November
November dripped onto Long Island, as it did every year. The days turned gray and damp, and a hovering mist licked everything. The perfect white cement sidewalk in front of the Perfect House was always wet. The azaleas lost the remnants of their white and pink blossoms, and then many of their leaves, and since they were half-naked and embarrassed, my father wrapped them in tight burlap—which also got wet. On the first Saturday, I cut the lawn for the last time, and then my father cut the lawn again to get it right, since it was going to look this way until spring, he said, and it had better look good. The next Saturday we climbed up to the roof and cleaned out the gutters, since they were overflowing now every time it rained and the dirty water was staining the corners of the Perfect House. Which made my father really mad.
But not as mad as the stain on the ceiling of the Perfect Living Room made him. No one knew how long water had been dripping down onto it, because no one ever went in there. So by the time my mother discovered it while vacuuming, the stain was as wide as a garbage can lid, and dark with mold. That night, when my father reached up to feel it, a handful of plaster came down on his face. Some of the moldy stuff got into his mouth.
It was a very quiet supper.
But that's November. It's the kind of month where you're grateful for every single glimpse of the sun, or any sign of blue sky above the clouds, because you're not sure that they're there anymore. And if you can't have sun or blue sky, then you wish it would snow and cover all the gray world with a sparkling white so bright that your eye can't take it in.
But it doesn't snow on Long Island in November. It rains. And rains and rains.
Which is how, I think, Mrs. Baker got the idea of assigning me The Tempest.
But her nefarious plot to bore me to death failed again, because The Tempest was even better than The Merchant of Venice. In fact, it almost beat out Treasure Island—which is saying something.
It was surprising how much good stuff there was. A storm, attempted murders, witches, wizards, invisible spirits, revolutions, characters drinking until they're dead drunk, an angry monster named Caliban—can you believe it? I was amazed that Mrs. Baker was letting me read this. It's got to be censored all over the place. I figured that she hadn't read it herself, otherwise she would never have let me at it.
Caliban—the monster in the play, not the escaped rat—he knew cuss words. I mean, he really knew cuss words. What Mr. Vendleri said while standing on Danny Hupfer's desk didn't come close. Even Doug Swieteck's brother couldn't cuss like that—and he could cuss the yellow off a school bus.
I decided to learn them all by heart—even if I didn't know exactly what they meant. I didn't know what most of Doug Swieteck's brother's cusses meant, either, and it didn't make all that much difference. It's all in the delivery anyway. So I practiced in my bedroom, thinking of my sister.
A southwest blow on ye and blister you all o'er!
I know, it doesn't sound like much. But if you say it slow and menacing, especially when you get to "blister," it'll do. Keep your eyes half-closed, and it will really do. But for the rest of the Caliban curses, it's a lot better to say them loud and fast, like:
The red plague rid you!
and:
Toads, beetles, bats, light on you!
and:
he/em>
I'm not exactly sure what that last one means, but if you really hit the last three words hard, it will do its stuff.
I told you that Mrs. Baker wouldn't have let me read this if she'd read it herself.
Every night after supper, I practiced in front of the dresser mirror—without my shirt, because I could look more menacing that way. I decided to perfect the "Toads, beetles, bats" one first, since that was the one I understood the best and because when I said it, a little bit of spit came out with the "beetles."
By the second Tuesday night, I had gotten it about down and could say "toads" with a bloodcurdling croak when my mother knocked on my bedroom door.
"Holling?" she said. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine," I called.
"It sounds like you're talking to someone."
"I'm practicing for a speech," I said, which was sort of true.
"Oh," she said. "Oh. Then I'll leave you to finish."
I worked on the "red plague" for a bit, because that one is all in the timing.
Then my father knocked on the door. There must have been a commercial on.
"I can hear you all the way down in the den. What are you doing?"
"Practicing Shakespeare," I said.
"What do you need Shakespeare for?"
"For Mrs. Baker."
