Ramona the Pest (6 page)

“I don't know,” said Beezus. “Talk to you, I guess, or call Mother. Ramona, why did you
have to go and do a dumb thing like hiding behind the trash cans?”

“Because.” Ramona was cross since Beezus was so cross. When the girls came out of the bathroom, Ramona reluctantly allowed herself to be led into the principal's office, where she felt small and frightened even though she tried not to show it.

“This is my little sister Ramona,” Beezus explained to Miss Mullen's secretary in the outer office. “She belongs in kindergarten, but she's been hiding behind the trash cans.”

Miss Mullen must have overheard, because she came out of her office. Frightened though she was, Ramona braced herself to say, I won't go back to kindergarten!

“Why, hello, Ramona,” said Miss Mullen. “That's all right, Beatrice. You may go back to your class. I'll take over.”

Ramona wanted to stay close to her sister, but Beezus walked out of the office, leaving
her alone with the principal, the most important person in the whole school. Ramona felt small and pitiful with her knees still marked where the asphalt had gouged her.
Miss Mullen smiled, as if Ramona's behavior was of no particular importance, and said, “Isn't it too bad Miss Binney had to stay home with a sore throat? I know what a surprise it was for you to find a strange teacher in your kindergarten room.”

Ramona wondered how Miss Mullen knew so much. The principal did not even bother to ask what Ramona was doing behind the trash cans. She did not feel the least bit sorry for the poor little girl with the gouged knees. She simply took Ramona by the hand, and said, “I'm going to introduce you to Mrs. Wilcox. I know you're going to like her,” and started out the door.

Ramona felt a little indignant, because Miss Mullen did not demand to know why she had been hiding all that time. Miss Mullen did not even notice how forlorn and tearstained Ramona looked. Ramona had been so cold and lonely and miserable
that she thought Miss Mullen should show some interest. She had half expected the principal to say, Why you poor little thing! Why were you hiding behind the trash cans?

The looks on the faces of the morning kindergarten, when Ramona walked into the room with the principal, made up for Miss Mullen's lack of concern. Round eyes, open mouths, faces blank with surprise—Ramona was delighted to see the whole class staring at her from their seats.
They
were worried about her.
They
cared what had happened to her.

“Ramona, this is Miss Binney's substitute, Mrs. Wilcox,” said Miss Mullen. To the substitute she said, “Ramona is a little late this morning.” That was all. Not a word about how cold and miserable Ramona had been. Not a word about how brave she had been to hide until recess.

“I'm glad you're here, Ramona,” said
Mrs. Wilcox, as the principal left. “The class is drawing with crayons. What would you like to draw?”

Here it was seat-work time, and Mrs. Wilcox was not even having the class do real seat work, but was letting them draw pictures as if this day were the first day of kindergarten. Ramona was most disapproving. Things were not supposed to be this way. She looked at Howie scrubbing away with a blue crayon to make a sky across the top of his paper and at Davy, who was drawing a man whose arms seemed to come out of his ears. They were busy and happy drawing whatever they pleased.

“I would like to make
Q
's,” said Ramona on sudden inspiration.

“Make use of what?” asked Mrs. Wilcox, holding out a sheet of drawing paper.

Ramona had been sure all along that the substitute could not be as smart as Miss Binney, but at least she expected her to know
what the letter
Q
was. All grown-ups were supposed to know
Q
. “Nothing,” Ramona said, as she accepted the paper and, pleasantly self-conscious under the awed stares of the kindergarten, went to her seat.

At last Ramona was free to draw her
Q
her own way. Forgetting the loneliness and discomfort of the morning, she drew a most satisfying row of
Q
's, Ramona-style, and decided that having a substitute teacher was not so bad after all.

Mrs. Wilcox wandered up and down the aisle looking at pictures. “Why, Ramona,” she said, pausing by Ramona's desk, “what charming little cats you've drawn! Do you have kittens at home?”

Ramona felt sorry for poor Mrs. Wilcox, a grown-up lady teacher who did not know
Q
. “No,” she answered. “Our cat is a boy cat.”

“
N
o!” said Ramona on the first rainy morning after she had started kindergarten.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Quimby.

“No!” said Ramona. “I won't!”

“Ramona, be sensible,” said Mrs. Quimby.

“I don't want to be sensible,” said Ramona. “I hate being sensible!”

“Now, Ramona,” said her mother, and Ramona knew she was about to be reasoned
with. “You have a new raincoat. Boots cost money, and Howie's old boots are perfectly good. The soles are scarcely worn.”

“The tops aren't shiny,” Ramona told her mother. “And they're brown boots. Brown boots are for boys.”

“They keep your feet dry,” said Mrs. Quimby, “and that is what boots are for.”

Ramona realized she looked sulky, but she could not help herself. Only grown-ups would say boots were for keeping feet dry. Anyone in kindergarten knew that a girl should wear shiny red or white boots on the first rainy day, not to keep her feet dry, but to show off. That's what boots were for—showing off, wading, splashing, stamping.

