Listen for the Singing

by Jean Little

  There was a pause while his eyes swept the front rows. Anna went scarlet but sat absolutely still, hoping he would not notice her. Their eyes met, locked for an instant during which Anna knew she had been recognized, and then he looked past her.

  How had he known her? For she was certain he had. She didn’t look a bit like the others. Maybe Miss Gregory had told him that too and her telltale blush had told him the rest.

  “Wherever you are sitting, Anna,” he said smoothly, not looking in her direction again, “remember that I’m here to help you in any way I can. That goes for every new student beginning here this morning. It’s a big school and I’m sure most of you have a bit of a hollow, lost feeling right this minute, but it’ll be all right soon. You’ll see.”

  Behind Anna, someone applauded loudly. Mr. Appleby looked to see who it was and chuckled.

  “Thank you, Boris,” he said. “We couldn’t have a better recommendation.”

  “You’re quite welcome, sir,” a boy’s voice replied.

  Anna straightened at the sound of it. So it was that Boris! He was a friend of Fritz’s. He had come over from England halfway through the school year, had trouble adjusting, and had failed. The next year, he failed again, through sheer lack of work. Last year, when Fritz got to know him, he had settled down and headed the class. He’d set Fritz enough of a good example so that Fritz, too, had passed respectably. Boris must really like and trust Mr. Appleby to have had nerve enough to clap that way. And Mr. Appleby’s voice, even while it teased a little, had made clear his liking for Boris too.

  The principal went on for another couple of minutes. Anna spent the time wondering why he had said so much about her family. Somehow she had received an impression that he had done it on purpose. But why?

  It was over. Everyone was standing up. Anna got up too, copying the rest. Boys and girls all around her set off with what looked like boundless confidence to their various homerooms. She herself stood still. Which direction was it? What if she couldn’t …?

  Then Gretchen’s directions came back to her. She walked over to the hall, turned right — she was pretty sure this was the way they had come — and walked slowly, very slowly, down the next long hallway, her eyes searching each door as she passed it, searching but not at all sure …

  Then she saw it. The door, standing open but with the jagged scratch across it. 9E!

  “I did it!” Anna said out loud. She looked around. Nobody seemed to have heard her. Nobody was noticing her at all, except that she was standing still and people wanted to get past. She lifted her chin, reached up and touched Mama’s cameo to give herself added courage and, pretending she knew exactly what to do next, she walked into Mr. Lloyd’s homeroom.

  Chapter 5

  Anna would have hesitated just inside the door, hoping to get her bearings, but a thrust of bodies behind her sent her forward and she was standing by the teacher’s desk before she could come to a halt. She glanced at the straight chair behind it and then, doing her best to appear casual, looked around the rapidly filling room. As far as she could tell, Mr. Lloyd had not yet arrived. Some of the people clustered in the back corner by the windows were tall. But even though she could not see them distinctly, Anna knew that the teacher was not among them. Everyone was too relaxed. All around her she could hear bits of conversation which would not be taking place with such a teacher as Mr. Lloyd within earshot.

  “Are you going to try out for the rugby team?”

  “Mother wanted me to wear a summer dress when I’d made her buy me this skirt especially …”

  “My cousin warned me about this teacher …”

  “Are you going to see The Wizard of Oz?”

  “Let’s sit near the back.”

  The last remark told Anna what to do next. Find a desk for herself. Even in a front seat, she would not be able to read what was written on the board unless the teacher had really large writing, but at least she would have a better idea of what was going on. Here the desks were all nailed to the floor in straight rows. In the Sight Saving Class, they had separate desks which could be moved up till they even touched the board if necessary. And there had been much brighter overhead lights. And the boards had been green instead of slate-coloured. And the chalk had been fat and yellow instead of skinny and …

  Realizing that she was standing still, lost in a flood of memory, Anna hurried to move toward the front desk right in the centre.

  Nobody else would want it. She slid into the seat and sighed with relief. Now she didn’t look different if anybody was looking. Her common sense told her nobody was. But she seemed to feel all eyes staring at her, everybody thinking things like, What’s wrong with that girl in the funny-looking glasses? Gee, she looked dumb, just standing there!

  Well, she wasn’t just standing there any longer. She was placing her sweater on the seat beside her, arranging the battered, two-ring zippered notebook Gretchen had given her in the exact centre of the desk, taking out her new fountain pen and trying it out on a bit of paper to make sure it had enough ink in it. Having filled it just the night before, she knew it had, but it looked like a normal thing to be doing, she thought.

  “Hey, don’t sit there, kid,” a boy’s voice said.

  Anna jumped guiltily and glanced up, ready to look away quickly if he were not actually speaking to her. He was though. He towered above her, his hair as fair as Rudi’s, his face kind. He didn’t know her but he was taking the trouble to try to help her as though they were friends.

  “My brother had Leadhead two years ago and he told me that he eats the kids alive who sit up front.”

  “But … I chose this place on purpose,” Anna said. “I can’t see very …”

  The boy, looking over her head, did not let her finish. His voice dropped to a whisper.

  “Here he comes. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

  He was gone, heading for the back row, Anna was sure. Had he heard her attempt to explain?

