nice and pulled half back with a green ribbon. I smiled back.
Then she did something that made me like her an awful lot. She winked at me, and stuck her tongue in Tom Sawyer’s direction.
The sticking-out tongue made me think that maybe, just maybe, she was the kind of girl who would partner up with me to take on Sid’s witchy bet.
Jon, I think I found a friend.
By lunchtime I was missing those cookies something awful, but I saw Dobbins lock his desk drawer with a fancy key before he left for the outhouse. Boys and girls filed outside and found themselves cool spots under shade trees or at a few picnic tables. Tom Sawyer shuffled around his brother’s group of friends until they shooed him off with jeers and a few well-aimed pebbles.
Sid smiled and gestured me over, but I thought it best to try to sit with girls. Miss Ada and Mama would say that was the right thing to do, and I really didn’t want to make Daddy look bad by being too friendly with boys. It was hard, though, because those boys had cards out, and I do love a game of cards.
Three girls sat at a table that had an open space on one side. Two of them were the Green twins, who looked exactly alike down to their matching sunbonnets. They sat across from a beanpole of a girl whose yellow hair was done in two braids like mine. She had blue ribbons at the ends of hers. My mind drifted to the dresser at home, where I’d left two good white ribbons. Didn’t wear them, because I didn’t want to seem too fancy.
Darn if I didn’t wish I had those ribbons in my hair now.
Taking a deep breath, I walked over only to have the beanpole girl scoot her behind to block me.
“Seat’s taken,” she stated matter-of-factly.
I recognized her from church the day before. She’d worn a white embroidered frock and shiny black dress shoes. With her thin scowly lips and all her features squished together, she looked just like a pinchy-faced toad I caught on Jon’s fishing pole once. Her mother was a bigger version of toad and had spoken nicely to Daddy before glaring at my church shoes, which were the opposite of shiny.
One of the twins looked at the behind-scooting girl. “Seat’s taken by who, Ruth? Nobody was sitting there.”
Ruth ignored her and jabbed a finger toward the stream. “Why don’t you go sit with Amy Lawrence? Her daddy being the town drunk and your daddy being the town judge, you’re bound to run into each other soon enough.” She smiled sweetly, but her eyes stayed as mean as a trapped raccoon. “Oh, and her mama’s dead and I hear your brother’s dead, so you can talk about dead people too.”
My face got hot at that business. “I do believe you’ve earned a spot on my special list,” I told her.
Her pinchy eyes turned to squinty slits. “What list is that?”
“I reckon you’ll find out,” I said, raising my eyebrows with a hint of mysteriousness. Jon would’ve been proud that I used his favorite threat.
I gripped my satchel and walked close to where Amy sat under a trio of cottonwoods. I was determined to be friendly and make her like me as much as I liked her. Amy Lawrence was mourning a family death too. Between that and our mutual dislike for Tom Sawyer and Mr. Dobbins, I was becoming more and more certain of our destiny to be great friends and partners for the witchy bet.
Settling my nerves, Amy brightened at my approach and patted the ground next to her. “I’ve been hoping you’d come sit with me. I’ve liked you since you shot that spitball at Tom Sawyer.”
“You have?” That warmed me up like a sunrise. There isn’t hardly anything more nice than someone telling you they like you for who you are. “I saw you stick your tongue out. That was risky.”
“I don’t care. Mr. Dobbins is . . .”
“He’s a meanie,” I finished. “I think his black hair grease is seeping into his brain and heart.”
She giggled. “He used to be the town dentist, but jabbed people too hard in the mouth, so nobody went to him anymore. Old teacher left town, so Mr. Dobbins was offered the post, him being educated and all. He hates the fact that he has to be a teacher now.”
“I’m not overly fond of him being a teacher either.”
We sat chewing, me on cheese and tomato slices and her on cold ham, cornbread, and hardboiled eggs. I was trying to raise the subject of whether she’d like to come over to my house for a visit, but was afraid I’d say something that would make her not want to be my friend.
“My cat just had kits. Five of them.” Amy wiped her mouth with a napkin, reminding me to pull mine out.
I searched my brain for something equally impressive. “Miss Ada says we need more hens, so she’s letting the chicken have chicks.”
“Oh my, I love a chick. Until they poop on you, that is,” Amy said, giggling.
To my surprise, a giggle slipped out of me, too. “You can come over and meet them when they hatch, if you want.”
She clapped twice, smiled, and took a bite of egg. “I would love to,” she said, spraying me with a few egg flicks. “I haven’t been invited to anyone’s house for—” She stopped talking and her face fell, like she’d said something wrong. She studied her hands, then peeked at me with big, blinking eyes.
“Good, that’s settled,” I told her, and dug through my satchel until I found a molasses cookie. Breaking it, I grandly handed Amy the bigger half. “Here you go. Amy Lawrence, I think that you and I were meant to be friends.”
Looking up, she gave me a shy grin. “And I think St. Petersburg just got a whole lot more tolerable.” She let out a small hiccup and pointed. “I declare, I think Sid Sawyer and Joe Harper are coming this way.”
The sight of Sid and his shaggy-headed friend walking along the streambed made me remember the witchy bet. The next question I wanted to ask Amy might break our delicate thread of friendship, but I needed to know. “Amy, do you reckon we’re too old to be having adventures?”
Amy’s glower and shaking head were a beautiful thing to behold. “No! My daddy leaves me alone most nights. I’d be having adventures all the time if I had someone to have ’em with.”
My sigh of blessed relief left me nearly breathless. I could only smile.
“But sometimes I need to stay home and take care of him,” s
he said. “He just gets sad and then gets sick from too much drink, but it’s all on account of my mama dying. He’s a good daddy.”
I nodded, looking down at the streambed. Joe and Sid seemed to be arguing about something or other. I didn’t feel like telling about Mama’s sadness. Whiskey for men was one thing, but a mama who ignored you was quite another. “If your daddy gets in trouble, I’ll tell my daddy to go easy.”
Amy’s eyes got shiny. “Would you?” She had a happy, trembly look about her and held out a pinky finger. “Becky Thatcher, I know we practically just met and all, but will you be my best friend?”
Putting out my own pinky finger, I smiled so big it hurt. It’s nice that those kind of things transferred with different towns, because I knew just what to do. Shaking pinkies wasn’t nearly as dramatic as my blood pact with Bill Chaney back in Riley, but girl friendship pacts were more likeable in a way. We linked fingers.
“Amy Lawrence,” I said, “I vow my eternal loyalty to our friendship and will never abandon you for the likes of anyone. I also promise to make a sworn enemy of anyone talking badly about you or your daddy.”
She smiled back. “That was awful nice. Becky Thatcher, I will . . .” She frowned.
“Vow eternal loyalty—”
“Yes! I will vow eternal loyalty to our friendship and make an enemy of anyone who doesn’t like you.”
“A sworn enemy,” I reminded her.
“A sworn enemy,” she repeated.
We shook and wiped lunch crumbs off our laps just as Sid Sawyer joined us. Joe stayed at the stream, throwing sticks at the water.
“Hello, Becky. Amy.”
Amy gave a little wave. “Hello, Sid.”
“Look here.” He held out a few torn papers no bigger than a playing card and what looked like ragged bits of dried grass. “Found it behind the schoolhouse. Pile of burned matches, too.”
“Tobacco!” My declaration caused a few heads to whip around.
“Shh! Somebody’s been smoking behind there.”
