Читать книгу Kings Row - Henry Bellamann - Страница 13

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The next two years were not exactly pleasant ones for Parris. School itself was less interesting. He had a new teacher, Miss Martha Colt. None of the children liked her. Whippings were frequent, and other punishments which were out of all proportion to the offenses. The children were quick to recognize her bad temper and unfairness, and it brought out in them a determination “to get the best of Miss Colt.” Parris escaped her displeasures, but most of the boys did not. Day after day they left school, their legs covered with a crisscross of long red welts. Some of them exhibited their injuries with pride.

Fulmer Green, one of the “tough boys from the lower end of town,” fully expressed the sentiment and attitude of all of them. “She kin cut the blood outa me if she wants to, but I’ll get even with her, darned old fool.”

It was not school that weighed heaviest on Parris. He could not say what it was. It seemed to be inside of him—some stirring, some restlessness, some urge which made him say again and again: “I don’t feel good.” His grandmother thought he might need a tonic but forgot to do anything about it. He roamed the place more than usual, summer and winter. He read a great deal—impatiently. Sometimes he sat and dreamed, vague, half-shaped dreams like those pictures beggars make in India by sifting colored dust on still water. But always something moved and shook the outlines and broke the visions into confusion.

He had grown considerably but he filled out well as he gained in height and retained his rather rounded and sturdy figure. The shadow on his lip was more pronounced. Drake McHugh said he would have to shave next year. Drake already boasted the possession of a razor of his own.

Parris was not unaware of the physical changes in himself or unobservant of the changes in others. But almost without noticing it he and his friends began to think of themselves as an older crowd. The children in Miss Venable’s room seemed very young. Drake, who was nearly sixteen, kept his friendship with Parris, who found the association flattering. Both of them assumed grown-up and superior airs to boys of twelve or thirteen.

Only his friendship for Renée remained unchanged. She still waited for him after school and walked home with him, but she talked more now than she used to—mostly about the other girls and what they said. Parris paid scant attention to her conversation and sometimes did not listen at all. She never seemed to notice his distraction, and was content to chatter on in her husky little voice. She had an odd trick of ending all of her sentences with a rising inflection as though she were asking a question, but she never waited for an answer. Sometimes she, too, was silent and they walked nearly all of the way without speaking. She was still his shadow, but less his double in action. Even he noticed that. She was less of a tomboy now in her walk and behavior—more girlish. He realized that she was really very pretty. Other people spoke of it. She didn’t look so babyish. Her face still kept its endearing heart shape, but her chin was more rounded, and she was almost as tall as he.

When Parris talked she listened with close attention but asked few questions. She was not really intelligent and had very little curiosity about things she could not readily understand.

She particularly liked to come and sit with him while he practiced the piano. She sat very straight in a high-backed velvet chair and listened with rapt attention, but she was immediately distrait if he stopped to explain why this or that passage was so hard to do. There were a few pieces she liked especially. When he played them her lips parted and her breath came quickly. Parris thought she looked like an angel at such times, but she was really looking slightly vacant. She wore much the same expression when she was eating. Her enjoyment of music was purely sensuous. When it was finished she thought no more about it.

On his fourteenth birthday Parris had his usual birthday supper with a cake and candles. Renée was his only guest. It wasn’t really convenient for children to come out from town in the evening, especially on a schoolday. Renée gave him three handkerchiefs with crooked initials worked in the corners. She had made them herself.

After supper Anna, the stout German maid, gave him fourteen playful spanks—one for each year—and another to grow on.

“It’s after eight, Parris,” Madame reminded him. “You’d better walk down to Renée’s house with her. It’s moonlight. You’re not afraid to come back by yourself, are you?”

He flushed. His grandmother didn’t seem to realize he was fourteen and would have to shave next year. “Of course not,” he answered impatiently.

As they went down the terrace steps Renée took his hand, and they walked on, swinging their clasped hands between them.

“I guess I ought to give you fourteen licks, too, like Anna did.” He laughed, but the laugh died quickly and his throat tightened. He swallowed. “I’d rather you’d kiss me,” he said.

“All right,” she said readily. “I’ll kiss you fourteen times.” She placed her hands on his shoulders and kissed him on the mouth, counting each time.... “Twelve ... thirteen ... fourteen ... and a big one to grow on.” She hugged him tight around the neck and made a humorous little grunt with the effort. He returned the embrace awkwardly and they stood for a moment a little breathless. The moon shone full on her face. Her moist red lips were parted, and she had her familiar look of listening to music.

