Love Among The Blackboards

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Title:     Love Among The Blackboards
Author: Myra Kelly [More Titles by Kelly]

An organized government requires a cabinet, and, during the first weeks of her reign over Room 18, Miss Bailey set about providing herself with aides and advisors. She made, naturally, some fatal and expensive mistakes, as when she entrusted the class pencils to the care of one of the Yonowsky twins who, promptly falling ill of scarlet fever and imparting it to his brother, reduced the First-Reader Class to writing with coloured chalk.

But gradually from the rank and file of candidates, from the well-meaning but clumsy; from the competent but dishonest; from the lazy and from the rash, she selected three loyal and devoted men to share her task of ruling. They were Morris Mogilewsky, Prime Minister and Monitor of the Gold-Fish Bowl; Nathan Spiderwitz, Councillor of the Exchequer and Monitor of Window Boxes; and Patrick Brennan, Commander-in-Chief of the Forces and Leader of the Line.

The members of this cabinet, finding themselves raised to such high places by the pleasure of their sovereign, kept watchful eyes upon her. For full well they knew that cruelest of all the laws of the Board of Education, which decrees: "That the marriage of a female teacher shall constitute resignation." This ruling had deprived them of a Kindergarten teacher of transcendent charm and had made them as watchful of Miss Bailey as a bevy of maiden aunts could have been. Losing her they would lose love and power, and love and power are sweet.

Morris was the first to discover definite grounds for uneasiness. He met his cherished Miss Bailey walking across Grand Street on a rainy morning, and the umbrella which was protecting her beloved head was held by a tall stranger in a long and baggy coat. After circling incredulously about this tableau, Morris dashed off to report to his colleagues. He found Patrick and Nathan in the midst of an exciting game of craps, but his pattering feet warned them of danger, so they pocketed their dice and turned to hear his news.

"Say," he panted; "I seen Teacher mit a man."

"No!" said Patrick, aghast.

"It's a lie!" cried Nathan; "it's a lie!"

"No; it's no lie," said Morris, with a sob half of breathlessness and half of sorrow; "I seen her for sure. Und the man carries umbrellas over her mit loving looks."

"Ah, g'wan," drawled Patrick; "you're crazy. You don't know what you're talking about."

"Sure do I," cried Morris. "I had once a auntie what was loving mit a awful stylish salesman--he's now floorwalkers--und I see how they makes."

"Well," said Patrick, "I had a sister Mary and she married the milkman, so I know, too. But umbrellas doesn't mean much."

"But the loving looks," Morris insisted. "My auntie makes such looks on the salesman--he's now floorwalkers--und sooner she marries mit him."

"Say, Patrick," suggested Nathan; "I'll tell you what to do. You ask her if she's goin' to get married."

"Naw," said Patrick. "Let Morris ask her. She'd tell him before she'd tell any of us. She's been soft on him ever since Christmas. Say, Morris, do you hear? You've got to ask Teacher if she's going to get married."

"Oo-o-oh! I dassent. It ain't polite how you says," cried Morris in his shocked little voice. "It ain't polite you asks like that. It's fierce."

"Well, you've got to do it, anyway," said Patrick darkly, "and you've got to do it soon, and you've got to let us hear you."

"It's fierce," protested Morris, but he was overruled by the dominant spirit of Patrick Brennan, that grandson of the kings of Munster and son of the policeman on the beat. His opportunity found him on the very next morning. Isidore Wishnewsky, the gentlest of gentle children, came to school wearing his accustomed air of melancholy shot across with a tender pride. His subdued "Good morning" was accompanied with much strenuous exertion directed, apparently, to the removal and exhibition of a portion of his spine. After much wriggling he paused long enough to say:

"Teacher, what you think? I'm got a present for you," and then recommenced his search in another layer of his many flannels. His efforts being at length crowned with success, he drew forth and spread before Teacher's admiring eyes a Japanese paper napkin.

"My sister," he explained. "She gets it to a weddinge."

"Oh, Isidore," cried the flattered Teacher; "it's very pretty, isn't it?"

"Teacher--yiss ma'an," gurgled Isidore. "It's stylish. You could to look on how stands birds on it and flowers. Mine sister she gives it to me und I gives it to you. I don't need it. She gives me all times something the while she's got such a kind feelin' over me. She goes all times on weddinges. Most all her younge lady friends gettin' married; ain't it funny?"

At the fateful word "married," the uneasy cabinet closed in about Teacher. Their three pairs of eyes clung to her face as Isidore repeated:

"All gettin' married. Ain't it funny?"

