The weeks folded into months, and still no summons came. Each morning I walked past the post-box with my heart braced for joy or shame, and each evening it stared back empty, its silence heavier than words. Arabella tied her ribbon bright as though colour itself might coax a letter. Heath leaned his stick by the door each night, ready for the walk he believed we would take when word at last arrived. But no message came, no letter was delivered, and the days lengthened like shadows across the lane.
In those months, we scattered each morning. Heath went north to his school with a swagger in his step, Arabella east to hers with her ribbon already flapping in the wind, and I alone went straight on. We parted at the crossroads, each carrying our own hunger, each waiting in our own way. Yet the waiting bound us as surely as the ocean's voice, steady and grave beyond the fields.
The bell tore the morning open, shrill and merciless, so that even the gulls startled from the fence-posts and beat their ragged wings into the mist rising from the ocean. Its clang lodged inside my ribs long after it ceased, as if the sound itself meant to dwell there. The lane up to the school stretched damp and narrow, bordered with sodden weeds, the air sharp with salt blown inland. I carried my small bundle, the tin cup clinking at my side, my heart already burdened.
The schoolhouse crouched at the hill's crown, narrow-shouldered and suspicious, its roof hunched as though the ocean wind had pressed it down in mockery. The windows were clouded with the sighs of children who had sat there before us, and it seemed less a sanctuary than a jailer's hut, watching every approach with dull contempt. I slowed at the gate, but the bell still vibrated in the air and I could not tarry.
Inside, the air scratched with chalk dust and stove smoke. Damp wool steamed from children's coats, filling the room with the sourness of bodies crowded too close. Desks leaned tiredly against one another, their grooves recording generations of elbows and bored knives. The strap lay hidden beneath Miss Harrowell's books, yet its silence filled the room more surely than the squeal of chalk as she wrote upon the board.
Miss Harrowell entered with a tread heavy for her size. She was short and thick about the waist, her black hair cut blunt and drawn back with pins that gleamed like nails. Her cheeks were quick to flush, giving her face the look of one perpetually aggrieved. The curl of her mouth seemed carved, as though it had never known softness. Her eyes, small and restless, swept the room with contempt and lingered on me a beat too long, as if my very presence insulted her. She straightened her bodice with pomp and crossed to her desk. The hush fell without command.
We stood to sing the anthem. Voices thin and strained rose against the rafters. Outside, the ocean boomed like a great drum, indifferent to our pledges. When the song ended, we sat again, already smaller.
Numbers began the day. Miss Harrowell called Elise first. Elise rose, her plait shining pale as straw, ribbon neat at her crown. She read her sums clear and even, like water poured from a glass. Miss Harrowell's face warmed, almost beautiful in its change, and she praised Elise in a tone of sticky sweetness. The whole room knew Elise had pleased her. Elise sat, cheeks bright with triumph, her eyes lowered in modest pride.
Then my name.
I rose, slate in hand, and spoke each figure steady and quick. Not one sum faltered. My voice reached every corner of the room. For a heartbeat I thought she would approve.
"Clara," Miss Harrowell said, her tone colder than the frost clinging to the panes, "you must learn humility. Pride makes poor scholars."
The class shifted. Heat struck my face. Some children smirked, others looked down uneasy. Elise coloured faintly and clasped her hands, ashamed for me. I sat, my answers still right, but my heart soured as if correctness itself had turned poisonous.
The morning lengthened under chalk and ink. Pens scratched and blotted, chalk squealed against the board. My hand trembled once, and a blot spread dark across the page. The pointer struck near my wrist, sharp and warning. I flinched, eyes drawn unwillingly to the strap beneath her books. My heart counted not numbers but beats, quick and sick. I whispered the sums to myself, small as dust, until the whisper steadied me.
At noon the bell released us into the yard. The ground was sodden, the air raw, the ocean's breath bitter on our cheeks. Arabella was not there, Heath was not there. Loneliness sharpened the salt sting. I unwrapped my bundle, bread so thin it bent, cheese scarcely more than a shaving, and broke it with ceremony as if ritual might enlarge it. Elise passed near, not too close, not too far. "You read well," she murmured.
"So did you," I said.
"She likes my hand better," Elise whispered, glancing at her perfect copybook.
"Yes," I answered, because it was true.
A braid had slipped loose by her ear. I longed to tuck it back but kept my hands still. Touch always speaks louder than words.