"For Mrs. Baker?"
"Yes."
"Then get it right," he said, and walked away.
I went back to the "toads, beetles, bats" until my sister knocked on the door.
"Holling?"
"Yeah."
"Shut up."
"A southwest blow on ye and blister you all o'er," I said.
She threw open my door. "What did you say to me?"
In the face of a sixteen-year-old sister who's about to drop something on you from heaven, even Shakespeare fails. "Nothing," I said.
"Keep it that way," she said, "and put your shirt on, you weirdo." She slammed the door shut.
I decided I was done with practicing for the night.
I went to school early the next day, since I needed some private place to practice the curses. When I reached the third floor, I found Mr. Vendleri holding a ladder steady in the middle of the hall. He had half a dozen spring traps in his hand, which he was holding up toward Mr. Guareschi. I could see only Mr. Guareschi's legs, since the rest of him was poked up through an opening where he'd removed some asbestos tiles.
"Hand me the rest," Mr. Guareschi called down, and Mr. Vendleri did.
"Now the cheese."
Mr. Vendleri reached into his bib overalls and pulled out a plastic bag with cubes of yellow cheese.
"Now, I'll just pull this spring back," Mr. Guareschi said, "and set the bait right beneath—"
There was a sudden loud snap, and then it wasn't mercy dropping down as the gentle rain on the place beneath. It was Mr. Guareschi.
"Oh," he said.
(Not really "Oh," but it wasn't as good as Shakespeare. Not even as good as Mrs. Baker.)
Mr. Guareschi looked up from the floor. His face was red, and his fingers redder. He shook them wildly, as if he wanted them to separate from the rest of him. "Oh," he said again.
(Not really.)
"You could try 'The red plague rid you!'" I said.
Mr. Guareschi, still on the ground, looked up at me. "What are you doing in school so early?" he said.
"Or 'Scurvy patch!'" I said.
Mr. Guareschi shook his fingers again. "You're not supposed to be here this early," he said.
"He saw us putting up the cages," said Mr. Vendleri.
Mr. Guareschi stared at him. "This is the student who let the rats go," he said. "He already knows."
Mr. Vendleri looked hard at me. Then he put his finger up to his lips. "Not a word," he said.
"Toads, beetles, bats light on me if I let it out," I said, and I got the timing just right—even the little bit of spit on the "beetles."
Mr. Guareschi looked at me strangely, and then he slowly stood, picked up the spring traps that had fallen around him, and turned to climb back up the ladder. Considering the condition of his red fingers, I thought it was pretty brave of him.
"Go to class, Holling Hood," he said.
Mrs. Baker was already in her classroom. She was looking up at the ceiling when I came in, listening to the scrambling and pattering of feet scurrying across the asbestos tiles overhead. We listened together for a moment until the scurrying stopped.
"Not a word, Mr. Hoodhood," she said.
"Not a word," I said, and went to my desk.
"Did you finish The Tempest?" asked Mrs. Baker.
"Yes," I said.
"We'll see this afternoon," she said, and she turned back to a pile of essays on her desk, spreading a red plague over them with her pen.
Even though I didn't have the private place to practice that I wanted, I figured I could work on the Caliban curses to see if I could get them down just right in a pressure situation. So I whispered into my desk, "Strange stuff, the dropsy drown you"—which was cheating a little, because I put two together. But I thought it sounded right. I tried it again, thinking about Caliban and Sycorax—the rats, not the monsters in the play—because I wanted to make the "strange stuff" come out more like a hiss.
"Strange stuff, the dropsy drown you," I whispered.
"Is there something you have to say?" asked Mrs. Baker.
I sat up. "No," I said.
"Are you speaking to someone hiding in your desk?"
I shook my head.
She put her red pen down. "Since there are only two of us in the room—a situation which has become very familiar to us these past months—and since you were speaking, I assumed that you must be addressing me. What did you say?"
"Nothing."
"Mr. Hoodhood, what did you say?"