  Then she took in what he had said and turned, her whole body tensing, to see the man Fritz called “the meanest man alive.” She expected some kind of ogre. Mr. Lloyd looked too ordinary to be as bad as they said. As he crossed the room to his desk, students filled in the last seats. Since there were no extra places, Anna was not the only one in the front row.

  Mr. Lloyd was not remotely like Papa. He had no laughter lines around his eyes. Anna could not usually have seen that, but he leaned across his desk to pick up a long ruler and she was only about a foot and a half away from him. What hair he had was reddish. He wore glasses with steel rims that glittered. His mouth looked as though he were biting his lips. But he was not tall. He looked not much taller than Mama. Anna wondered where she had received the impression that he was a giant.

  Then he spoke and she knew. He roared exactly like a giant. And nobody had done anything yet to make him angry.

  “Silence at once! This is a classroom, not a monkey house. Stop that jabbering this instant!” He banged on his desk with the heavy ruler.

  Anna felt herself jump at the unexpected loudness.

  “I’m warning you right now that I want no trouble from you. And I mean it! You’d better learn, and learn fast, that when I say, ‘Silence,’ I don’t want to hear so much as one whisper. Or a page turning. Or any sound at all! Is that quite clear?”

  Nobody moved. Were they supposed to answer somehow? Not a soul dared chance it.

  “If there’s anyone here who thinks he can show off and make mischief in this classroom, he’d better think again, for I can tell you right now that I’m more than a match for him. Is that understood?”

  Finally, the tension told. One boy, unable to help himself, snickered nervously. Mr. Lloyd was around the desk and down the aisle like a shot, banging into Anna’s elbow as he passed. He grabbed the now completely sober boy by the shoulder and jerked him out of his seat.

  “Stand up and face me,” he shouted.

  Anna peered back over her shoulder, ready to turn in a flash if the te
acher should start to look in her direction. The poor boy stood, brick red to his ears, head hanging, a good six inches taller than the man glaring up at him.

  “I’ll have an apology out of you this minute or you’ll go to see the principal,” Mr. Lloyd threatened.

  Anna had once seen a turkey gobbler, fussing away noisily over nothing, puffed up to twice his size and looking silly. She thought of him suddenly, and speedily pushed the picture out of her head, lest somehow Mr. Lloyd could read minds.

  Why doesn’t the boy just say he’d rather go to see Mr. Appleby? she wondered, remembering how kind the principal had sounded when he spoke to those in Grade Nine. But she knew. To say such a thing would mean … Anna could not think of anything short of murder on the spot.

  “I’m sorry,” the boy mumbled.

  “I’m sorry, sir!”

  “I’m sorry, sir,” the boy repeated, keeping his voice expressionless, his face blank.

  The teacher shoved him back toward his seat and stamped back up the aisle.

  He’s got us scared the way he wants, but nobody’s ever going to like him, Anna thought, keeping her eyes down.

  Without another word, Mr. Lloyd opened the register and began to take roll call. There was no need to instruct them how to answer when he called their names.

  “Barbara Abbott.”

  “Present, sir.”

  “Mark Ayre.”

  “Present, sir.”

  Anna listened as the names went by. None meant anything to her.

  “Simon Dangerfield.”

  “Present, sir.”

  “Margaret de Vries.”

  “Present, sir. But I’m called Maggie.”

  Mr. Lloyd lowered the book and stared over Anna’s head at the girl who had spoken out of turn.

  “Your name is Margaret, Miss de Vries, is it not?”

  “Yes, but …”

  “There will be no use of nicknames in this class,” Mr. Lloyd told her and went on.

  Anna wished she dared look around and see the girl who had had courage enough almost to argue. She suddenly remembered hearing Maggie’s voice before, as she and Gretchen were leaving the office. So there was a name she knew.

  Thank goodness they don’t call me Annie, she thought.

  They were nearing the S’s now. But she knew exactly what to do, after listening to so many others. Nothing could go wrong. Even if he did remember her brothers and sisters, he would not say anything about them at this point, surely.

  “Carl Schmidt.”

  “Present, sir.”

  “Anna Solden.”

  “Present, sir.”

  Anna relaxed and waited for the next name to be called. Mr. Lloyd did not go on.

  “Schmidt and Solden,” he said slowly. “Where was your father born, Schmidt.”

  “Kitchener, Ontario, sir,” Carl answered.

  Anna had been to Kitchener just last spring to visit friends of the Schumachers. Many German people had settled there on coming to Canada. She remembered Dr. Schumacher telling Papa that the city had been called Berlin, after the city in Germany, until the 1914–1918 war.

  “And your mother?”

  There was a tiny pause as though maybe the boy had not heard the question.

  “In Munich,” Carl said, dropping the “sir.”

  Anna waited for Mr. Lloyd to yell at the boy but he was on another track and did not even notice.

  “In Germany. Just as I thought,” he said, his voice ominous though the words sounded harmless enough. “And you, Miss Solden? Where are your parents from?”

  Unsure of what he was after but frightened all the same, Anna lapsed into the accent of her childhood.

