• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1148 0

the most intelligent of the children, Douglas was growing up to be the most obdurate. To persuade him was as difficult as it was simple to command him; in the depths of his soul some recalcitrance was rooted which could neither be examined nor assuaged. If he was about to be punished he would argue against it, not very effectively, and finally accept it without comment, leaving no doubt that he considered himself undefeated. Punishment failed because he either knew he had done wrong, in which case the punishment seemed unnecessary and therefore ridiculous, or he remained convinced that he had been treated unjustly. Neither his mother nor his father knew quite what to do. Strange wood was growing; both of them sensed it.

“What in the world have you on your hands?” his mother demanded.

Douglas gazed at the backs of his hands, which were blotched with purplish marks, as though he observed nothing unusual. He said it was crayon.

“Crayon!” she exclaimed. “Young man, if you think for one instant you can sit down at the table without washing those hands, you have another think coming. Hop to the kitchen right now.”

“Let me see those hands,” his father said.

Douglas obediently walked around the table. Mr. Bridge took his son’s hands in his own and looked closely at the curious marks. He turned the hands over and looked at the palms, which were clean.

“How did you get this?” he asked.

Douglas said he had gotten the crayon on his hands during geography class, but he did not explain.

“Let’s hear the rest.”

“What rest?”

“How did you get these marks?”

After a long silence Douglas said: “From a ruler.”

“Go on.”

“Ye cripes,” Douglas said, and rolled his eyes. “It’s a little bit of purple crayon. You act like it was the end of the world. It was just Miss Breuhauf, that’s all. She got sore and gave me the business with her ruler. I guess it had a little purple crayon on it.”

“Do you mean to say,” his mother asked with a shocked expression, “she struck you with a ruler?”

“Don’t worry. He deserved it,” said Carolyn.

“A fat lot you know,” said Douglas. “She probably did worse than that to you when you had her class.”

Mr. Bridge was still examining his son’s hands. The skin had not been broken. He said, “Does she make a habit of this?”

“Sure,” Douglas said. “She loves to beat up kids. She gives somebody the business all the time. Rodney Vandermeer got it last week. If she gets sore she gets good and sore.”

“Do your hands ache?”

“Not too much. They swelled up at recess but they’re okay now.”

“I simply cannot believe this,” Mrs. Bridge said. “She ought to be reported.”

“Don’t report her,” Douglas said patiently. “She’d just take it out on us. She’s nutty as a fruitcake.”

“Why did you provoke her?” his father asked.

“I didn’t.”

“Spitballs,” said Carolyn.

Douglas sneered. “How do you know so much? Were you there?”

“No. But I know somebody who was.”

“That will be enough, both of you,” Mrs. Bridge said. “Corky, eat your salad.”

“Well,” Douglas said, “am I supposed to wash my hands, or not?”

“Yes. Go do it,” said Mr. Bridge, and with a thoughtful expression he began to whet the carving knife. Carolyn probably was right, very probably Douglas did deserve to be punished for whatever he had done; but he did not like the idea of a teacher who made a habit of beating children.

Later that evening he stopped by his son’s room to talk about it some more.

Douglas had assumed the matter was ended, and he was bored. He admitted, after questioning, that he had been trying to antagonize the teacher, and he did not seem to feel that he had been mistreated. Yes, he said, it hurt while she was beating him. Then he said, “She thought I was going to try and jerk my hands away, so she grabbed hold of them, but I just let her do whatever she wanted. She sure got mad. I thought she was going to have a heart attack. She kept asking if I was sorry. That’s what she asks kids when she beats them up.”

“Did you apologize?”

Douglas laughed. “Shoot, no.”

“Why not?”

“Because that’s what she wanted.”

“What did you tell her?”

“Nothing.”

“Where