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Chapter 16 Rosemarie comes to School · The Wind Boy

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Chapter sixteen of The Wind Boy by Ethel Cook Eliot. This LibriVox recording is
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in the public domain. Chapter sixteen, Rose Marie comes to school in the
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little brown house over the hedge. Kay was waking too, but even before
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his eyes were opened, he remembered that something unpleasant was waiting for him in
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this day. What was it? Oh? Yes, the mask business.
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The policeman had told the artist that he Kay was the masker. Before night.
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Every one in the village would think that he was the masker. Every
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one, that is, except Gentian and Nan and Detter. They would not
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believe the policeman, but they would be bothered all the same. But why
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was Gentean laughing? Had she forgotten all about last night and the policeman.
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Kay jumped out of bed and ran to the head of the stairs. The
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laughter was coming from the sitting room, and there was Gentian clapping her hands.
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She only clapped her hands when she was very, very happy. What
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is it? Why are you laughing? Kay called down to her. At
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his voice, she came dancing out into the hall. She was still in
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her nightgown and her hair was all rumpled from her pillow. Her cheeks were
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rosy from sleep. Oh, Kay, she cried, do come and see
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the wind boy. He is perfect? Is the wind boy down there?
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Hello, wind boy, Kay sang out, Oh no, not our wind
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boy, the statuette. I could hardly wait for morning to see if Mother
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had followed him to the clear land and got him happy. I was awake
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before dawn. But Kay was bounding down the stairs. He had forgotten about
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the statuette. Of course. Well, some good thing had to come out
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of last night. At any rate, Detro was just finishing her early breakfast
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at the little low table by the tulips, and right in the middle of
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the table, with the early sun just touching his head, stood the finished
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wind Boy. Hay went close and stood looking. Yes, Gentian was right,
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he was perfect. It was the wind Boy, as he had looked
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when he caught the mask that Nan had thrown and scattered it to bets on
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the lawn. His face and body, too, were all a light and
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joyous. He was about to fly up, up and away into the blue
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air. He was standing on very tiptoes, his wings spread wide, his
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whole body every bit of him ready. Indeed, the statuette, little as
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it was, and made only of Plastelina was so alive and lighted from within
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that it was not easy for the children to remember that it was just a
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statuette and not the wind boy himself. Oh, mother, he is just
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himself as he became last night. Nan was right, you did follow him
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up there. Then Detter was smiling, happily but sleepily. She had not
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been to bed at all, but had worked all night in the clear land.
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Yes, she said, last night he was different. I saw him
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right. He had never been like that before. There was always a cloud
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over him somehow, But last night he shone out to my eyes, clear
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and radiant like this. Oh, I have never never done work of this
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sort before. I know that. Kay and Gentien were looking at each other
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now their eyes said. She thinks she did it, but it was really
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us, ourselves and Nan. We made the wind boy happy. And Kay
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exclaimed aloud, I don't care now they can do what they want to me.
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It was worth it. Deetro looked away from the statuette and at Kay,
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puzzled, what don't you care about, Kay? What was worth it?
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And worth what? But with her words, the village clock began to
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strike. It was seven o'clock. Oh, I must hurry, Dettor cried,
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jumping up, or I shall miss my train. She suddenly kissed and
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hugged both her children, snatched up her cape, and ran away out of
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the house. But Kay had meant what he had said. The statuette was
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so lovely, and his mother was made so happy by it, that he
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was now ready to face the day and all the humiliation it might hold for
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him. He marched off to school by Gentiean's side, with his coppery head
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held high, and the minute he got into the school yard he knew that
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the thing that was to happen had already begun. When the children playing around
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the door saw his approach, they pretended great fear and ran away, screaming,
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the masker, he'll bite, Oh, oh, the masker. So
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the policeman had already been talking, and news had spread, but there was
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nothing to do but march in and take his accustomed seat, and there wait
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for what must come. Miss Todd, he thought, kept her gaze on
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him steadily and strangely. From the very first there was an unusual hubbub in
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the room, but it stopped when he entered. Then school began. Kay's
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cheeks were afire, but his head was very, very high. He was
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thinking, I'm glad mother won't know till to night. Anyway, she'll have
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all day to think about the wind boy and be happy in But he was
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sorry for Gentian, who was sitting very erect behind her little desk, with
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her hands tightly clasped in her lap and her lips set together. At first,
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school went as usual. Miss Todd's perfect order and drill were not to
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be shaken by the excitement that lay under the morning. But whenever Kay looked
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up from his books or paper, he seemed to find her keen eyes upon
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him, and she did not call on him to recite. Although his turn
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came over and over, she passed him by, but still looking at him.
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Never had school seemed so long to Kay and Gentian, though in truth
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it had often seemed long enough. Well, if Kay was to be expelled
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and put to shame, why didn't Miss Todd do it now? That would
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be better than this. Behind the ticking of the school clock and the lessons
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and the recitations, the whole school was simply waiting. Everyone knew that.
