by Trish Mercer
The new educational director over Edge arrived several weeks later, after Jaytsy’s 2nd birthday. Perrin brought Mahrree the news that Karna had met the newest arm of Idumea to punch into Edge and escorted him to his new office at the site of Mahrree’s old school. Mahrree decided to give him a fair chance by letting him get settled for two weeks before he encountered the wrath of Mrs. Shin.
Besides, Perrin wouldn’t let her meet him until Mahrree promised she would be polite and present the name of Shin properly.
And no, that didn’t mean she could go wearing a sword or a hidden long knife.
It was a beautiful Planting Season afternoon when Mahrree left her two children napping while Mrs. Hersh sat at the house, so she could meet Mr. Hegek. Mahrree needed to know, after all, what her After School Care boys would be tested on in the next year. That was the excuse she could give, in order to bypass demanding to know what terrible things the Administrators had done to education.
When she pounded on the thin wooden door of the office and opened it, she wasn’t quite prepared for what she found.
“Can I help you, ma’am?” asked a timid voice from behind a pile of papers.
Mahrree peered into the shack, the one in which she and Perrin had shared a kiss the day after they were engaged. A too-large desk was crammed in there, and the walls were now lined precariously with stacks of pages, not rakes and spades.
“I certainly hope so,” she said crisply, craning her neck to find the person that belonged to the mousy voice. “I understand the Administrators have decided to tell us what our children should be learning in Edge. I’d like to see a copy of the plans.”
Mahrree evaluated the man who peeked cautiously between two stacks to see her. Mr. Hegek was perhaps in his mid-thirties and only slightly larger than Mahrree, with black hair that could be ratty if not constantly combed, a nose too pointy, green eyes that were far too small for his head, and arms not much thicker than hers.
Yes, she could like take him in a fistfight. Perrin had taught her a few defensive moves that could easily turn offensive.
He raised his eyebrows as he searched his desk overflowing with stacks. “Of course, of course,” he said cheerily, which grated on Mahrree’s ears. “I have them here somewhere.” He stood up and looked through folders and pages. “And what age is your child?”
“I don’t have any in school yet. My oldest won’t be ready for another four years. I’m planning for the future.”
Mr. Hegek stopped searching his desk and slowly looked up. “Then why are you worrying about it now?”
Mahrree smiled as sweetly as she could, although her eyes were poisonous. “Shouldn’t I be worried about what all children in our village are learning?” Her voice dripped syrup. “As a concerned citizen, I should be aware of what my future shopkeepers, lumberjacks, and weavers are being taught, shouldn’t I?”
He stood fully—but shortly, Mahrree noted with hostile approval—and looked her in the eye. “I suppose so. Only I haven’t heard anyone expressing interest yet. I’m not sure I can give you a copy.”
“No parents have expressed interest?” She was stunned. Just as recently as three years ago, the last time Mahrree started a new school year, she was being briefed by her students’ parents on what they expected her to teach their children. Now complete strangers were deciding what their children should learn, and not one parent was concerned what that might be? To have so much trust in leaders they didn’t know . . .
Mahrree struggled to remain sweet while a bitter taste grew in her mouth. “So why can’t I have a copy?”
“They’re for the parents,” he shrugged. “Of children in school now,” he clarified.
“And no other parents have come in inquiring about their children’s education?”
Mr. Hegek, perhaps recognizing he was not much larger than Mahrree, tried to look a little taller. “Well, none so far—”
She sharpened her glare. “When did the parents first hear about the new lessons?”
“Perhaps five or six weeks ago.” His stature slowly began to shrink.
“And how long have you been here, with the copies of those lessons?”
“Two weeks now,” he melted.
“And in that time no one’s come for a copy? How many do you have?”
Mr. Hegek cleared his throat. “Forty. I believe.”
Mahrree gave him half of a genuine smile. “Certainly you can sacrifice one copy for me, then?”
“Look, Mrs. . . . Mrs. . . ?”
Time to represent the name properly, but likely not in the way Perrin intended. “Shin,” she said as heavily as an army.
Mr. Hegek’s eyes grew big as he shriveled another two inches. “As in Captain Shin? High General Shin?”
Mahrree smiled fully, thoroughly enjoying the effect. “As in Mrs. Mahrree Shin, but yes, some connection there. You see, I taught in the past before my first baby was born, and I most likely will return to teaching someday—”
She didn’t elaborate to say, In my home, teaching only my children.
“—and I merely want to know what to expect in the future. I also tutor ten boys.”
