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playground instead of leading the games as she used to. I was worried bout her
but I couldn't set my mind to her problem while the lessons with Loo Ree went
on and on, sandwiched between Christmas program rehearsals, a combination that
left me dragged out and practically comatose when the week before Christmas
vacations arrived.
0o Ree was reading Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea and I was thanking
heaven that there was a glossary of sea life terms in the back of the book. I
was supporting my weary head as usual and I let the sound of her voice flow
over me like a shadowy river and must have dozed because my cheek slipped from
my hand and I caught myself just in time to keep my head from thumping on the
desk.
And there was Loo Ree, standing by me, holding the place with her finger
closed inside her book. I must have a beautiful imagination because she was-I
have no words for her beauty. Even if I tried, I could only compare her to
what I have experienced-and she was way outside any of my experiences, but I
can remember her eyes-
Loo Ree smiled. "I have learned to read." I gaped at her, still sluggish with
the cumulative weariness that teachers everywhere will understand.
Loo Ree spoke again. "I've finished, teacher. I've learned what I had to
learn." I should have skipped on the high hills and leaped from leaf blade to
leaf blade with delight and relief but instead, my heart lurched and slowed
with dismay.
"You're finished? How come? I mean, how do you know?"
"I just know." Loo Ree put the book down gently, sliding her finger out
reluctantly, it seemed to me. "It would be useless to try to thank you for the
help you have given me. There's no way to repay you and you will never know
how far your influence will be felt."
I smiled ruefully. "That's nothing new to a teacher. Especially a first grade
teacher. We're used to it."
"Then it's goodbye." Loo Ree began to fade and pale away.
"Wait!" I stood up, holding tight to my desk. My weariness set tears in my
eyes and thickened my voice. "All my life I'll think I was crazy these past
few months. I'll wonder and wonder what you are and why you are, if you don't
it seems to me the least you can do is tell me a little bit. Tell me something
so I'll be able to justly to myself all this time I've spent on you and the
shameful way I have neglected my children. You can't just say goodbye and let
it go at that" I was sobbing, tears trailing down my face and smearing the
bottoms of my glasses.
Loo Ree hesitated and then flooded back brighter.
"It's so hard to explain-"
"Oh, foof!" I cried defiantly, taking off my glasses and, smearing the tears
across both lenses with a tattered Kleenex. "So I'm a dope, a moron! If I can
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ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
explain protective coloration to my six-year-olds and the interdependence of
man and animals, you can tell me something of what the score is!" I scrubbed
the back of my hand across my blurry eyes. "If you have to, start out `Once
upon a time."' I sat down-hard.
Loo Ree smiled and sat down, too. "Don't cry, teacher. Teachers aren't
supposed to have tears."
"I know it," I sniffed. "A little less than human-that's us.
"A little more than human, sometimes." Loo Ree corrected gently. "Well then,
you must understand that I'll have to simplify. You will have to dress the
bare bones of the explanation according to your capabilities.
"Once upon a time there was a classroom. Oh, cosmic in size, but so like yours
that you would smile in recognition if you could see it all. And somewhere in
the classroom something was wrong. Not the whispering and murmuring-that's
usual. Not the pinching and poking and tattling that goes on until you get so
you don't even hear it." I nodded. How well I knew.
"It wasn't even the sudden blow across the aisle or the unexpected wrestling
match in the back of the room. That happens often, too. But something else was
wrong. It was an undercurrent, a stealthy, sly sort of thing that has to be
caught early or it disrupts the whole classroom and tarnishes the children
with a darkness that will never quite rub off.
"The teacher could feel it-as all good teachers can-and she spoke to the
principal. He, being a good principal, immediately saw the urgency of the
matter and also saw that it was beyond him, so he called in an Expert."
"You?" I asked, feeling quite bright because I had followed the analogy so
far.
Loo Ree smiled. "Well, I'm part of the Expert." She sobered. "When the Expert
received the call, he was so alarmed by the very nature of the difficulty that
he rushed in with a group of investigators to find where the trouble lay." Loo
Ree paused. "Here I'll have to stretch my analogy a little.
"It so happened that the investigators were from another country. They didn't
know the language of the school or the social system that set up the
school-only insofar as its resultant structure was concerned. And there was no
time for briefing the investigators or teaching them the basics of the
classroom. Time was too short because if this influence could not be changed,
the entire classroom would have to be expelled-for the good of the whole
school. So it had to be on-the-job training. So-" Loo Ree turned out her hands
and shrugged.
"Gee!" I let out my breath with the word and surreptitiously wiped my wet
palms against my skirt. "Then you're one of them, finding out about our
world."
"Yes," Loo Ree replied. "And we believe now that the trouble is that the
balance between two opposing influences has been upset and, unless we can
restore the balance-catastrophe."
"The Atom Bomb!" I breathed. "The principal must have found radioactivity in
our atmosphere-" I gleaned wildly from my science fiction.
"Atom bomb?" Loo Ree looked puzzled. "No. Oh, no, not ,the atom bomb. It is
much more important than that. Your world really ought to get over being so
scared of loud noises and sudden death. If you would all set your minds to
some of the more important things in your life, you wouldn't have such loud
noises and so many sudden deaths to fear."
"But the hydrogen bomb-"
"At the risk of being trite," smiled Loo Ree, "there are fates worse than
death. It's not so important how you die or how many die with you. Our group
is much more concerned with how you live and how many live as you do. You [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]