Read Online Blow Out the Moon by Libby Koponen - Free Book Online
Authors: Libby Koponen
Tags: JUV039200
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tweed skirt and two sweaters — one cardigan, one pullover — showed us around.
I liked it all until she opened the door of a dormitory. The beds were covered with thin, pale green bedspreads (exactly the same pale green as the desks at St. Vincent’s) and pinned to each pillow was a small piece of lined white paper (not cut out with scissors, but ripped by hand — neatly, but still ripped) with a girl’s name on it. All the names were in the same handwriting.
I took my mother’s hand and held it tightly; she looked down at me, a little surprised (I don’t usually hold her hand).
“What’s the matter?” she said, as soon as we were back on the sidewalk.
“It’s the best one we’ve seen so far, but … I don’t like it.” I didn’t like those pale bedspreads and little ripped pieces of paper, but that wasn’t a real reason. “There’s just something about it that isn’t quite right.”
Then I thought of one good reason, something that would make sense to her.
“And it’s not in the country, though it’s nice that it’s by the ocean.”
My mother smiled, but it was a tired smile, I thought.
“Maybe Daddy will find something!” I said.
“Maybe he will,” she said, and
that
smile looked happy.
I was right. One night he came home and said he’d found the perfect school.
“I drove down to Kent after lunch, and as soon as I saw Sibton Park, I knew it was the one,” he said, more to my mother than to me; then he laughed a little, almost as though he was embarrassed. “I fell in love with it.” He handed me a small, thin booklet. “ ’Ere ’ave a butcher’s at this!”
The brochure cover.
Inside it said:
Sibton Park is a beautiful Queen Anne house standing in its own grounds of 88 acres…the foundations of the house go back to the reign of Edward III.… Each girl is encouraged to explore her own potential and to take pleasure in the success of others as well as her own. We believe in the old-fashioned value that consideration for other people is at the root of good manners.… Children whose parents are abroad may spend all or part of the holidays at school. It is Mrs. Ridley-Day’s home and the school is never closed.
The grown-up code — the rhyming slang! Have a butcher’s hook (look) at this.
The booklet showed a big, rosy-brick building surrounded by fields. SIBTON PARK it said in blue letters. It sounded like a Jane Austen novel.
Inside were pictures of meadows with horses, and girls riding, and girls in the stable petting a horse (it was in a loose box, with bars at the top, exactly like the ones in the happy part of
Black Beauty
), and girls in their pajamas on their beds, talking. It looked better than the boarding schools in the books: older, more strange and magical, more like the house in
The Secret Garden
than a school. There was a little map of the school and grounds, and there were gardens all over: a rose garden, a Tudor garden (what was that?). Meanwhile my father was excitedly telling my mother about the headmistress, and how old the house was (some parts were almost seven hundred years old, he said); I didn’t really listen until his voice changed. By the change, I could tell something was wrong.
A picture from inside the brochure.
“Term starts the day after tomorrow,” he said.
“But she’ll need lots of new clothes, and I’ll have to sew name tapes on everything — couldn’t she go a day or two later?”
He shook his head. “They won’t take children once the term has started. I have the clothes list right here,” he said quickly, eagerly. She didn’t say anything, and he went on: “Mrs. Ridley-Day said you can get all the uniform things at Peter Jones, and that they can send whatever she won’t need right away straight to the school.”
He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and my mother and I both looked at it.
“Jodhpurs, a RIDING jacket!” I said. “Oh, Daddy! Can I take it to show Emmy?”
“I signed you up for
I liked it all until she opened the door of a dormitory. The beds were covered with thin, pale green bedspreads (exactly the same pale green as the desks at St. Vincent’s) and pinned to each pillow was a small piece of lined white paper (not cut out with scissors, but ripped by hand — neatly, but still ripped) with a girl’s name on it. All the names were in the same handwriting.
I took my mother’s hand and held it tightly; she looked down at me, a little surprised (I don’t usually hold her hand).
“What’s the matter?” she said, as soon as we were back on the sidewalk.
“It’s the best one we’ve seen so far, but … I don’t like it.” I didn’t like those pale bedspreads and little ripped pieces of paper, but that wasn’t a real reason. “There’s just something about it that isn’t quite right.”
Then I thought of one good reason, something that would make sense to her.
“And it’s not in the country, though it’s nice that it’s by the ocean.”
My mother smiled, but it was a tired smile, I thought.
“Maybe Daddy will find something!” I said.
“Maybe he will,” she said, and
that
smile looked happy.
I was right. One night he came home and said he’d found the perfect school.
“I drove down to Kent after lunch, and as soon as I saw Sibton Park, I knew it was the one,” he said, more to my mother than to me; then he laughed a little, almost as though he was embarrassed. “I fell in love with it.” He handed me a small, thin booklet. “ ’Ere ’ave a butcher’s at this!”
The brochure cover.
Inside it said:
Sibton Park is a beautiful Queen Anne house standing in its own grounds of 88 acres…the foundations of the house go back to the reign of Edward III.… Each girl is encouraged to explore her own potential and to take pleasure in the success of others as well as her own. We believe in the old-fashioned value that consideration for other people is at the root of good manners.… Children whose parents are abroad may spend all or part of the holidays at school. It is Mrs. Ridley-Day’s home and the school is never closed.
The grown-up code — the rhyming slang! Have a butcher’s hook (look) at this.
The booklet showed a big, rosy-brick building surrounded by fields. SIBTON PARK it said in blue letters. It sounded like a Jane Austen novel.
Inside were pictures of meadows with horses, and girls riding, and girls in the stable petting a horse (it was in a loose box, with bars at the top, exactly like the ones in the happy part of
Black Beauty
), and girls in their pajamas on their beds, talking. It looked better than the boarding schools in the books: older, more strange and magical, more like the house in
The Secret Garden
than a school. There was a little map of the school and grounds, and there were gardens all over: a rose garden, a Tudor garden (what was that?). Meanwhile my father was excitedly telling my mother about the headmistress, and how old the house was (some parts were almost seven hundred years old, he said); I didn’t really listen until his voice changed. By the change, I could tell something was wrong.
A picture from inside the brochure.
“Term starts the day after tomorrow,” he said.
“But she’ll need lots of new clothes, and I’ll have to sew name tapes on everything — couldn’t she go a day or two later?”
He shook his head. “They won’t take children once the term has started. I have the clothes list right here,” he said quickly, eagerly. She didn’t say anything, and he went on: “Mrs. Ridley-Day said you can get all the uniform things at Peter Jones, and that they can send whatever she won’t need right away straight to the school.”
He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and my mother and I both looked at it.
“Jodhpurs, a RIDING jacket!” I said. “Oh, Daddy! Can I take it to show Emmy?”
“I signed you up for
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