First Came the Owl

by Judith Benét Richardson

  “Do you have … a book about Thailand?” asked Nita.

  “Look in the low 900s,” said the librarian, pointing to the nonfiction section.

  Nita went off to the back shelves, where Anne was looking at science books. “Anne,” Nita whispered, after a short search, “you’ll never believe this.” She held out the book she had found: Talking of Thailand.

  “Neat,” said Anne. “Are you going to do your report on Thailand?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Look up those houses,” said Anne. “You know, that the Captain talked about.”

  And there it was, on page 50: “spirit houses.” Nita sat down on the floor and started to read. It was as if she already knew a lot of things in this book, things she had known once and had forgotten.

  Here was the lizard she remembered, here was the story of the two quarreling children. There was even a recipe for the peanut sauce her Mom sometimes made!

  “Anne, I even found out how my parents got married. Mom was a ‘war bride.’” Nita stuffed her book in her backpack.

  “But I still want to know about those spirit houses.”

  “This book says the houses keep bad spirits away from your house. But Captain Pudge says the houses are for good spirits. I’ll have to ask Ma-jah what she thinks, if … she’ll talk,” said Nita. What if Ma-jah doesn’t talk? The warm glow of her excitement began to ebb. Her confused feeling was creeping in like fog as she and Anne came out onto the stone steps of the library. She looked at the sky. It was a dull, low gray with not a—Splat! A snowball landed on the front of her jacket.

  Up ahead, Henry jumped up and down like a lunatic. He clasped his hands over his head and congratulated himself on his awesome aim.

  Nita ran down the steps and molded some snow in her mittened hands. Paf! She landed her snowball in the middle of Henry’s back as he turned and ran. Suddenly, the day seemed brighter. Another snowball at the ready, Nita ran along the path toward school.

  * * *

  Nita had her book under her arm as she headed for the Coast Guard base after school. A seaman near the gate told her where to wait for Lieutenant Cooper, who was going to take her to the radio room. Nita sat on a chair covered with shiny red plastic and looked at Talking of Thailand. On the cover was a picture of a canal boat loaded with food, cooking pans, firewood, and other things for sale. Very different from the boats in Maushope’s Landing.

  “Hi, Nita!” said Lieutenant Cooper’s cheery voice, and zip! Nita was back from Thailand, in the Landing, at the door of the radio room on the Coast Guard base.

  The radio room was filled with the sound of crackling voices from the ceiling speakers. Computers, radio equipment, and file drawers marked SECRET crowded the small space, but it was made homey by a vacuum cleaner in the corner and a banana on the desk. A mirror with stars and stripes on the frame hung on the wall.

  Nita shook hands with the radio operator when Lieutenant Cooper introduced her.

  “Sit here and hold this,” he said, “and push this button when you want to talk.”

  “Sqwaaaak Coast Guard Cutter Islandia 02 screech over,” said the radio.

  The radio operator said into the microphone, “This is Coast Guard Group Maushope’s Landing. Over.”

  “Nita!” Dad’s voice boomed out of the speaker. “How’s my girl? Over.”

  “Dad!” said Nita. Then she remembered to push the button on the microphone. “Where are you?”

  Silence.

  “Remember to say ‘over,’” said Lieutenant Cooper.

  “Over.”

  “We’re near Boston. But we’re having a little trouble with the … whoosh. Crackle.”

  “Bad connection,” said the radio operator. “There’s a storm up there. Tell him your news. I think he can read us.”

  “I’m okay,” said Nita. Then, in a rush, she went on, “And Captain … Vanderpost and me and Anne have a plan called the Roots Committee. I’m going to speak Thai to Mom. Over.”

  “Speak Thai? What for? Her English is perfect.”

  “I’ll explain it when you get here. When are you coming back?”

  There was a long, echoing silence.

  “Over.”

  “Love you, kiddo.” Dad’s voice wavered close and then far away, as if winds were blowing it around over the Atlantic.

  “Love you, Dad. Come. Back. Home. Over.”

  Whooooosh. Crackle. Did the winds waft them a faint “O.K.”?

  “I think he reads you,” said the radio operator.

  Lieutenant Cooper gave Nita the thumbs-up sign. “I think you got your message through, loud and clear.”