“That’s the best birthday present I ever had,” he said. The gallantry of his speech surprised him, but he was pleased to have said it “I—I love you, Renée.”

“Honestly, do you?”

“You bet. I guess you’re my girl.”

“I like to be your girl. I guess you’re my sweetheart, too.”

“Let’s be sweethearts forever, Renée, you and me.”

“All right.”

“Cross your heart?” he demanded.

“... And hope to die,” she replied.

“Good night, Renée.”

“Good night. I had a nice time.”

“So did I.”

“Well, see you tomorrow, Parris.”

“Remember what you promised?”

“Of course.”

“You won’t forget?”

She shook her head. “Never.”

“Good night, then.”

“G’night.” Her voice trailed the words softly. He watched her go up the short walk to her door, her bright hair looking more silver than gold in the moonlight.

A few days later when they were coming home from school they overtook Willy Macintosh. He was walking slowly, absently kicking a stone ahead of him. He looked very solemn.

“What’s the matter, Willy?” Parris asked.

“Nothin’.”

“Goodness,” Renée said, “you look like you been crying.”

“I ain’t.”

“Well, you look like it.”

“My pa is awful sick.” He blurted the words, and tears stood in his brown eyes.

“What’s the matter with him?”

“He’s got sores on his leg.”

“Oh.” Renée’s tone conveyed the idea that this was nothing much.

“They’re bad sores,” Willy explained.

“What kind of sores?”

“They’re ulcers.”

“What are ulcers?”

“I don’t know. They’re terrible bad though. He’s going to have an operation today.”

“Oh, my goodness!”

“Uh huh.” Willy was apparently relieved that he had convinced them of the seriousness of the case. “Dr. Gordon’s there now, I guess.”

They walked slowly, keeping step with Willy, who delayed as much as possible. When they came to the crossroads where the big white Macintosh house stood in a grove of trees they saw a buggy standing at the gate. Two big bay horses pawed the ground impatiently.

“That’s Dr. Gordon’s buggy,” Willy said as if to prove his story. “I guess he’s performin’ the operation.”

The children stared curiously at the windows of an upper room where white curtains were looped back from the windows and the shades rolled high.

“Well, Willy, I hope your papa’ll—” Renée’s speech was cut short by a dreadful sound. A long-drawn cry came from those open windows. It was more like the howl of a dog. It mounted and mounted as though it would never stop, then broke into several short, quick sobs and died in a long moan. Renée turned pale and caught Parris by the arm. The cry came again—louder than before—rising and ending in a fearful shout.

Willy whimpered and ran back a few steps. His face was working with terror.

“Good gracious, Willy,” Renée spoke in a loud whisper, “didn’t Dr. Gordon give your father chloroform?”

“I—I heard Mama say he c-couldn’t take chloroform because he’s got heart disease.”

“Good gracious me! Parris, didn’t you think they had to give people chloroform for an operation?”

The terrible yells began again. Willy threw his books into the ditch beside the road. His face was crimson, and he was crying aloud. He clenched his fat dirty hands and rubbed his eyes violently. Then he began to run toward the house. “He’s got to quit that,” he sobbed. “He’s got to quit that. I’ll—I’ll kill that old durn-fool doctor.”

Parris and Renée watched Willy as he dashed up the walk and flung himself at the front door. He wrenched and pulled at the door, but it was locked. He ran around toward the kitchen door crying, “He’s got to quit that—I’ll kill him—I’ll kill him.”

“Come on, Parris, let’s go home. I’m scared. I never heard a man cry and holler before, did you?”

They hardly spoke but walked as fast as they could.

The next day at school they were told that Willy’s father had died. Parris overheard Miss Colt say to Miss Venable that Mr. Macintosh had died from shock. He wondered just what that meant. It was a long time before Parris could forget the sounds he had heard that afternoon. Whenever he saw Dr. Gordon dashing along the road behind his two high-spirited bays, he was reminded of it, and always he was divided between two feelings—one, a sort of terror of the man who cut people with knives, and the other an excited admiration. He wondered, as he watched Dr. Gordon pass in a cloud of dust, if he were hurrying to another operation. But it must be wonderful to be a doctor, anyhow, he decided. He imagined Dr. Gordon working and fighting to save somebody’s life. Dr. Gordon must be a very fine doctor. Everybody said so. The more he thought about it the more certain he was that he wanted to be a doctor; but he often wondered if he could really cut people open and sew them up—especially if they had heart disease and couldn’t have chloroform.

One thing, however, he was certain of. He was afraid of Dr. Henry Gordon.