Between Earth and Sky(40)
He wore that same mischievous smile as he sauntered behind his marching classmates into the classroom after breakfast. Beneath the desktop, Alma’s hands clenched. She hated the way he flouted the rules. She watched him sink into his seat at the front of the class, beside the younger children. He’d kept up his charade of ignorance, convincing even Miss Wells he knew no English. Liar, she wanted to shout when he bungled easy phrases or ignored simple directions. But she kept her mouth shut, grinding her teeth till her jaw ached. The others thought him clever, wily, brave. It was for them she remained silent.
Only Asku shared her indignation. He slid behind their double-wide desk and handed her a history text. “He’s up to something.”
Alma placed the heavy book atop the desk but didn’t open it. “If he doesn’t want to learn, why is he here?”
“The sisters at the missionary school on his reservation kicked him out. So the agent sent him here.”
She almost laughed. “The agent can’t force someone to come. Enrollment at Stover is voluntary.”
Asku’s bright eyes dampened. He shook his head and looked down at his book. “They have their ways.”
“What do you mean?”
“The agent controls the food, tools, and money granted to us in the treaties we signed with the Great Father. We can no longer roam to hunt and fish as we please. Without government rations and supplies we have nothing.”
Alma bit her lip. “But . . . you wanted to come, didn’t you? And Minowe?”
His expression grew distant. “In the beginning I was . . . unsure. Our father wanted it. He knew the world was changing.” Asku paused. “Mother disagreed. She cut away her hair, streaked her face black with ash in mourning.” He smoothed a hand down the open page of his textbook. “I see my father’s wisdom now. The way of the white man is the way of the future.”
Alma nodded halfheartedly. She looked back at George, her throat growing tight. Had his mother cried over his departure too? He sat uncharacteristically straight in his chair, his eyes fixed on the blackboard, where Miss Wells had written out each grade’s lesson plan. His uniform never looked crisp and neat like Asku’s, but, for once, it didn’t bother her. Perhaps he was trying.
She turned her attention toward her studies—a chronological history of England’s monarchs. Asku was already several pages ahead of her, but she could catch up. That he had progressed so far so quickly impressed not only her but the entire Stover staff, and she wondered briefly before opening her book if she would fare as well were the text before her written in Anishinaabemowin, not English.
Three paragraphs into her study, a low buzzing noise snagged her attention. She looked around the room for the offending bee or horsefly. Seeing none, she returned to her book.
Amid the sound of chalk scratching over slate and the occasional flutter of a turning page, the buzz continued. Alma found herself reading the same passage about Richard I over and over again.
With a huff, she looked up again. By now, the noise had caught the attention of Miss Wells. The teacher’s thin lips curled slightly. She strode along the near wall, shaking out the checkered window drapes. Her bones stood out beneath her dry, pale skin as she moved—those of her wrist, her hands, the sharp vertebrae of her neck.
A soft giggle drew Alma’s attention forward. A few of the first years leaned toward George, shaking with suppressed laughter. Alma sat forward to get a better look. Beneath his desk, George held a small cream-colored box. Whenever the buzzing began to taper, he gave the box a gentle shake and the noise flared.
Miss Wells walked from the bank of windows to the front of the class, striding so close to George the hem of her skirt brushed his gangly leg. She cocked her head, clearly alert to the proximity of sound, but did not see the paper box hidden beneath his desk.
She shook her head as if to dislodge the low, persistent noise from her ears and straightened. “All right. First, second, and third years, eyes on the blackboard.”
The buzzing continued as Miss Wells chalked out a series of short phrases on the board. Alma could see the teacher’s shoulders bunching with tension. Her lettering grew dark and cramped, her fingers throttling the chalk.
By now most of the students had seen the box. They craned, twisted, and pointed behind the Skunk’s back, their lips clamped, holding back laughter.
Had it not been George’s doing, Alma might have laughed too.
Miss Wells turned around and the class went rigid. The older children dropped their heads over their textbooks. The younger ones fixed their gaze forward. George cradled the box between his knees and folded his hands atop the desk. The humming quieted.
Beside her, Asku remained lost in Plantagenet history, but Alma gaped at the scene at the front, her face angled down to feign study, her eyes straining upward.
“Who can read the first line for me?” Miss Wells asked.
As usual, no one volunteered. Indolence, Miss Wells frequently complained. But Alma knew the Indians simply preferred not to stand out or appear conceited.
The teacher’s face soured. “William, please rise and recite the first line.”
The young Potawatomi boy stood on command. His cheeks grew flush. He fidgeted with the hem of his suit coat, rolling the coarse fabric between his thumb and forefinger. After a heavy silence, he began, “God b-b-bless our se-chul.”
“We learned this word last week.” Miss Wells’s words came more clipped than usual. “Sound out the letters.”