Mr. Bones held the broken pencil up to the early morning light coming through his science class window and positioned a magnifying glass at the tip of his Roman nose. He closely inspected the small dents along the pencil’s barrel. Moments earlier, after he had removed his winter hat covering his ears, his elegant scarf, and his long dark coat, he had noticed the untoward pencil and the largely unintelligible note on a sticky that read, “—-broak my pensle—.”
“Good morning Bones!” boomed the voice of Dr. Walters, the English teacher who waddled in, his fulsome stomach protruding from his tweed jacket and pulling his white shirt out of the belt that struggled to contain the whole mess. “What have you there? Another case?” Bones whirled around. “Walters! What do you make of this?” Bones handed him the broken pencil and the unintelligible note.
“Hmmmm…,” Walter wheezed. He examined both pieces under the gaze of a dangling skeleton which Bones had informed the pupils was all that remained of “a student who copied his lab report from another and was given detention for so long that everyone forgot about him.”
“Well, Bones, clearly this is a student who is restless and so bangs his pencil on the side of his desk which is why there are these dents. The eraser has been heavily used due to work that has been done too quickly and had to be erased multiple times, especially given your high and exacting standards as their teacher. Similarly, the note has been written in haste, so this is a careless student, not given much to academic work. My guess would be the pencil and note belong to Bobby…”
This Bobby was a third-grade boy who always seemed to have somewhere else to go and loved nothing better than to be outside showing the other boys how he could kick, dribble, throw, or balance some kind of ball or other. He passionately disliked anything that had to do with books, pencils, and the like.
“Bravo, Walters! Bravo! Despite your love of antique literature, I admire your willingness to use rigorous scientific reasoning based on evidence.”
Walters smiled and stood a little taller.
“But, I regret to tell you,” continued Bones, “that your conclusions are entirely erroneous. Dents in the pencil? Surely bite marks by an anxious student. Used eraser? An anxious student always doubts his answer and is continuously erasing. The handwriting? This student lacks confidence and hesitates greatly in his writing. No, clearly, this belongs to Milton…”
While Bones spoke, the sounds of children rose in the hallway, and many pairs of eyes peered into the room of the great Mr. Bones, Science Teacher at the Woods Academy K-8, a man who knew everything, everything. Then the form of an unkempt little boy appeared in the doorway.
“Milton! Come in, come in,” called out Bones as he flashed a wry smile at Walters to indicate that he had now won the previous discussion.
The small shame-faced red-headed third-grader made his way across the linoleum laboratory floor, his winter coat wrapped loosely around his waist. The sleeves dragged on the floor. With the impeccably dressed Mr. Bones silently watching, Milton became acutely aware that his sneakers made a squishing sound with each step and that the laces of his right shoe were undone and clicking against the floor.
“Milton, how can we help you?”
Milton looked at the pencil, his shoulders scrunched up. He rubbed his knuckles, which were already red from rubbing, and began: “Mr. Bones, yesterday in study hall, Bobby and I were working on our project and…”
So began an overly long story that wound up with a broken pencil and an unintelligibly scribbled note on a sticky.
“Dr. Walters, would you be so kind as to get Bobby? I saw him darting about behind that group of children.” Bones waved his hand toward the kids who had gathered in the doorway and were staring wide-eyed at the meeting with Milton. One little boy didn’t even notice that he was holding his backpack upside down such that his math folder fell out and buried his feet with work sheets on which his math teacher had written that he could “do better.” The little girl next to him guffawed and then covered her mouth, and they both returned to watching Mr. Bones and Milton. The heap of papers remained on the floor.
Soon enough Dr. Walters came back with Bobby who stood tall and confident in his DC United soccer shirt. He promptly delivered a lively, brief, and essentially inaccurate account of an incident that wound up with a broken pencil. Mr. Bones leaned forward in his chair and trained his brown eyes into a laser-like glare at him, stopping the boy in mid-sentence. “Bobby, Dr. Walters and I know that…” He then set forth an air-tight case in which an overly active Bobby, probably bored while working on the project during the third-grade study hall held in Mr. Bones’ lab and needing stimulation, broke anxious Milton’s well-chewed pencil. Milton, knowing this was unfair and that Bobby would not apologize, left both the pencil and an explanatory note. Bobby lowered his gaze and admitted as much.
Having meted out justice and solved the Case of the Broken Pencil, Bones dismissed the boys, who ran out whispering recriminations against each other and stood up to leave.