“Of course, of course,” Mr. Hegek said nervously. “For you, Mrs. Shin, I’m sure I can make an exception.” He rummaged around his desk for another moment, held up a finger in remembrance, and turned to a large crate next to his desk. He pulled up several thick documents. “Do you want the full version for parents, or the shortened version for the teachers?”
“Two versions?” Mahrree stared wide-eyed at the volume of papers involved for one year’s planning of school. She could usually keep all that she was going to do with her students summarized on two sheets of parchment.
Mr. Hegek shrugged apologetically.
Mahrree sighed. “I’m feeling ambitious. Give me the full version.” Why the parents received a larger version than the teachers made her intensely suspicious.
Mr. Hegek smiled as he handed it to her. “It’s really quite progressive, as you can see. Lots of pages.”
“Mm-hmm,” she said dubiously as she eyed the document stamped on thin papers. “And as everyone knows, volume certainly must connote quality, therefore progressiveness.”
He beamed in agreement.
She groaned to herself, rapidly losing faith in the Administrators’ man who didn’t notice her sarcasm. “And what have you thought of it so far?” she asked as she thumbed through the dense text.
“Uh, well, I uh . . .”
Mahrree looked up at him critically.
“I, uh, haven’t read it all yet,” he confessed. “Quite a bit to do around here reorganizing all the schools, you see . . .”
“I guess that’s why you have the Weeding Break, right? To catch up on all this light reading?”
He coughed a tense laugh. “Yes, of course.”
Mahrree nodded. “How about I read through it and bring you a report in a few weeks? Give you a head start on the project.”
Mr. Hegek gave her a real smile. “That would be most welcome, Mrs. Shin. I’d appreciate hearing your reaction to the new lessons.”
“I’m sure you will.”
---
Mahrree sat down the next afternoon when her children were napping, filled with eager anticipation to begin studying the thick stack of papers.
She got as far as page three before she fell asleep.
And she wasn’t even that tired.
That evening she asked Perrin to read it without telling him about her failure to endure all sixty-two pages. He got to page two before he began rubbing his eyes.
“What is this?” he exclaimed, tossing it on the table. He picked it back up and read in his most official voice. “‘Resolved: That the youngest children, youngest being those who turn six by the appropriate date established by the Director of Instruction or the local Director of School Regions, whichever authority is recognized at the date of inception of school during that present year, shall be taught in the methods and facts of numerals wh
ich designate values to assigned qualities, and the grouping of such numerals and the removal of such numerals.’”
He threw the pages on the table in disgust and gave her a look that demanded explanation.
She had one. It had taken her a few minutes, but by her fifth attempt she began to understand. “I think it means, ‘Six year-olds will learn how to add and subtract numbers.’”
Perrin picked up the papers again and read through the sentence with battling subjects once more He slowly shook his head. “Then why not just say that?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.” Mahrree sat down across from him. “You speak Idumean, don’t you? Skip to page three, at the bottom. That one’s my favorite. Then again, that’s only as far as I’ve read,” she admitted.
Perrin turned the pages and cleared his throat. “I feel like I should be wearing a red coat and some ruffles . . . ah, here we go. ‘Resolved—’” He stopped. “What’s with this ‘resolved’ nonsense? All right, I know, I know—just read it. ‘Resolved: that the upper level students, those being students within the ages of fourteen and seventeen, including those that turn seventeen within the school year but have not yet completed the full educational program, therefore remaining in the school until it terminates for the school year—’”
Perrin paused to catch his breath and roll his eyes.
“‘—will be instructed in the memorization and commitment to the mind of facts—’ don’t those phrases mean the same thing?”
Mahrree nodded. “But you’ll never finish the sentence at this rate,” she pointed out.
He shrugged in acknowledgment. “‘—of facts concerning all matters of historical significance, whether real or perceived—’”
He raised his eyebrows at her.
She motioned for him to keep going and yawned dramatically.
He grinned and continued. “‘—whether real or perceived, but rather focusing on those matters more real such that the students may recall the issues committed to memory in a comprehensive and all encompassing—’”
He decided not to comment on that redundancy in an effort to finally get to the end of the sentence.
“‘—final test to determine their ability to progress from one age level to another, notwithstanding their age at the time of taking the final test.’ Whew! Explanation?”
Mahrree said in a bored tone, “Teens memorize the facts. Spit them out on a test. If they pass, they move on.”
Perrin skimmed through the sentence again. “Impressive. Should the ancient spy groups that the founders of Idumea created ever resurface, I can use you to break their codes.”
She smiled. “Try the next one. I’m sure you can figure it out. All you need to do is add about five extraneous words for each important one.”