“Ramona,” said Mrs. Quimby sternly. “Get that look off your face this instant. Either you wear these boots or you stay home from school.”

Ramona recognized that her mother
meant what she said, and so, because she loved kindergarten, she sat down on the floor and dragged on the hated brown boots, which did not go with her new flowered plastic raincoat and hat.

Howie arrived in a yellow slicker that was long enough for him to grow into for at
least two years and a yellow rain hat that almost hid his face. Beneath the raincoat Ramona glimpsed a pair of shiny brown boots, which she supposed she would have to wear someday when they were old and dull and dirty.

“Those are my old boots,” said Howie, looking at Ramona's feet as they started off to school.

“You better not tell anybody.” Ramona plodded along on feet almost too heavy to lift. It was a perfect morning for anyone with new boots. Enough rain had fallen in the night to fill the gutters with muddy streams and to bring worms squirming out of the lawns onto the sidewalks.

The intersection by the school was unusually quiet that morning, because rain had halted construction on the new market. Ramona was so downhearted that she did not even tease Henry Huggins when he led
her across the street. The kindergarten playground, as she had expected, was swarming with boys and girls in raincoats, most of them too big, and boots, most of them new. The girls wore various sorts of raincoats and red or white boots—all except Susan, who carried her new white boots so she would not get them muddy. The boys looked alike, because they all wore yellow raincoats and hats and brown boots. Ramona was not even sure which boy was Davy, not that he mattered to her this morning. Her feet felt too heavy for chasing anyone.

Part of the class had lined up properly by the door, waiting for Miss Binney, while the rest ran about clomping, splashing, and stamping. “Those are boys' boots you're wearing,” said Susan to Ramona.

Ramona did not answer. Instead she picked up a smooth pink worm that lay wiggling on the playground and, without
really thinking, wound it around her finger.

“Look!” yelled Davy from beneath his big rain hat. “Ramona's wearing a ring made out of a
worm!
”

Ramona had not thought of the worm as a ring until now, but she saw at once that the idea was interesting. “See my ring!” she shouted, thrusting her fist toward the nearest face.

Boots were temporarily forgotten. Everyone ran screaming from Ramona to avoid being shown her ring.

“See my ring! See my ring!” shouted Ramona, racing around the playground on feet that were suddenly much lighter.

When Miss Binney appeared around the corner, the class scrambled to line up by the door. “Miss Binney! Miss Binney!” Everyone wanted to be the first to tell. “Ramona is wearing a worm for a ring!”

“It's a pink worm,” said Ramona, thrusting
out her hand. “Not an old dead white worm.”

“Oh…what a pretty worm,” said Miss Binney bravely. “It's so smooth and…pink.”

Ramona elaborated. “It's my engagement ring.”

“Who are you engaged to?” asked Ann.

“I haven't decided,” answered Ramona.

“Not me,” Davy piped up.

“Not me,” said Howie.

“Not me,” said Eric R.

“Well…a…Ramona…” Miss Binney was searching for words. “I don't think you should wear your…ring during kindergarten. Why don't you put it down on the playground in a puddle so that it will…stay fresh.”

Ramona was happy to do anything Miss Binney wanted her to. She unwound the worm from her finger and placed it carefully in a puddle, where it lay limp and still.

 

After that Ramona raced around the playground with a worm around her finger whenever her mother made her wear Howie's old boots to school, and when everyone asked who she was engaged to, she always answered, “I haven't decided.”

“Not me!” Davy always said, followed by Howie, Eric R., and any other boy who happened to be near.

Then one Saturday Mrs. Quimby examined Ramona's scuffed shoes and discovered that not only were the heels worn down, the leather of the toes was worn through because Ramona stopped her lopsided two-wheeled tricycle by dragging her toes on the concrete. Mrs. Quimby had Ramona stand up while she felt her feet through the leather.

“It's time for new shoes,” Mrs. Quimby decided. “Get your jacket and your boots, and we'll drive down to the shopping center.”

“It isn't raining today,” said Ramona. “Why
do I have to take boots?”

“To see if they will fit over your new shoes,” answered her mother. “Hurry along, Ramona.”

When they reached the shoe store, Ramona's favorite shoe salesman said, as Ramona and her mother sat down, “What's the matter with my little Petunia today? Don't you have a smile for me?”

Ramona shook her head and looked sadly and longingly at a row of beautiful shiny girls' boots displayed on one side of the store. There she sat with Howie's dingy old brown boots beside her. How could she smile? A babyish nursery-school girl, who was wearing new red boots, was rocking joyously on the shoe store's rocking horse while her mother paid for the boots.

“Well, we'll see what we can do for you,” said the salesman briskly, as he pulled off Ramona's shoes and made her stand with
her foot on the measuring stick. Finding the right pair of oxfords for her did not take him long.

“Now try on the boots,” said Mrs. Quimby in her no-nonsense voice, when Ramona had walked across the shoe store and back in her new shoes.

