Little Citizens: The Humours of School LifeKelly, Myra
General
Little Citizens: The Humours of School Life
Kelly, Myra
Short stories; Students -- New York (State) -- New York -- Fiction; United States -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
After his initial speech in his English, so like Miss Bailey's, Isaac
Borrachsohn resumed his cloak of silence and spoke no more of the
language of the land. Even in his own tongue he was far from garrulous.
And yet his prestige continued to increase, his costumes grew ever
more gorgeous, and his slaves--both male and female--daily more
numerous. In reading and in "Memory Gems" his progress was, under the
veil of speechlessness, imperceptible, but in writing and in all the
prescribed branches of Manual Training he acquired a proficiency which
made it impossible to return him to his royal sire. Gradually it was
borne in upon Miss Bailey that she had met her Waterloo--a child who
would have none of her. All her attempts at friendliness were met by
the same stolid silence, the same impersonal regard, until in
desperation, she essayed a small store of German phrases, relics of
her sophomore days. Six faulty sentences, with only the most remote
bearing upon the subject in hand, were more efficacious than volumes
of applied psychology, and the reserve of Isaac Borrachsohn vanished
before the rising conviction that Teacher belonged to his own race.
How otherwise, he demanded, could she speak such beautiful Hebrew?
When Morris translated this tribute to Patrick, a flame of anger and
of hope lit up that Celtic soul. Such an accusation brought against
Miss Bailey, whom he had heard his noble father describe as "one of
ourselves, God bless her!" was bitter to hear, but the Knight of Munster
comforted himself with the conviction that Teacher would no longer
shield the sissy from the retribution he now had doubly earned. But
it should be a retribution fitted to the offender and in proportion
to the offence. Long experience of Jewish playfellows had taught Patrick
a revenge more fiendish than a beating, a ducking, a persecution by
"de gang," or a confiscation of goods and treasures. All of these were
possible and hard to bear, but for Isaac's case something worse was
needed.
He should be branded with a cross! Fortune, after weeks of
frowning, was with Patrick on that warm April afternoon. Isaac was
attired in a white linen costume so short of stocking and of
knickerbockers as to exhibit surprising area of fat leg, so fashionable
in its _tout ensemble_ as to cause Isidore Belchatosky to weep aloud,
so spotless as to prompt Miss Bailey to shield it with her own "from
silk" apron when the painting lesson commenced. Patrick Brennan had
obeyed his father's injunction to "lay low" so carefully that Teacher
granted a smiling assent to his plea to be allowed to occupy the place,
which chanced to be empty, immediately behind Isaac's.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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