“Let’s see, ‘The practice of deliberating and analyzing issues to the extent of establishing conclusions, intended or accidental, shall, in the interest of maintaining efficiency and eliminating ambiguity, no longer be of necessity within the studies of various subjects, specifically those subjects addressing accepted historical essentials and acknowledged scientific developments.’”
He stopped and stared. “You thought I could figure that one out? I’m flattered. Can you give me a few minutes?”
“Of course. I’ll give you a hint if you want.”
“Not yet,” he said leaning over it as if it were a complicated math puzzle. “Let me see . . . ‘deliberating and analyzing issues’ . . . could mean . . . establishing conclusions . . . is this debating?”
“Very good. Now the next part.”
“Establishing conclusions, maintaining efficiency, eliminating ambiguity, well if they really wanted to eliminate ambiguity—” But he shook his head and continued, “‘no longer be of necessity . . .’”
He stopped.
“Whoa.”
He looked up at Mahrree with sudden understanding.
“Debates are not needed,” he said. “They take up too much time and confuse students.” He checked the pages again. “So no debates about history and science?”
“You cracked that faster than I did.”
“I’m in the army, remember? Sometimes we use ambiguity in messages that have the remote chance of falling into the wrong hands. Or be read by nosy privates. Or Administrators,” he smiled ruefully. “My father and I have been sending each other messages about ‘the weather’ for years. But we’ve never used ambiguous verbiage this ambitiously. Ugh. Now I’m starting to sound like them.”
“Apparently all historical evidence has already been ‘accepted’ and needs no more interpretation,” she told him, “and all scientific developments are ‘acknowledged’ and need no more theories.”
Perrin stared at the sentence again as if trying to understand a mooing horse. “But this only applies to the upper aged students, right?” His eyebrows furrowed. “Or . . . is the sky always going to be blue in Edge?”
“I don’t know. I still have fifty-nine pages to go,” she said gloomily.
Perrin cringed. “You really don’t have to do this. You’re not teaching this, and no one’s asked you to read it.”
She sat up taller. “If I don’t read it, who will? No parents have expressed interest, yet. At all!” Her eyes turned stony with determination. “The poor director had a glazed look in his eyes when I asked him what he thought of it. I hate to admit it, but he only seems like an overwhelmed and slightly clueless man. Not administrative at all. We might be able to work with him. He seemed quite grateful for my assistance.” She shook her head. “Perrin, if I don’t figure out what our children might have to eventually learn, who will?”
Perrin’s eyes softened as hers hardened. “That’s why I married you, isn’t it? Read it. Find out. We can ask Corporal Zenos to come by to watch the children and give you some uninterrupted time. You need to get to the bottom of this.”
Mahrree spent a couple of hours for the next several days staring at the baffling language, deciphering the ridiculously long sentences, and musing as to why nothing was plainly stated. Sometimes Jaytsy and Peto napped, or Shem took them for a walk so she could concentrate in silence. But sometimes it didn’t matter if she was undisturbed or not. The entire document was completely ludicrous.
So ludicrous that one afternoon she could no longer fight the urge anymore.
She wrote a third letter.
As per and in reference to the previously distributed documents detailing the declarations in educational developments—
She was sure someone among the skimmers might enjoy her attempt at writing like the Administrators. Their lives must be so dismal, so dreary.
—I am moved by concern and interest and a sense of duty to the children, offspring, and descendants of the world to express my thoughts and ideas about the aforementioned document.
Perhaps, she reasoned, if she wrote like them then someone might actually read it. Perhaps they simply couldn’t understand her previous letters, with her direct tone. They enjoyed repetition, redundancy, and the same thing being said in different ways in order to make sure the reader got the message on at least one of the attempts to communicate the ideas so critical to express in very long sentences with many irrelevant and unnecessary additions.
Besides, after reading their writing, she couldn’t formulate a sentence that didn’t take up at least three lines of parchment.
I am compelled to suggest and propose that the guidelines detailing and delineating what children will be taught and instructed in Full School be written more concisely, precisely, and nicely.
It was as contagious as a stomach ache, and just as nauseating. She did feel better once it was all up and out, though.
---
Two men sat in a dark room of an unlit building.
“I see she got a copy of your ‘test,’” Brisack couldn’t help but snort.
Mal was gripping the armrests of his chair. “She’s mocking us!” the old man snarled.
“Not us,” Brisa
ck pointed out. “But the Department of Instruction. Quite cleverly, too,” he grinned in appreciation. “Almost concisely, certainly precisely, and a bit saucily.” He bobbled his head, proud of his own construction.
Mal was not amused. “You can be replaced, you know.”
The doctor waved that out of the room. “Gadiman isn’t nearly as much fun as I am, and you know it.”