“Quite right, Bones, quite right,” said Dr. Walters as they left the lab. The middle schoolers in the hall were rattling their lockers, trying to locate their belonging and remember their schedules. They all called out to Mr. Bones as he passed by. “Hi Mr. Bones!”, “Good morning Mr. Bones!”, “Hello Mr. Bones!”. He gave a general nod to the rabble of children who were full of energy from their morning milk chocolate and waffles but knew better than to talk to him beyond a greeting as this was the time he took his morning tea in the teachers’ headquarters.
~~~
At 3 p.m. dismissal, Bones had a meeting of some singular interest. There had been an incident the previous day involving William, another third-grader, whom Bones and Dr. Walters referred to privately as “the Weasel” for his slippery character. The kids all knew he was a bad kid—he was constantly getting thrown out of activities, even homeroom greeting circle. The teachers all knew he was a bad kid—he fibbed like he breathed but because he was so intelligent, the tired teachers could never catch him in the lie. The only person who didn’t know he was a bad kid was the person Bones was meeting with at 3 p.m.: his mother.
To her, William was a genius. He read far above grade level and never misspelled a word. She was the most active parent in the Woods Academy PTA and a ubiquitous presence at all Woods Academy functions. So, she was puzzled by the regular calls from the school about this or that incident. When she entered Mr. Bones’ room at 3 p.m., she felt apprehensive.
William slunk in behind her. He was a spindly boy with thin limbs, limp dark hair, and dark eyes that darted about, and he regularly did things that were deeply puzzling. Yesterday, for example, after he had been called to the teacher’s desk, he returned to his seat by hopping with his arms and hands curled up next to his chest imitating a rabbit and making yelping sounds and then stopping and saying, “I’m a squirrel.” The other bright kids smiled, though they were perplexed, and the slower kids laughed nervously thinking this was a joke they should understand but that only the smarter kids really understood.
Trailing behind his mother, he was no longer a squirrel but a quiet, serious student who was eyeing Bones with resentment and the fear of the soon-to-be-condemned. His mother began with fulsome praise for Mr. Bones and his class. “My son,” she gushed, “absolutely loves your class. All he talks about is igneous rocks,” which Mr. Bones and William both knew was a bald-faced lie.
With Mr. Bones, her praise was entirely in vain. He laid out in front of her two tests—her son’s and the incorruptible Lauren Mazel’s who, though not very bright, was universally acknowledged as extremely diligent and impeccably honest. “One can always count on Lauren,” said every teacher who had ever taught her.
Mr. Bones presented his assessment of the Case of the Purloined Answer:
“On the day in question—when the third grade was taking its test on the formation of rocks, I saw William suddenly stop writing, as though he was having difficulty with an answer. The clock on the wall said 1:15 pm and the test started at 1 p.m., a fact which will be plainly relevant in a moment. He looked around and then gazed to his right for eight seconds. To his right was Lauren Mazel. After I had collected the tests, I compared the tests of these two. After 15 minutes of work, an average third-grader is usually on problem number seven, as previous years of experience have shown. I checked number seven on both copies and found that each student had misspelled ‘igneous’ the same way, as ’ignuse.’ We all know that William never misspells a word and Lauren struggles in this area—many of her answers contain misspelling though they are correct. Therefore, what can we conclude? William? We both know you copied the answer.”
William was caught in the trap. He studied his shoes, his limp hair now clumpy from perspiration. His mother turned to him red-faced. The kids crowding the doorway—Bones wanted them to see the swiftness of justice—pushed each other, mouths agape, to see William get caught.
The mother promised that this would not happen again. Mr. Bones said he hoped not.
He got up, excused himself and walked to the coat rack. Other third-graders stared as he put on his coat jacket and then his long elegant coat, wrapped the scarf with care around his neck and then placed the hat on this head that covered his ears, tipping it as he passed the mother and William “the Weasel.” Walking through the doorway, the third-graders parted. He strode towards the door of the Woods Academy and was soon gone, leaving the gaggle of children in awe as they re-committed themselves to the best possible behavior, like ever.
~~~
Some weeks later, on a Monday morning, Dr. Walters hoisted himself out of his car then steadied himself and reached for his leather satchel bursting with student papers, newspapers from past days, and a dog-eared paperback or two which he planned to finish at some future date. He walked through the school parking lot, empty except for the car of the genius Mr. Bones whom he soon happened upon sitting on the bench at the side of school. Bones was staring pensively ahead, his head enveloped in cigarette smoke.
“Bones, how can you still engage in that noxious habit? So early in the morning yet! Don’t you know the damage you are doing to your body and the brilliant mind with which you have been gifted?”
