When the doctor was gone, Samira said to Anna, “I’d like to stay with Elias until I can see that he’s better. I can’t help thinking of Maryam.”
Anna nodded. “I’ll take my mat into that empty room down the hall and get a good sleep tonight. Then I’ll be ready for Elias when he’s feeling better.”
For the rest of the afternoon Samira sat on her mat and watched Elias sleep. She gave him tea to drink when he woke for a few minutes and sang softly to help him sleep again. By nightfall she thought he was breathing more easily, and she fell asleep herself.
The window was gray with early morning light when she woke up.
“Are you sick, too?” a scratchy voice said. “I’ve asked and asked for a drink.”
She leaned over to look at him closely. His eyes were still bright with fever and he hadn’t bothered to sit up, but there was determination in his voice.
“He’s getting better,” she said to herself, feeling that she had woken from a nightmare.
“No, I’m not sick,” she said. “I’ll get you a drink.”
When the doctor came back he said that Elias definitely was getting better.
“He doesn’t need to go to the hospital, but he must stay in bed until his fever is gone.”
The next two days weren’t difficult. Elias was glad to lie in bed as the girls sang to him and told him stories. Then he began to feel better and it was a challenge just to keep him quiet. Samira had to keep telling herself how glad she was that he was not limp and feverish anymore.
On the fourth morning it was her turn to look after him until lunchtime. He was hardly coughing at all and he wanted a new story, an exciting one. Samira had eaten bread and cheese for breakfast but she was hungry.
“Once there was a boy who was hungry…” she started.
“That’s not exciting,” said Elias.
“Listen,” said Samira. “This boy was hungry for something extra good, something very special. He heard about an umbar, a cellar, where all sorts of wonderful food was kept. Honey and rock sugar and fruit. It was a magic umbar where he could find anything he wanted to eat.”
She paused. How would the boy find this umbar? Elias was looking at her, waiting.
Just then she heard voices in the hall. Who could it be? All the children were in school. Samira forgot about the hungry boy. She got up and went to the door.
A woman wearing trousers and a jacket was walking down the hall with Mr. Edwards, talking quietly. Her hair was short and brown. Samira couldn’t see her face, but she could hear her voice, asking questions.
Elias got up and pushed himself in front of her so that he could see, too. Samira put her finger to her lips.
“Shhh. Be very, very quiet. Mr. Edwards has a guest and we mustn’t disturb them.”
Elias looked up at her and said, “Shhhhh.”
Samira patted his shoulder. By listening hard she could catch a word now and then.
“Windows,” the woman said. And “cold” and “winter” and “wheat.”
Mr. Edwards kept shaking his head. Samira knew what that meant. He was saying that nothing had been done about the winter. No window coverings, no wheat stored up.
About halfway down the hall the woman turned and saw the two children in the doorway. She smiled and came toward them.
“This must be your room,” she said. “What are your names?”
“I’m Samira and this is Elias.”
“Is he your brother?”
“No. He’s just little so Anna and I look after him,” said Samira.
“That’s like being a sister.”
“Yes, it is,” said Samira. “And I have a real brother, too. Benyamin. He’s older than I am. He lives in the boys’ dormitory.”
“You’re lucky to have two kinds of brothers,” said the woman. “Now I’ll know who Benyamin is when I meet him.” She paused. “I should tell you who I am. I’m Miss Shedd. I’ve come to be the director of the orphanage. I was just telling Mr. Edwards that there’s a lot to be done. We’re all going to be very busy.”
Samira couldn’t think of a word to say, and she couldn’t stop staring. Miss Shedd was young, much younger than Miss Watson or Mrs. McDowell. She wore trousers. And she was the director.
Miss Shedd saw her surprise and looked at her very seriously. “I probably don’t look like the director you expected. You see, I came all the way from Tabriz on horseback, and these are my traveling clothes. When I got to Hamadan this morning I wanted to see the orphanage right away. I thought the dormitories would be empty at this hour. Please don’t tell the other children about the trousers. Next time you see me I’ll be wearing a skirt and look the way a director should.” She smiled and Samira had to smile back.
“I won’t tell anyone,” she promised.
Miss Shedd said, “Thank you, Samira.” She looked down at Elias. “Young man, why are you in your sleeping shirt at this hour of the morning? Are you sick? Should I send you back to bed?”
She knelt down and took Elias’s face between her hands and looked into his eyes. Then she stood up.
“He has been sick, hasn’t he?” she said to Samira.
“He had a fever and sickness in his chest. Anna and I have been looking after him.”
“He’s better now,” said Miss Shedd. “I’ve had some training as a nurse and I can’t detect any fever and he’s breathing properly. You’ve taken good care of him but he should have been in the infirmary.” She turned toward Mr. Edwards, who simply shook his head.