“How can you be so casual about this?” Mal exploded. “Don’t you see? She’s getting it!”
Brisack leaned forward. “Wasn’t that the point? To see if she did? But she still may give up, just like others have. The Department of Instruction hasn’t received any other letters besides this one,” he shook it. “Hers is the first, and maybe the only one. Everyone else has dropped out of your little test, Nicko. They concede they’re too stupid to understand. Great victory for the Administrator of Education!”
“I don’t appreciate your cynical tone, Doctor.”
Brisack scoffed. “What kind of tone did you expect? It is rubbish! Even you declared it so. And we’re pushing this forward anyway. Every school in the world is affected simply because you wanted to teach a lesson to an insignificant teacher in Edge.”
Mal firmed his grip on the armrests, as if they were real arms. “I’m not that narrow. You know full well this is for the best for everyone. As I said, we’re drowning many cats in one well.”
“Well, this cat is still swimming,” Brisack said, slapping the letter down on a side table. “And what will you do if she makes it to the top?”
“We’ll wait to see if she does,” Mal hissed. “In the meantime, form letter number one goes back to her. In four weeks.”
---
Three days after Mahrree sent off her third letter, Shem took the children but returned earlier than she expected. In one arm was a sleeping Peto, and in the wagon he was pulling, a snoring Jaytsy.
Mahrree went out to the front garden to help him bring them in. “How do you do that?” she whispered enviously as she took Peto from him.
He chuckled quietly as he scooped up Jaytsy and followed Mahrree into the house. They put the dozing children in their bedrooms and met again in the gathering room.
“Well, Zenos?” she demanded. “It’s mead, isn’t it? You get my babies drunk, don’t you?”
He groaned. “My secret’s out. Who told you, the barmaid at the inn your mother works for? One of your former students, is she? She looked deep into my eyes and said, ‘This is our little secret.’ But as my father said once, never trust a cross-eyed girl.”
Mahrree chuckled at his stoically solemn face that didn’t even twitch. “Seriously, how do you do it?”
“Well, I simply think very sobering thoughts, then I—”
“Not your face,” Mahrree laughed. “I mean, get the children to fall asleep!”
Corporal Zenos shrugged. “Just run them ragged, Mrs. Shin. Just like I do with the boys each week.”
“Well, so do I,” she groused, “but it never works. I’m the one always ready for a nap and they have more energy than ever. But Shem, thank you.”
“Anytime, ma’am. I really do enjoy playing with them. I’ll be on my way, then—”
“You don’t have to go already, do you?” Mahrree said. “I’ve hit a particularly difficult passage and I could really use a break. Care for pie?”
Shem didn’t mean to, but he licked his lips.
Mahrree pointed at his face. “I’ll take that as a yes. Sit down and relax a bit before you go back to the fort. I know you have the evening shift again.”
“I think I will,” he smiled as he pulled out a chair at the table. “Sometimes your children tire me out.”
“Only sometimes?” Mahrree grinned as she went to the kitchen. A few minutes later she came out with two plates of pie, and set the larger one before the corporal. She sat down next to him as he thumbed through the thick document.
“May I borrow this when you’re done? Sometimes I have a hard time getting to sleep when I get off duty in the middle of the night.”
“Might as well. Puts me to sleep in the middle of the day.”
Shem took a big bite of pie and shook his head as he skimmed a page. “Reads like the codes Poe told me he and the boys pass to each other during class. Usually about someone stinking like . . . well, never mind. This is odd,” he said, reading between bites. “If they mean, ‘All ages will learn to write coherently’, why don’t they write that coherently themselves?”
Mahrree leaned over to look at the passage he was referring to, and her mouth fell open. “How’d you figure that out so fast? That’s where I got stuck!”
Shem blushed. “Just . . . um . . . I don’t know.”
Mahrree squinted at him. “Don’t dismiss yourself, Shem. You’re exceptionally bright. I see it in you all the time.”
He turned even redder and took another bite of pie.
“Ever thought of going to Command School? You’d be an excellent officer. You could easily pass the entrance exam, I’m sure.”
“Oh, no, no . . .”
“If it’s a question of money, we could help you find a sponsor, and Perrin and I would love to—”
Shem shook his head vigorously. “Thank you, ma’am, but no thank you. I’m not officer material. And I could never bear to live in Idumea.”
“You are officer material, Zenos. My husband even said so, and he’s never wrong. It’d be for only three years, Shem. Two, if you pass the advanced intelligence exam, which shouldn’t be a problem for you. Then you could come back here and serve with Captain Shin. I’m sure my father-in-law would—”
She didn’t expect him to become so distressed. “Please, Mrs. Shin—you’re very kind, but . . . that’s not what I can do.”
