“Oh, children!” she gasped, holding her head in both hands, “I can’t hear myself think!”
She sat down, unable to bear the hubbub of class recitation, and put her hands over her ears for a moment. Her eyes closed. The throbbing veins at her temples seemed about to burst.
It was Sadie Goronofsky who brought about the final catastrophe—and that quite innocently. Being unable at this juncture to attract attention by the usual means of waving her hand in the air and snapping her fingers, Sadie jumped up and went forward to Miss Pepperill’s desk.
She had just sent away a class, and their clumsy footsteps had but ceased thundering on her eardrums when Sadie came on tiptoe to the platform. Miss Pepperill did not see her, but Sadie, tired of weaving her arm back and forth without result, clutched the edge of the light shawl Miss Pepperill wore over her shoulders.
The jerk the child gave the shawl was sufficient to pull Miss Pepperill’s elbow from the edge of the desk where it rested, her hand upholding her throbbing head.
In her weakness the teacher almost pitched out of her chair to the floor. She shrieked.
Sadie Goronofsky flew back to her seat in terror. Miss Pepperill opened her eyes and saw nobody near. It was just as though an invisible hand had pulled at the shawl and had dislodged her elbow.
She was not of a superstitious nature, but her nerves were unstrung. She uttered another shriek—then a third.
The children under her care were instantly alarmed. They rose and ran from her, or cowered, whimpering, in their seats, while the poor hysterical woman uttered shriek after shriek.
Her cries brought other teachers into the room. They found her with her hair disarranged, her dress disheveled, beating her heels on the platform and shrieking at the top of her voice—quite out of her mind for the time being.