For a moment, as Ramona sat down on the floor and grasped one of the hated boots, she considered pretending she could not get it on. However, she knew she could not get away with this trick, because the shoe-store man understood both children and shoes. She pulled and yanked and tugged and managed to get her foot most of the way in. When she stood up she was on tiptoe inside the boot. Her mother tugged some more, and her shoe went all the way into the boot.

“There,” said Mrs. Quimby. Ramona sighed.

The babyish nursery-school girl stopped
rocking long enough to announce to the world, “I have new boots.”

“Tell me, Petunia,” said the shoe man. “How many boys and girls in your kindergarten?”

“Twenty-nine,” said Ramona with a long face. Twenty-nine, most of them with new boots. The happy booted nursery-school baby climbed off the rocking horse, collected her free balloon, and left with her mother.

The shoe man spoke to Mrs. Quimby. “Kindergarten teachers like boots to fit loosely so the children can manage by themselves. I doubt if Petunia's teacher has time to help with fifty-eight boots.”

“I hadn't thought of that,” said Mrs. Quimby. “Perhaps we had better look at boots after all.”

“I'll bet Petunia here would like red boots,” said the shoe man. When Ramona
beamed, he added, “I had a hunch that would get a smile out of you.”

When Ramona left the shoe store with her beautiful red boots,
girls'
boots, in a box, which she carried herself, she was so filled
with joy she set her balloon free just to watch it sail over the parking lot and up, up into the sky until it was a tiny red dot against the gray clouds. The stiff soles of her new shoes made such a pleasant noise on the pavement that she began to prance. She was a pony. No, she was one of the three Billy Goats Gruff, the littlest one, trip-trapping over the bridge that the troll was hiding under. Ramona trip-trapped joyfully all the way to the parked car, and when she reached home she trip-trapped up and down the hall and all around the house.

“For goodness' sake, Ramona,” said Mrs. Quimby, while she was marking Ramona's name in the new boots, “can't you just walk?”

“Not when I'm the littlest Billy Goat Gruff,” answered Ramona, and trip-trapped down the hall to her room.

Unfortunately, there was no rain the next morning so Ramona left her new boots at
home and trip-trapped to school, where she did not have much chance of catching Davy because he could run faster than she could trip-trap in her stiff new shoes. She trip-trapped to her seat, and later, because she was art monitor who got to pass out drawing paper, she trip-trapped to the supply cupboard and trip-trapped up and down the aisles passing out paper.

“Ramona, I would like it if you walked quietly,” said Miss Binney.

“I am the littlest Billy Goat Gruff,” explained Ramona. “I have to trip-trap.”

“You may trip-trap when we go outdoors.” Miss Binney's voice was firm. “You may not trip-trap in the classroom.”

At playtime the whole class turned into Billy Goats Gruff and trip-trapped around the playground, but none so joyfully or so noisily as Ramona. The gathering clouds, Ramona noticed, were dark and threatening.
Sure enough, that evening rain began to fall, and all night long it beat against the south side of the Quimbys' house. The next morning Ramona, in her boots and raincoat, was out long before Howie arrived to walk to school with her. She waded through the wet lawn, and her boots became even shinier when they were wet. She stamped in all the little puddles on the driveway. She stood in the gutter and let muddy water run over the toes of her beautiful new boots. She gathered wet leaves to dam the gutter so she could stand in deeper water. Howie, as she might have expected, was used to his boots and not a bit excited. He did enjoy stamping in puddles, however, and together they stamped and splashed on the way to school.

Ramona came to a halt at the intersection guarded by Henry Huggins in his yellow slicker, rain hat, and brown boots. “Look at all that nice mud,” she said, pointing to the
area that was to be the parking lot for the new market. It was such nice mud, rich and brown with puddles and little rivers in the tire tracks left by the construction trucks. It was the best mud, the muddiest mud, the most tempting mud Ramona had ever seen. Best of all, the day was so rainy there were no construction workers around to tell anyone to stay out of the mud.

“Come on, Howie,” said Ramona. “I'm going to see how my boots work in the mud.” Of course, she would get her shiny boots muddy, but then she could have the fun of turning the hose on them that afternoon after kindergarten.

Howie was already following Henry across the street.

When Henry executed his sharp about-face on the opposite curb, he saw that Ramona had been left behind. “You were supposed to cross with me,” he told her.
“Now you have to wait until some more kids come.”

“I don't care,” said Ramona happily, and marched off to the muddy mud.

“Ramona, you come back here!” yelled Henry. “You're going to get into trouble.”

“Traffic boys aren't supposed to talk on duty,” Ramona reminded him, and marched straight into the mud. Surprisingly her feet started to slide out from under her. She had not realized that mud was so slippery. Managing to regain her balance, she set each boot down slowly and carefully before she pulled her other boot from the sucking mud. She waved happily to Henry, who seemed to be going through some sort of struggle within himself. He kept opening his mouth, as if he wanted to say something, and then closing it again. Ramona also waved at the members of the morning kindergarten, who were watching her through the playground fence.