Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits - Donoghue [27]
The preacher went on without stopping for breath. "To attempt to teach a child so blighted, and a girl at that, is to fly in the face of the Providence that made her so."
When Mr. McGranahan is angry he speaks quieter than ever. "Nobody gets the chance to teach Frances Brown anything, Brother, so quick is she to teach herself."
Even then, if I could have kept my mouth shut, he might have saved me. The words behind my lips are no trouble to anybody; it's only when I let them out that I give scandal.
"When I grow up I shall be a poet."
My words hung on the air like a foul smell. I felt the draught when the boys on either side of me shrank back, as if afraid to catch a fever.
The Master began to speak, but my fear made me rush in. "Mr. Milton himself was blind, was he not, Mr. McGranahan? Was he not? Did you not tell us so?"
But the Minister was standing over me now, his words falling like hail. "Milton was a great man. You are a stunted little girl."
Suddenly I was shouting. "Does it not say in the Book of Leviticus, Thou shalt not put a stumbling block before the blind?"
There was no sound at all for a few moments. I stiffened, ready for the blow that would knock me off the bench. But the Minister only took my wrist between his icy fingers and held my arm up high. When he spoke it wasn't to me, and his voice boomed over my head like the Orange drums on the Glorious Twelfth. "Who will lead this creature home so she will not fall in the ditch?"
Up close he smelt like vinegar. I ripped my hand out of his grasp. "I can find my own way," I said, shoving past the other children, past the long chalky coat of Mr. McGranahan, who tried to hold me. I got out the door before I started crying.
As a rule, I can follow any path through Stranorlar and not lose myself, but today I was so bewildered with rage that I very nearly stepped into the ditch opposite the smithy. Only the long grasses at the edge told me I was gone astray. When I got on the right track home I felt the last rays of sun on my face before the mountain snuffed them out.
Once the Browns were great folk hereabouts. Our grandfathers father owned a big stretch of land, but he squandered it all. I can see it in my head if I try: a wet green kingdom, with rivers sliding through the fields like thread through cloth. Now all we have left that is grand is our grandmothers rocking chair. Sometimes our mother lets me sit in it if my feet are clean. Its back is carved with fruit and flowers and shapes that I can't make out no matter how often I trace them with my fingers.
Our mother sits in that chair to do her darning. If I hold my breath now I can hear through the wall the faint creak of its rockers—unless that's more wishful thinking. Our father has been gone for hours. Mother was yawning at supper, but she'll not go in to bed before he comes home from Meeting.
They didn't beat me, when I came home from school, not even when I told them every word I said to the Minister. Maybe they're saving it till tomorrow. I would rather have the beating over with and then I could sleep.
Tabby's face is pressed against my hand on the pillow; I can feel her breath like an oven on my fingers. From the corner, Dickie lets out a faint snore. Martha turns over, without warning, and we all must shift too, myself and Tabby and Catherine and Billy at our feet, all packed together like mackerel in a pot.
If the others were awake I would tell them a story: maybe the one about the cottage that stood in the middle of a village that stood in the middle of a bleak moor in the north country, where lived a certain man and his wife who had three cows, five sheep, and thirteen children. One more than us. Martha likes the tale of the old woman who wove her own hair. Ned prefers the one about the prince with fourteen names.
If I had seven-league shoes and a cloak of invisibility I could be at the Meeting House now. Maybe they're too busy with other matters to discuss a froward child like me. Or else the Elders are arguing with my father this very moment, their