A Place to Belong (5 page)

Wilmer let out a smothered yelp and slid across the seat, as far from Danny as he could get. Danny sat down, took a deep breath, and looked up to see Miss Clark standing beside him, holding a book. “Do you read?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” Danny answered.

“Let’s see how well, so I’ll know where to place you,” she answered. “Will you please turn to the story on page three? While the others are preparing their lessons, you may come to my desk and read to me.” She turned to walk back to the front of the room.

Danny fumbled with wooden fingers against pages that seemed to stick together, forgetting for the moment about Wilmer, who took advantage of the situation by giving Danny such a shove that he toppled into the aisle.

Miss Clark turned at the sound of the thump and looked at Danny with surprise. Then she looked at Wilmer. “How did that happen, Wilmer?” she asked.

As Danny scrambled up, he glared at Wilmer, who was gazing at Miss Clark with wide, innocent eyes.

“I dunno,” Wilmer said. “Maybe he’s just clumsy.”

“Danny?” Miss Clark turned to him.

“I guess that’s right,” Danny said. He muttered to Wilmer from the corner of his mouth, “I’ll talk to you later.”

“You and who else?” Wilmer whispered.

“Are you ready to read, Danny?” Miss Clark asked. “I’m waiting.”

Aware of the impatience that had crept into her voice, Danny hurried to her desk and began to read aloud.

As he finished the story, Miss Clark smiled. “Very good, Danny. Thank you. You’ll be with the group reading from the fifth reader. Boys and girls in this group, we’ll all turn to page twenty-five, and I’ll ask Elsie to read the first paragraph.”

During the rest of the morning Danny tried to concentrate on his lessons, but he had to keep part of his attention on Wilmer, ready for whatever his desk mate would try next. To his surprise, however, aside from an occasional jab from a sharp left elbow, Wilmer ignored him.

Danny was surprised when Miss Clark pulled a round watch from her skirt pocket and announced that it was time for the noon meal. “You may eat outdoors today,” she said. The students crowded to the cloakroom to get their dinner pails. Wilmer had been first, shooting from his seat as though starting a race. Danny wanted to make sure Peg was all right, and was happy to see her hand in hand with a little girl her size.

Danny was among the last to reach the cloakroom. He reached up for the two dinner pails—his and Peg’s—and found only Peg’s. But on the floor in the corner, against the wall, lay his dinner pail, the lid off and the contents spilled out. The package of sliced bread and cold meat was torn, and heel marks from heavy boots had stomped the food. Danny knew Wilmer had been responsible and he was furious.

He opened Peg’s dinner pail. In addition to the wrapped package of bread and meat, she had an apple and a square of some kind of cake with a browned sugar crust. Fine. Now he knew what to look for.

He put the lid back on Peg’s dinner pail just as she came into the cloakroom with her new friend. He handed it to her, picked up his own, along with the mess on the floor, and went outside.

Wilmer was sitting on a log bench with two other boys. When Danny appeared, they stiffened, alert, ready for trouble.

“Well, well, there’s the boy from the orphan train, come here all the way from New York,” one of them said.

“My pa said them Easterners are all abolitionists,” the other boy said. “We don’t need their kind in Missouri.”

Wilmer simply kept his eyes on Danny and didn’t speak.

Danny strolled toward them, smiled, and said, “Mind if I join you lads?” Before any of them could answer, he squeezed in next to Wilmer.

“Hey!” Wilmer spoke up. “Who invited you?”

In one speedy motion Danny reached over, grabbed Wilmer’s dinner pail, and opened it. Inside, on top of the food Wilmer had brought, lay Danny’s sugar cake and apple. “These are mine, so I’ll just put them back where they belong,” Danny said. He picked up the cake and apple and popped them into his own dinner pail.

“You can’t—” Wilmer began, but Danny interrupted.

“Where did this mess come from?” he asked in mock surprise. “It couldn’t be mine. It looks like the kind of slop
you’d
eat.” He picked up the wad of torn and dirty bread and meat and slammed it into Wilmer’s pail. He glared at Wilmer and said, “If you ever try anything like that again, I’ll feed it to you bite by bite.”

“I’d like to see you try it!” Wilmer snarled.

“Oh, would you now?” Danny said. As he put down his dinner pail, the other two boys quickly scurried out of the way.

Wilmer was faster than Danny had anticipated. He kicked Danny’s feet out from under him, gave him a shove, and leapt up as Danny fell backward over the log. “ ‘Bite by bite,’ was it?” Wilmer taunted.