  It’s as hard as talking to someone on another planet to get your parents to listen to you sometimes, thought Nita. “He sounds a lot farther away than Boston,” she muttered. The lieutenant smiled sympathetically.

  Nita said good-bye to Lieutenant Cooper and the radioman and plodded back up the hill to the school and her rehearsal.

  Fifteen

  “PLACES!” called Amy.

  “Faces!” called Henry, pulling his eyes sideways so he looked at Nita out of little slits.

  Is he making fun of my face again? Nita glared at him.

  Pete held the cardboard mirror in front of Henry, who was now making a pig face by pushing up his nose.

  “What an ugly pig I see

  Snow White will never marry thee”

  said Pete.

  Henry laughed and made an even worse face by pulling the sides of his mouth up with his thumbs and the corners of his eyes down with his first fingers, meanwhile sticking out his tongue.

  Amy stood with her hands on her hips, moving her lips as though she were counting to ten to keep her patience. “This is what I get for practicing in the kindergarten room, I guess,” she said. “Let’s get started if you’re finished with the baby act.”

  Nita stood outside the wooden window frame. It was set on one of the little tables to suggest the dwarfs’ house. The dwarfs hung around their house, getting ready for work.

  “Sssst. Nita!” Pete pointed to where she should go.

  Nita stepped into the dwarfs’ house.

  “Oooooh,” said the dwarf named Sloppy. “Ooooh, look! A beautiful girl!”

  “Where did you come from?” asked Grouchy.

  “I came from … the Palace. They left me in the woods to die,” said Snow White, and her voice trembled. The dwarfs clustered around her with extra sweaters and pretend cups of cocoa.

  Amy put her first finger and thumb together and flashed an approving sign at Nita.

  Then the dwarfs pulled on their hats and marched off to work, singing, “Heigh ho, heigh ho, we think it’s going to snow!”

  Snow White took her broom and swept the floor. She hummed the dwarfs’ song. She glanced out the window. Who was that? A bent old woman hobbled down the front path.

  The disguised Queen wore gloves to hide her fabulous fingernails. “Come out, my pretty, and see what I have for you,” she quavered. She pulled ribbons and laces out of her sack.

  And so, as the play went on, Snow White fell for the old crone’s suggestions, and first she was laced too tight, then she was poisoned with a poisoned comb. After each visit the dwarfs came home and revived her, warning her not to be so trusting.

  But the old crone tricked Snow White a third time. The poison apple looked delicious.

  “No,” said Snow White, “no, thank you.” She remembered how she had been laced up so tight she couldn’t breathe. Take nothing from strangers.

  “Oh,” said the old crone, “you seem so lonely here in the woods where no apple trees grow. Look, I’ll take a bite myself.” Juice ran down her chin as she crunched into the apple. “The rest is for you.”

  Snow White couldn’t stop herself. She reached her hand through the window. The apple felt cool in her hand and the taste was tangy. But as soon as the bite of apple slid down her throat, she swooned to the floor, as if dead. The floor was hard on her back and her nose itched from
chalk dust that drifted down from the blackboard tray.

  The Queen ripped off her gloves and danced around outside the dwarfs’ house. Then she ran back to the castle to look in her Mirror.

  “Mirror, mirror, on the wall

  Who is the fairest one of all?”

  “You, unfortunately,” said the Mirror. It made a face at the Queen.

  “Great,” said Amy. “Now, we have one last scene for today. Nita, you were terrific. Come on over here.”

  It took Nita a minute to realize that Amy was talking to her. She still felt like Snow White. She almost felt dead. She moved slowly over to Amy’s side and brushed some chalk dust from her arm.

  David and Petrova carried in the coffin and helped Nita get inside. “Don’t roll onto the sides,” said Petrova. “It’s not stuck together all that tight.”

  Nita lay down in the clear plastic coffin and David closed the lid. Nita knew there were air holes, because she could see them, but she felt suffocated all the same. She saw Amy’s mouth moving and heard her say something, but she couldn’t make out the words. She lay very still and tried to breathe so the audience wouldn’t notice, and she imagined an owl outside on a tree branch or perched on the classroom flag holder. Bemoaning her.