Children scattered in shrieks and games. Some drew kingdoms in chalk on the wall. Others wrestled until mud scrawled its map across their coats. A group of boys marched stiff-legged like soldiers, sticks their muskets, their cries stolen from drills echoing up from the harbour. I sat apart, clutching my cup. The ocean rolled in my ears like judgment. Elise lingered near, then was called by others, and I was alone again.
The bell dragged us in. The stove heaved its grudging breath, the windows wept with condensation. Miss Harrowell's eyes swept the room like blades. Then they fixed upon me.
"Clara. Step forward."
I obeyed, heart tight.
"Fasten your shawl," she ordered.
I did.
"Tighter."
I pinned it again.
"Even so," she said, her eyes sweeping me from crown to shoes. "This garment is ill-managed. Plainness, when flaunted, is vanity."
"It covers me," I answered, my voice cracking but steady.
Her gaze flicked to Elise. "There is modesty, and then there is show. You would do well to study her example."
Heat rose through me, fire under my ribs. "It covers me as well as hers," I blurted before caution could still me.
A ripple moved the class, a stifled laugh, a cough. Elise bent her head, her hands twisted in her lap.
"Insolence," Miss Harrowell declared. She drew the strap from beneath her books. The air shrank.
"Palms."
I offered them.
Leather hissed through air and found me once, twice, thrice. Fire lit across my skin, spread to my arms, up into my throat. Tears brimmed but I bit them back. The room listened in guilty silence.
"Stand there," she commanded, pointing to the wall.
I obeyed. The plaster pressed cold through my shawl. Chalk dust settled bitter on my tongue. Children bent their heads, scribbling harder, pretending not to see. Elise gripped her desk until her knuckles whitened. I stood still as stone, my palms burning.
At last the day bled out. Benches scraped, books shut, children scattered like released birds. Elise lingered at the door, staring at the floorboards. As I passed, she brushed her hand against my sleeve, just enough to say I had been seen.
Outside, the wind had sharpened. The ocean thundered iron-voiced beyond the wharves. Gulls wheeled and scissored the greying sky. I walked alone. Other children laughed in pairs or groups, but I counted my steps by the throbbing of my palms. At the post-box I lifted the lid. Empty. I shut it softly, whispering faithful, as if naming its patience might conjure a letter.
The lane stretched long. Nettles clawed at my hem, puddles mirrored the dimming sky. Curtains twitched at windows then fell back. No door opened. My loneliness trudged beside me heavier than my bundle.
At last our cottage rose, squat and familiar, with the ocean's breath clawing its shingles. We entered by the lower rooms. Mama's chamber lay to the right, ours to the left, the small washroom between with its tub cracked, basin chipped, and the hollow where Legs spun his patient web. Upstairs the kitchen sulked in shadow, the parlour beyond, and the forbidden room we never entered.
I set water to warm and plunged my hands into it. The sting softened though the memory did not. Arabella was already home, ribbon askew, mimicking a schoolmistress for Heath, who grinned at her antics. Their chatter filled the room, but mine remained silent. Heath noticed and frowned, yet said nothing.
When Mama came, later than the light, she read everything in a glance. She lifted the cloth, saw the welts, counted them with her eyes. She pressed my palms against her cheek, her breath warm on the raw skin.
"What is this?" she asked, her voice low but fierce.
"Miss Harrowell," Heath answered for me.
Mama's lips thinned to a blade. She bound my hands with linen, then straightened. "I will speak. Tomorrow."
The rafters hushed. The stove stilled. Even the bowls ceased their trembling. Fear pressed on me, but relief pressed deeper. At last someone taller than I would carry words into that hostile room.
We ate bread in narrow shares. Arabella named each bite a feast, cheese a treasure. Heath muttered justice under his breath. I drank from the cup and let its cold honesty steady me.
Night gathered. We washed, folded, prayed. God keep us. God bring her home safe. God let the morning remember us. Arabella's amen was feather-light, Heath's dropped like a stone. Mine cracked in my throat.
We lay down, two in the bed, one on the mat. Bodies made the only warmth we would have. The stove's eye closed. The ocean outside kept its endless account. Above the washroom Legs adjusted a single thread, certain of his small kingdom. I tucked my burning hands beneath my cheek and whispered they were safe, though I was not sure it was true.
Sleep came late, broken. The bell still rang inside me, the strap still hissed, the wall still pressed cold against my back. Yet I clung to two truths: Elise's hand brushing my sleeve, and Mama's promise to speak. Small things, yet enough to keep despair from devouring me whole. Still the greater waiting lay upon us. The post-box stayed empty, the lane unvisited, no letter, no message, no word from Papa. Each morning we hoped, and each evening we learned again how silence can stretch a day into an age.