Bright Island

by Mabel L. Robinson

  Mr. Fletcher lifted a silencing hand. “The only time that I have heard Latin read like that,” he said, “was at Oxford. I wish that you had all been born on islands and taught by your mothers.” A gong rang. “Will you wait, Miss Curtis?” and Thankful caught the sudden charm of his smile as the class filed out behind her. Her knees trembled a little.

  He talked to her like a human being. Amusingly, as one adult to another. And Thankful, who had known no girls but a whole family of men, felt at home with him at once. Even to telling him how she must go back to the island now. Strangely enough minding the thought of it.

  “Utter nonsense,” the man said. “Not but what you would be better off with the kind of teaching you’ve had. But failure’s a bad companion to take back with you. Come to my office at four.”

  The office was a comfortable untidy place. Books scattered over the table as they were in the kitchen. Familiar ones, too. Thankful’s experienced eye picked them out. Mr. Fletcher wandered around the room about his own affairs as her mother did. Now and then he talked with her about books she had read. Mostly he smoked his pipe and read.

  After a while Dr. Davis sauntered into the room and the two men talked about new bookcases for the library. Thankful paid no attention to them. This was the most peaceful spot that she had found. The tide flowed back over bare and thirsty spaces. She felt refreshed in the vigor of her own thoughts. When Dr. Davis asked her what she was doing she scarcely heard him.

  Then it was like a swift game. He moved, and she moved, covering the board on which was written all that she knew. Of course he won, but Thankful had the elation of a good player. Her alert eyes under their dark brows had followed his every move. After her mother had finished a grilling like that, Thankful always leaped for her boat and went singing down the bay. Excitement tingled now like an electric current. Even her fine halo of hair seemed alive with it.

  Dr. Davis looked as if he had been having a good time, too. Mr. Fletcher had the air of the cat who had swallowed the canary. He smoked very fast.

  “There seems to be a good deal of doubt about George Washington and his successors,” Dr. Davis said, and Thankful felt chagrined. “But the Scottish lines are intact.”

  Thankful ventured that they hadn’t done much with the United States yet because it was so new. He said yes, that there was nothing like a good foundation, and wouldn’t she like to go out and have a little fun before dinner. Friday afternoons lots of things went on.

  Friday afternoon! The time struck her and she staggered. Suddenly she saw the whole thing. They had been giving her the final interview before they sent her home. And she had played it like a game! George Washington! But he had probably only clinched the failures that all the teachers had reported. Go out and have a little fun! The light flowed out of her as if the current had been suddenly turned off.

  “I think I’d better do something about getting my father to meet me,” she said drearily. “He might be able to come across in his boat Sunday if I could send word tonight.”

  Mr. Fletcher slammed his pipe down and sprang to his feet. But Dr. Davis laughed at her. “Tut, tut,” he said, “we’re only settling which classes you’ll fit into. Your father won’t have to come for you for quite a while. Go on out and have some fun.”

  They were going to let her stay! She stood outside in the early twilight until she knew that it was so. She looked back at the lights turned on in the study. There she had got glory. Here she would keep it. Shouts across the darkening campus. Other human beings besides herself. She would find out how not to be a shadow. And she would learn about George Washington before she slept—her heart swept forward days ahead.

  Saturday morning blew through her window shaking and scattering leaves until she could see patches of sky as blue as island sky. No’west with a bite to it. The bay would be feather white today. She stared up from her bed and saw waves tossing instead of the leaves.

  Selina shivered under the covers. “For goodness’ sake shut that window. And see if there isn’t steam on.”

  “I’ll shut the window.” Thankful had wakened to her glory and she would not let it go. “But where do you look for the steam?”

  “In the pipes, goose.” Selina rose on her elbow. “Turn that wheel.”

  Thankful knelt like an angel, her hair its halo, to the astonishing rite. And heat was made there in the pipes with odd and guttural sounds. She sat back on her heels and laughed because of her light heart. “The fire is built,” she said. “Get up.” But Selina went back to sleep again.