She pursed her lips in disappointment. “Because of your father?”
Now Shem squinted. “My father?”
“He wouldn’t care for it?”
He smiled faintly. “That’s part of it. He told me I could join the army as long as I never went to Idumea. He hates the city. Really, I’m flattered, but after my two years here are up, I think I’ll be done with the army.”
Mahrree scrunched up her face. “That means I lose my baby tender and my favorite soldier, doesn’t it?”
He chuckled. “Maybe not. Mrs. Shin, it’s all too far in the future for me to worry about right now.”
“Hmm,” Mahrree said, picking at her pie. “It’s only next year so I’m worried about it now.”
Shem smiled at her and cleaned off his plate. “Uh, did the captain really say that? About me?”
Mahrree nodded. “Last week. Said even the older soldiers respect and listen to you, that you always make the best decisions, and . . .” She hesitated, but just couldn’t keep back the juiciest part: “he confessed you nearly beat him when the two of you were sparring last week. Wrestling or something?”
Shem burst into a grin, in spite of himself. “I did? Really?”
“But you didn’t hear that from me,” she chuckled. “He said you really keep him on his toes.”
Shem sat back in his chair. “No one beats the captain! I don’t know how he does it, but he always seems to be half a step ahead of everyone else, anticipates the movement right before it happens.
“But you know,” his eyes got a faraway look, “I thought I nearly had him. I finally got him into a hold and was ready to throw him to the ground, when suddenly he made this quick twist and the next thing I knew I was flat on my back looking up into his smirk.” He grimaced at the memory.
Mahrree elbowed him gently. “He claims no one’s faster than him. I guess that’s true?”
Shem nodded. “It’s true, all right. Although it’s become my goal to best him in something some day.” He looked at her worriedly. “I mean that respectfully, ma’am! I don’t mean—”
Mahrree laughed. “I know a little bit about men and competition, Shem. I think he’s made it his goal to never be bested by you! Perhaps you’ll have to stay in the army un
til you finally break him?”
Shem shook his head. “I don’t ever want to break him, ma’am. I just want to be as good as him, that’s all. He’s an unusual and remarkable man.”
Mahrree smiled. “Yes he is. And you know what, Shem? So are you.”
Shem turned purple. “Thank you,” he whispered and stood up abruptly. “I better let you get back to work.”
“Why do I get the feeling,” she eyed him critically, “that if I handed it to you, you’d be able to read and decipher it all in just minutes? When we first met you said I knew more than the average officer’s wife. But you know much more than the average corporal, don’t you, Shem Zenos? ”
He shook his head soberly. “I don’t know what possibly gave you that impression, Mrs. Shin. I thank you for the pie, ma’am.”
Mahrree drummed her fingers in thought about the reticent corporal for several minutes after he left, then reluctantly went back to her reading.
---
It took her a couple of weeks, but at the “bottom” of it all was a list she made to elucidate and disambiguate—
Clarify what the Administrators were advising. Whenever she got stuck or tired trying to decipher the intricately convoluted—
Needlessly complicated language, she asked Perrin for ideas, and also received a few more insights from Shem. She discovered that the changes in instruction were only an advisement—for now. In the nebulous “near future” it would all be compulsorily mandatory—
Unavoidable.
And in the end she wasn’t as infuriated with the findings as she thought she would be, much to her disappointment. She finished compiling the list one afternoon and had time to stare at the results. “Uncle” Shem had taken the children for a walk and she could think without interruption.
Some school subjects were, unfortunately, reduced and even eliminated, like practices in drawing and exposure to melodies. And there was a vague reference to a new civics and loyalty class she’d have to inquire about.
But she was reluctant to admit that a progressive set of guidelines might be a good idea. Every child would be exposed to the multiplication tables by age nine, and would read competently by age ten. And by seventeen each young adult would be readying for a job or a university.
And yet, it seemed strange that the so-called authorities in education assumed children of the same ages were at the same levels of learning. She’d never met two seven-year-olds—or seventeen-year-olds for that matter—that were at the same level of readiness as their peers.
It was almost as if those in the education department knew nothing of children and their development, which Mahrree suspected was the case. So the department dictating what to teach was a ludicrous as Mahrree advising farmers on how to weed. She’d never presume to tell those who actually worked in the dirt, who know each plant, and who observed the changes from day to day what they should be doing next.
But, she had to grudgingly acknowledge, this was an experiment—although experimenting on children struck her as appalling. No parents or teachers were consulted as far as she could tell.
She was also bothered by the idea that intellectual progress would now be measured by the ability to memorize and restate numbers, dates, and definitions, much of which struck Mahrree more as trivial than useful.