“Another thing that hasn’t been done yet, I suppose. Well, we’d better get to work.” She looked at the children again. “Elias, you listen to Samira and get well.” And she walked away down the hall with Mr. Edwards.
Samira felt as if the air around her was crackling with Miss Shedd’s energy. She couldn’t wait to tell Anna about the new director. Of course, she couldn’t tell everything, she reminded herself. She had to keep her promise.
But Miss Shedd had not made Elias promise. The minute Anna came in he said, “I saw a lady wearing trousers. She said I’m not sick anymore.”
“It must have been a dream,” said Anna. “Ladies wear skirts.”
“No. A lady came. She talked to Samira. She wore trousers. Just like Mr. Edwards.”
Anna looked at Samira. “What’s he talking about? Is he seeing things? Is he worse?”
“No, he’s better.” She came close to Anna and spoke in a very low voice. “Look, it’s a secret, but a lady did come with Mr. Edwards to look at the dormitory and she was wearing trousers. But that’s not important. What’s important is that she’s the new director of the orphanage.”
“Are you telling me that it’s a secret that the director has come?” asked Anna.
“That’s not the secret. Just the trousers are a secret. We happened to see her in her traveling clothes because she came from Tabriz on horseback. After this she’ll wear a skirt like the other ladies. But she’s not like the other ladies, Anna. She speaks Syriac almost the way we do and she could see that nothing is ready for winter. She told Mr. Edwards that something must be done.”
“Well, I hope I meet her soon, no matter what she’s wearing. We need a director,” said Anna.
Elias spent the rest of the day telling Anna about the lady
who wore trousers. But by the next day when the doctor came to see him, he had forgotten all about her in his eagerness to get outside and play with his friends.
“I feel fine,” he said, taking a deep breath through his nose. “See, I can breathe!”
“You are fine, Elias,” said the doctor. “You go on outside and play.”
He checked Samira and Anna, too.
“No problem with either of you. But get some rest. You’ve done a big job keeping a little boy quiet.”
Several days passed and Miss Shedd did not come to the orphanage again. Now Samira began to worry. Maybe the people in Hamadan had sent her away because of the trousers. Or maybe they thought she wanted too many things for the orphanage and wouldn’t let her come back.
But Miss Shedd did come back. One day Samira came out of the eating room after breakfast to find the yard filled with wagons. The drivers were unloading rolled-up rugs and big crates. Walking around supervising everything was Miss Shedd. She was wearing a brown skirt and a bright red jacket.
“She looks so serious,” Samira whispered to Anna. “When I saw her before she looked excited and glad to be here.”
“She told you that there’s a lot to be done, didn’t she?” said Anna. “She’s getting started.”
Miss Shedd was busy counting boxes. When she saw the big boys and girls watching, she called, “Come on over and give me a hand.”
The children came closer but they stood a respectful distance away.
“Not over there,” she said sharply. “Right here. Two by two. I’ll tell you what to take and where it goes.”
In no time at all Samira and Anna found themselves carrying a rolled-up rug into each dormitory room. The boys lugged pots and pans and dishes into the kitchen and big boxes of cloth into the school building.
As the children worked, word spread that this woman was the new orphanage director.
At last there was nothing left except six sewing machines standing in a row. Miss Shedd motioned to Benyamin and Ashur.
“These are heavy,” she said. “Can you two carry them to the schoolroom?”
The boys nodded.
“Good,” said Miss Shedd. “But don’t drop them. These machines must be treated with great respect. After all, they’ll keep you warm this winter.”
By the time all the supplies were in their proper places, every older child had met Miss Shedd.
“She doesn’t wait even a second before she tells you to hurry up,” complained Anna as they went into the eating hall for lunch. “I need time to get started.”
“She’s the same with everyone,” said Samira. “She told one of the oxcart drivers to move his cart quickly or winter would catch up with him. She’s in a hurry to get things done.”
“Maybe,” said Anna. “Or maybe she’s just bossy.”
Before the children were dismissed after their meal, Miss Shedd came in and stood at the front of the room. She looked around the room at the children sitting on the floor.
Elias was right in the front. Samira could see him staring hard at Miss Shedd.
Suddenly his voice rang out in the silent room.
“I saw you before,” he said. “You were wearing trousers.”
Before Samira could take a breath, Miss Shedd said, “Well, I saw you, too. And you were wearing a shirt that came right down to your feet.” Then she laughed and everyone laughed with her, though they had no idea what Miss Shedd and Elias were talking about.
