#
I didn't get a puppy. Mr Johnstone gave me an air-rifle that I was sure Mama
would have fits over, but she just smiled. She gave me a beautiful fountain-pen
and a green blotter and a ream of creamy, thick paper.
The pen made the most beautiful, jet-black marks, and the paper drank it up like
a thirsty man in the desert. I recopied my essay the next day, sitting with Mama
in the parlour while she darned socks. Mr Johnstone had given her a tin of
cosmetics from Paris, that he'd ordered in special. I'd heard Mama say that only
dancehall girls wore makeup, but she blushed when he gave it to her. I gave her
a carving I'd done, of the robutler we'd had in 75. I'd whittled it out of a
block of pine, and sanded it and oiled it until it was as smooth as silk.
Oly Sweynsdatter came by after supper and asked if I wanted to go out and play
with the fellows. To my surprise, I found I did. We had a grand afternoon
pelting each other with snow-balls, a game that turned into a full-scale war, as
all the older boys back from high-school came out and joined in, and then,
later, all the men, even the Sheriff and Mr Adelson. I never laughed so much in
all my life, even when I got one right in the ear.
Mr Adelson led a charge of adults against the fort that most of the Academy boys
were hiding behind, but I saw him planning it and started laying in ammunition
long before they made their go, and we sent them back with their tails between
their legs. I hit him smack in the behind with one ball as he dove for cover.
Oly's mother gave us both good, Svenska hot cocoa afterwards, with fresh whipped
cream, and Oly and I exchanged gifts. He gave me a tin soldier, a Confederate
who was caught in the act of falling over backwards, clutching his chest. I gave
him my best marble. We followed his mother around their house, recounting the
adventures in the snow until she told me it was time for me to go home.
#
School started again, and I went in early the first day to turn in my paper. Mr
Adelson took it without comment and scanned the first few paragraphs. "Thank
you, James, I think this will do nicely. I'll have it graded for you in the
afternoon."
I met Oly out in the orchard, where he was chopping kindling for the school's
stove, a job we all took turns at. "I hear you might be getting a new Pa for
Christmas," he said. He gave me a smile that meant something, but I couldn't
guess what.
"What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.
"My Mama says your Mama had old man Johnstone over for Christmas dinner. And the
widow Ott told my Mama that she'd connected one or two calls between your house
and the store every day in the last month. My Mama says that Johnstone is
courting your Mama."
"Mrs Ott isn't supposed to talk about the calls she connects," I said, as my
mind reeled. "It's like a telegraph operator: it's a confidential trust." Mr
Adelson had told me that, once when he was telling me stories about his life
before he went to sea.
"So, is it true?"
"No!" I said, surprising myself with my vehemence. "My Mama just didn't want him
to be alone at Christmas."
Oly swung the axe a few more times. "Well, sure. But what about all the
telephone calls?"
"That's business. The store is still partly ours. Mama's just looking after our
interests."
"If you say so," he said.
I shoved him hard. I drew a line in the snow with my toe. "I _do_ say so. Step
across the line if you say otherwise!"
Oly got to his feet and looked at me. "I don't want to fight with you, James. I
was just tellin' you what my Mama said."
"Well, your Mama ought to mind her own business," I said, baiting him.
That did it. He stepped over and popped me one, right in the nose. Oly and I had
been chums since we could walk, and we'd had a few fights in our days but this
time it was different. I was so _angry_ at him, at my Mama, at my Pa, at New
Jerusalem, and we just kept on swinging at each other until Mr Adelson came out
to ring the bell and separated us. My nose was sore and I was limping, and I'd
torn Oly's jacket and bent his fingers back, so he cradled his hand in the crook
of his arm.
"Boys!" Mr Adelson said. "What the hell do you think you're doing? You're
supposed to be friends."
His language shocked me, but I was still plenty angry. "He's no friend of mine!"
I said.
"That's fine with me," Oly said and glared at me.
The other kids were milling around, and Mr Adelson gave us both a look that
could melt steel, then rang the bell.
#
I could hardly concentrate in class that day. My Mama getting married? A new Pa?
It couldn't be true. But in my mind, I kept seeing my Mama and that Johnstone
kissing under the mistletoe, and him sitting in my Pa's chair, drinking his
whiskey.
Oly's desk was next to mine, and he kept shooting me dirty looks. Finally, I
leaned over and whispered, "Cut it out, you idiot."
