The Teacher's Funeral by Richard Peck Page B

walked over to the picture of Theodore Roosevelt, with Little Britches hitched up on her hip.
    â€œWho knows where the President lives?”
    â€œIndianapolis!” Flopears sang out. He was chockful of geography, most of it wrong, and always willing to share.
    â€œWashington, D.C.,” Tansy said, “in the White House.” Little Britches had buried her face in Tansy’s shirtwaist.
    â€œDoes he have any kids?” Tansy asked.
    Durned if we knew.
    â€œHe does,” Tansy said. “Four boys and two girls. This is the First Family of America. What are their names?”
    Search us.
    â€œTheodore, Junior,” Tansy said. “Kermit, Ethel, Archibald, and Quentin.
    â€œAnd Alice is the oldest. She is the President’s daughter by his first marriage.” Little Britches held on. We all listened.
    â€œThe Roosevelts have turned the White House into a regular menagerie.” Which was one of our M words. “Quentin brought his Shetland pony, named Algonquin, up in the elevator for a visit to Archie’s room when Archie was in bed with diphtheria. Kermit has a pet kangaroo rat who likes sugar in a cube. And they’ve got a parrot and a blue macaw.”
    Where Tansy came up with her information we didn’t know. But it was fairly interesting. “Guess what Alice’s pet is.”
    â€œA kitty,” Little Britches said against the shirtwaist.
    â€œNo,” Tansy said, “Alice’s favorite pet is a little green garter snake that lives in her purse.”
    â€œNo,” Little Britches said. “Not a doggone snake.”
    â€œYes,” Tansy said. “I’m the teacher. Believe it.” She put her other hand out and snapped a finger at Glenn. He reached into his pocket. You could have heard a pin drop. We were all as silent as Sunday afternoon.
    Glenn handed over a skinny little more-or-less green garter snake, ten or so inches long. We watched it spill out of his hand into Tansy’s. It wrapped once around her wrist and coiled in her palm. Its eyes were like little diamond chips.
    â€œSay listen, I think Alice’s pet garter snake has come to pay us a visit,” Tansy said.
    â€œBetter not.” Little Britches spoke muffled against Tansy’s bosom.
    â€œWhy, here it is.”
    Now even Pearl stood at her desk, staring transfixed. Little Britches chanced a quick glance. “If that thing’s somebody’s pet,” she said, “what’s its name?”
    â€œEutaenia sirtalis,” Tansy said without skipping a beat. “All garter snakes have the same name.”
    She must have picked up more learning at high school than we’d figured.
    The garter snake was content in the warm hollow of Tansy’s hand. Little Britches chanced another glance. She just touched the tail hanging down from Tansy’s wrist.
    â€œShall we keep her?” Little Britches wondered.
    â€œAlice wants her home,” Tansy said. “We’ll turn her loose so she can get going.”
    Little Britches needed another hug. But then she slid down Tansy’s skirts and bobbed back to the recitation bench. Tansy had swapped one snake for another in Little Britches’s mind. It must have worked, because she looked to be recovered. Now she was pulling Glenn and Charlie down on the bench, to say, “Repeat after me,
    â€œ A is for the animals who keep us alive,
    B is for the busy bee, buzzing round the hive.”
    â€œRussell Culver,” Tansy commanded, “see me outside.” She always called me Russell Culver at school, like we weren’t kin. Out on the front step, she whispered, “Get that thing off me, quick, and fling it in the ditch.” She was flushed, but underneath that, paler than death. “I can’t stand a snake.” I unwound it, and it slithered off.
    â€œTansy, does Alice Roosevelt really carry a pet snake around in her purse?” I asked.
    â€œOf course she does,”