Danny had tangled with some dirty fighters in New York City. Now that he knew what to expect, Wilmer’s tricks would be nothing new. Danny stood, took off his coat, jumped over the log, and faced Wilmer.

They were evenly matched, Danny decided. Wilmer moved lightly and quickly, however, and Danny could see that kicking was one of his favorite moves. Wilmer had taken off his coat, too, throwing it to one side, and he stood with his right shoulder hunched, his arms up, his hands balled into fists.

Good
, Danny thought.
The way he’s holding his shoulder, I can tell that he’s not as good with his fists as he is with his feet
.

“What’s the matter, orphan boy?” Wilmer taunted. “Are you afraid?”

“I bet he thinks he’ll get in trouble with the teacher,” one of the other boys said, and laughed.

Danny hadn’t given Miss Clark a thought. If he got into trouble—well, in this case he hadn’t a choice.

“Maybe we should just shake hands and make up,” Wilmer suddenly said. He took a step toward Danny and held out his right hand.

But Danny spied the glint in Wilmer’s eyes and was ready. He took a step toward Wilmer as though he believed Wilmer were sincere, but when Wilmer’s right foot shot out, Danny easily jumped aside.

With his right fist he clipped Wilmer so hard on the jaw that Wilmer sat down with a thud on the packed ground.

Some of the other children had begun to gather around them. “You’re gonna get in trouble if you fight!” a girl warned.

“Want to shake hands now?” Danny asked and held out a hand to Wilmer.

“Yeah,” Wilmer said and raised his right hand. “I do. Help me up first.”

As Wilmer gripped his hand Danny knew he had made a mistake. Wilmer was strong enough to jerk Danny off his feet. The two of them landed in a heap in the dust.

Pummeling as hard as he could and smarting from the blows he took, Danny rolled over and over on the ground with Wilmer. He heard Peg’s voice crying out, “Leave my brother alone!” and someone else shouting for Miss Clark.

All at once Danny felt himself grabbed by his shirt collar and the waistband of his trousers and hauled roughly to his feet. He was face-to-face with Tom, one of the older boys. Another boy—Charlie—had pulled Wilmer up and to one side. “It’s over now. Forget it,” Charlie said to the crowd that had gathered.

Tom ordered Danny and Wilmer, “Get yourselves
dusted off before Miss Clark gets out of the privy. Hurry up.”

“Who started this?” Charlie asked. “You up to your old tricks, Wilmer?”

“He’s an Easterner, an abolitionist,” Wilmer said sullenly.

Charlie’s eyes narrowed. “What’s wrong with that?”

Wilmer looked startled, than wary. “Well, that wasn’t exactly why we were fighting. Don’t matter. The fight’s over,” he said.

But Charlie’s face was stern, and he remained staring down at Wilmer. “Slavery’s wrong,” he said, “and fighting for it makes everything worse.”

Wilmer stuck out his chin. “Who says so? Just you and your family. My pa says if it comes to war, you’ll all be traitors to Missouri!”

“Your pa—” Charlie began, but Tom interrupted.

“Don’t get into that now!” he hissed. “Here she comes!”

Danny saw Miss Clark hurrying toward them. He tried to smooth down his hair, tuck his shirt back into his trousers, and look innocent at the same time. He knew he hadn’t succeeded when she stopped in front of him and asked, “Were you boys fighting?”

Wilmer shot a look at Danny, then rubbed the toe of one boot in the dust. Danny took a deep breath and said, “You might say we were getting acquainted.”

Miss Clark’s eyebrows rose. “By rolling around in the dust?”

“It could be that was the best way we could find out what each other is like.”

He could see that Miss Clark was struggling to keep a straight face. “We don’t allow fighting here at school, Danny.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.

“Do you understand that, Wilmer?”

“Yes,” Wilmer answered. He glanced at Danny with a puzzled expression.

“Very well. Now that you both understand, you’d better finish your meal,” she said. “And hurry up. It’s almost time to start lessons again.”

As Miss Clark walked back toward the schoolhouse, Wilmer said to Danny, “I thought you were going to tell her about your dinner pail.”

“Well, I didn’t,” Danny said. “Besides, you would have just denied it, and your friends would have backed you up.”

Wilmer nodded. “Maybe, but you don’t know that for sure.”

“Are you saying that you’d really tell Miss Clark that you stomped half my food and stole the rest?”

“That’s over and done with, isn’t it?”

“Not when my stomach is so hungry it’s growling as loud as two dogs with one bone.”

