True to the Law Read Free

you want to say to Priscilla?”
    Now Finn looked up and stared squarely at Priscilla’s back. “Sure is. Prissy, that pigtail is nuthin’ but a temptation. And now that I heard you squeal, well, giving it a yank now and again is a thing that can’t be resisted.” He risked a glance at Miss Morrow. For reasons he did not entirely understand, she looked as if she was going to choke on her spit. “That’s all I got to say, ma’am.”
    Tru Morrow covered her mouth with the back of her hand and politely cleared her throat. “We will speak later, and you can write your apology.”
    Finn’s narrow shoulders slumped. Staying after school with Miss Morrow was nothing but a pleasure. Writing, whether it was an apology to Priscilla or “I will raise my hand before I speak” twenty times, well, that cast a long shadow on the pleasure of Miss Morrow’s company. His pap would tell him that a man has to pay for his pleasure, and it seemed to Finn that his pap was proved right again. He tucked that thought away so he could use it when Pap asked him to account for his behavior today. There was nothing like flattering a man with the rightness of his thinking to stay another lecture on the same subject. Granny would be a little trickier. She wasn’t impressed by flattery, and it seemed that a man paying for his pleasure had a different meaning to her because when Pap said it she snorted and set his plate down hard. If she didn’t have a plate in her hand, she just cuffed him.
    Finn sighed. He would consider the problem of his granny later. Miss Morrow was walking to the front of the classroom. His eyes followed her. The carefully tied bow at the small of her back perched as daintily above her bustle as a bird hovering on the edge of its nest. It was as severe a temptation as Priscilla Taylor’s braid. Even if he could keep himself from tugging on it, he still might blurt out the question he was asking himself: How did she tie it?
    Finn sat on his hands. For the moment, it was the best way to stay out of trouble.
    * * *
    Tru Morrow stood to one side of the door as she ushered her students out. She made certain they left with their coats, hats, and scarves. Most of the girls wore mittens or carried a muff. The boys, if they had gloves, wore them. Those with mittens simply jammed their hands into their pockets. Mittens were for girls and babies, she’d learned. Finn had explained it to her.
    She closed the door as soon as the last student filed out. The “bitter” in “Bitter Springs” didn’t refer to the quality of the water, but the quality of the wind. Born and raised in Chicago, she had been confident that she understood cold. She was familiar with the wind blowing over the water of Lake Michigan, funneling ice into the collective breath of the city. That was frigid. It was only October, and she was coming to learn that there was a qualitative difference between frigid and bitter. Here in the high plains country, wind seared her lungs. It was so cold, it was hot, and even when she sipped it carefully, she seemed to taste it at the very back of her tongue. Bitter.
    Tru lifted her poppy red shawl and drew it more closely around her shoulders. The wool felt substantial and warm and smelled faintly of smoke from the stove.
    “Finn, would you add some coals to the stove? Half a scoop. That will keep us warm long enough for you to write your apology.”
    Finn stood. Tru sensed his uncertainty as she passed him.
    “What is it?” she asked without pausing.
    “Well, it’s just that you’re awful confident that I know what I’m apologizin’ for.”
    Careful not to smile, Tru took her seat behind her desk. She folded her hands and placed them in front of her where Finn could see them. Her posture was correct, her spine perfectly aligned, shoulders back, chin lifted. She envisioned herself as a model of rectitude, and she was impressed with herself even if she could see that Finn wasn’t. It was probably her eyes that