"Well, no, dear," answered Teacher musingly. "You know nearly all young ladies do it."

Patrick took a pin from Teacher's desk and kneeled to tie his shoe-string. When he rose the point of the pin projected half an inch beyond the frayed toe of his shoe, and he was armed. Morris was most evidently losing courage--he was indeed trying to steal away when Patrick pressed close beside him and held him to his post.

"Teacher," said Isidore suddenly, as a dreadful thought struck him, "be you a lady or be you a girl?"

And Teacher, being of Hibernian ancestry, answered one question with another:

"Which do you think, Isidore?"

"Well," Isidore answered, "I don't know be you a forsure lady or be you a forsure girl. You wears your hair so tucked up und your dress so long down like you was a lady, but you laffs und tells us stories like you was a girl. I don't know."

Clearly this was Morris's opening. Patrick pierced his soul with a glance of scorn and simultaneously buried the pin in his quaking leg. Thus encouraged, Morris rushed blindly into the conversation with:

"Say, Teacher, Miss Bailey, be you goin' to get married?" and then dropped limply against her shoulder.

The question was not quite new to Teacher and, as she bestowed Morris more comfortably on her knee, she pondered once again. She knew that, for the present, her lines had fallen in very pleasant places, and she felt no desire to change to pastures new. And yet--and yet--. The average female life is long, and a Board, however thoughtful as to salary and pension, is an impersonal lord and master, and remote withal. So she answered quite simply, with her cheek against the boy's:

"Well, perhaps so, Morris. Perhaps I shall, some day."

"Teacher, no ma'an, Miss Bailey!" wailed the Monitor of the Gold-Fish. "Don't you go and get married mit nobody. So you do you couldn't be Teacher by us no more, and you're a awful nice teacher by little boys. You ain't too big. Und say, we'd feel terrible bad the while you goes and gets married mit somebody--terrible bad."

"Should you really, now?" asked Teacher, greatly pleased. "Well, dear, I too should be lonely without you."

Here Isidore Wishnewsky, who considered this conversation as his cherished own, and saw it being torn from him, determined to outdo the favoured Morris as a squire of dames.

"Teacher, yiss ma'an," he broke in. "We'd all feel terrible the while we ain't got you by teacher. All the boys und all the girls they says like this--it's the word in the yard--we ain't never had a teacher smells so nice like you."

While Teacher was in the lenient mood, resulting from this astounding tribute, Nathan forged yet another chain for her securing.

"Teacher," said he, "you wouldn't never go and get married mit nobody 'out saying nothing to somebody, would you?"

"Indeed, no, my dear," Miss Bailey assured him. "When I marry, you and Patrick and Morris shall be ushers--monitors, you know. Now are you happy, you funny little chaps?"

"Teacher, yiss ma'an," Morris sighed, as the bell rang sharply, and the aloof and formal exercise of the assembly room began.

Some days later Teacher arranged to go to a reception, and as she did not care to return to her home between work and play, she appeared at school in rather festive array. Room 18 was delighted with its transformed ruler, but to the board of monitors this glory of raiment brought nothing but misery. Every twist in the neat coiffure, every fold of the pretty dress, every rustle of the invisible silk, every click of the high heels, meant the coming abdication of Teacher and the disbanding of her cabinet. Just so had Patrick's sister Mary looked on the day she wed the milkman. Just such had been the outward aspect of Morris's auntie on the day of her union to the promising young salesman who was now a floorwalker and Morris's Uncle Ikey.

Momentarily they expected some word of farewell--perhaps even an ice-cream party--but Teacher made no sign. They decided that she was reserving her last words for their private ear and were greatly disconcerted to find themselves turned out with the common herd at three o'clock. With heavy hearts they followed the example of Mary's little lamb and waited patiently about till Teacher did appear. When she came she was more wonderful than ever, in a long and billowy boa and a wide and billowy hat. She had seemed in a breathless hurry while up in Room 18, but now she stood quite placidly in a group of her small adherents on the highest of the school-house steps. And the cabinet, waiting gloomily apart, only muttered, "I told ye so," and "It must be a awful kind feeling," when the tall stranger came swinging upon the scene. When Teacher's eyes fell upon him she began to force her way through her clinging court, and when he was half way up the steps she was half way down. As they met he drew from his pocket a hand and the violets it held and Teacher was still adjusting the flowers in her jacket when she passed her lurking staff. "I didn't expect you at all," she was saying. "You know it was not a really definite arrangement, and men hate receptions."