"'Strange stuff, the dropsy drown you.'"
Mrs. Baker considered me for a moment. "Was that what you said?"
"Yes."
"A curious line to recite, especially since the combination never occurs in the play. Are you trying to improve on Shakespeare?"
"I like the rhythm of it," I said.
"The rhythm of it."
"Yes."
Mrs. Baker considered this for a moment. Then she nodded. "So do I," she said, and turned back to spreading the red plague.
That had been close.
But I watched her with something like amazement.
She had known the curses! Both of them!
She had read the play!
And she had still let me read it!
Whatever she was plotting, it was a whole lot more devious than I had given her credit for.
I decided to ease into things more naturally, to let Caliban curses come where they might fit in without any fuss.
At lunch, I found that my mother had given me a bologna sandwich with no mayonnaise, a stalk of celery that had been wilting since the weekend, and a cookie with something growing on it that wasn't supposed to be there.
"Strange stuff," I whispered.
At lunch recess, Doug Swieteck's brother lurched across the field, sixth graders scurrying out of his way as if he was a southwest wind about to blister them all over.
"Thou jesting monkey thou," I said.
Not so that he could hear it.
Right after recess, I found that the eighth graders had filled the boys' restroom with smoke so thick you couldn't even smell the disinfectant.
"Apes with foreheads villainous low," I said.
Not so that they could hear it.
In Geography, Mr. Petrelli announced a unit project: "The Mississippi River and You." I raised my hand and told Mr. Petrelli that I had never been to the Mississippi River and had no plans to go soon. I didn't feel any kind of personal stake in it at all, so I didn't understand the "You" part.
"Must all history center around your own personal experience, Hoodhood?" Mr. Petrelli asked.
It did seem that since we were talking about the Mississippi River and You—or in this case, Me—one possible answer to his question would be yes. But in Camillo Junior High, and especially in Mr. Petrelli's class, the right answer is usually just shutting up.
"Your report," Mr. Petrelli continued to the class, "can be on..."
I whispered the "Toads, beetles, bats" one here and got it just right.
In Chorus, Miss Violet of the Very Spiky Heels—the "Very Spiky Heels" line isn't in Shakespeare, it's from Danny Hupfer—Miss Violet of the Very Spiky Heels figured we had way too many altos, and she told me to move forward to sing the melody with the sopranos.
"Me?" I said.
"You have a lovely, clear voice, Holling."
"I can't sing soprano."
"Of course you can," said Miss Violet. "Just reach for the high notes."
I gave my music—my tenor music—to Danny Hupfer. "You have a lovely, clear voice, Holling," he said.
"Pied ninny," I said.
Meryl Lee made room for me on her music stand. "You didn't know you could sing like a girl, did you?" she said.
"Blind mole, a wicked dew from unwholesome fen drop you," I said. I was getting good at making combinations.
Meryl Lee grabbed my arm. "What did you say?"
Miss Violet of the Very Spiky Heels tapped her baton for silence. Then she raised her hands and waved them grandly, and we began a medley of American folk songs—which are supposed to make your heart swell patriotically. I tried to look like I cared a whole lot about reaching for the high notes, of which there were more than enough.
Meryl Lee still held my arm. "What did you say?" she asked again.
"I'm just a poor wayfaring stranger..."
"That's not what you said," she said.
"A-trav'ling through this world of woe..."
Meryl Lee moved her hand up toward my throat.
Then Miss Violet of the Very Spiky Heels tapped her baton again.
Everyone went quiet.
"Meryl Lee?" Miss Violet said.
Meryl Lee dropped her hand and looked at Miss Violet. Her cheeks flushed into a color you only see in television cartoons.
"Meryl Lee," said Miss Violet, "I didn't send Holling up there so that you could flirt with him."
Well, the look that came over Meryl Lee's face was the look you'd have if you wanted the earth to open up so that you could jump in and no one would see you again forever and ever. Her mouth opened, and her eyes opened, and her nostrils opened. Even the freckles across her nose got a whole lot bigger.
