Shadow Witch (34 page)

“Can we draw flowers, Miss Duffy?” Leora said.

All three boys groaned at the idea, and Aiven suggested they draw something less girlish instead, like horses, or flying wizards.

Miss Duffy took a deep breath through her nose and rubbed her mouth lightly with the fingertips of one hand. “We shall draw flowers first with Sammi’s markers, then perhaps we’ll try something to suit the boys. That will be a good way for me to assess your level of skill before we get into more detailed instruction.”

She began passing out paper to each of the children, and Daisy said, “Miss Duffy, could you draw some flowers for us first, so that we may have something to copy?”

“I want you to draw from memory if you can. You know what flowers look like, don’t you?”

“Yes, but...but what if we do it wrong?”

“There is no right or wrong with art, as long as you do your best and it is from your heart.”

Rachel leaned back against the cabinet and smiled to herself.
I like that answer
.

“We can draw flowers for our mothers,” Daisy said brightly.

“But Sammi doesn’t have a mother,” Aiven said.

Sammi’s face fell, and Rachel felt a sympathetic pang in her own heart.

The room was awkwardly silent for a moment, everyone watching Sammi, until Blane said, “Neither do you, Aiven.”

It was Aiven’s turn to look hurt, but it didn’t last long. He clenched his jaw and said, “But I will soon! Mrs. Tully is going to adopt me, she is, and...and she will be my mother.” His eyes turned hard, as if he dared any of them to deny it.

“But what about Sammi?” Daisy said.

“Mrs. Callahan is going to take her in for good.” Aiven bobbed his head adamantly. “She will be Sammi’s...um...I don’t know what you call it.”

He looked at Rachel for help and she nodded. “She’ll be Sammi’s foster mother. It’s only a legal term, but Mrs. Callahan will take care of her like a....” She almost said
like a real mother
but caught herself. “Like a mother should.”

Sammi’s chin had dropped to her chest and her eyes began to glisten. Rachel wanted to rush to her and wrap her arms around her, and comfort her. And cry with her.
You poor, motherless child!

Miss Duffy knelt beside Sammi and rested her hand gently on Sammi’s shoulder. “Well, Mrs. Callahan sounds just like a mother to me. Anyone who would take in a child and care for them, and give them their love...that is a true mother. I would like to meet this fine woman someday.”

“We met her at Sammi’s birthday party on Saturday,” Leora said, “and she is wonderful and beautiful, and she loves Sammi very much. I can tell.” The other children all quickly agreed with Leora, and Sammi lifted her chin and wiped her eyes with her shirt sleeve.

Miss Duffy stood but stayed next to Sammi. “Now then, how about if I work with Sammi first, so that she can draw her very best flower for this wonderful woman, Mrs. Callahan? Then I will help each of you afterward.”

Sammi glanced up at the young teacher, a smile flickering at the corners of her mouth, and she nodded.

Rachel nodded, too.
I think Miss Duffy may work out just fine
.

* * *

After the art class was over, Rachel got Miss Duffy to go with her when she took the kids outside to play. Two more young boys had joined them in the last hour, bringing their total to eight students, and all of them seemed to be having a good time at what passed for organized recreation: running around, throwing balls at each other, and shrieking.

The two women sat at the picnic table, and though the day was warming up quickly, it was still cool under the shade of the big oak. Rachel liked it there, the rich, earthy smell so close to the tree, the view of the wide field adjacent to the school that ended at a wooden fence belonging to the farm beyond. Nothing but more farms, with their small houses and weathered barns, were in that direction, as far as she could see; quaint and idyllic, picture postcard-beautiful.

Rachel tried to engage Miss Duffy in conversation, but the young woman seemed reluctant to talk about herself. She answered every question with as few words as possible, as if she had a limit of only forty for the whole day and didn’t want to use them up too soon.

Rachel felt like she was trying to coax a clam from its shell, until the topic turned to Jamie and the school.

Miss Duffy gestured at the big yellow building. “Master Jamie pays for everything? The construction and supplies, and salaries, too?”

“He pays for all of it, including the clinic.”

“But how can he afford it if he is only seventeen years old?”

“He uses the money he got —” She stopped herself before she said
the money he found in the stone house
. “He has enough money. Don’t worry about it.”

“Are all sorcerers so wealthy?”

