Read Online Northern Borders by Howard Frank Mosher - Free Book Online Page A

isn’t a schoolteacher is like saying a trout isn’t a fish. A fish may be a trout. But all trout are still fish and all headmasters are still schoolteachers. That’s as certain as the sun coming up over the White Mountains of New Hampshire in the morning and setting behind the Green Mountains of Vermont at night.”
    My grandmother, who had not served herself a morsel yet, glared back at my grandfather. “That,” she said, “is one of the most peculiar declarations I’ve ever heard in my life.”
    â€œI’ll tell you what’s peculiar,” my grandfather said, pointing a long arm toward my grandmother’s sitting room-bedroom, Egypt. “That, by God, is peculiar.”
    My father set down his drumstick. “Okay, I can’t stand any more of this,” he said, and took his plate out to the kitchen. He was immediately followed by Little Aunt Freddi, who burst into tears on her way out of the room.
    Rob kicked me under the table. This time I caught what he mouthed at me. “Three down.”
    â€œNow even you must be satisfied, Mr. Kittredge,” my grandmother said. “You’ve driven three of your four children away from their Sunday dinner.”
    â€œBy Jesus Christ, I haven’t driven anybody anywhere!” my grandfather barked out. “The next time you hear from me, I’ll be in Labrador.”
    And he, too, was up and gone.
    My grandmother nodded grimly. “Once a sashayer, always a sashayer,” she said. “His Waterloo looms nearer, Tut.”
    Across the table Uncle Rob was holding up four fingers.
    At exactly the same time, as though to immortalize this awful moment in my memory, the dining room clock began to strike twelve, in a wild, frenetic manner, followed at irregular intervals by all of the other clocks in the house both near and far.
    Rob grinned. “Well, Buddy,” he said, helping me to another piece of chicken, “dig in.”
    When I looked up from my plate again, I just caught out of the tail of my eye the dark swish of my grandmother’s skirt, retreating into Egypt.
    â€œThat’s five,” Rob said cheerfully. “Welcome to the Kittredge family, kiddo. Hope you like chicken.”
    Â 
    After dinner, Rob and Dad and I played flies and grounders in the cut hayfield beside the house while the women washed those few dishes that needed washing. Then while my father visited with my grandmother in Egypt, Little Aunt Klee and Little Aunt Freddi spirited me up to the cupola for a Sunday School lesson. They had just finished washing their hair with the soft rainwater from the big cistern outside the kitchen door, and they wanted to dry it in the sunshine and breeze coming in the cupola windows. Aunt Klee appeared to have gotten over her peeve and Freddi was as enthusiastic as ever. In fact, it seemed to me that with the exception of my grandfather, off in Labrador, nobody in the family acted as though anything much out of the ordinary had happened.
    No sooner were we ensconced in the cupola than Klee and Freddi confirmed my impression that such domestic brush-ups were not at all unusual. “That was a wonderful grace that you said, Old Mole,” Freddi said. “I’m sure it made all of us Kittredges stop and think how much we really love each other.”
    It occurred to me that if Freddi was right about the effect of my prayer, the Kittredges had a strange way of showing their affection; but I said nothing.
    â€œThat’s how nearly all our Sunday dinners break up,” Klee said

with a certain note of pride. “Should the Sunday School lesson today deal with Dad and poor Austen, Freddi?”
    â€œMother certainly wouldn’t want it to,” Freddi said. “On the other hand, if Mole’s going to be heard from, won’t he need to know?”
    Klee nodded. “The sooner the better, I think. Listen closely, now, Austen. The reason your grandfather and your