"I'm positive it was Gisselle," I said. "She once threatened to do the exact same thing if I revealed the secret about her not being crippled anymore."
"Did you confront her?"
"Naturally, she denies it," I said. "It doesn't matter now. The damage has been done, and she has won what she wanted: I hate it here."
"Complain to Daphne," he suggested. "Maybe she'll let you come home."
"I doubt it," I said. "It doesn't matter anyway. I just do my work and plod on. I'm not doing much artwork. The new teacher is nice, but he's not Miss Stevens."
"Well, be up there this weekend," Beau promised.
"Saturday, late in the morning."
"Okay."
"Ruby, I hate to hear how sad you are. It makes me sad too," he said.
I was crying, but I didn't let him hear. I nodded, caught my breath, and told him I had to go finish up some homework.
He did drive up on Saturday, and the sight of him getting out of his car in front of the dorm put some sunshine in my heart. I had gone into the dorm kitchen and prepared a picnic lunch of po'boy sandwiches and apple juice. When the other girls set their eyes on him, they expressed their approval with cheers and giggles. With a blanket folded under my arm, I rushed out to meet him and go off to another part of the campus.
"Daphne was supposed to send permission for Gisselle and me to leave the campus on weekends, but she didn't," I explained, "so we can't leave the grounds."
"It's all right. It's nice here," he said, looking around.
We walked around the campus and then spread the blanket on the lawn. We both lay back on our hands and looked up at the blue sky with its puffs of creamy white clouds and talked softly. Our talk wasn't of much at all at the start. He rattled on about some of his friends back in New Orleans, the prospects for the upcoming baseball season, and his-college plans.
"You've got to get back to your art," he told me. "Miss Stevens would be very upset, I'm sure."
"I know. But right now everything I do is mechanical. I feel like a robot, getting up, getting dressed, going to school, doing my homework, studying, going to sleep. But you're right," I told him. "I do have to get back to what is most important to me."
I sat up. He played with a blade of grass and then tried to tickle me with it. I was very selfconscious about everything we did, however. We were in plain view of everyone. There was no privacy for us at Greenwood, and I could imagine even Mrs. Ironwood gaping out of a window watching us, just waiting for us to do something she considered wrong.
We ate our sandwiches, talked some more, and then went for another walk. I showed him parts of the school itself, the library, the auditorium, and cafeteria. All the while I felt we were being watched, being followed. I didn't want to take him back to my dorm. I was happy we had been able to avoid Gisselle. We ended up walking toward the Clairborne mansion. Beau thought it was an impressive old house, especially because of how it was set back, with woods between the house and the school.
It was getting late, so we started back toward the dorm and his car, but on the way, we spotted a path that went deeper into the woods, and Beau thought we should explore and see where it would take us. I was reluctant at first, still having this sense of being watched. I even looked behind and around us, studying the pockets of shadows created by the late-afternoon sun, but I saw no one nor heard anyone. So I let him pull me along. We went farther and farther into the small wooded area until we heard the distinct sound of water rushing over rocks. When we came around a turn, there it was: a small but vigorous little stream that had created a waterfall.
"It's very pretty he
re," Beau said. "You've never been here before?"
"No, and no one's mentioned it."
"Let's sit awhile. I'm in no rush to go back to New Orleans anyway," he said. I didn't like the way he said it.
"Your parents know you've come up here to see me, don't they, Beau?"
"Sorta," he said, smiling.
"What's that mean, `sorta'?"
"I said I was going for a ride," he replied with a shrug. "Just a ride? But you drove all the way to Baton Rouge!"
"It's a ride, isn't it?" he said, laughing.
"Oh Beau, you're going to get into trouble with them again, aren't you?"
"It's worth it to see you, Ruby." He stepped up to me to put his hands on my shoulders and bring his lips to mine. Here in the solitude of the woods, he felt free to be more affectionate. I couldn't help but be nervous, however. We were still on Greenwood grounds, and in my dark imagination, I envisioned the Iron Lady hovering behind a tree with a pair of binoculars. Beau sensed my agitation and felt the tension in my body.