  Is this how Ma-jah feels? As if there is a wall of plastic between her and the rest of the world? Shut off from the world, she can’t hear, can’t speak, and can only see people out there through the plastic glass? That’s it, exactly. Mom has somehow gotten out of this regular world and now she can’t get back in.

  The coffin wobbled. Nita pressed her hands against the sides so she wouldn’t roll as the dwarfs heaved the coffin onto their shoulders. “Stop!” Nita yelled, but no one seemed to hear her.

  “Oh woe, oh woe, it’s through the woods we go!” sang the dwarfs, stomping their boots.

  Nita slid toward her head and then her feet inside the plastic box. “Put me down!” she yelled. Then she sat up, banging her head against the lid, and bursting out of the coffin. The dwarfs stopped stomping and the coffin lurched.

  Nita crashed onto the table on her hands and knees.

  “Okay, don’t have a heart attack,” said Anne.

  “Guess that poison apple got unstuck from her throat,” offered Henry from the sidelines.

  “Rehearsal’s over!” called Amy. “You’ll get used to it, Nita.”

  Not ever, thought Nita. I won’t get used to it, and I won’t let Ma-jah get used to it, either.

  Sixteen

  “YOU SURE yelled,” said Anne, as they trudged up the hill in the dark to the Still-waters’ house. “I never heard you yell before.”

  “I did yell loud, didn’t I?” said Nita, stomping through the slush. “But it was just so awful, feeling stuck in there! I didn’t even yell like that when I fell through the ice.”

  “Maybe you should have,” said Anne. “Maybe I’d have heard you and we could have helped.”

  “I always hate yelling. But in the coffin, it made me feel better.”

  “I bet! I wouldn’t like to get in that coffin!”

  The two girls shivered in the dark.

  Anne’s house looked as cozy as the dwarfs’ cottage when the girls got closer and could see through the front windows. A light shone out into the cold street and they could see Mrs. S. in the kitchen window.

  They burst into the warm front hall, shedding coats and boots. “I’m starving,” called Anne, as usual.

  “So come and help me,” her mother called back. Then Nita remembered that tonight Mrs. S. was going to take her to the hospital again to see Ma-jah. Nita’s strong, bursting-out-of-the-coffin feeling began to slip away. But maybe she’s better, Nita told herself. I’ll take my owl cutout and tell her about the play. Nita went out on the sun porch to get her shadow puppet, which she had glued to a stick.

  “Nita!” called Mrs. S. “Better come now, dear, we’re going to eat.” She gave Nita a questioning look. “Are you okay? Did you talk to your Dad?”

  “I talked to him, and I tried to talk to him about Mom, but I’m not sure he heard me,” said Nita. “It’s hard talking on the radio.” As she began to eat her soup, she wondered what Ma-jah was like when she was eleven years old. When Ma-jah was my age, she thought, was she like me? It was hard to imagine a girl in Thailand being the same as herself. A girl who grew up on a mango farm and went to shadow puppet shows and then married a tall, pale person in the Coast Guard at the Loran station in Thailand. That’s what acting did—it made you think what it would be like to be someone else.

  The drive to the hospital seemed even longer tonight. Nita watched the dark sky flow by the tops of the even darker trees.

  After the dark drive, the lights in the hospital were very bright and the air was hot. Mrs. S. wandered off toward the waiting room with a preoccupied look, her mind probably already on the pile of papers in her briefcase.

  Nita clutched her owl cutout, took a deep breath, and pushed open the door.

  Mom was up! At least, she was sitting in a chair.

  “Mo—Ma-jah?” said Nita softly. She walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. Mom still seemed far away. But she looked at Nita and smiled a little smile. Then she reached over and took Nita’s hand. Their two hands lay together on the bedspread, and for a few minutes no words were needed.

  The changed feeling in the air was as delicate as a gauzy fabric that might tear if a loud voice or a sudden movement cut through it. Nita kept her voice soft and low as she began. “Once upon a time, there was a queen.…”

  She told the whole story.

  Ma-jah even smiled at the dwarfs’ song.

  Finally, Snow White lay in her coffin.

  When the owl cutout flew in and swooped down toward Snow White, Ma-jah’s breath hissed in. She was not looking at the puppet but at the shadow on the wall.