  “Papa came from Hamburg and Mama from Frankfurt but we lived in Frankfurt until we came to Canada,” she said.

  Only after it was out did she realize she had said more than she needed to say and played right into his hands.

  “Well, well,” Mr. Lloyd said, “so you really are a German yourself, Miss Solden? Are you proud of your Fatherland?”

  Anna stared at him, feeling like a trapped bird. What did he want from her? How could she answer? This was a thousand times worse than having him ask if she were Rudi’s sister.

  “Miss Solden, you are German, are you not?”

  “I am, sir,” a quick, breathless voice said, breaking the tension for a second and then adding to it. “I’m a real German. Well … half.”

  “What do you mean? Who …?”

  “I’m Paula Kirsch. Mother’s Scottish but my father’s parents were German and, believe it or not, I was actually born in Austria in Braunau am Inn, the exact place where Herr Schicklgruber came from. He calls himself Adolf Hitler now. Is this a history lesson, sir?”

  Anna could not believe her ears. Mr. Lloyd looked as if he might literally explode. She could see veins standing out on his forehead. She had never felt more afraid. How did that girl dare talk back to him like that?

  “Aren’t you going to finish taking the roll?” came another voice, a boy’s this time. It sounded like the boy who had warned her not to sit up front. “My name’s Weber, sir. You haven’t got to me yet.”

  Mr. Lloyd snatched up the book from the desk where he had laid it after calling out Anna’s name. The book shook in his hands.

  He can’t be afraid of us! Anna thought, not believing her eyes.

  “Susan Sowerby,” the teacher got out.

  “Present, sir.”

  “Martin Tait.”

  “Present, sir.”

  The crisis was over.

  There were only a few minutes left in which to do several important things. Mr. Lloyd ordered them to copy down the morning’s schedule and the name of the textbook from the board. Anna strained but could not make out the words. The teacher’s writing was as small and crabbed as he was himself. She looked across at a girl who had answered to the name of Nancy French. Nancy probably would not mind letting her copy if she asked. Then, thinking of what might happen if she were caught whispering even so innocent a request, Anna knew she could not do it.

  “Never be afraid to explain and ask for help,” Papa always said.

  But Papa had not met Mr. Lloyd.

  And he taught them geography first thing Monday and Wednesday mornings. Well, at least that way, it would be done with early in the day!

  At last! The bell! They sprang to their feet. Mr. Lloyd made them all sit down again and get up properly, row by row, filing in order out the door.

  Anna was one of the first ones out. She was right behind Nancy French. Nancy was wearing a cherry-red blouse, so she was easy to follow. Even though they were walking in line, as they had been instructed, Anna had a feeling that, if she took her eyes off that bright blouse, she might easily drift into the wrong lineup in the crowded hall.

  While she concentrated, though, she heard bits of indignant conversation.

  “Who does he think he is — God Almighty?”

  “I was petrified!”

  “I thought he’d have a heart attack when Paula talked back!”

  “To think I looked forward to coming to high school!”

  Then Nancy French turned her head and spoke directly to Anna. “I think he ought to be reported — or something. The way he yelled at Dave!”

  “He’s terrifying,” Anna said, still shaking somewhere inside.

  “He didn’t scare me,” Nancy said. “Not even Germans frighten me.”

  She watched Anna.

  Like a cat watching a mouse, Anna thought, but I’m no mouse.

  She was pleased to hear the calm in her own voice as she answered.

  “That’s nice.”

  Their row had to stop to let another line pass. Nancy, not looking where she was going, bumped into the girl in front of her.

  “Watch out!” the girl snapped.

  “So sorry,” Nancy said, not sounding sorry at all.

  She paid no more attention to Anna.

  If you expect me to smile at her, forget it, Anna to
ld Isobel inside her head.

  The Latin teacher was an elderly lady with a firm cool voice. She made no mention of the war, not Hitler’s war. She did tell them they would begin studying Caesar’s wars before Christmas.

  “You will find them extremely interesting,” Miss Ogilvie said.

  Anna decided she was going to like Latin.

  Miss Raymond, who was to teach them French, sounded unsure of herself but she admitted openly that it was her first day teaching. The class whispered but not too much. She was pretty enough to make them show mercy to her, this time at least.

  English came next. Miss Sutcliff was wonderful. She had them skip making a seating plan so she could share a poem with them. When she started to read it aloud, Anna was delighted to find it was a poem Papa had given her to memorize.

  I never saw a moor.

  I never saw the sea,

  Yet know I how the heather looks

  And what a wave must be.

  I never spoke with God

  Nor visited in Heaven,

  Yet certain am I of the spot

  As though the chart were given.

  “What Emily Dickinson is saying in this poem is one of the chief reasons why we study English literature,” Miss Sutcliff said. “Think about it. We’ll discuss it tomorrow.”

  She then read aloud the list of books they would need. Anna gave her credit for being considerate even though the teacher had no idea yet that she had a pupil who could not read what was written on the board.

  Great Expectations, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a book of poems, one of Greek and Roman myths, and a final one called Shorter Essays.

  Great expectations! Anna thought, as she got up to go. That’s exactly the way I feel about English class. And we have it every day.