It was far more essential that students learned how to decide for themselves what was important, rather than rehearsing “accepted facts” and “ideas imperative to the good of the world” that could readily be looked up in a book. It was what was put into those books, and by whom, that required one to carefully think about it. What one couldn’t find in a book was a step-by-step procedure on how to analyze. And that was what schooling was supposed to do.
At least, that’s what it used to do.
Two more things troubled her. One was that the original document had been written so confusingly. She kept mulling over Perrin’s reasons for the garbled language: to keep the wrong sets of eyes from fully understanding.
But who would the Administrators want to confuse? She generously considered that they were trying to eliminate misreading, and maybe some overambitious—or perhaps lazy—legal advisors may have had a hand in it. But wouldn’t someone notice it was now incomprehensible? It didn’t make sense. She was missing something.
The other thing that saddened her was that the Administrators didn’t see a need for debate, at any age. The sky was officially blue in Edge. Sunsets would never be the same, and storms would never be noticed. She wondered if that development bothered her so much because she was so partial to debating. It was, after all, how she met her husband.
And even though she knew she shouldn’t, she derived a great deal of satisfaction in winning an argument. She still relished the day at the university when she reduced a legal student to blustering when she proved that men really weren’t needed in society except to propagate the species. Occasionally the women’s college interacted with the men’s portion of the university, and Mahrree had enjoyed the debating class that was co-educational. She intimidated every man there.
As she sat at her table, she wondered why she suddenly remembered that debate ten years earlier in Mountseen. Maybe the idea that a legal advisor had mucked up the document she just finished reading was what brought back the memory.
And that memory now hit her with unexpected shame.
Had she really felt that men were unnecessary? She certainly didn’t feel that way now, and hadn’t believed it then either, but she had just returned from another visit home. Her last words to her mother had been in a nasty argument about the need to find a husband. Even the long walk back to Mountseen didn’t reduce her anger. All of it had surfaced at that debate.
Mahrree sat up as a terrible realization occurred to her. She’d argued for a point that she didn’t really believe in, and had won.
She tried to remember how many people had attended that debate where she demonstrated to a young man that he wasn’t anywhere near ready to argue before the Administrator of Law. Mahrree closed her eyes again in mortification.
Several dozens—maybe even a hundred—students had heard her manipulate information and twist definitions into a logic that no one could recognize, so no one could counter it. Their only option was to accept it or admit their ignorance.
Afterwards the professor had suggested that she consider a career in legal issues. True, no women were in the study, but he was sure he could make allowances. She’d refused but had been flattered by the offer.
Flattered that she could argue anything, if she believed in it or not.
Mahrree closed her eyes and groaned. That’s what debating had accomplished? Maybe destroyed a young man’s confidence ten years ago—or doomed him to write drivel for the Department of Instruction—and convinced many others that men were unnecessary? What about the debates with Perrin? Hadn’t he frequently argued for ideas he didn’t believe in, and left them both so angry they were ready to burst into flames at the sight of each other?
She looked again at the list she’d extracted from the mangled ruins of paragraphs.
Confused students.
Inefficient use of time.
Facts misunderstood.
Maybe, just maybe, the Administrators had a point.
Stupid men.
---
Perrin wasn’t so quick to accept his wife’s conclusion about the ‘debate’ debate. After the children were put to bed that night he comforted his wife.
“You really convinced your audience men weren’t necessary?” He laughed. “Oh, I would have loved to have seen that! Actually, I’d like to take a shot at countering that right now. So what was your main premise?”
“No, you don’t understand! I was awful! The first student I was up against conceded quickly, and two other young men next in line after him refused to take the podium against me. I said horrible things and no one could out-argue me. That’s what I worry about. Is it possible to think so much that you think your wa
y out of the truth?”
Perrin pondered that. “Yes, it is. But you were acting out of anger, not logic.”
“And that makes it all right?”
Perrin sighed. “No, of course not. But I think it makes it harder to see the real issues. Anger, or fear, or whatever, distorts the problem. But Mahrree, debates are not being discouraged because of the young man you humiliated! Although I must admit it would be a fascinating chain of events to find out if he is working for the Department of Instruction. Do you remember his name?”
“Perrin!” Mahrree said sharply, not at all amused.
“Another Perrin? I thought I was the only one,” he grinned. “Maybe you have a thing for taking on men named Perrin.”
When he saw she was still not smiling, and quite possibly mentally revisiting the merits of her argument, he smiled gently at her. “Mahrree, you know as well as I do that without debating people don’t think. They simply accept what’s given to them and never question if it’s right. Even the Creator told us ‘to test all things, as we are tested’. Right?”
