"What is this, Inger Johanne?" asked Mr. Gorrisen severely.
"It was so tedious to stand there, Mr. Gorrisen," I said.
"Yes, that was exactly why you were put there."
"And so I crept over here when you didn't see me."
Without another word, down across the floor he came. I turned my right ear towards him, for the left ear burned horribly even yet from the other time. But he evidently thought that an ear-pinch was too gentle a punishment for creeping through the whole class-room. I was taken by the arm and led along out of the door. Outside in the hall he shook me by the arm. Oh, well! it was just a little shake anyway,—but then I had to hang around in that hall until the lesson was all over.
I can't understand now how I ever dared to creep that way in Mr. Gorrisen's class. O dear! I have been awfully foolish many times—unbelievably foolish!
Then there was that day Mr. Gorrisen fell off his chair. I was put out in the hall that day, too. But all the others ought to have been sent out as well, for we all laughed together. It was just because I couldn't stop laughing that I had to go. I surely have spasms in my cheeks, for long after all the others have stopped I keep on—I can't help it.
We were having our geography lesson. Mr. Gorrisen sat in an armchair by the table and stared at us, for he was not the kind of teacher that sharpens pencils or polishes his finger nails or does anything like that. He just sits and sways back and forth in his chair and stares incessantly. Well, never mind that. The lesson was on the peninsula of Korea. I remember distinctly.
"Now, Minka, Korea lies——" He swayed and swayed in his chair.
"Korea lies—ahem! Ko-re-a lies——"