Oly said, "You're the idiot. I think you got your brains scrambled in France,
James."
"I'll scramble your brains!"
"Gentlemen," said Mr Adelson. "Do you have something you'd like to share with
the class?"
"No sir," we said together, and exchanged glares.
"James, perhaps you'd like to come up to the front and finish the lesson?"
"Sir?" I said, looking at the blackboard. He'd been going through quadratics, an
elaborate first-principles proof.
"I believe you know this already, don't you? Come up to the front and finish the
lesson."
Slowly, I got up from my desk, leaving my slate on my desk, and made my way up
to the front. Some of the kids giggled. I picked up a piece of chalk from the
chalk-well, and started to write on the board.
Mr Adelson walked back to my seat and sat down. I stopped and looked over my
shoulder, and he gave me a little scooting gesture that meant go on. I did, and
by the end of the hour, I found that I was enjoying myself. I stopped frequently
for questions, and erased the board over and over again, filling it with steady
columns of numbers and equations. I stopped noticing Mr Adelson in my seat, and
when he stood and thanked me and told us we could eat our lunches, it seemed
like no time at all had passed.
Mr Adelson looked up from my essay. "James, I'd like to have a chat with you.
Stay behind, please."
"Sit," he said, offering me the chair at his desk. He sat on one of the
front-row desks, and stared at me for a long moment.
"What was that mess this morning all about, James?" he asked.
"Oly and I had an argument," I said, sullenly.
"I could see that. What was it about, if you don't mind my asking?"
"He said something about my Mama," I said.
"I see," he said. "Well, having met your mother, I feel confident in saying that
she's more than capable of defending herself. Am I right?"
"Yes, sir," I said.
"Then we won't see a repeat?"
"No, sir," I said. I didn't plan on talking to Oly ever again.
"Then we'll say no more about it. Now, about this morning's lesson: you did very
well."
"It was a dirty trick," I said.
He grinned like a pirate. "I suppose it was. I wouldn't have played it on you if
I didn't have every confidence in your abilities, though." He leaned across and
picked up my essay from his desk. "It was this that convinced me, really. This
is as good as anything I've seen in scholarly journals. I've half a mind to send
it to the _Idler_."
"I'm just a kid!"
"You're an extraordinary boy. I'm tempted to let you teach all the classes, and
take up whittling."
He said it so deadpan, I couldn't tell if he was kidding me. "Oh, you can't do
that! I'm not nearly ready to take over."
He laughed. "You're readier than you think, but I expect the town council would
stop my salary unless I did _some_ of the work around here. Still, I think
that's the most active I've seen you since you came to my class, and I'm running
out of ideas to keep you busy. Maybe I'll keep you teaching maths. I'll give you
my lesson plan to take home before school's out."
"Yes, sir."
#
Mr Adelson gave me a stack of papers tied up with twine after he dismissed the
class for the day. I went home and did my chores, then unwrapped the parcel in
the parlour. The lesson plans were there, laid out, day by day, and in the
centre of them was a smaller parcel, wrapped in coloured paper. "Merry
Christmas," was written across it, in his hand.
I opened it, and found a slim book. "War of the Worlds," by Verne. For some
reason, it rang a bell. I thought that maybe it had been on our bookcase in 75,
but somehow, it hadn't made it back home with us. I opened it, and read the
inscription he'd written: "From one traveller to another, Merry Christmas."
I forced myself to read the lesson plans for the next month before I allowed
myself to start the Verne, and once I started, I found I couldn't stop. Mama had
to drag me away for dinner.
#
My trip back to 1975 wasn't planned, but it wasn't an accident, either. We'd
gotten a new load of hay in for our team, and Mama added stacking it in the
horsebarn to my chores. I'd been consciously avoiding the horsebarn since Pa had
disappeared. Every time I looked at it, I felt a little hexed, a little
frightened.
But Mama had a philosophy: a boy should face up to his fears. She'd been
terrified of spiders when she was a girl, and she told me that she had made a
point of picking up every spider she saw and letting it crawl around on her
face. After a year of that, she said, she never met a spider that frightened
her.
Mama had been sending me to the store more and more, too, and having Mr
Johnstone over for dinner every Friday night. She knew I didn't like him one
little bit, and she said that I would just have to learn to live with what I
didn't like, and if that was the only thing I learned from her, it would be
enough.