She nodded sadly.
“So we debate all ideas, even if we believe in them, to be sure of their truth. Just as The Writings say, ‘In testing the truth is revealed, the weaknesses are recognized, and the falsehoods are exposed’.”
“So why did no one discover my falsehoods?” she fretted. “And why did I want to punch you in the stomach on our second debate? Why couldn’t we come to a resolution?”
Her face was so earnest Perrin was a little startled. He didn’t have a ready answer, but he tried anyway. “Don’t you think that after your ‘Victory Over Men,’ students eventually dissected your arguments enough to see where you had deceived them? Or that I would have run out of ideas to hit you with on our second debate?” He chuckled softly. “Actually, I was quite relieved for the abrupt ending Hogal staged. I didn’t have much left to say, and I simply couldn’t imagine losing.”
She managed a feeble smile and her eyes brightened slightly. “Do you really think I didn’t do any permanent damage?”
Perrin shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe that man you defeated left that class full of resolve to never be caught off guard again. In that case, he most likely was named Perrin.”
That made Mahrree smile. “We still need the debates, don’t we?”
“Yes, we do. Some things we take on faith. Other things we study to find the correct answers. How else do we find the truth?”
“But people can still be misled.”
“Yes they can. So tell me, what was your first point in the debate? Let’s see how my sweet wife set about to destroy men.”
“I wasn’t out to destroy men,” Mahrree sighed impatiently. “I was trying to prove we would be better off without them in charge.” She looked at her husband and hoped his sense of humor would remain. “Now remember, I was young and also very emotional at the time—”
“Not too much has changed.”
She glared at him playfully. “And I was still reeling from my visit home. I began with something like, our world would be better off if men weren’t in charge because they cause all the battles.” She breathed out and hoped the captain still loved her.
He pressed his lips together until they contorted, then his face began to quiver, and he burst into a big grin. “Seriously? You came back from a fight with your own dear mother to claim that men are the source of armed conflict? And people believed that?”
“No one knew I just came from a fight,” Mahrree defended, a bit embarrassed. “No one knew I was fighting another battle elsewhere.”
“Interesting,” Perrin mused. “You were fighting something else entirely, but put the burden of it on innocent bystanders. And so your opponent responded . . . how?”
“I’m trying to remember. I know he was surprised. I think he stammered for a bit before asking how women would resolve a prolonged conflict.”
Again Perrin grinned. “I know how. They’d gossip about with their friends and bring it up again and again to prolong it even further. I’ve listened to you and your little friends enough!” he said in response to her insulted expression. “I think I know that poor man’s problem. He probably didn’t have a sister or female friends. He actually trusted your assertion that women wouldn’t go to battle.”
The light hit both of them at the same time.
“He trusted me!” Mahrree marveled. “He accepted my argument blindly and asked what a different solution would be.”
Perrin nodded. “You surprised him, and he missed the very issue he should have argued. Women do battle! In different ways, but just as frequently as men, I dare say. Did he know you before this? Have any reason to trust you?”
Mahrree shook her head. “No, not really.”
“That’s it, Mahrree. He trusted when he shouldn’t have. Maybe if he were a friend or knew about your tactics, he wouldn’t have been caught off guard.” His voice softened. “If you’d known me better you would’ve been able to discover my deceits far more quickly as well. I could never pull on you now what I did three years ago.”
“The Creator said there are some things we need to take on faith,” Mahrree said slowly, “but everything else we can test through questioning and examination.”
He nodded.
“So Perrin,” she said pointedly, “why do the Administrators not want us to teach our children how to test for the truth?”
“I’m not sure,” he said heavily. “But I don’t think that’s something you should ask them in a letter. It might even reach the Main Skimmer. And,” he added with a slightly different tone to his voice, “I’m going to pretend the captain of Edge didn’t hear you ask that.”
She bit her lip as thoughts of her father suddenly filled her mind, along with another idea. She could feel Cephas Peto so closely as if he was standing right next to her, and his message nearly overwhelmed her.
“Then the captain better not hear this, either. Perrin, the Administrators and Department of Instruction have done this,” she held up the thick document, “on purpose.”
Perrin frowned. “What do you mean?”
“They deliberately wrote this to be confusing and difficult. Any parent who happens to read it will feel stupid. Too stupid to be smart enough to teach their own children. They’ll think that obviously the Administrators know more than they do, in order to write such a highly intelligent document with so many big words and such long sentences. So the Administrators better be in charge of teaching it!”
Perrin released a low whistle. “Good thing the captain’s out on a very long walk so he can’t hear you accusing the Administrators of manipulation. And you said Hegek hadn’t read this yet?”