A big voice replied in a phrase which Morris identified as having been prominent in the repertoire of the enamoured salesman--now a floorwalker--and Teacher with her companion turned to cross the street. Her heels clicked for yet a moment and the deserted cabinet knew that all was over.

The gloom obscuring Patrick's spirit on that evening was of so deep a dye that Mrs. Brennan diagnosed it as the first stage of "a consumption." She administered simple remedies and warm baths with perseverance, but without effect. And more potent to cure than bath or bottle was the sight of Teacher on the next morning in her accustomed clothes and place.

The Board of Monitors had hardly recovered from this panic when another alarming symptom appeared. Miss Bailey began to watch for letters, and large envelopes began to reward her watchfulness. Daily was Patrick sent to the powers that were to demand a letter, and daily he carried one, and a sorely heavy heart, back to his sovereign. In exactly the same sweetly insistent way had he been sent many a time and oft to seek tidings of the laggard milkman. His colleagues, when he laid these facts before them, were of the opinion that things looked very dark for Teacher. Said Nathan:

"You know how she says we should be monitors on her weddinge? Well, it could to be lies. She marries maybe already."

Patrick promptly knocked the Monitor of Window Boxes down upon the rough asphalt of the yard and kicked him.

"Miss Bailey's no sneak," he cried hotly. "If she was married she'd just as lief go and tell."

"Well," Morris began, "I had once a auntie--"

"Your auntie makes me sick," snapped Patrick. But Morris went on quite undisturbedly:

"I had once a auntie und she had awful kind feelings over a stylish floorwalker, und he was loving mit her. So-o-oh! They marries! Und they don't say nothings to nobody. On'y the stylish floor walker he writes on my auntie whole bunches of lovin' letters."

"She ain't married," Patrick reiterated. "She ain't."

"Well, she will be," muttered Nathan vindictively. "Und the new teacher will lick you the while you fights. It's fierce how you make me biles on my bones. Think shame."

When the ruffled Monitor of the Window Boxes had been soothed by the peaceful Guardian of the Gold-Fish, the cabinet held council. Nathan suggested that it might be possible to bribe the interloper. They would give him their combined wealth and urge him to turn his eyes upon Miss Blake, whose room was across the hall. She was very big and would do excellently well for him, whereas she was entirely too long and too wide for them.

Morris maintained that Teacher might be held by gratitude. A list should be made out, and, each in turn, a child a day, should give her a present.

Patrick listened to these ideas in deep and restive disgust. He urged instant and copious bloodshed. His big brother's gang could "let daylight into the dude" with enjoyment and despatch. They would watch him ceaselessly and they would track him down.

The watching was an easy matter, for Teacher, in common with the majority of rulers, lived much in the public eye. The stranger was often detected prowling in her vicinity. He even began to bring her to school in the mornings, and on these occasions there were always violets in her coat. He used to appear at luncheon time and vanish with her. He used to come in the afternoon and have tea in Room 18 with two other teachers and with Teacher. The antagonism of the Monitor of Gold Fish became so marked that Miss Bailey was forced to remonstrate.

"Morris, dear," she began one afternoon, when they were alone together, "you were very rude to Doctor Ingraham yesterday. I can't allow you to stay here with me if you're going to behave so badly. You sulked horribly and you slammed the door against his foot. Of course it was an accident, but how would you feel, Morris, if you had hurt him?"

"Glad," said the Monitor of the Gold-Fish savagely. "Glad."

"Morris! What do you mean by saying such a thing? I'm ashamed of you. Why should you want to hurt a friend of mine?"

"Don't you be friends mit him!" cried Morris, deserting his fish and throwing himself upon his teacher. "Don't you do it, Teacher Missis Bailey. He ain't no friends for a lady." And then, in answer to Teacher's stare of blank surprise, he went on:

"My mamma she seen him by your side und she says--I got to tell you in whispering how she says."

Teacher bent her head and Morris whispered in an awe-struck voice:

"My mamma says she like that: 'He could to be a Krisht,'" and then drew back to study Teacher's consternation. But she seemed quite calm. Perhaps she had already faced the devastating fact, for she said:

"Yes, I know he's a Christian. I'm not afraid of them. Are you?"

"Teacher, no ma'an, Missis Bailey, I ain't got no scare over Krishts, on'y they ain't no friends for ladies. My papa says like that on my auntie, und my auntie she's married now mit a stylish floorwalker. We'm got a Krisht in our house for boarder, so I know. But you couldn't to know 'bout Krishts."

