“And my dad says all artists are queers,” Jimmy replied. “My dad says your parents are commies and bums and you should go back where you came from.”
Robby glared at the bigger boy, his eyes blazing with anger. He knew he shouldn’t swing at him — his parents wouldn’t approve. But how else could he defend himself from Jimmy Phipps’s taunts? He took a step forward and saw three other boys line themselves up behind Jimmy.
“Get him, Jimmy,” Joe Taylor urged. “Rub his face in the dirt.”
“I don’t want to fight,” Robby said in a final effort to avoid a fracas.
“That’s ’cause you’re chicken!” Jimmy cried. His friends urging him on, he leaped on Robby, his fists pummeling the smaller boy.
Robby fought back and managed, somehow, to get on top of Jimmy, but then the other boys crowded in, grabbing Robby and holding him while Jimmy Phipps recovered himself.
“Let go of him!” Missy screamed. “You let go of my brother!”
She aimed a kick at one of the boys, but Robby stopped her, telling her to stay out of it. Then he jerked suddenly, struggled free, and threw a punch at Joe Taylor. Joe’s nose started to bleed immediately and he ran off toward the schoolhouse, howling in pain and clutching his injured face. The other boys looked on in surprise. Jimmy Phipps, about to leap on Robby again, stopped and stared, suddenly unsure of himself. Robby, though small, apparently packed a wallop.
“You leave me alone,” Robby said. “And you take back what you said.”
“All right,” Jimmy Phipps said. “You’re not chicken. But your daddy’s still a commie queer. My dad says so.”
Robby jumped on the bigger boy, but the fight was suddenly stopped when their teacher appeared, grabbing each of the boys by the shoulder and separating them by pure force.
“That will be enough,” she said. “What’s this all about?”
“It’s Robby’s fault, Miss Peters! He gave Joe Taylor a bloody nose and jumped on Jimmy Phipps!”
Miss Peters had been teaching at the Clark’s Harbor school for thirty years. She was sure there was more to the story than that, but she had learned long ago that getting the whole truth out of half a dozen ten-year-olds is harder than undoing the Gordian Knot. The most effective way to deal with a situation like this was to listen to no one at all.
“I don’t care what happened,” she said. “Robby, your clothes are filthy and it looks like you’re going to have a black eye. Go home for the rest of the day.” Jimmy Phipps grinned maliciously but Miss Peters put a quick end to his triumph.
“As for you, James, you can spend this afternoon cleaning the school, and the rest of you can help him!” She took Missy by the hand and started back inside.
Robby stood glowering at his tormentors for a moment, then started toward the schoolyard gate. Behind him, Jimmy Phipps couldn’t resist a parting shot.
“We’ll get you for this!” he shouted. “You’ll wish you never came to Clark’s Harbor!”
Robby Palmer, his eye beginning to swell, burst into tears and began running home.
Rebecca gave the pottery wheel a final kick, gently molded the clay between the fingers of her right hand and the palm of the left, then wiped the dampness from her hands while the wheel coasted to a stop. She surveyed her work with a critical eye. The rim of the vase should be a little thinner, perhaps a shade more fluted. Then, with a sigh, she decided to leave well enough alone. Heavy, chunky pottery was her style — the fact that it was easier for her to execute was a bonus — and why take a risk she didn’t have to take? She brushed a strand of long dark hair away from one eye, then carefully removed the nearly finished vase from the wheel.
She left the old tool shed that had been converted into a makeshift pottery and walked slowly toward the cabin to check on her bread dough. To her right the beach arched invitingly away to the south, white sands glistening, and for a moment she was tempted to go off beachcombing, looking for items that could eventually be sold in the gallery. But somehow it didn’t seem fair to abandon herself to the beach while Glen was cooped up in the gallery, struggling with two-by-fours that refused to bend themselves to his desires. Which was strange, she reflected, considering that he could do anything at all with wood-carving tools. In fact, Rebecca considered Glen to be a better wood sculptor than painter, but she would never tell him so. Yet when it came to a simple thing like measuring and cutting a shelf, he was a dead loss. She smiled to herself as she pictured the finished gallery, its shelves all slightly lopsided. No, she decided, Glen’s sense of artistry would make the gallery look right, no matter how ill-fitting everything might be.
With one last longing look at the beach, she made herself continue on into the cabin. She surveyed the bread dough dolefully. In fairness to Glen, there were things she wasn’t very good at either, bread making among them. The dough, which should have risen by now, sat stolidly where she had left it. It seemed, if anything, to have shrunk. She poked at it, hoping to set off some small, magical trigger inside, that would start it swelling up to what it should be. Instead, it resisted the pressure of her finger and looked as if it resented the intrusion. Rebecca contemplated alternate uses for the whitish mass, since it was obvious that it was never going to burst forth from the oven, a mouthwatering, golden-brown, prize-winning loaf. Finally, since she could think of nothing better, she simply dumped the mass of dough onto a cookie sheet, shoved it into the oven, and threw another piece of wood into the ancient stove, hoping for the best.
She was about to move on to another of her endless tasks when she heard Robby’s voice. She wasn’t sure it was his at first, but as it grew louder she had a sudden feeling of panic.
“Mommy, Mommy!” The child’s voice came through the woods. And again: “Mommy! Mommy!”
Dear God, Rebecca thought, it’s starting up again. He’s done something awful at school and they don’t want him back, and now what are we going to do? With a shock she realized how near the surface the old fears, the fears she had lived with for so many years, were. She thought she had buried them. Since they had come here Robby had been so well, she believed she’d put them aside forever. Now, as Robby’s cries drew closer, Rebecca struggled to control herself. She had never been good at dealing with her son’s violent outbursts. She could feel the terror rising inside her. Dear God! Why wasn’t Glen here? “Mommy!”
Rebecca dashed out of the cabin just in time to see Robby emerge from the woods. Fear clutching at her, she saw that his nose was bleeding and his clothes were a mess. Then he was upon her, his arms wrapped around her, his head buried in her stomach. He was crying.
“It’s all right,” she said. “It’s all right Mommy’s here, and everything’s going to be fine.” God, she prayed silently, please let everything be fine. Please …
Still sobbing, Robby let himself be led into the cabin. Rebecca braced herself for trouble as she began cleaning him up, but Robby sat quietly while she washed his face. Most of her fear left her: it wasn’t the hyperkinesis then. It was something else. But what? He should be at school, not home, bloody and crying.
“What happened, Robby?” she said when the bleeding had stopped and most of the smudges had been removed from his face.
“I had a fight,” Robby said sullenly.
“A fight?”
Robby nodded.
“What was it about?”
“You and Daddy.”
“Me and Daddy? What about us?”
“They were calling you names and saying we shouldn’t have come here.” He looked beseechingly at his mother. “Why didn’t we stay in Seattle?”
“You were sick there.”
“I was? I don’t remember.”
Rebecca smiled at her son and hugged him. “It’s just as well you don’t remember,” she said. “You weren’t very happy when you were sick, and neither were Daddy or Missy or I.”
Robby frowned. “But we’re not very happy here, are we?”
“We’re happier here than anyplace else,” Rebecca whispered. “And things will get better. Just don’t listen to them when they say things about you.”
“But they weren’t saying anything about
“Well, it’s the same thing. Now I want you to promise me you won’t fight anymore.”