  Thankful thought about her Saturday and knew what to do with it. Six miles to the sea. She could walk that easily. Would they let her have a lunch? They would. At nine by the chapel clock she went through the gates with her quick light step. But she thought, I can come back through them. I belong.

  Halfway to the shore the bus picked her up. Robert had leaned out and called to her. He and his two roommates of the tower room were off to try his boat.

  “Too much wind till the tide turns,” said Thankful, weather-wise. But she would have taken out the Gramp.

  They listened, doubtful. She sounded like one who knew. “Will it go down then?” they asked.

  “I should think so.” She nodded, not too sure. “Probably get becalmed by afternoon,” and she smiled to see them worry.

  She left them as soon as the bus turned on the shore. It was not possible to sit in a car on a day like this. If she went up the shore and they went down, she needn’t see them again. And Robert’s lovely sloop. She skittered along like a sandpiper, her hair blowing in the wind, her feet light on the hard sand. She thought she could never breathe enough of this sharp salt air.

  Dark-grained sand, humped rocks sunk in beds of gold wet seaweed, up and up the shore with the tide rushing the feathered waves at her. It hissed into gullies, and sure-footed she leaped them. All about her was the sound of moving water.

  When she had gone a long way, she came to a closed rocky cove, shut around like a room. She stripped off her clothes and plunged into the brine and the cold of the sharp waves. She dashed through them as if she breathed water, not air. She floated and watched the waves bear down on her and lift her up. She swam herself into a glow such as she had not felt since she left the island. I could swim back to Bright Island, she thought, and quickly put that thought away.

  The sun dried her, the good lunch fed her, and then she slept, tired with the first real stretch of her muscles. When she woke the sun said mid-afternoon. She must start back. The wind had all gone down as she had prophesied, and the sea lay still and blurry blue. The sharp morning had softened into the fall quiet that Thankful knew on her island.

  Just before she had to leave the shore for the road, an old man drove his powerboat up to a rough wharf. She stopped to watch him. He was making a botch of it. She ran down to the end of the landing and caught his painter. “Hurt my wrist hauling,” he explained and Thankful knew that he was grumpy because it hurt. She moved handily about the boat making things shipshape. “Pretty good at it, ain’t you?” he conceded. “Come from round here?”

  “Bright Island,” she said and was proud.

  “A Curtis, hey? No wonder you can handle a boat.” He toiled down the wharf with Thankful at his heels. “What you doing round here?”

  Thankful told him.

  “Come down next Sat’day and I’ll take you out,” he grunted.

  Thankful could not believe her luck. But he said it again when he saw her face, as if he even understood a little the thirst of her sea-starved soul. “Gorry, you help quite a lot,” he said and stumped off across a pasture.

  The bus passed her with the boys just as she entered the gates. They leaned out and waved. It slowed up and she hopped to the steps hanging to the rail as they slithered up the drive. Blown and sunburned and happy!

  “Hey, don’t fall off there!” That was Robert laughing at her. “Say, we got becalmed all right. Who told you all about the weather?”

  “I just know,�
� Thankful called back at him. “It’s born in island people.”

  “Pretty handy,” mourned Robert touching gingerly a blister on his palm. “Saves a lot of rowing.”

  “Where you been all day?” asked one of the boys leaning forward to look at her.

  The bus stopped and Thankful leaped off without answering. Robert waved his cap at her and she ran up the steps. She ran as if she had just risen from a night’s slumber, and her heart was warm and full.

  Five minutes to change from the old blue gingham to an ugly thing from her closet, and she was seated at the table stiff and quiet as ever. Inside though, something had melted and flowed softly through her veins. She had found the sea again, and Robert liked her. Of course it was important, too, that she was to be allowed to stay, but that was old news. Today’s sun had poured light into a good many dark corners.

  Selina was curious. She had seen the bus drive up and knew who was in it. “Where you been all day?” she asked like the boy.