"Yes, I do. They're very nice people."

"No ma'an," said Morris gently. And then still more courteously: "It's a lie. You couldn't to know about Krishts."

"But I do know all about them, Morris dear. I'm a Christian."

Again Morris remembered his manners. Again he replied in his courtly phrase:

"It's a lie." As he said it, with a bewitching rising inflection, it was almost a caress. "It's a lie. Teacher fools. You couldn't to be no Krisht. You ain't got no looks off of Krishts."

Teacher was mildly surprised. She was as Irish as Patrick Brennan and, in her own way, she looked it. Truly her eyes were brown, but the face and the faith of her fathers were still strongly hers. Morris, meanwhile, examined his sovereign with admiring eyes. He could well understand the heart of that Krisht, for Teacher was very beautiful and of splendid array. Her jumper was red, with golden buttons, and her collar was white, and her hair was soft, with combs. And she had a light face and a little bit of nose and teeth. Her apron was from silk with red ribbons and red flowers, and she had like man's-shoes and a watch. This vision of feminine perfection was bestowing time and smiles on him. She was actually appealing to his judgment.

"Not look like a Christian?" she was saying. "Well, then, Morris, what do I look like?"

And Morris, ever going straight to the point, replied: "You looks like a stylish Sheeny," and waited for this intoxicating praise to bring blushes to the light face he loved. It brought the blushes, but they were even redder and hotter than he had expected. There was also a gasp on which he had not counted and a queer flash in the brown eyes.

"Morris," said Teacher, "Morris, did you ever see a Sheeny with a nose like mine?"

Morris raised his head from the red jumper, climbed off the from-silk apron and solemnly contemplated the little bit of nose. The truth broke over him in sickening waves. The star of his life had set; his doll was stuffed with sawdust; his idol had feet of clay; his light-faced lady was a Christian. And yet she was his teacher and greatly to be loved, so he bore the knowledge, for her dear sake, as bravely as he could. He returned to the from-silk apron, wound a short arm round the white collar, and sobbed:

"Teacher, yiss ma'an, you'm got a Krisht nose. But don't you care, no one couldn't never to know like you ain't a for sure Sheeny the while you got such terrible Sheeny eyes. Oh, but they couldn't never to think you're a Krisht. Und say, don't you have a frightened. I wouldn't never to tell nobody. Never. I makes a swear over it. I kiss up to God. I hopes I drops down if I tells."

At the end of a month the high heels and the festive raiment appeared again, and the staff knew that the time for action had really come. They must bring the Krisht to terms before he should see Teacher in her present and irresistible array. He was always first at the trysting place, and there they would have speech with him. They arranged to escape from Room 18 before three o'clock. The Commander-in-Chief feigned a nose-bleed, the Prime Minister developed an inward agony, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, after some moments of indecision, boldly plucked out a tottering tooth and followed--bloody but triumphant--in their wake. They found the enemy just as they had expected, and Morris, being again elected spokesman, stepped forward and took him by his dastard hand. The adversary yielded, thinking that Teacher had been forced to greater caution. The Commander-in-Chief and the Chancellor followed close behind, they having consented, in view of the enormous issues involved, to act as scouts. Around the corner they went into a dark and narrow alley, and, when they had reached a secluded spot between the high wall of the school and the blank windows of a recently burned tenement house, Morris began:

"Teacher don't wants to go on the party mit you the while she ain't got no more that kind feeling over you."

"What?" cried the astonished Doctor Ingraham.

"She don't wants to be married mit you."

"Did Miss Bailey send you with any message to me?"

The question was so fierce that the truth was forced from the unwilling lips of the spokesman.

"No ma'an--no sir," they faltered. "On'y that's the feeling what she had. Und so you go away now 'out seeing Teacher, me und the other fellows we gives you FIVE cents."

The cabinet drew near to hear the answer to this suggestion. It puzzled them, for--

"Now, look here, boy," said Doctor Ingraham, "you'd better go home and get to bed. You aren't well."

Morris conferred with his colleagues and returned with:

"We gives you SEVEN cents so you go home now 'out seeing Teacher. A nickel und two pennies so you go now. Und say, Miss Blake could to go by your side. She has kind feelings over you."

"Nonsense," said the man. "When will your teacher be down?"

"She ain't coming at all. She has no more feelings. So you goes now we gives you a dime and a penny. ELEVEN cents. We ain't got it; on'y we could to get. Teacher gives me all times pennies."