Miss Violet tapped the baton again, and we started to sing.
"Yes, we're all dodging, dodging, dodging, dodging,
Yes, we're all dodging a way through the world."
I tried not to show anything when Meryl Lee put her foot on top of mine and pushed down as hard as she could, which, let me tell you, teaches you something about a world of woe, and dodging, too.
The next hour was Gym, where we ran laps around the track along with the eighth-grade class, who all smelled smoky—especially Doug Swieteck's brother.
"Hoodhood," called Coach Quatrini, "you call that running?"
The quality of mercy doesn't drop much from Gym teachers.
The reason I wasn't running well was because Meryl Lee had kept pushing down on my foot for all of "Goin' Down the Road Feeling Bad" and almost all of "Worried Man Blues," and if it's possible for there to be internal bleeding in a foot, then that's what mine was doing.
"Pied ninny," I said, not loud enough for Coach Quatrini to hear me.
But loud enough for Doug Swieteck's brother, who was running just behind me, to hear.
"What does that mean?" he said, coming up beside me.
"What?"
He slowed down to match my limp. " 'Pied ninny.' What does that mean?"
"Uh..."
"C'mon," said Doug Swieteck's brother.
"It means ... uh..."
"You don't know."
"It means someone who's so stupid that he's eaten all these pies and gotten really sick—sick like he's going to throw up all over himself. That sick."
It was the best I could do while limping along with internal bleeding.
"That's it?" he said.
"That's it," I said.
"Thanks," he said, and ran ahead, the scent of cigarette smoke lingering in the air.
That afternoon, after everyone had left for Temple Beth-El or Saint Adelbert's, Mrs. Baker handed me a 150-question test on The Tempest. One hundred and fifty questions! Let me tell you, Shakespeare himself couldn't have answered half of these questions.
"Show me what you've read and understood," said Mrs. Baker.
I sat down at my desk and picked up my pencil.
"And Mr. Hoodhood," she said, "there isn't a single question there about Caliban's curses—presuming, as I do, that you have mastered those already."
That's the Teacher Gene at work, giving its bearer an extra sense. It's a little frightening. Maybe that's how people decide to become teachers. They have that extra sense, and once they have it, and know that they have it, they don't have any choice except to become a teacher.
I got down to work. Overhead, the scurrying sounds of Caliban and Sycorax across the asbestos tiles accompanied the scratching of my pencil.
I handed the test in five minutes before the end of the day. Mrs. Baker took it calmly, then reached into her bottom drawer for an enormous red pen with a wide felt tip. "Stand here and we'll see how you've done," she said, which is sort of like a dentist handing you a mirror and saying, "Sit here and watch while I drill a hole in your tooth." The first four were wrong, and she slashed through my answers with a broad swathe of bright red ink. It looked like my test was bleeding to death.
"Not such a good beginning," she said.
"The quality of mercy is not strained," I said.
She looked up at me and almost smiled a real smile. Not a teacher smile. Think of it! Mrs. Baker almost smiling a real smile.
"Nothing so much as a pound of flesh is at stake."
You could have fooled me.
Maybe it was mercy, or maybe I just needed to get into the rhythm of the thing, but after the first four wrong, the rest went pretty well, and the gushing blood slowed to a trickle, and then, for the last thirty questions in a row, a complete stop.
"You've coagulated, Mr. Hoodhood," Mrs. Baker said, which I think is a Caliban curse that I missed. "For next week, we'll review what you missed. And read The Tempest again."
"Read The Tempest again?" I said. I mean, you can understand reading Treasure Island four times, but no matter how good a Shakespeare play is, no one reads it twice.
"You'll find that there is a lot more to The Tempest than a list of colorful curses."
"Read The Tempest again?" I said.
"Repetition is not always a rhetorical virtue," said Mrs. Baker. "Yes, read it again. From the start."