Miss Shedd went on, “Children, we have so much to do but we need to laugh, too. Thank you. I am Susan Shedd and I am now the orphanage director. For me coming to this orphanage is a little like coming home. You see, I was born in Urmieh. My father was with the American Mission in the city and I lived there until I was fifteen years old. Then I went to America to go to school. Now I’ve had the chance to return to Persia and be with you.
“I’ve been away for a long time but I remember how hard everyone in Urmieh and the villages worked to be ready for winter. This orphanage is new and there hasn’t been time to get everything ready, though the cold weather is already here. We have a lot to do very fast. We must make clothes and shoes, store food and make your rooms comfortable. And at the same time you must go to school. We will not let your education fall behind, for you’ll need it when you’re back in your village or wherever you go in the world.”
Samira felt dizzy. She remembered how a gust of wind would suddenly blow down the streets of Ayna, lifting the leaves that lay peacefully on the ground and swirling them high into the air. Now she felt like one of those leaves.
Miss Shedd was still talking. While she talked she was looking around the room, and Samira had the feeling that she was noticing every single child and deciding what task each one would do.
“Until things are in order we will have school in the morning and jobs in the afternoon. Once everything is organized there will be time for afternoon classes and games and music. It won’t be all work, I promise, but the work must come first. I want each of you to go to your room in the dormitory. You will find a rug there and some other supplies. You can arrange things as you wish. Just be sure that everyone who lives in the room is pleased with it. Stay in your room until I come around to see how you’ve settled in. Now, off with you!”
She turned quickly and walked out the door.
Samira looked over at Anna. “Let’s get Elias and go and look at our rug. I hope it’s red.”
The rug turned out to be dark red with a pattern of blue diamonds and a golden brown border. In some places it was very worn, but the girls agreed that it was beautiful, and it felt soft and warm under their bare feet.
Elias immediately lay down on his stomach on the rug. He took a small stick from his pocket and began tracing the blue shapes against the red background, humming quietly.
“I remember doing that,” Samira said, almost to herself.
“Let’s see what else there is to arrange,” said Anna. “I want to be ready when Miss Shedd comes.”
There were three cotton quilts and three baskets to hold the clothes they weren’t wearing. And there was a metal lantern with a candle in it. It had a loop at the top so that it could be hung from a hook in the wall, if there had been a hook.
They put their extra clothes in the baskets and set the baskets against the wall along with the folded quilts so that they would have the whole rug to play on. Since there was no hook for the lantern, they put it in a corner.
Samira looked around the little room. It held everything that was theirs and they could sit comfortably together on the rug. She sat down beside Elias, who was busy finding many diamond shapes, little and big, in the pattern.
Anna watched for a moment. Then she went outside and came back with several roundish pebbles. Samira knew at once what those pebbles were for.
Anna showed Elias the big blue diamond in the middle of the rug.
“All the pebbles go here,” she said. “Now, pick the one you like best and Samira and I will choose, too.”
Elias spent a long time choosing the best pebble.
“Now what?” he asked.
“Put your pebble down on the rug and flick it with your finger, like this.” She showed him how to flick his first finger against his thumb to make the pebble move across the
rug.
Elias’s short fingers were surprisingly strong, and soon his pebble was shooting straight and far.
“Now,” said Anna, “flick your pebble at those pebbles inside the diamond. If you hit one and it goes out of the diamond, then it’s yours. We’ll take turns and whoever gets the most pebbles out of the diamond wins.”
This was harder. Elias managed to hit one pebble out of the blue diamond and was so pleased that he didn’t notice that Anna and Samira were sneaking back the ones they hit so that they wouldn’t win too fast. In the end Anna couldn’t help winning, but Elias promised her that he would practice and beat her next time.
“He probably will,” said Samira. “He’s a very determined boy.”
Miss Shedd came by as they were gathering up the stones.
“I used to play something like that,” she said. “And there’s another game where you toss a stone in the air and pick up others as fast as you can.”
“Yes,” said Samira. “First you throw down all the stones except one.” She could remember how the other girls always watched closely to be sure you tossed the stones and didn’t just drop them in a heap.
“That’s it,” said Miss Shedd. “Now, what were the words we said?”
“It’s shkelta when you throw them and metaytah when you pick them up. But you have to get them all up before the stone you tossed comes down,” said Samira.
“Oh, yes. I remember.” Miss Shedd glanced around the room. “You’ll need a hook for the lantern to keep it away from anything that might catch fire. And you’ll need some hooks for clothes, too.” She smiled. “Don’t worry. You’ll have new clothes to hang up as fast as we can make them. Shoes, too. Winter’s coming, you know.” She gave the uncovered window a quick glance, shook her head and was gone.
THREE DAYS LATER Miss Shedd made an announcement as the children were finishing lunch.
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