lessons, beamed from the roomâs back corner: once again, something he had put his hand to had come to immediate success. He joined the singers with his own rich baritone, happy to share his good mood.
Ida had taken Lucy by the hand to join the instructors at the roomâs front, but Lucy had not been able to bring herself to sing, and even being up there beneath the gaze of so many had caused her stomach to seize, and she was obliged to drop Idaâs hand and make her way to a side table, where she sank thankfully to the worn wooden bench.
Ida tried not to see her friendâs retreat as cowardice. She had found herself wrestling with an impatience over Lucyâs timidity. She wanted her old Lucy back, the girlfriend of creek swims in their petticoats and horseback rides on green-broke geldings their fathers had forbidden, skirts torn on wire fences, and books and slates buried in secret caves or forgotten in the long grass of the Robinsonsâ backyard. Happy as she was to have those late-night conversations lying beside each other in Lucyâs narrow bed, she wanted their old conversations once again, the future plans of silly girls, all of them involving never being separated, not by death or husband.
The instructors held the last note and there was silence as the bemused Celestials regarded them. From his sickbed, Charlie called out in Chinese, and the boys immediately commenced a round of hearty applause and then gathered to give a song of their own.
Back in their houses for Sunday dinner, the American instructors would tell their loved ones that the Asian air had been simple, monosyllables of all kinds mixed together in what was, they might venture to say, a rather lugubrious rhythm. The words, of course, made no sense at all, but neither, they would hasten to add, did much of the popular singing of their own language. To a household, all would conclude that the Celestialsâ song had indeed been peculiar, though not unpleasing.
Lucy, meanwhile, felt as if she might faint or throw up. She stared at the line where wall met floor the way one struck by seasickness stares at the smallest scrap of distant land. She could feel Idaâs impatience like heat from a stove and it saddened her. One of her pupils, whose name she was ashamed to realize she could not recall, quit his singing and slid next to her on the bench and took her hand. She flinched, but he held it in a way that seemed drained of intimacy. He pointed to her head and stomach and then applied firm pressure to a spot on the inside of her wrist.
Her dizzy head righted itself; her stomach ceased its wavering. When she removed her eyes from the floorâs seam, testing her newfound health, they fell on Idaâs face, which wore an expression Lucy recognized easily from their childhood. It said: You are making me sad , but Lucy was so astonished to have the touch of a male bring solace rather than suffering that she could not rouse herself to remove her hand from the boyâs, whose name she still could not remember, but against whose thumb her pulse beat like a small machine.
Chapter Six
The newspapers of Wednesday, June 29, reported that California produced three million pounds of quicksilver annually; St. Louis was to have a theological seminary for the colored; an old lady in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania, had seventy pet cats; American girls were flirting too much in Paris; Thomas Keating, on a charge of second drunk, was fined seven dollars and costs; a lad named James W. Gray was arrested for being a stubborn and disobedient child; and a Crispin rally was held in Tremont Temple in Boston. That same day, several of the stateâs manufacturers also convened in that City of Notions.
By chance, Sampson took an early supper a mere two park benches away from Alfred, both of them having chosen the opportunity to get some air and time to themselves. They found the company of large groups unmanageable after extended periods. The
Ida had taken Lucy by the hand to join the instructors at the roomâs front, but Lucy had not been able to bring herself to sing, and even being up there beneath the gaze of so many had caused her stomach to seize, and she was obliged to drop Idaâs hand and make her way to a side table, where she sank thankfully to the worn wooden bench.
Ida tried not to see her friendâs retreat as cowardice. She had found herself wrestling with an impatience over Lucyâs timidity. She wanted her old Lucy back, the girlfriend of creek swims in their petticoats and horseback rides on green-broke geldings their fathers had forbidden, skirts torn on wire fences, and books and slates buried in secret caves or forgotten in the long grass of the Robinsonsâ backyard. Happy as she was to have those late-night conversations lying beside each other in Lucyâs narrow bed, she wanted their old conversations once again, the future plans of silly girls, all of them involving never being separated, not by death or husband.
The instructors held the last note and there was silence as the bemused Celestials regarded them. From his sickbed, Charlie called out in Chinese, and the boys immediately commenced a round of hearty applause and then gathered to give a song of their own.
Back in their houses for Sunday dinner, the American instructors would tell their loved ones that the Asian air had been simple, monosyllables of all kinds mixed together in what was, they might venture to say, a rather lugubrious rhythm. The words, of course, made no sense at all, but neither, they would hasten to add, did much of the popular singing of their own language. To a household, all would conclude that the Celestialsâ song had indeed been peculiar, though not unpleasing.
Lucy, meanwhile, felt as if she might faint or throw up. She stared at the line where wall met floor the way one struck by seasickness stares at the smallest scrap of distant land. She could feel Idaâs impatience like heat from a stove and it saddened her. One of her pupils, whose name she was ashamed to realize she could not recall, quit his singing and slid next to her on the bench and took her hand. She flinched, but he held it in a way that seemed drained of intimacy. He pointed to her head and stomach and then applied firm pressure to a spot on the inside of her wrist.
Her dizzy head righted itself; her stomach ceased its wavering. When she removed her eyes from the floorâs seam, testing her newfound health, they fell on Idaâs face, which wore an expression Lucy recognized easily from their childhood. It said: You are making me sad , but Lucy was so astonished to have the touch of a male bring solace rather than suffering that she could not rouse herself to remove her hand from the boyâs, whose name she still could not remember, but against whose thumb her pulse beat like a small machine.
Chapter Six
The newspapers of Wednesday, June 29, reported that California produced three million pounds of quicksilver annually; St. Louis was to have a theological seminary for the colored; an old lady in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania, had seventy pet cats; American girls were flirting too much in Paris; Thomas Keating, on a charge of second drunk, was fined seven dollars and costs; a lad named James W. Gray was arrested for being a stubborn and disobedient child; and a Crispin rally was held in Tremont Temple in Boston. That same day, several of the stateâs manufacturers also convened in that City of Notions.
By chance, Sampson took an early supper a mere two park benches away from Alfred, both of them having chosen the opportunity to get some air and time to themselves. They found the company of large groups unmanageable after extended periods. The
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