  Thankful answered in the same way. She took her towels and soap and closed the door softly behind her.

  When she came back Selina was waiting. “You certainly looked funny hanging onto that bus like a street kid. Lucky no one in the office saw you.”

  “Did,” said Thankful. “Dr. Davis saw me.”

  “My Heavens! But then I suppose it makes no difference now. When you going?”

  “Going where?” Thankful had opened her window, and was stretched in the luxury of the soft bed.

  “Home, of course.” Selina was sounding crosser.

  “Oh, that!” Thankful turned away from the light. “When I’m through here, I guess.”

  “Well, when’s that?” exasperated.

  No answer. From the quiet head on the pillow Thankful might be sleeping. Selina knew no way to prove that she wasn’t.

  Monday morning Thankful was summoned to the office. The old fear rushed back though she tried to still it with what she was sure Dr. Davis had said. He certainly made me think I was going to stay, she thought, but just what did he say? And she could not remember. If I have to go now!

  But it proved a business-like encounter which left her rather breathless. She sat at her desk in the study hall and examined the program in her hand. Senior courses all of them except history and German. With a little extra work, he had said, she could finish up this year. Finish up this year! Go back to Bright Island to live! Forever and forever! Her eyes still looked as they had when he made the incredible statement, and followed it with, “Are you then so glad to be through with us?”

  “Oh, no!” He must believe that she was not rude. “Not that!” It was no use. She could not explain. She lifted honest distressed eyes to him. “Bright Island is where I belong.”

  She hoped he understood. He had said, “You’ll have to work hard to get back there.”

  “There’s no work too hard for that,” she had told him, and he had looked oddly touched.

  Suddenly she realized from the blue program in her hand that she should be in a class this moment. Room 212. Senior Latin. She ran for it! Down the long hall! But the door, that implacable door, with seniors behind it, and astonished looks. She fingered the knob. And then somehow she was in, and Mr. Fletcher was glaring at her with his impatient, “Late! Late! What have I—oh, it’s you, Miss Curtis. Well, try to be on time after this. Go on, Saunders.”

  She slid into a seat. There they were, Selina and Robert. She should have known that they would both be in this class. Selina looked horrified, and Robert embarrassed. They think I have made a mistake, thought Thankful, they all do. Maybe I have.

  She began to listen to Saunders to find out. He was pretty bad. Mr. Fletcher’s irritation agreed with her. She would have to do better than that. Well, she could. He was good not to call on her until she felt more secure. Perhaps he would skip her this time. Selina had passed a note along to her. “Tell him that you’ve got in the wrong room.” She was honestly distressed. That was nice of Selina. She had made a stumbling translation herself. Perhaps she felt a little responsible if Thankful was to be disgraced before the seniors. The hour was nearly over. Then she heard her name.

  “Read the Latin, Miss Curtis, I need not tell you as if you were a Roman.”

  Thankful caught that sudden charm of his smile, and read.

  The class stirred uneasily, ready to laugh, waiting their cue from the master.

  “Learn to read your Latin like that,” he said benignly and picked up his book.

  The class watched him leave the room. They turned a dazed stare on Thankful like one person slowly turning a head. Then they followed him out of the room.

  Selina caught her by the arm. “What under the sun!” she whispered angrily. “I tried to save you!”

  “Didn’t need saving.” Thankful felt cool and steady now.

  Robert was on the other side now. “Say, that was a grand performance! What do you mean by getting Fletcher sore at us?” His keen dark face was admiring, interested.

  Selina rushed ahead. “Hurry up, Robert. We’ll be late to math.”

  Thankful followed them. She had to go there, too. And math was something you couldn’t read out of a book. You had to think about it, alone and quiet.

  The room was like a beehive. It quieted when the teacher entered. But the inner noise and confusion went on. Thankful knew that she was finished. Her brain felt like a frozen block. The problems rushed out at the students, and they took them with them to the blackboard. Thankful took hers and stood with it, blank and empty. She heard the rattling of letters and figures around her as the recitations drew nearer her. Then it was her turn. She had not put one figure on the board.