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And then toward recess time, at last it came a step out in the
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hall. A boy near Kay whispered the policeman, so that it was they
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had been waiting for the policeman to come to take him away to prison.
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In his own country, they did not put little boys into prison, so
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he had not thought of that happening. But who knew what they might or
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might not do here in this strange foreign land. Well let them now,
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less than ever did he mean to tell on Rosemarie. Suddenly a knock at
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the schoolroom door. Everyone jumped a little, even Miss Todd, just as
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though after the steps they had not been waiting for it. Kay straightened back
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his shoulders and tried not to look at Gentian, but somehow he could not
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help seeing her. Her wide blue Gentian eyes swam before his gaze, eyes
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terrified for him. Then Miss Todd opened the door, and there came in,
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not the police policeman, but the artist, and with him Rose Marie.
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The school gasped in its surprise. You could hear it all about the
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room. But the artist did not take the chair Miss Todd so politely offered
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him. He came and stood by her desk and looked at all the children.
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He looked at them all in turn, and they looked back. It
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made Gentian think of the shoe man who measured her and Kay by looking into
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their eyes. What was the great artist measuring them for when he came to
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Gentie and he smiled a greeting, but she could not smile back. She
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was too troubled for Kay. But the artist seemed to understand her soberness.
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He spoke rather quickly, then, in a low, clear voice. I
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have come to tell you that the masker has been found, he said,
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and that it will not frighten you again. At twilight you can play on
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the streets near my house now without thought of it. It will never come
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again. Miss Todd at her desk nodded, and now there was no doubt
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about it any longer. She was looking at Kay in great sternness. But
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the Artist was not stern, he said, And the policeman assures me that
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he knows who the masker was. It was, he says, a boy,
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a boy in this school. Indeed he caught him with the mask in
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his hands. His name is Kay. Is Kay here? Now? Kay
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stand up? Miss Todd's voice, to Kay's surprise, had sorriness mixed with
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its sternness. Kay stood up by his seat. The artist looked at him
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seriously but kindly, but Kay was too troubled and ashamed to see the kindness.
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I hear that for many days all was a twilight. Kay, you
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have gone around in a horrid mask, frightening other children. The policeman caught
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you with the mask, so he thinks it must have been you all the
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time. Was it? I was just carrying the mask when he caught me.
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I had never been the masker. If you weren't, who was.
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Kay did not answer that. He stayed silent, trying hard not to look
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at Rosemarie. Won't you tell? No. All the other children and even
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Miss Todd gasped at Kay's firm No. It must have been because Kay was
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a foreigner and did not know how great a man the artist was, and
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how important to this village that he dared speak so firmly. Is no why
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the artists had given them this very school and its big playground. No other
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village of its size in the country had such a fine school and playground.
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But the artist did not mind Kay's firm no a bit. He liked it.
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Well, Kay, if you won't tell, he said, then Rose
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Marie is here just for that he turned and looked down at his little granddaughter.
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Rosemare had stood all this while looking at no one in the school but
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Kay. She was a little shy at being up there before all the eyes
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of the village children. But aside from that shyness, she was her natural
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self, her merry self, with dimples just around the corner. Now that
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her grandfather had turned to her, she had to speak. She did it
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quickly, rather breathlessly, and still looking at Kay. I was the masker.
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It was I who frightened you all. My governess has her supper at
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twilight, and then I could get out without her knowing. Last night Kay
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chased me and caught me, and I gave him the mask. He was
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taking it back to the windboy to tear up when the policeman caught him.
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He never woreries at all. Never was a schoolroom so silent as that school
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was for a minute after Rosemary had finished. Then the artist spoke again.
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Rosemarie didn't know about the little boy who was made sick. You see,
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we did not want her to be frightened, and so no one mentioned the
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mask to her ever, or what harm it was doing. Rosemarie had no
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children to play with. So she found that running around in the twilight,
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frightening people and looking in at windows where there were children was the next best
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thing to having playmates. That is why it would not be fair to punish
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her for her masquerading any more than she has already been punished. And now
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I want her to have children to play with forever after, so that she
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will not have to look into windows. And so I am here to ask
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miss Todd if she may come to the school and indeed begin working with you
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and playing with you this very morning. And then, and the artist added
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one thing more, I hope you will all be friends with Rosemarie, for
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she needs your friendship. But already you know now from what has happened,
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that she has one true and loyal friend here, and that is Kay.
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Then, after a few quiet words at the door with missus Todd, the
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Artist went away, leaving Rosemarie at school. Just at first, the children
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could hardly attend to their lessons. It was as though a princess at least
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had come to school among them. Before this, they had only glimpsed Rosemarie
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as she went by, sitting between her two attendants in the back seat of
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her grandfather's big car, wrapped around in furze or silk, and now here
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she was one of them, in a plain gingham frock, with every day
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leather sandals and brown socks. Why she looked just like any schoolgirl. But
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almost at once Rosemarie's merry brown eyes and the tasks of her dark dancing curls
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did away with their feelings of strangeness. She was truly one of them even
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before they went out to play at recess time. But recess did add the
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finishing touch. Rose Marie was such a merry little girl. It was she
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who thought up the games to play and right away led in everything. You
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would think that she had been comrading with the other children all her life.