Just as the stranger was wondering how much of truth these extraordinary children knew, Teacher, calm-eyed and unruffled, appeared upon the scene. She said, as she generally did:

"Doctor Ingraham! Who would have thought to find you here!" And then, "Are you talking to my little people? They are the cleverest little things, and such friends of mine. Morris here and I are the greatest of cronies."

Teacher's manner, as she began her greeting, was serene and bright, but a gloomy, even a morose, glance from Doctor Ingraham's cold blue eye quite changed her. His voice too, considered as the voice of love, sounded sulkily as he said:

"So it seems. He has given me an answer which you refused me."

"How generous of Morris and how thoughtful! He's always trying to save me trouble. And the question, now, to which the answer belonged. May one know that?"

"You know it well enough," with a glance up and down the deserted alley, for even Patrick had realized that discretion is the better part of statesmanship.

"Oh that" said Teacher. "And Morris's answer?"

"No."

"They really are the cleverest children."

"Little brutes! I can't think why you come down here every day. The brats aren't in the least grateful."

"But they are. They think me perfection."

"That is the contagion of mental states."

"And they're not fond of you." "That's it again, I suppose." And, as Teacher made no sign of having heard, he went on: "Tea, do you know, is a dreadful bore."

"Of course, but cold tea is worse. And the cakes are so shattered towards the end. Come."

"I've changed my mind. I'm not going. I'm tired of this sort of thing. Answer me now."

"But the children," faltered Teacher. "I should miss them so."

At this sign of weakening Doctor Ingraham favoured the queer old street with a tableau to which it long had been a stranger. And the cabinet, creeping back to reconnoitre, immediately guessed the worst. Said Morris:

"She's lovin' mit him und he's loving mit her. They've got loving looks. I had once a auntie--"

This was too much for the torn spirit of the Leader of the Line. He laid violent hands--and feet--upon the Monitor of Gold Fish. The Monitor of Window Boxes promptly followed suit. Morris's prolonged yell of agonized surprise brought Teacher flying to the rescue. And Teacher brought Doctor Ingraham. While the latter held and restrained Patrick and Nathan, Miss Bailey lavished endearments and caresses on her favourite. The captor grew as restless as his captives under this aggravation, and at last allowed his charges to escape.

"Look here!" he remonstrated; "I can't stand this sort of thing, you know. It's cruel."

But Teacher's ears were all for Morris's tale of sorrow.

"I don't know what is mit Patrick," he was saying. "He hits me a hack somethin' fierce sooner I says about mine auntie. Und Nathan, too, is bad boys. He says you lies."

"I?" said Teacher; "I?"

"Yiss ma'an, that's how he says. On'y I know you don't lies. I know we should be monitors like you says."

"When, dearie?"

"On your weddinge. You know you says me, und Patrick, und Nathan, should be monitors on your weddinge when you marries mit him." And Morris stretched a pointing finger at the foe. After one radiant glance at Teacher's face, Doctor Ingraham possessed himself of the scrubby hand and shook it warmly.

"And so you shall, old chap," he cried, "so you shall. You may be best man if you so desire. Anything you like."

"New clothes?" asked Morris.

"From stem to stern."

"Ice-cream?"

"Gallons."

"Paper napkins mit birds?"

"Bushels."

"Can I mine little sister bring?"

"A dozen little sisters if you have them."

"Can I go in a carriage, down and up? It's stylish."

"You shall have a parade of carriages--one for each sister."

"Morris," commanded Miss Bailey, "go home."

When she turned to confront Doctor Ingraham the "light face" was brightly pink and the "terrible Sheeny eyes" held a mixture of embarrassment and anger.

"Of course I can't explain this," she said. "I must simply ask you to believe that he is making a dreadful mistake. You were quite right when you said they were ungrateful little brutes. They are. You were quite right, too, about teas being a bore. They are. So you will pardon me if I go to see little Leah Yonowsky. The twins are reported ill again. Good afternoon."

It was a very rueful and disgusted enemy that the cabinet discerned in the offing.

"Good Lord!" cried the Commander-in-Chief. "Here he comes again, and Miss Bailey ain't with him."

"Morris," said the enemy, "you've done for me, my boy."

"Won't she go by your side on the party?" asked the Prime Minister.

"She will not," admitted the hostile power. "So you may as well trot out Miss Blake and begin to collect my eleven cents. For, though you may not have discovered it--and there be those who doubt it--a ten-cent cigar's a smoke."

[The end]
Myra Kelly's short story: Love Among The Blackboards

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