So.
It had turned out to be an all-right Wednesday afternoon after all. Except for the internal bleeding. And except for the 150-question test. And except for having to read The Tempest again. From the start.
But as I limped on home, I figured that if I read an act that night, and another on Thursday, and Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, I could have it all finished pretty painlessly. And each one would probably go a lot quicker, since I had already read them all once.
Life got brighter, and somehow, the world suddenly got brighter, too. You know how this is? You're walking along, and then the sun comes out from behind a cloud, and the birds start to sing, and the air is suddenly warm, and it's like the whole world is happy because you're happy.
It's a great feeling.
But never trust it. Especially in November on Long Island.
Because as I limped past Goldman's Best Bakery, the front window was filled with cream puffs. Brown, light, perfect cream puffs. And I remembered the death threats hanging over me like Shylock's knife hanging over Antonio's chest.
I decided that to be safe I'd better get the cream puffs—even if it meant asking for an advance on my allowance.
Which I had about as much chance of getting as Shylock had of getting his ducats back.
Still, I thought I might have a little chance when Dad got home that evening and let out the great news: Hoodhood and Associates had won the Baker Sporting Emporium contract! They were going to design a new main store and redesign every single one of the chain stores—and there were plenty of them, one in almost every town on Long Island. He grabbed my mother and twirled her around, and they danced beneath the newly plastered ceiling of the living room. Can you believe it? They went into the Perfect Living Room! Then they danced through the kitchen, back into the Perfect Living Room, out onto the front stoop, down the stairs, and past the embarrassed azaleas.
Let me tell you, when Presbyterians start to dance on the front stoop, you know that something big has happened.
"We got the contract, we got the contract, we got the contract, we got the contract," my father sang. It sounded like he was waiting for a full string orchestra to come in, something out of The Sound of Music.
When he swept back inside, pirouetting my mother, it seemed the perfect moment to ask.
"Dad, could I have an advance on my allowance next week?"
"We got the contract, we got the contract, not on your sweet life, we got the contract."
That night, I dreamed that Caliban sat at the foot of my bed, looking a lot like Danny Hupfer and telling me how I was going to end up all scurvy and blistered if I didn't get the cream puffs next week—the end of the three weeks I had promised. "Beware, beware," he said, and I decided I should.
So on Friday, I went to Goldman's Best Bakery and put two dollars and forty-five cents on the counter—all the money I had in the world.
"Two dollars and forty-five cents can buy a great deal," said Mr. Goldman. "So what is it you want to buy?"
"Twenty-two cream puffs," I said.
Mr. Goldman added up twenty-two cream puffs in his head.
"For that you need two more dollars and eighty cents."
"I need the cream puffs by next week."
"You still need two more dollars and eighty cents."
"I can work. I can wash dishes and stuff?."
"I should need you to wash dishes? I have two good hands. They can wash dishes, too—and I don't have to pay them."
"I could sweep and clean up."
Mr. Goldman held up his two good hands.
I sighed. "You don't need anything done around here?"
"What I should really need," he said, "is a boy who knows Shakespeare. But is there a boy who knows Shakespeare these days? No. Not one. You would think that they should teach Shakespeare in school. But do they? No."
Okay, I'm not kidding here. Mr. Goldman really said that: "What I should really need is a boy who knows Shakespeare." Those words came right out of his mouth.
"I know Shakespeare," I said.
"Sure you do," Mr. Goldman said. "You still need two more dollars and eighty cents."
"I do."
Mr. Goldman put his hands on his hips. "Show me some Shakespeare, then."
I went back to The Tempest, and not just the Caliban curses, either—which is all that Mrs. Baker thought I knew. I spread my arms out wide.
Now does my project gather to a head.
My charms crack not, my spirits obey, and Time
Goes upright with his carriage. How's the day?