“I couldn’t say. He’s the only one I know, except for Aiven, who isn’t much of a sorcerer yet.”

“Your son still lives with you and your husband? I am sure you must have a fine house.”

“It’s okay, I guess. It’s not a mansion, by any means. Now, Jamie’s grandparents, Pete and Darla, they live in a
nice
house. It’s huge. It’s too big, in my opinion. They have to hire people to clean it for them.”

“Do you have servants, also?”

Rachel laughed. “Not hardly. But we can manage okay by ourselves.” She shrugged. “And my mother wouldn’t approve if we hired a maid. She’d think I was lazy.”

“That’s Mrs. Wallace?”

Rachel nodded. “Her twin sister, Mrs. Moore, will be here tomorrow. She’s helping out with the school, too. She used to be a reading specialist, so she’ll be working with you on organizing the reading program for the kids.”

Just then, Aiven held the ball he was about to throw and faced the front of the building. “Jamie’s here. I felt him make a doorway.”

Everyone looked in the direction he was gazing and saw Jamie and Evelyn walk around the corner toward them, Jamie with a book in one hand. “I knew I heard you guys out here,” Jamie said. He turned to Miss Duffy and he smiled. “You must be the new teacher.”

Rachel introduced them and Jamie shook her hand. “Thanks for coming to our little school. What do you think so far?”

“It is fine,” she said quietly and lowered her gaze.

There she goes again, turning back into a clam
. Rachel said to Jamie, “How did it go with Mr. Winston?”

“Pretty good, I thought, but I’m no expert on evaluating teachers. I like his shop, though.” He showed her the book he had. “I bought this from him.”

“He claims to be good at teaching history,” Evelyn said, “among other things, and he’s also a librarian.”

“That would be handy,” Rachel said. “We need somebody to organize our books.”

“He can get books from local publishers for us because of his connections. If we build a library, we’re going to need books from this world, too, not just from Earth.”

“That makes sense. I hadn’t thought about that.” Rachel bit one fingernail for a moment. “When can he start?”

“Thursday,” Jamie said. “I’m going to make a doorway for him. We’re going to give him a two-week trial.”

Miss Duffy frowned deeply. “Excuse me, Master Jamie, but why do you feel that you need to hire another teacher?”

“Oh...uh, it’s not that we don’t think you’ll work out, it’s just that we’re afraid we’ll have too many kids to handle by the time September gets here.” He looked at Rachel. “How many do you think we’ll have so far?”

“Hard to say. We have two new kids today.” She gestured at the boys on the playground. “And a couple of more families stopped by right before you got here. We could easily have thirty-five to forty by the start of the school year.”

Jamie smiled and nodded approvingly.

“But....” Miss Duffy’s frown deepened. “Will we not have sufficient staff to teach them?”

Rachel was surprised at Miss Duffy’s sudden desire to be talkative. Rachel eyed the young woman curiously for a second before saying, “I won’t be here then, and my mother and my aunt are hoping to only work part-time. We’d rather have full-time, experienced teachers here, if possible.”

Miss Duffy looked away for a moment, crossed her arms and grasped her elbows firmly with each hand. “I still do not understand why you would hire another so soon. What do you know of this man? Is he qualified?”

“We know as much about him as we know of you,” Evelyn said. “We have to take a chance and go with our instincts.”

Miss Duffy opened her mouth as if she were going to say more, but looked away again instead.

Sammi ran up to them and said, “Can we have lunch now. We’re hungry.”

Evelyn checked her watch. “I suppose. Round everybody up and let’s go inside.” She turned to Jamie. “Are you going to eat with us? The kids would love that.”

He scratched his neck and pushed his mouth to one side. “I’d like to, but I need to go home and get ready for work. I’ll probably eat a sandwich later.”

“How about you, Miss Duffy? Did you bring your lunch today?”

“I forgot. I am used to having all my meals prepared for me at the Fuller’s house.”

“We can’t let you go hungry,” Evelyn said.

“I shall be fine.”

“You can have some of my peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” Sammi said with a big smile.

“We’ll all share,” Evelyn said. “We’ll have enough, I’m sure.”

Miss Duffy’s mouth tightened and she seemed to squeeze her arms around her chest even harder. “I...I can do without lunch. It will be good for me.”