  She shook her head, and saw Robert’s pitying eyes. The teacher was a stout woman who somehow looked insulted at her refusal. “How do you happen to be in this class?” Her voice said, At least I have a right to know this.

  Thankful stood with downcast head. What to say but the truth? “Dr. Davis sent me.”

  “But why?” This woman was not daunted by Dr. Davis or anybody else. “Why, when you can’t understand a simple theorem like this? He has made a mistake.”

  He had not made a mistake. Thankful lifted her head to catch Selina’s triumphant agreement. He had not made a mistake. She would not have him humiliated by her. “I do understand it,” she said. “I think I can prove it now.”

  “Too late. See me after class.”

  Thankful sat still and waited. She thought someone touched her gently on the shoulder as the class filed out, and she looked up to the dark eyes she was learning to notice. “Sic her!” whispered Robert. “She likes a good fight.”

  He was gone. And so were the rest. Thankful did not feel like a good fight. She felt like a good run. But Miss Jackson was challenging her through round spectacles. Yet all she said was, “Prove it then.” And Thankful proved it. “Stage fright?” she asked. Thankful nodded. “Well, I don’t bite.” Mary Curtis had been caustic often enough to make Thankful feel at home now. She tried to explain about the business of thinking and Miss Jackson looked interested.

  “But you might as well learn to think in a crowd. You can’t live like a hermit all your life.”

  “Yes, I can!” Thankful’s face lit with white fire. “I’m going back to Bright Island.”

  “Not yet, you aren’t,” the woman said briskly. “You’re here to stay for the year, I understand. Now you learn to use the brain God gave you without having to dig yourself into a hole to do it.”

  “Yes’m,” said Thankful meekly, and she thought that she could. After a few more math lessons!

  Learning that Lies in People

  Thankful now looked about her. She was here to stay irrevocably. You could be alone on an island and not be lonely. She thought how she wandered about day in, day out, berrying, clamming, sailing, and loved her loneliness as freedom. But here that freedom was changed into ostracism by these people milling about her. They worked upon her kind of enjoyment as they did on her thinking. Since s
he could not go her own ways here, she must learn to go theirs. The Saturdays would still belong to her, and rain or shine, the sea waited for her. But six long days stretched between them, days and evenings filled with activities in which she had no part.

  Selina was of little help. She had accepted a sort of academic equality with Thankful because of the increased ease of her own work. Thankful answered questions willingly, and her resources were astounding. Selina grew to rely upon them. Time to her was a thing not to be thrown away on work.

  She’s as busy as a mink having a good time, Thankful thought wistfully. I seem to have so much time for nothing. Her anxious absorption at the beginning had set her apart, and now she found herself still outside watching all these young people who had no awareness of her. She had thought she could find out how not to be a shadow, but now she was not sure that a shadow could ever become substance.

  Each evening when they danced until study hour, Thankful sat in a far corner and watched them. The rhythm beat in her ears and inside she felt herself dancing. Once Robert saw her and said casually, “Dance?” and she shook her head. “I don’t know how.” She would have given a large piece of her world to have slipped into step with him. And he did not even notice what she said. All the girls were waiting to dance with him.

  Once after Thankful had explained some tricky geometry to Selina, she thought that she might ask her how you knew just what step your partner was going to take, and could Selina show her. She bungled the asking, and Selina looked startled. “Oh, I couldn’t show you. I don’t lead. You just follow if you are a girl.” Thankful thought that she had not had much practice in following. What was it her father had said she must find out? What a girl’s for! If it was following, she’d never be much good at that. She did not ask Selina again.

  A special dance was coming. She knew about it because Selina was chairman of the committee and could talk of nothing else. Selina was so responsible for everything that she even included Thankful. “Where would you come in,” she speculated, “in a dance that seniors give freshmen? You are neither one nor the other.”