Susie and Jerry were waiting, clinging to each other’s hands as they always were. They were shy and withdrawn, but both were radiant because of starting school. Jerry, who did almost all the talking for the two of them, answered our greetings with a shy hello.
Then Susie surprised us all by exclaiming, “We’re going to school!”
“Isn’t it wonderful?” I replied, gathering her cold little hand into mine. “And you’re going to have the prettiest teacher we ever had.”
But Susie had retired into blushing confusion and didn’t say another word all the way to school.
I was worried about Jake and Derek. They were walking apart from us, whispering, looking over at us and laughing. They were cooking up some kind of mischief for Miss Carmody. And more than anything I wanted her to stay. I found right then that there would be years ahead of me before I became an Old One. I tried to go into Derek and Jake to find out what was cooking, but try as I might I couldn’t get past the sibilance of their snickers and the hard flat brightness of their eyes.
We were turning off the road into the school yard when Jemmy, who should have been up at the mine long since, suddenly stepped out of the bushes in front of us, his hands behind him. He glared at Jake and Derek and then at the rest of the children.
“You kids mind your manners when you get to school,” he snapped, scowling. “And you Kroginolds-just try anything funny and I’ll lift you to Old Baldy and platt the twishers on you. This is one teacher we’re going to keep.”
Susie and Jerry clung together in speechless terror. The Kroginolds turned red and pushed out belligerent jaws. The rest of us just stared at a Jemmy, who never raised his voice and never pushed his weight around.
“l mean it, Jake and Derek. You try getting out of line and the Old Ones will find a few answers they’ve been looking for-especially about the bell in Kerry Canyon.”
The Kroginolds exchanged looks of dismay and the girls sucked in breaths of astonishment. One of the most rigorously enforced rules of the Group concerns showing off outside the community. If Derek and Jake had been involved in ringing that bell all night last Fourth of July-well!
“Now you kids, scoot!” Jemmy jerked his head toward the schoolhouse, and the terrified twins scudded down the leaf-strewn path like a pair of bright leaves themselves, followed by the rest of the children, with the Kroginolds looking sullenly back over their shoulders and muttering.
Jemmy ducked his head and scowled, “It’s time they got civilized anyway. There’s no sense to our losing teachers all the time.”
“No,” I said noncommittally.
“There’s no point in scaring her to death.” Jemmy was intent on the leaves he was kicking with one foot.
“No,” I agreed, suppressing my smile.
Then Jemmy smiled ruefully in amusement at himself. “I should waste words with you? Here.” He took his hands from behind him and thrust a bouquet of burning-bright autumn leaves into my arms. “They’re from you to her. Something pretty for the first day.”
“Oh, Jemmy!” I cried through the scarlet and crimson and gold. “They’re beautiful. You’ve been up on Baldy this morning.”
“That’s right. But she won’t know where they came from.” And he was gone.
I hurried to catch up with the children before they got to the door. Suddenly overcome with shyness, they were milling around the porch steps, each trying to hide behind the others.
“Oh, for goodness” sakes!” I whispered to our kids. “‘You ate breakfast with her this morning. She won’t bite. Go on in.”
But I found myself shouldered to the front and leading the subdued group into the schoolroom. While I was giving the bouquet of leaves to Miss Carmody the others with the ease of established habit slid into their usual seats, leaving only the twins, stricken and white, standing alone.
Miss Carmody, dropping the leaves on her desk, knelt quickly beside them, pried a hand of each gently free from their frenzied clutching and held them in hers.
“I’m so glad you came to school,” she said in her warm rich voice. “I need a first grade to make the school work out right and I have a seat that must have been built on purpose for twins.”
And she led them over to the side of the room, close enough to the old potbellied stove for Outside comfort later and near enough to the window to see out. There, in dusted glory, stood one of the old double desks that the Group must have inherited from some ghost town out in the hills. There were two wooden boxes for footstools for small dangling feet and, spouting like a flame from the old inkwell hole, a spray of vivid red leaves-matchmates to those Jemmy had given me.
The twins slid into the desk, never loosening hands, and stared up at Miss Carmody, wide-eyed. She smiled back at them and, leaning forward, poked her fingertip into the deep dimple in each round chin.
“Buried smiles,” she said, and the two scared faces lighted up briefly with wavery smiles. Then Miss Carmody turned to the rest of us.
I never did hear her introductory words. I was too busy mulling over the spray of leaves and how she came to know the identical routine, words and all, that the twins’ mother used to make them smile, and how on earth she knew about the old desks in the shed. But by the time we rose to salute the flag and sing our morning song I had it figured out. Father must have briefed her on the way home last night. The twins were an ever-present concern of the whole Group, and we were all especially anxious to have their first year a successful one. Also, Father knew the smile routine and where the old desks were stored. As for the spray of leaves, well, some did grow this low on the mountain and frost is tricky at leaf-turning time.
So school was launched and went along smoothly. Miss Carmody was a good teacher and even the Kroginolds found their studies interesting.
They hadn’t tried any tricks since Jemmy had threatened them. That is, except that silly deal with the chalk. Miss Carmody was explaining something on the board and was groping sideways for the chalk to add to the lesson. Jake deliberately lifted the chalk every time she almost had it. I was just ready to do something about it when Miss Carmody snapped her fingers with annoyance and grasped the chalk firmly. Jake caught my eye about then and shrank about six inches in girth and height. I didn’t tell Jemmy, but Jake’s fear that I might kept him straight for a long time.
The twins were really blossoming. They laughed and played with the rest of the kids, and Jerry even went off occasionally with the other boys at noontime, coming back as disheveled and wet as the others after a dam-building session in the creek.
Miss Carmody fitted so well into the community and was so well liked by us kids that it began to look like we’d finally keep a teacher all year. Already she had withstood some of the shocks that had sent our other teachers screaming. For instance…
The first time Susie got a robin-redbreast sticker on her bookmark for reading a whole page-six lines-perfectly, she lifted all the way back to her seat, literally walking about four inches in the air. I held my breath until she sat down and was caressing the glossy sticker with one finger, then I sneaked a cautious look at Miss Carmody. She was sitting very erect, her hands clutching both ends of her desk as though in the act of rising, a look of incredulous surprise on her face. Then she relaxed, shook her head and smiled, and busied herself with some papers.