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Perhaps that was because she had so often imagined what she would do had she
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playmates. And of course she never, as the other children had done in
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the past, left Gentien and Kay out. Rather, they were first she
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turned to in everything. Had she not been watching them from our high nursery
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window for a year now? Did she not know them well? So,
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for the first time since they had come to the village, Kay and Gentian
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forgot that they were foreigners and left off all strangeness they raced and shouted and
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laughed with the rest, and at the close of school, Rosemary ran home
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between them, the happiest little girl in the village. But she pulled them
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to a stop at the corner. How can you run so fast, she
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asked, My breath is gone. It's the sandals, I think, Kay
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answered, And then all the rest of the way home they walked very slowly
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for Kay and Gentie and had to tell Rosemary about the shoe man and his
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blue curtained store with the crystal light flooding down the stairs, and the little
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oven bird in place of a door bell. Rosemarie was enchanted. Gentine and
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Kay were very late in getting home from school that day. When Nan saw
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their faces, she asked, what happened to you? Was school so wonderful?
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Oh? It was? They cried, and then between them they told
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her all about the morning. Nan was as happy as they over all that
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had happened. And now school will never seem unpleasant to you again, she
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said, when they were done, and you will call there gladly every morning,
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just as the other children do. It is your school now, and
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the village will get to be your village, that is, just as your
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mother wants it, how contented she will be. But they were hardly done
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with their dinner because they had talked so much before Rosemarie came skipping through the
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hole in the hedge, just as though she had been doing it every day
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for a year, and was at their window. Her dancing curls and merry
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eyes might have belonged to some fairy, but her cheeks were too hard and
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rosy for any but a very human little girl. Come in, Come in,
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cried the children. No, come out, called back, Rosemarie.
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Let's play in the tulip garden. Grandfather says we may, and without miss
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Prine's coming along to bother us either. But mother doesn't let us go there,
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the children said wistfully. It would be such a beautiful place to play.
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Nan had heard from the kitchen, and now she came into the sitting
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room. Your mother would not mind your going through the hedge now, she
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assured them, since it's Rosemarie herself that asks you. It was only because
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she thought you were not wanted there that she forbade it before. But Rosemarie
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had run around and in at the door. Now she was in the room
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with them. To Gentian's and Kay's surprise. She threw her arms around NaN's
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neck and gave her a great hug. Do you know Nan, they asked,
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Of course I do. Didn't she come in starry brightness to tell me
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everything and make me brave? Grandfather thinks she was only a dream, But
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he won't think so now when I show her to him and see what she
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has made happen. I'm your playmate now, I'm even going to your school
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a funny dream to manage all that. Then Nan and Gentian and Kay and
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Rosemarie all laughed together, though Kay and Gentian did not yet know exactly what
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it was about. And just as Gentian Monday morning, up in the clear
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school, had danced round and round in the arbor and then out of it,
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so here now those four took hands and danced round and round in the
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room and out the door, and there round and round under the cherry tree,
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to the music of their laughter. But it was Nan who stopped first.
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I am forgetting all about the dishes, she said. At that they
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laughed more. What a thing to remember, Rosemary cried, But Kay said,
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Nan is like that. If there weren't dishes or some such thing to
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be done, I think she'd fly straight away and be a fairy. Maybe
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help you with the dishes, then asked Rosemary, I've never helped any one
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washing dishes. Do you do it in the kitchen? How jolly? So
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the children went in with Nann and helped clear the table. Nan gave them
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a clean towel each, a towel with the sunshine still in it, for
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they had come from the line at the door when Nan had hung them that
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morning. And after she dipped the glasses and plates, knives and forks into
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rainbow soap SuDS and washed them well, and the children took them to dry.
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Then Rosemarie, because she was the guest, was allowed to sweep up
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the crumbs under the table while Kay held the dustpan for her, and to
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hang the newly washed towels out in the sunshine at the back door. Again
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it was the greatest fun in her life, now for the tulip garden.
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Kay cried, who had grown a little impatient of all this house working.
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Good bye, then come home in time for supper. Nan said, oh,
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but you come too, Nan, Rosemary pleaded, it will be so
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much more fun with you along. But I thought you didn't want to groan
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up. Miss Prane's not going Rosemarie laughed, her lightest, jolliest laugh.
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Well you're not, miss Prine, she said, Why, you're like us,
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only more so so. Nan put off the mendings she had intended until
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evening, and ran away with the children through the hole in the hedge and
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down the grassy paths toward the tulip garden. End of chapter sixteen.