I turned back to meet Mrs. Penn’s eyes. “I am sorry for my rudeness in coming downstairs barefoot, but my boots are filthy. I need to clean them.”
She waved her hand in a manner that said it wasn’t important. “I’ll take you and the boys to the shoe shop tomorrow. We can get you some new ones.”
“No. I can’t . . .” I said, as I took a seat in the spare chair.
Mrs. Penn refilled her coffee, then offered me a cup. I shook my head, but Officer Krugle raised his cup for another round.
“You will. No excuses. Frank will back me up on this. We can’t have you going about barefoot or in old, dirty boots.”
I sighed, then drank half the water in my glass. “Thank you. I’d be happy to pay you back if there’s someone who needs a house cleaner or . . .”
Mrs. Penn wagged her finger at me, as if I’d said a swear word or something. “Nonsense, your work is here. You can read, can’t you? You’ve had some schooling, right?”
I nodded, embarrassed. I hadn’t finished, though. I’d left when I was ten to earn enough money to pay for food for myself and, then later, Frey, but I was lucky that Mr. Sullivan, the sheriff, had insisted I attend school with the other children in my earlier years. His firmness had apparently caused a rumpus in the village, because the others thought I should do chores during school hours so I could labor more hours to pay for my room and board.
“Good, then you can do some instructing in your spare time,” Mrs. Penn said. “That should provide you with some additional wages that will allow you to buy incidentals. But the boots and your clothing will be paid for by the town’s orphanage endowment. As well as your food and the needs of your horse, because I’d already said that was part of the deal.”
I’m afraid to say that my mouth was jaw dropping then. It was all too remarkable to believe. In fact, my good fortune left me breathless.
“I will be happy to teach the boys, Mrs. Penn. You don’t have to pay me, and I can use Mrs. Smith’s teaching materials that I found up in the attic,” I told her with a big smile.
She shook her head and one more wiggled her finger in the air, but she didn’t say anything more. We were busy eating the sandwiches she’d brought us. I’d pulled the meat out of mine and buried it under a heap of cabbage slaw. I wasn’t fond of that anyway. I disliked anything that had mayonnaise in it. Most people made the gooey stuff with raw eggs. Mrs. Bellows had gotten food poisoning from hers.
My sandwich, which unfortunately had mayonnaise on the bread, was still plump with chunks of lettuce, a thick slab of cheese, and a couple of slices of tomato, so it was perfectly tasty despite the mayonnaise. I enjoyed the apple slices and carrot sticks, also, which were a real treat, because mostly, when I got them, they went to Frey.
After the sandwich, there was even an oatmeal cookie. Wow! I savored mine, nibbling at the edges until every bit of it was gone. Then I wanted to lick my fingers, but, of course, I didn’t.
Frances placed his sandwich down on the plate and leaned forward. “Really? Shama’s going to teach us to read? Mom started to do that, but Dad said it was a waste of money to buy books. Mom used to write the alphabet in the dirt, but we never learned all of it. Dad kept telling Mom it was time for her to do something whenever she sat down to teach us. Carlo doesn’t even know the first three letters, but I learned ten of them. Except the b and d. They’re really tough.”
All the adults smiled. That was a story common to most children. I’d always thought it was poor planning on the part of the person who’d invented writing. I would have given those letters completely different characters, like an H with bars at the top and bottom or a W with a pole in the middle. But then, maybe the crossed H and the poled W might also cause a muddle of confusion.
Anyway, I told Frances that I couldn’t wait to get started. “I love to read,” I said. “And soon, that will be you, too, having adventures in books. You get to go anywhere you like, even to fly like a bird, if you can find a book like that. And you want to know a secret? Once you learn your letters, you can even make up stories in your head and write them all down. I saw some paper in the attic. We can use that to make books! If that’s okay with Mrs. Penn and Officer Krugle,” I added.
“Definitely, but just for a while,” the woman told me. “Once the boys get caught up, then they can attend school with the other children. Well, Frances can. I’m afraid that Carlo is too young yet. But he can work with you during school hours.”
I nodded, reminding myself that my new job would only be temporary.
Our sandwiches had been chicken and we had fresh asparagus spears and apple slices as well as the carrots. Mrs. Penn said it had all come from the town’s restaurant.
The boys didn’t seem to care. They probably didn’t know what a restaurant was. I’d never been to one, unless washing dishes in the back counted.
“Can you cook?” Mrs. Penn asked me.
I wasn’t a great cook. I’d never had much training, but the house mothers had shown me the basics so that I could help them out in the kitchen. In the last house, I’d cooked all of Mrs. White’s meals because she was always feeling poorly, although she had a good, strong appetite when the food was ready. Sometimes, I wondered how she got along without me, but after I left her house, I was living in the termite-invested lean-to, and I wasn’t willing to go back, even if she’d asked me to.