Bones had a faraway look in his eye.
“Work, Walters, give me work. Not these idle days of no interest. My mind rebels at stagnation.”
“Well. Surely, this is not the way to go about it. And you are such an esteemed and distinguished teacher, respected and admired by all!”
“To find a field for my particular powers is the only true reward, Walters.”
“Well, let’s go in and see if any fresh adventures await us.”
This is, in fact, what the two found when an email from an 8th grader popped up in Walters’ inbox, and he printed it out to show Bones:
“Dr. Walters, I am being bulied by some one online and I think I know who. She has put up a web page last Wednesday with a photo of me that she shouldn’t have b/c its not a good photograph that I want people to see. And it’s probably not even a real photo, I don’t know. She might have photoshopped it. But I need to get the photo taken down!! I am applying to Georgetown Prep and if Admisions sees it I might not get in, and my dad would be furious. Can I come talk to you this morning during homeroom, pleeeze? Thanks Jack”
Walters clicked on the link and he and Bones saw the problem. The photo showed a shirtless Jack—whom Walters and Bones thought of as “Jack the Jock” for obvious reasons—holding a bottle of vodka up, arm around and up the shirt of a high school looking girl, a big grin on his face and a green party hat on. The lettering above the photo read “Georgetown Prep’s finest.”
Walters and Bones knew there was little that could be done about student interactions outside of school, but Bones delighted in the challenge of retrieving the photograph and having a new case. Walters could see the wheels turning in his friend’s head.
During homeroom period, Jack strode in wearing his letter jacket and black jeans, chest out, broad shoulders and clean sneakers such that either side of his body was in complete symmetry with the other. Even his hair was perfectly in place and hardly moved. He was flanked by two almost identical boys who, to their regret, had some lack of symmetry either in their hair or in how their shirts fit in their pants or some other imperfection such that were like Jack, but not. They were, though, in front of the several other boys traipsing behind them who were clearly not symmetrical—derelict bookbag on one shoulder, untamed hair flailing about, a shoelace dragging here, a hockey t-shirt instead of the requisite baseball shirt there…All wanted to be in Jack’s world and be able to tell students who were far removed—say in Drama Club or Model UN—all about the latest goings on in the inner sanctum.
“Boys, would you wait over there while we talk with Jack,” asked Walters who, whenever he saw this put-together boy, Jack the Jock, became aware of the chaotic display of his many books imperfectly lined up on the shelves, some falling forward, others pushed in to the wall, and the piles of papers lying about in slovenly piles.
Bones and he listened as Jack restated the information written in the note except in poorer English and repeating, “My dad’s gonna kill me if I don’t get in to Prep,” and “She’s just pissed ‘cause I dumped her.” Walters, remembering his own boyhood as a little round tub whom all the big boys ignored, promised eagerly to do all he could to rectify the injustice. Bones simply watched impassively.
To the boys in 6th through 8th grade, the girl in the note, Irene, was The Girl—tall with long brown hair who had developed early and fully, and most characteristic of all, always left one button extra undone at the top of her white blouse revealing just enough so that not a single boy near her could concentrate unless he stared directly at the teacher or the textbook or the laptop.
To Bones, after this case, the Scandal in Eighth Grade, she would always be ‘the girl’ whom he would truly admire.
“Bones, what do you make of this?” asked Walters after the boys had gone to class.
“Let us see what is really going on here. I will look into this. Forward Watson!” Bones thrust his index finger with great vigor showing the enthusiasm for life with which this case had infused him.
Bones’s plan unfolded over the coming days with Walters puzzling over his esteemed friend’s mysterious ways, though always confident of the outcome. Several times a day, Bones would walk discreetly through the eighth-grade locker area between classes and during recess period pretending to read a paper or looking down pensively as though he were thinking over a science problem, but he was in reality, attempting to pick up any loose and incriminating talk. On one of these strolls he heard Jack tell a group of boys that he had to use the bathroom before going outside. Hearing this, Bones slipped unnoticed into the bathroom and locked himself in a stall.
Soon Jack and few of his boys entered and, in the temple of the toilet where nothing was too coarse, their tongues let loose. Jack spewed on about “that slut Irene” and the boys cackled and snorted and spit and joined in the piling on of the girl they hopelessly lusted for. Bones heard every word of Jack the Jock’s animus.