  “Owls are bad luck,” she whispered.

  “I don’t think so. Really! This is the owl that came to bemoan Snow White. It feels sorry for her.” Nita moved so the shadow was not on the wall. Still, Ma-jah turned her head away.

  “No, don’t,” said Nita urgently. “Listen! And then came the raven, but at last came the dove. And it’s a real mystery, too,” Nita went on, “because I saw a terrific snowy owl, and Petrova and I even banded it! And I found a black feather on the floor to point the way for Snow White—maybe it was a raven feather. But we haven’t seen the dove.”

  Nita’s voice died away. She remembered the dove’s sad call that almost made her cry when Anne imitated it. Ma-jah had talked, but now Nita was afraid she would slip back into silence, like a fish that came to the surface and then sank down again, back into the deeps.

  Nita couldn’t help it, she felt so sad that she heard her own voice whisper, “I wish you would come home.”

  Ma-jah looked at Nita. She didn’t turn away. She didn’t close her eyes. Then she said, in the most normal voice, as if she had never had a problem in the world, “The only doves I remember in the Landing live under the railroad bridge in the ferry parking lot. Doves … are pigeons.”

  Nita gave a little snort of laughter. “And no one can park their car in that part of the lot because the birds are so messy. I hope that pigeon is not going to mess up Snow White’s nice plastic coffin.”

  Ma-jah’s brown eyes looked into Nita’s. Was there a twinkle of laughter in her eyes for just a second?

  “I’ll get the dove to sit near my enemy, Henry,” Nita said. Her smile grew bigger. “My enemy, the Prince.”

  Then Ma-jah leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

  “I think she’s going to sleep,” said Mrs. S. quietly. When had she crept in? Mrs. S. beckoned to Nita, who tiptoed out into the hall, carrying her owl puppet.

  “That was really nice. I bet your mom loved it.”

  “Did you hear her talk? She talked to me!”

  “That’s wonderful,” Mrs. S. said, and squeezed Nita’s arm.

  “I think she was even trying to cheer me up. So, can she come home
now?”

  “Oh, the doctor will have to decide.”

  Nita looked back at Ma-jah’s door. Ma-jah was still in there, stuck in her glass coffin, but at least now she had talked through the breathing holes.

  Mrs. S. and Nita drove through the dark night back to Maushope’s Landing.

  “Do you think they’ll let her come home soon?” Nita asked again. “Do you think she’ll come to the play?”

  “Well, it would be nice.” But Mrs. S. didn’t say, “Yes, of course.”

  As they came into town, Nita could see the flash of the lighthouse. Suddenly she longed for her own room, for Dad polishing his shoes, and the smell of curry coming from the kitchen. Maybe soon she could be back there.

  When they got to the Stillwaters’ house, Nita rushed past Bill and Petrova, who were working on the owl model at the card table. She hurried up the stairs and flopped down on the end of Anne’s bed.

  “Guess what? Mom talked!”

  “Oh, Nita, that’s so nice. What’d she say?” Anne put her finger in the orange fairy-tale book to hold her place.

  “She was scared of the owl for a second, but she made a joke about the dove! She said they’re like the pigeons under the railroad bridge, the ones that make such a mess.”

  Anne laughed. “So that’s the famous dove.”

  “I’m going to make the dove sit over Henry in the play.”

  “Good idea. And then in real life, we’ll be like the wicked queen and say, ‘Oh, Henry, wouldn’t you like to take a nice walk with us, under the railroad bridge?’ Anyway, I’m glad you’re here. Dad and Petrova are being awful.”

  “What did they do?”

  “Oh, they made me do math for hours. And they said mean things about my rock report because I found out some neat stuff about the native Americans, the first people who lived around here. There are stones that they carved, but Dad and Petrova call them ventifacts and say the wind did it. Plus, they laughed when Henry called up.”

  “Henry called up? On the phone?”

  “Well, how else would he call? Oh, sorry, Nita, I’m not mad at you.” Anne bounced up in bed and the orange fairy-tale book fell on the floor. “You should’ve seen Petrova dancing around, saying, ‘Annie has a boyfriend, Annie has a boyfriend.’ And Dad laughed! I hate them. And anyway, Henry’s your stupid prince.”