The Excellent Lombards(28)
I had to say to Mrs. Kraselnik, “Could you—could you please repeat the question?”
By allowing Amanda, the girl in the business attire, to win, would I, the cheater, in fact be a force for good?
There were a few more rounds, both of us answering without much effort within the twenty-second time period, and yet I was dizzy and warm, the sweat running down my back. The thought I’d had about cheating was insane; I was maybe going crazy, a foaming in my mind. But remember, remember, Mrs. Kraselnik had been practically teary in class when she’d been imparting her message about goodness. She’d been suffering because of what she was asking, because of the enormity of my sacrifice. I had a fever. That was it, I was suddenly ill. I was going to burn up and fall over, my vision failing, Mary Frances soon to go blind. Poor good blind girl, blind and then dead. I felt that in a minute I might die.
Nonetheless, my turn came again when I was still standing. “Which Canadian province produces more than half the country’s manufactured goods?” Mrs. Kraselnik was wearing an orange cashmere dress that came to her knees, made shapely by a giant leather belt with a huge O buckle, clothing to lay your face against even if you yourself were boiling.
I knew, of course, that Ontario borders all the Great Lakes and also has access to the St. Lawrence Seaway. Ontario, therefore, was the reasonable answer. There was a hitch in my throat and sweat in my eyes, that sting. I turned to look at the orange softness of Mrs. Kraselnik. She nodded at me supportively. Put good into the world, Mary Frances. I looked at William, at his uplifted, bright face. Do it, Imp. Amanda was not going to become the farmer, no, she was going to leave home. She would have to prove herself everywhere she went in her heels and jacket, whereas the farm would be ours, William’s and mine. Was that not winning? Was that not the real prize? Everyone had been trying to tell me the answer and maybe even I myself had known it all along: Amanda should have the Geography Bee. If I lost, and because Mrs. Kraselnik knew about my secret vein of goodness, she would gather me to her. She would thank me, whispering in my ear, her wet cheek to mine. And I’d choke, Oh, Mrs. Kraselnik!
Thank you, my love. Thank you, Mary Frances.
Come on, Imp, let her have it, William beamed to me.
Do I have to, William?
Yes.
It was something William would do, kind good William. I felt his eyes not only on me but boring into me so steadily they were nearly my eyes, too, his good deep-brown eyes.
And so I said it, I said, “British Columbia.”
The startled hush in the crowd. Is it right, is it wrong? “I’m sorry,” Mrs. Kraselnik said quietly, the audience groaning, the audience sorry for me although glad, too, that the evening was soon going to be over. They could get home for the end of the Packer game.
But not so fast. The winner had to answer another question correctly, the contest not yet done. Our course could be reversed—there was still hope. Instantly after the corrupted answer I knew that I did not want to be the loser; I didn’t want to put good in the world after all, no interest, none, in that project.
Mrs. Kraselnik began a narrative question, which by and large she’d avoided. “Hundreds of wooden and stone churches, Amanda,” she said, “containing both Christian and Viking symbols were built during the Middle Ages in what country that borders the Barents Sea?”
Russia, didn’t Russia border that sea? Amanda didn’t answer immediately. She was breathing heavily, her lips tightly pursed. The harsh gym lights, the sound of her breathing, the trick question, the digital clock in front of us—all compounded my illness and fatigue. Mrs. Kraselnik hadn’t said a Nordic country, which would have been expected if the answer was Norway. Were there Vikings in Russia in the Middle Ages? Maybe I’d missed that unit. I couldn’t think exactly where Norway was, and what of Finland, my mind was suddenly no good, the maps gone dark. It had to be Russia, Russia touched the Barents Sea. With two seconds on the clock Amanda said, “No way.”
No way? No way was not a country. No way most certainly could not stand as the answer. And yet next I knew Mrs. Kraselnik was hugging Amanda on stage, this before our teacher outlined the future. “Right here, in our presence,” she then said, “a possible county champion, and who knows, a girl who could get to state and maybe beyond.” Never, Mrs. Kraselnik said, had she worked with such dedicated students, but now in our gym she meant that only Amanda was the truly dedicated one.
As an afterthought Mrs. Kraselnik said, “Let’s give another hand for the excellent Lombards.”
I had slunk down the steps, even though I was supposed to stay on as the loser, as the runner-up, the alternate, in the event that in the weeks to come Amanda had a change of heart or broke a limb. Or damaged her vocal cords trying to learn Standard English. I ignored my mother’s outstretched hand and went to sit next to William. He may have spoken to me—I don’t know. I wanted to stand up and shout the truth, to explain my reasoning. On the way out many people tried to hug me but Dolly especially made a point to draw me to her ample breasts. She’d never hugged me before but I had to let her. “You girls did so well!” she screamed even though I was pressed into her. “So wonderfully well!”
Gloria hugged me, too. She murmured one of her incomprehensible Gloria sentences. She said, “You have so many advantages, Mary Frances. I’m very proud of you.”
When William and I were grown, when Dolly and Gloria were old ladies, maybe we’d put a plate of pie by the door of the manor house. Say the men had gone away, and it was only the history hermit upstairs, the farmer’s wife downstairs with her black bob, and Gloria, the three women stuck with each other. They would all be closed up with May Hill, and like May Hill they wouldn’t even celebrate Christmas or Thanksgiving, never a holiday. Maybe we wouldn’t feed them at all.