Mr. Goldman clapped his hands—really!—and then he leaped upon a stool behind the counter—and Mr. Goldman is not someone whose size encourages leaping. He clapped his hands again above his head, and a fine, light flouring flew into the air—sort of like chalk dust—and a haze shimmered about his face. His voice changed, and when he spoke, it was as though he was chanting a high and faraway music.
On the sixth hour, at which time, my lord,
You said our work should cease.
I spread my arms out even wider, and tried to imagine long robes with sleeves that flowed down along the arms of Prospero.
I did say so
When first I raised The Tempest. Say, my spirit,
How fares the king and's followers?
The "and 's" is not easy to say, but it came off pretty well, with about as much spit as "beetles."
Mr. Goldman clapped his hands again, and another shimmering of flour fell.
Confined together
In the same fashion as you gave in charge,
Just as you left them.
Mr. Goldman climbed down from the stool and held out his still floury hand. His smile pushed his cheeks into round lumps.
And that was how I got to be part of the Long Island Shakespeare Company's Holiday Extravaganza, which was opening next month.
And how I got twenty-two cream puffs for two dollars and eighty cents less than I should have—plus two more free, since they come cheaper by the dozen.
And it was a good thing.
When Monday came and I walked into the classroom carrying a long box of cream puffs, it was pretty clear that Danny Hupfer and Meryl Lee and Doug Swieteck and Mai Thi would have been at me with daggers, looking for a pound of flesh, if I had failed them. I set the box on the shelf by the window and opened it up. Twenty-four cream puffs—brown, light, perfect cream puffs—waiting to be eaten after lunch.
Mrs. Baker didn't say anything. But all through English for You and Me, the buttery vanilla smell of the cream puffs wafted around the room with the circulating air, and even Mrs. Baker couldn't help but look at them. I saw her nostrils grow wide. Danny Hupfer kept turning around and grinning at me. Meryl Lee pretended like she didn't care much, but she's a terrible liar.
If lunchtime hadn't come when it did, we might have all gone wild. Even Mrs. Baker. But finally, finally, finally the school clock clicked to noon, and we crammed our sandwiches down our throats, and then Danny Hupfer stood up and approached the brown, light, perfect cream puffs sort of reverently.
"Not just yet, Mr. Hupfer," said Mrs. Baker.
Danny Hupfer looked at her like he'd just missed an easy goal.
Meryl Lee looked at me like it was my fault.
"If you are going to eat cream puffs," said Mrs. Baker, "you are going to do it on your own time. Go out for lunch recess and come back a few minutes early. Then you may gorge yourselves as you please."
"I bet she's going to take three for herself," whispered Doug Swieteck.
"No, Mr. Swieteck, she is not going to take three for herself," said Mrs. Baker. "She is going to Saint Adelbert's quickly to light a candle, and she will be back in time for your gorging. Now, out, all of you."
We went out.
It was, of course, a cold November day on Long Island, and everything was, of course, gray—the sky, the air, the grass, the drizzle misting down. Gray everywhere. We stood around in huddled groups, a little bit damp, and still hungry because we'd eaten so fast and there were twenty-four cream puffs waiting for everyone back in the classroom. Twenty-four brown, light, perfect cream puffs.
"They better be good," said Meryl Lee.
"They'll be good," I said.
"They better be really good," said Danny Hupfer.
"They'll be really good," I said.
When there were only seven minutes left in recess, Danny Hupfer declared that we had served our time, and even if Mrs. Baker hadn't come back yet, we deserved our cream puffs. So like an unstoppable mob, like a tidal wave, like an avalanche, we rushed into Camillo Junior High, up two flights of stairs, and to the doorway of our classroom.
And stopped.
On the shelf, the long box of cream puffs lay ripped apart, and in the middle of the buttery, brown, light, perfect cream puffs stood Sycorax and Caliban, up on their hind legs, their paws holding shreds of crust to their mouths. Their faces were covered with yellow vanilla filling and powdered sugar. Their naked tails were thick with it. Their scabby skin was slathered with it.