Wilmer shrugged. “My ma packed me too much food, as usual,” he said. “If you want I could give you some corn bread and a slice of fatback.”

“Thanks,” Danny said.

As they walked back to the log and sat down, the other two boys joined them. “This here’s Henry and that’s Nat,” Wilmer said, as the boys opened their dinner pails again. “They’re brothers.” He turned to Danny. “I’m like you. I ain’t got any brothers, just sisters.”

“I’ve got two brothers,” Danny said, his mouth filled with corn bread.

“Where are they?” Nat asked.

“They got placed in other homes.”

“Other homes? Hereabouts?”

Danny shook his head. “Petey’s off in Kansas, and Mike’s living on a farm somewhere in Missouri. I don’t know when I’ll see them again.”

For a few moments the other boys were silent, and
Danny struggled to gulp down the lump that rose in his throat. Then Wilmer said, “I’d trade any or all of my sisters for a brother, but if I had a brother I wouldn’t want him to go away.” He took a large bite of molasses cake and added to Danny, “That’s my sister, Gussie, who works for the Swensons.”

Danny took a bite from his apple and sticky juice ran down his chin. He wiped it away with the back of one dusty hand. “I like Gussie,” he said. “She’s nice.”

“She’s bossy,” Wilmer said. He licked molasses cake from each of his fingers, then rubbed his hand down the leg of his trousers. “All my sisters are bossy. My pa says someday they’ll all grow up and get married and move away, but it’s hard to wait that long.”

The bell in the tower of the schoolhouse clanged loudly, and the boys and girls still in the yard grabbed up their things and hurried to get inside the building. As Danny finally slid into the desk next to Wilmer, Wilmer turned to him and gave him a conspiratorial smile.

“We’re going to work hard on our spelling lesson,” Miss Clark said, “because we have to get ready for the spelling bee.”

“What’s a spelling bee?” Danny heard Peg ask.

“It’s a contest to find the best speller in the school,” Miss Clark explained.

“I’m going to win,” Wilmer whispered to Danny. “It’ll be easy.”

Danny grinned at him. “That’s what you think.” He’d take Wilmer on in any challenge!

“We’ll have a box supper with your parents, and our entertainment will be the spelling bee,” Miss Clark said. “It’s a fall tradition.” She rapped on her desk with her knuckles. “Pay attention, please. While I’m working with the younger children, you boys and girls from the third form up, take out your books and slates and get to work.
Danny, I have a slate you can borrow until you get one of your own.”

The slate was passed to Danny, and he took it eagerly. He’d never used one before. He checked to see what Wilmer and the others around him were doing with theirs, then worked as they did, copying the spelling list in his reader, writing the words over and over again as he tried to remember the position of the letters. It wasn’t hard. It was fun. So Wilmer thought he was going to win, did he! Wouldn’t he be surprised when Danny came out way ahead of him!

When Danny and Peg arrived home late that afternoon, Gussie took one look at Danny and reached for a clean cloth. “You can’t let Miz Swenson see you lookin’ like that!” she said.

“Show me my kitten first!” Peg said, jumping up and down in excitement. “Where’s my kitten?”

Gussie grinned at Peg. “In that box in the corner. Mind you pick him up gentle now.”

“He’s beautiful!” Peg squealed. “And look at his long whiskers! That’s what I’m going to call him—Whiskers!”

As Peg knelt by the box and scooped up her kitten, Gussie wet the rag from the kitchen water pitcher and scrubbed so hard at Danny’s face and ears that he yelped and tried to squirm away.

“First day of school, and you got into a fight,” she said. “It looks as though you was rollin’ around in the dirt.”

“He was,” Peg said, “and so was the other boy.”

“And who was this other boy?” Gussie asked.

“It doesn’t matter,” Danny said quickly.

Peg’s nose crinkled as she tried hard to remember. “I don’t know his name,” she said, and Danny let out a sigh of relief.

“Well, the two of you know better than that,” Gussie said. She held Danny off and looked at him. “You’ll do
for now,” she said. “And no more fightin’. Keep that in mind.”

“Yes,
ma’am
,” Danny muttered. Wilmer was right, Danny thought. Gussie
was
bossy.

Gussie grinned. “It don’t make me no never mind if you call me
ma’am
,” she said. “I kinda like it. If you did it all the time, I might even start to put on airs. Now, the two of you go into the parlor nice and quiet like and say hello to Miz Swenson. She’s lying’ on the sofa.”