“This isn’t for him or the teachers!” Mahrree shook the document in fury. “They get something much smaller, about a fourth the size, probably written with words and sentences as small as their minds! But I can see the truth, and I’m not afraid to reveal it. I will not let Idumea get away with this!”
She grabbed a clean piece of paper from a shelf and started for a chair.
Mahrree . . . Mahrree—
She knew the source of her name. Her father was still nearby, but she was too full of venom to heed him as she yanked out the chair from under the table.
“What are you doing?” Perrin demanded.
“I’m going to teach the Administrators a little lesson of my own! I’m going to write to—”
Mahrree, NO! Perrin, stop her—
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Perrin grabbed her arm before she could sit down at the table. “The captain is due back any minute, Mahrree. You need to cool down.”
“You said the other day that I needed to get to the bottom of this!” she said fiercely, wrenching her arm from his grip. “Well, here it is: Parents are stupid, Administrators are smart. Hand over your children to the Administrators with no questions debated so they can pour their own ideas into the children’s minds, while parents worry about nothing else except getting more gold! Gold which the
y then hand over to the Administrators in higher taxes. Ooh, very clever! The Administrators get richer while families fall apart!”
Perrin’s mouth opened and shut several times, but he knew that when his wife was on a rant, there was no safe way to interrupt her.
“And then what happens to the children?” she gestured wildly. “Give Idumea a few years, and I’m sure they’ll be telling the children what jobs they can have, so they make sure our children make them enough gold and silver!”
Perrin lifted a finger, likely to try to interject that she had an intriguing point, but he pulled it back in a moment later when she began to froth. His contribution could wait.
“Next they’ll dictate where we can live!” Mahrree exclaimed. “And what we can do, and where we can go—Oh, wait. They already tell us that. Can’t go to Terryp’s land or anywhere else on this vast sphere. Well, I’ve had enough. I’m going to give them a piece of my mind so they can see how intelligent mine really is!”
Sensing the end of the rant, and possibly the beginning of something even more threatening, Perrin stepped up quickly and took her by the arms. “Mahrree, breathe slowly and think about this. If you send a letter to the Administrators expressing anything we just talked about, it might make it to someone,” he said darkly. “And if it did, it would not be comfortable for anyone with the last name of Shin.”
“Who’s telling me that? My husband, or the captain?” she spat.
“The captain’s at the door, Mahrree, so both of us, because we both love you.”
“And you both fear the Administrators?” she accused.
Perrin bristled, his eyes turning stony. “There’s twenty-three of them, Mahrree, and significantly fewer Shins. I’m only a mere captain in the smallest fort. And you’re only my wife. Not only are we powerless, we’re insignificant. I know how Nicko Mal thinks. He’s high-minded and superior, until someone challenges him. Then he focuses all of his attention on demeaning and eliminating what he perceives as a threat. Trust me, Mahrree; we do not want to draw his attention. I did that too many times as an immature student. And Mal has a very long and spiteful memory.”
Mahrree squinted. “You may think you’re unforgettable, Perrin Shin, but I sincerely doubt the Chairman of the Administrators sits up at night thinking about how much you irritated him when you were twenty.”
The corner of Perrin’s mouth tugged upwards. “You’re probably right. He’s forgotten all about those childish outbursts we shared. But Mahrree, I’m also right. What would you hope to accomplish by sending a temper tantrum in another letter to the Department of Instruction?”
Mahrree blinked, slowly coming out of her rage. “Uh, I’m not entirely sure,” she confessed. “And I was going to address it to Chairman Mal.”
“Ha!” Perrin barked. “Good thing the captain got here to hold you back, Mrs. Shin.”
Good catch, son. Mahrree, listen to your husband. He’s right.
Mahrree sighed hopelessly, at both her husband and her father, who stood very near.
“There’s nothing we can do, is there?”
Perrin exhaled. “No, not really. You can give your findings to Hegek, but other than that? Well, at least the Administrators don’t have any eyes or ears in this house. We can say and think whatever we want, as long as we keep it to the house.”
Mahrree’s shoulders fell, completely deflated. “I don’t like the direction of any of this, Perrin.”
“Neither do I, Mahrree. I escaped Idumea for a reason. But now it seems it’s expanding even to Edge. I guess that’s progress for you.”
---
Mahrree did send a fourth letter, but to the Department of Instruction, as neutral, direct, and short as she could make it.
As a school teacher, I am wondering if you can give me the reasons why, in the future, all children will no longer learn to debate.
Surely something that short would elicit an original response.
Chapter 9 ~ “There have been some changes . . .”