Then Mrs. Baker came behind us and peered in. The rats opened their snouts and clacked their yellow teeth at her.
And Mrs. Baker screamed, "Strange stuff, the dropsy drown you! The red plague rid you, thrice double-ass!"
That last one I knew about, but I wasn't going to tell you I knew it, because of what you'd think of me.
Sycorax and Caliban understood the meaning of all those, I guess. They scurried out of the box, skidding in the vanilla cream, and leaped into the radiators. We heard them climb up inside the walls, then scamper across the asbestos tiles.
There was a long and absolute silence.
Then Meryl Lee turned to me. "You still owe us cream puffs," she said.
"Ten day," said Mai Thi.
"Ten days!" I said.
"We gave you three weeks already," said Danny Hupfer. "Now you have ten days."
"Ten days!" I said.
"Here is another situation where repetition is not a rhetorical virtue. Clean up the mess, Mr. Hoodhood," said Mrs. Baker.
And I did.
But I wasn't happy.
Usually, the last week before Thanksgiving was pretty easy. Everyone is thinking about two days off from school, grandparents coming for dinner, the Syosset-Farmingdale football rivalry, and all that.
But it wasn't an easy week this year. Not for me.
It was a long week.
First, it somehow became my fault that Sycorax and Caliban ate the cream puffs. I think this was because of Meryl Lee. For three days, things were whispered about me that I hope I never have to hear.
Then second, on Wednesday afternoon, when I went to get the script for the Long Island Shakespeare Company's Holiday Extravaganza from Mr. Goldman, I found out that I was going to play Ariel from The Tempest. Ariel is a fairy. A fairy! Let me tell you, it is not a good thing for a boy from Camillo Junior High to play a fairy. Especially a boy who has been singing soprano for Miss Violet of the Very Spiky Heels.
"I don't think I can play Ariel," I told Mr. Goldman.
"Here's your costume," he said, and handed me a pair of bright yellow tights with white feathers on the ... well, I'll let you guess what part the white feathers were attached to.
Third, now that I needed another set of cream puffs, I asked my father if he might ever, ever, ever imagine a three-week advance on my allowance, since he had clinched the deal with the Baker Sporting Emporium, and he just laughed out loud. "You ought to be a comedian," he said. "You and Bob Hope. You could travel to Saigon together and do troop shows."
"I wasn't trying to be funny," I said.
"You must have been trying to be funny, since no kid of mine in his right mind would ever ask for a three-week advance on his allowance," he said.
"I was trying to be funny," I said.
"I thought so," he said.
Fourth, when I told Meryl Lee that I might not be able to get the cream puffs by next Wednesday ("I wouldn't spread that around if I were you," she said) and that my father was a cheapskate since he'd just landed this big deal with the Baker Sporting Emporium and he wouldn't give me a dime, she started to cry.
Really.
"Meryl Lee," I said, "it's not all that bad. I'll find a way to get the cream puffs. I mean..."
"You jerk," said Meryl Lee, "you don't understand anything," and she wouldn't speak to me or anyone else the rest of the day.
Fifth, on the Tuesday before the Wednesday of the cream puffs deadline, Mr. Guareschi came in and asked Mrs. Baker if she knew what "pied ninny" meant. She asked him why he needed to know that, and he told her that Doug Swieteck's brother was in his office at that very moment for having called Mr. Ludema a pied ninny.
Mrs. Baker stared straight at me.
And sixth, when Wednesday morning came around and I walked in with a bag of five cream puffs—which was as far as a one-week allowance stretches—it was pretty clear that I was doomed. With five cream puffs, almost everyone could have one quarter of a cream puff, I pointed out. It was better than nothing.
Meryl Lee shook her head.
"You're dead," said Danny Hupfer.
And I supposed I was. At least I wouldn't have to wear the yellow tights with the white feathers attached you can guess where.
But you know that stuff about the darkest nights turning into the brightest dawns? That can sometimes come true. Even when you least expect it.
