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By Root 1454 0

were instructed to “go” before they left home in the morning and then to wait until lunch hour. There was supposed to be a time at recess but few children were able to take advantage of that. Usually the press of the crowd prevented a child’s getting near the washrooms. If he was lucky enough to get there (where there were but ten lavatories for five hundred children), he’d find the places preempted by the ten most brutalized children in the school. They’d stand in the doorways and prevent entrance to all comers. They were deaf to the piteous pleas of the hordes of tormented children who swarmed before them. A few exacted a fee of a penny which few children were able to pay. The overlords never relaxed their hold on the swinging doors until the bell clanged the end of recess. No one ever ascertained what pleasure they derived from this macabre game. They were never punished since no teacher ever entered the children’s washrooms. No child ever snitched. No matter how young he was, he knew that he mustn’t squeal. If he tattled, he knew he would be tortured almost to death by the one he reported. So this evil game went on and on.

Technically, a child was permitted to leave the room if he asked permission. There was a system of coy evasion. One finger held aloft meant that a child wished to go out but a short time. Two fingers meant desire for a longer stay. But the harassed and unfeeling teachers assured each other that this was just a subterfuge for a child to get out of the classroom for a little while. They knew the child had ample opportunity at recess and at lunchtime. Thus they settled things among themselves.

Of course, Francie noted, the favored children, the clean, the dainty, the cared-for in the front seats, were allowed to leave at any time. But that was different somehow.

As for the rest of the children, half of them learned to adjust their functions to the teachers’ ideas of such things and the other half became chronic pants-wetters.

It was Aunt Sissy who fixed up the leaving-the-room business for Francie. She had not seen the children since Katie and Johnny had told her she was not to visit the house again. She was lonesome for them. She knew they had started school and she just had to know how they were getting along.

It was in November. Work was slack and Sissy was laid off. She sauntered down the school street just as school was letting out. If the children reported meeting her, it would seem like an accident, she figured. She saw Neeley first in the crowd. A bigger boy snatched his cap off, trampled on it and ran away. Neeley turned to a smaller boy and did the same to his cap. Sissy grabbed Neeley’s arm, but with a raucous cry, he twisted loose and ran down the street. With poignancy, Sissy realized that he was growing up.

Francie saw Sissy and put her arms around her right there on the street and kissed her. Sissy took her into a little candy store and treated her to a penny chocolate soda. Then she made Francie sit down on a stoop and tell her all about school. Francie showed her the primer and her homework book with block letters in it. Sissy was impressed. She looked long into the child’s thin face and noticed that she was shivering. She saw that she was inadequately dressed against the raw November day in a threadbare cotton dress, ragged little sweater and thin cotton stockings. She put her arm around her and held her close to her own life warmth.

“Francie, baby, you’re trembling like a leaf.”

Francie had never heard that expression and it made her thoughtful. She looked at the little tree growing out of the concrete at the side of the house. There were still a few dried leaves clinging to it. One of them rustled dryly in the wind. Trembling like a leaf. She stored the phrase away in her mind. Trembling….

“What’s the matter?” Sissy asked. “You’re ice cold.”

Francie wouldn’t tell at first. But after being coaxed, she buried her shame-hot face in Sissy’s neck and whispered something to her.

“Oh, my,” said Sissy. “No wonder you’re cold. Why didn’t you ask to….”

“Teacher never looks at us