“Nonsense. We can’t expect you to work on an empty stomach.”

“I can get you something at the market from one of the food carts,” Jamie said, shifting the leather-bound book under his arm while he dug his hand into the front pocket of his pants. “I didn’t spend all my money at Mr. Winston’s shop.” He pulled out a few coins and turned to Miss Duffy. “How about a sausage on a bun? Fred told me those are good.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

“Sure it is. So, sausage on a bun, yes or no?”

“Um...yes.”

“Get some fruit for the kids while you’re at it,” Rachel said. “You can get a honeydew melon from Leora’s mother if you can find her wagon. Do you have enough money?”

“Think so. Should I buy a knife to cut it with, or can I use my magic?” Jamie wagged one finger and grinned.

“We have a knife, Jamie,” Evelyn said, “so go already, before we all starve.”

“Back in a sec.”

He vanished without warning, and Miss Duffy flinched and sucked in her breath as she gaped at the space where’d he’d been standing.

“He loves to do that,” Rachel said. “He can be a big show off, sometimes.”

“I saw his performance at the Founders’ Festival. It was astounding. He is a most amazing wizard, he is.”

“But he’s a good boy,” Rachel said quickly. “He’s not at all like Renn, so you don’t have to be afraid of him.”

Jamie returned a few minutes later with Miss Duffy’s food, wrapped in brown paper, and a couple of golden melons. “Leora’s mom gave me a discount on the fruit ’cause I was buying it for the school. This should be enough for everybody, don’t you think? Kids and grownups, too?”

He handed the steaming sausage to Miss Duffy, whose stomach grumbled as she took it.

Rachel laughed. “So, you are hungry after all.”

“I suppose I am,” Miss Duffy said with a weak smile. “I had no breakfast today. I was too nervous to eat this morning before I came.”

“Well, I hope you’re not too nervous to eat, now,” Evelyn said and turned to the children who waited nearby. “Let’s go inside and eat.”

Jamie returned to the school in the late afternoon, hoping to talk to Miss Duffy again before she went home, but he was too late.

“She left about ten minutes ago,” Rachel said as she closed and latched the last window. “She waited ’till all of the kids were gone, and she helped clean up a little bit before we called it a day.”

“Hmph.” Jamie pulled at his chin for a moment. “So what do you think of her?”

“Hold on,” Evelyn said and turned to Sammi. “Do you want to turn off the lights?” Sammi ran to the switch near the front hall and Evelyn leaned close to Jamie and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Let’s talk about this when we get home.”

They locked the doors and Jamie made a portal back to the Callahan’s living room. As soon as they had all stepped through, Sammi rushed up the stairs to see Lisa and Larry before they left for their foster parenting class.

Once Sammi was out of earshot, Jamie said, “What’s the word on Miss Duffy?”

“Well....” Rachel glanced at Evelyn before answering. “She’s really good with the kids. They love her, and she’s a terrific artist. And this afternoon, Mom and I showed her some of our reading workbooks, and she seemed okay with them.”

“So,” Jamie said, “is she going to be able to cut it or not?”

Rachel glanced at her mother again and squeezed her mouth into a line. “Depends on your definition of
cut it
.”

“What’s the problem?”

“She’s really hard to talk to,” Evelyn said. “I wouldn’t say she’s evasive, but she’s hesitant to talk about herself...in the extreme.”

“Do you think she’s hiding something?” Jamie asked.

“I don’t know,” Rachel said. “Maybe she’s just not good with adults. But that could be a problem down the line, because we need the staff to get along well, or the school might be a dysfunctional mess.”

“Maybe she needs time to get to know us,” Jamie said.

“I hope so, because she certainly has the knack for connecting with the kids.”

“I’d like to talk to her again, if I can. Maybe tomorrow, if dad and I get the refrigerator installed at the stone house early enough.”

* * *

Carl was reading in bed that night with Rachel so that Jamie and Fred could be alone in the family room. Rachel didn’t seem to be reading much, though. Her book was laid across her lap and she sighed so often that Carl finally put down his novel and said, “Something bothering you, honey?”

“I don’t know,” she said with another deep sigh that meant
yes, something important is on my mind
.

Carl had been married long enough to know that he should listen to how she sighed, not to what she said. “Come on, tell me.”

“I was just thinking about things.”