Because when we came back in from recess, on the shelf was a long box from Goldman's Best Bakery ... filled with twenty-four cream puffs! Twenty-four brown, light, perfect cream puffs! Twenty-four buttery vanilla cream puffs!
"Mr. Hoodhood was simply playing a joke on you all," said Mrs. Baker. "Now, enjoy."
And we did.
That afternoon, Mrs. Baker asked me if I thought that the ending to The Tempest was happy or not. Maybe because I had just had my own happy ending, I told her that I figured it was.
"How about for Caliban?" she asked. "Does he deserve a happy ending?"
"No. He's the monster. If there's going to be a happy ending, it means he has to be defeated. You can't end Godzilla without killing Godzilla. And you can't end The Tempest without Caliban getting..."
"Getting what, Mr. Hoodhood?"
"He can't win."
"No, he can't win. But sometimes I wonder if perhaps Shakespeare might have let something happen that would at least have allowed a happy ending even for a monster—some way for him to grow beyond what Prospero thought of him. There is a part of us that can be so awful. And Shakespeare shows it to us in Caliban. But there's another part of us, too—a part that uses defeat to grow. I wish we could have seen that by the end of the play." She closed her book.
"Defeat doesn't help you to grow," I said. "It's just defeat."
Mrs. Baker smiled. "Two weeks ago, the Saturn V lunar rocket passed its first flight test. It's been less than ten months since we lost three astronauts, but we're still testing the next rocket, so that some day we can go to the moon and make our world a great deal bigger." She held her hands up to her face. "Wouldn't Shakespeare have admired that happy ending?" she whispered.
Then she put the book away in her lower desk drawer.
It was quiet and still in the room. You could hear the soft rain on the windows.
"Thank you for the cream puffs," I said.
"The quality of mercy is not strained," she said.
Mrs. Baker looked up and almost smiled a real smile. Again.
And that was when Mrs. Bigio came into the classroom. Actually, she didn't quite come in. She opened the door and stood leaning against the doorway, one hand up to her mouth, the other trembling on the doorknob.
Mrs. Baker stood. "Oh, Edna, did they find him?"
Mrs. Bigio nodded.
"And is he..."
Mrs. Bigio opened her mouth, but the only sounds that came out were the sounds of sadness. I can't tell you what they sounded like. But you know them when you hear them.
Mrs. Baker sprinted out from behind her desk and gathered Mrs. Bigio in her arms. She helped Mrs. Bigio to her own chair, where she slumped down like someone who had nothing left in her.
"Mr. Hoodhood, you may go home now," Mrs. Baker said.
I did.
But I will never forget those sounds.
***
I found out the next day that Mrs. Bigio's husband had died on a small hill with no name, in a small part of Vietnam. He had died at night, on a reconnaissance mission. Afterward, the army decided the hill was not a significant military target, and abandoned it.
Three weeks later, the body of First Sergeant Anthony Bigio of the United States Marine Corps was brought back home and buried in the cemetery beside Saint Adelbert's, the church he had been christened and married in. The Home Town Chronicle showed a picture of Mrs. Bigio on the front page, holding in one hand the American flag that had been draped over his casket, now folded into a triangle. The other hand was over her face.
Two nights after that, the Home Town Chronicle showed a different picture—the home of the Catholic Relief Agency where Mai Thi lived, which had been attacked by unknown vandals. Across its front was scrawled these words in broad black letters: GO HOME VIET CONG.
At the happy ending of The Tempest, Prospero brings the king back together with his son, and finds Miranda's true love, and punishes the bad duke, and frees Ariel, and becomes a duke himself again. Everyone—except for Caliban—is happy, and everyone is forgiven, and everyone is fine, and they all sail away on calm seas. Happy endings.
That's how it is in Shakespeare.
But Shakespeare was wrong.
Sometimes there isn't a Prospero to make everything fine again.
And sometimes the quality of mercy is strained.