That day he told his third graders’ that they would be required to show the findings of their latest project by designing a web page and uploading a few photographs of their experiment. They were excited but a few of them would need help, which Bones knew. Among these was Irene’s eight-year-old brother. Bones then crossed the hall to Dr. Walters’ room and let him know that he needed a few eighth graders to help his third graders and would he make sure that Irene was one of them? Walters readily agreed, then realized the specific student requested and, leaning in, said in a hushed tone, “Bones! What are you up to?” Something was afoot in this special request. “We shall see Walters, we shall see!” exclaimed Bones on his way out.
And sure enough, during a third-grade study hall at the end of a day in Mr. Bones’ lab, Irene came in to help her little brother. In addition to being a physically beautiful girl, she was a caring sister who could always be relied on to help her slower little brother. She sat next to him by the laptop in the corner while Bones glided discreetly behind the divider that separated the lab from the classroom next door. He had left it open by a few feet, so he could sit and listen to the two working together.
Irene patiently helped her brother with each step in his assignment.
“How do you know so much about how to do this?” he asked looking up at her.
“I don’t know.” She shrugged her shoulders, smiled and patted him on the head for encouragement.
“Oh yeah! You were working on a page last week, but you didn’t want me to see it,” he remembered.
“Yes, because I was practicing, and it wasn’t finished. So let’s keep going now with your project. You see how…,” and she continued to instruct him.
Later Bones went in to Dr. Walters’ classroom to bring him up to date on the evolving case. They noticed that a small group of third graders were in there working discreetly and they included Irene’s little brother. The young boy seemed, in turn, to be observe that Jack, his older sister’s old boyfriend, was with them.
The following Monday, Bones was ready to deliver his summation, and he and Walters waited for Irene so they could to speak to her. To prepare for this meeting, they clicked on the link. To their shock, the page had been changed. Now the page displayed a photo of a smiling Jack in his baseball outfit with the caption, “Georgetown Prep’s finest!” Adding to the confusion was that Irene was not in school that day, nor any of the days that week until it was announced that she had withdrawn from the school.
Bones was baffled by this turn of events. The case had ground suddenly to a halt.
While reaching into his mailbox in the school office one morning Bones found an envelope with a note taped to a book wrapped in gift paper. Sitting in the quiet of his lab Bones read the note:
“Mr. Bones,
I know you’ve deduced it was me who put up the web page about Jack. I’m so sorry. When I was helping my little brother I leaned forward and saw your reflection in the monitor. I sent my brother into Dr. Walters’ room and he said you, Dr. Walters and Jack were talking together. Everybody knows that you can find anything and so I knew I’d get caught.
My mom explained to me why what I did was wrong. Hurting Jack isn’t right even though he and his friends called me names. I’m not really the kind of girl they described I thought Jack really liked me and he was nice when we went out so I agreed to be his girlfriend. That doesn’t mean that just because I broke up with him I’m what the boys called me and that I would do the things he said. I try to be nice to everyone. But my mom showed me that still isn’t an excuse.
I don’t want my little brother to be made fun of or anything. He already has a hard time in school. I can still help at home so I decided to transfer to another school and finish the year before I go to high school. I don’t want Jack’s chances at Prep to be hurt.
I’m giving you this book which Dr. Walters told us about in class because everyone knows you like philosophy. He said it’s about how you have to live each day doing what is right and let go of the past and then the future will be okay. So I replaced the bad web page with a new one. At a new school there won’t be rumors about me and I won’t have a bad reputation. That isn’t really how I am.
I’m glad you were my teacher in 6th and 7th grade. I learned a lot. I’m so sorry for what I did,
Irene.”
Bones unwrapped the book: On the Shortness of Life, by Seneca. He looked out the window. This was truly an exceptional girl. He mused that despite life going back to the humdrum now that the case was done, there was a real reward to be found in teaching when one had a student such as this. His reverie was interrupted by, “Mr. Bones! How are you? Mac! Jack’s father.”
In front of Bones’ desk stood an adult copy of Jack but wearing a business suit. He was a full foot taller and wider at the shoulders than his prize son, but otherwise they were mirror images. Mac had thrown his arm around the boy’s shoulders.
“I can’t thank you enough for resolving that situation. It could have really hurt my boy. I hope that girl has learned her lesson and will be a better young lady.” He leaned in to Bones, looked around and said in a hushed tone,
“I heard the rumors about her and boys and all the sleeping around. Hope her parents talk with her about that. Anyway, I’m glad my son had the sense to break up with her. It’s clear that girl has problems. She’s not on my son’s level.”
Bones squinted, his lips curling slightly into sardonic smile. “I’ve not a shred of doubt. She certainly is on a different level.”