Mary Cary | Page 2

All people are crazy sometimes."
That's why I'm up in the punishment-room to-day, and it only proves that what I wrote is right. It's crazy to let people know you know how queer they are. Miss Bray takes personal everything I do, and when she saw that blackboard, up-stairs she ordered me at once. She loves to punish me, and it's a pleasure I give her often.
I brought my diary with me, and as I can't write when anybody is about, I don't mind being by myself every now and then. Miss Bray don't know this, or my punishment would take some other form.
I just love a diary. You see, its something you can tell things to and not get in trouble. When writing in it I can relieve my feelings by saying what I think, which Miss Katherine says is risky to do to people, and that it's safer to keep your feelings to yourself. People don't really care about them, and there's nothing they get so tired of hearing about. A diary doesn't talk, neither do animals; but a diary understands better than animals, and you can call things by their right name in a book which it isn't safe to do out loud, even to a dog.
I know I am not unthankful, and I would much rather have a Father and Mother on earth than to have them in heaven, but I guess I should have kept my preferences to myself. Somehow preferences seem to make people mad.
But a Mother and Father in heaven are too far away to be truly comforting. I like the people I love to be close to me. I guess that is why, when I was little, I used to hold out my arms at night, hoping my Mother would come and hold me tight. But she never came, and now I know it's no use.
There are a great many things that are no use. One is in telling people what they don't want to know. I found that out almost two years ago, when I wasn't but ten. The way I found out was this.
One morning, it was an awful cold morning, Miss Bray came into the dining-room just as we were taking our seats for breakfast, and she looked so funny that everybody stared, though nobody dared to even smile visible. All the children are afraid of Miss Bray; but at that time I hadn't found out her true self, and, not thinking of consequences, I jumped up and ran over to her and whispered something in her ear.
"What!" she said. "What did you say?" And she bent her head so as to hear better.
"You forgot one side of your face when fixing this morning," I said, still whispering, not wanting the others to hear. "Only one side is pink--" But I didn't get any further, for she grabbed my hand and almost ran with me out of the room.
"You piece of impertinence!" she said, and her eyes had such sparks in them I knew my judgment-day had come. "You little piece of impertinence! You shall be punished well for this." I was. I didn't mean to be impertinent. I thought she'd like to know. I thought wrong.
I loathe Miss Bray. The very sight of her shoulders in the back gets me mad all over without her saying a word, and everything in me that's wrong comes right forward and speaks out when she and I are together. She thinks she could run this earth better than it's being done, and she walks like she was the Superintendent of most of it. But I could stand that. I could stand her cheeks, and her frizzed front, and a good many other things; but what I can't stand is her passing for being truthful when she isn't. She tells stories, and she knows I know it; and from the day I found it out I have stayed out of her way; and were she the Queen of Europe, Asia, and Africa, and the United States I'd want her to stand out of mine. I truly would.
Her outrageousest story I heard her tell myself. It was over a year ago, and we were in the room where the ladies were having a Board meeting. I had come in to bring some water, and had a waiter full of glasses in my hands, and was just about to put them on the table when I heard Miss Bray tell her Lie.
That's what she did. She Lied!
Those glasses never touched that table. My hands lost their hold, and down they came with a crash. Every one smashed to smithereens, and I standing staring at Miss Bray. The way she told her story was this. The Board deals us out for adoption, and that morning they