Queen Sophie Hartley Read online

  Sophie opened her door a crack to see whether John’s door was still open. It was. The minute he saw her, John scrambled out of bed and scooted over to lie on his stomach next to his door. Sophie often entertained him from her doorway at night when he was supposed to be asleep. He was a very good audience.

  “Now, imagine you’re the queen,” Sophie instructed him.

  “Boys can’t be the queen,” said John.

  “The king, then.”

  “Off with her head!” John shouted in a loud whisper, waving his arm as if he were brandishing a sword.

  “John ...”

  John quieted down and watched patiently while Sophie did a whole string of curtsies. Then he said, “It’s getting a little boring,” so she got a belt from her drawer and looped it around a stuffed sheep on her bed and dragged it behind her as she marched around her room, quietly singing Mary Had a Little Lamb and then curtsying. She was halfway through her final curtsy when she heard footsteps on the stairs. John made a dash for his bed, and Sophie fell over sideways.

  It was Nora.

  “What are you doing?” she said. She stepped coldly over Sophie’s body as if it were nothing more than a lumpy sack of potatoes, went over to her dresser, and picked up her hairbrush.

  “Resting,” said Sophie.

  “Well, go rest downstairs,” Nora said. She began brushing her hair. “I need to rehearse.”

  Sophie could have argued that it was her time in the bedroom and that Nora had no right to tell her to leave. But she was feeling generous because of how well her curtsying was going. Besides, she thought Nora’s face looked very pale.

  “I’ll watch you if you want,” she offered as she sat up. “I can tell you what you’re doing wrong.”

  “As if you’d know,” said Nora.

  “But I could—”

  “I don’t want your help.” Nora put down her hairbrush and turned around. “You don’t know anything, Sophie. Just go away and leave me alone. And you can take your babyish animals with you.” She snatched Sophie’s sheep off the floor and tossed it out into the hall. “I’m sick of them.”

  It was one thing for Nora to be mean to her, but to take it out on an innocent sheep? Sophie ran into the hall and picked up the sheep, cradling it in her arms as if it were taking its last breath. When their bedroom door slammed shut behind her, she whirled around.

  “I do, too, know something, Nora!” she yelled, pounding on the door a few times for good measure. “I’m better at being bad at ballet than you are, so there!”

  Her storming down the stairs was anything but queenly.

  “...and then she threw Curly against the wall.”

  “Who’s Curly?” said Mrs. Hartley.

  “My sheep.”

  “Oh, Sophie.” Mrs. Hartley’s face was red from the steam that shot up from the iron when she set it down. There was a warm, friendly smell of steam and clean clothes in the kitchen. “Try to be nice to her,” her mother said. “It’s only for two more days.”

  “I was trying to be nice,” said Sophie. “She was still mean.”

  “It’s because she’s worried,” her mother said.

  “Then why doesn’t she act worried?”

  “Pride,” said Mrs. Hartley. “Many times, people are too proud to show how they really feel, so they act mean.”

  “That’s no excuse,” said Sophie. She thought about Dr. Holt. “They act mean when they’re sick, too.”

  “Right.”

  “And homesick,” she said, thinking about Heather. “They want people to be nice to them, but then they take advantage of them. That’s what you always say,” she said defensively, seeing the expression on her mother’s face.

  “You’re right, I do,” said Mrs. Hartley. “My goodness. You’re becoming a regular philosopher.”

  “And Nora’s not a prima ballerina,” Sophie said. “She’s a prima donna.”

  It made her feel very proud the way her mother suddenly plunked the iron on its base and stared at her through a rush of steam. “Wherever did you learn that expression?” she asked. “Are you sure you’re the real Sophie Hartley?”

  “Dr. Holt told me,” said Sophie. “She knows lots of interesting things.”

  “Like what?” said Mrs. Hartley.

  “Oh, history and things,” Sophie said vaguely. She wished she could tell her mother about curtsying and meeting a queen and everything, but she couldn’t.

  Not yet.

  “So she’s not just a grouchy old lady anymore,” said her mother.

  “She still is, but I’m working on her.”

  “Now that,” her mother said, “is something I’d like to see.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Bad news,” said Heather. She slid into the seat next to Sophie and looked at her mournfully.

  “What?” Sophie said.

  “Destiny Fabrey is catching up to you. We were both just promoted to the gold reading group, and you weren’t.” Heather’s mouth turned down. “That means she gets two more points.”

  “Oh, no,” said Sophie, feeling her heart give a great leap into the air and fly joyously around.

  “That’s not all,” said Heather solemnly as she opened her notebook. “You lost a point this morning for peanut butter.”

  “I thought you loved peanut butter,” said Sophie.

  “Not when it’s on people’s clothes,” said Heather. She looked meaningfully at a spot in the middle of Sophie’s chest. Sophie looked down. A generous dollop of peanut butter was smudged around a button on her shirt.

  “Oh, no,” Sophie said again.

  Heather was busy making checks in her notebook and disapproving tsk-tsk noises with her tongue. When she finally looked back up, Sophie could tell the verdict wasn’t good.

  “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to get your hopes up. Sometimes these things don’t stick.” Heather could have been talking Russian for all Sophie understood. “You moved up to five at the end of school yesterday when you got a ninety-five on the spelling test.” She heaved a mighty sigh. “You were actually my best friend for the entire night until this morning.”

  “I was?” said Sophie. She immediately thought how glad she was she hadn’t known. She doubted whether she would have been able to sleep.

  “Now, I’m sad to say, it’s even.” Sophie didn’t think Heather sounded sad; she sounded glad. “Destiny had two, and now she has four,” she said. “And because of the peanut butter problem you’re back down to four, too. Whoever gets another point first gets to be my best friend.”

  “Either that,” said Sophie, “or whoever loses a point first, doesn’t.”

  Dr. Holt wasn’t at all interested in seeing how much Sophie’s curtsy had improved.

  “No more dilly-dallying,” she said irritably when Sophie offered to show her. “Too many more nights like the one I had last night and I’m not going to live long enough see this garden finished. Let’s get going.”

  Sophie’s feelings were a little hurt, but she dutifully picked up a pot of purple flowers and carried it onto the last empty spot in the flower bed. Then she picked up a pot of blue flowers and put it next to it.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” snapped Dr. Holt. “Purple doesn’t go next to blue.”

  “I think it looks pretty,” said Sophie.

  “Then you must be colorblind. It looks terrible.”

  Sophie took a deep breath. “Different people have different opinions,” she said.

  “Not when they’re working in my garden,” said Dr. Holt. “I’m the boss here.”

  Sophie put down the trowel. She was tired of arguing with Dr. Holt; there was no way she was ever going to win. Dr. Holt blamed her grouchiness on how sick she was when what she really was, was rude. Dr. Holt was a bully, Sophie decided. And Sophie was sick of it.

  She suddenly knew what dignified meant, too; it meant acting calm, even when what you wanted to do was stamp your feet and yell.

  Sophie stood up, brushed of
f her knees, and went and stood in front of Dr. Holt’s chair.

  “Well, what are you waiting for?” said Dr. Holt.

  Sophie put her left foot on the grass behind her and held out her imaginary silk gown. With her chin in the air and her back straight, she slowly and graciously lowered her body until she felt the tip of the grass scratch against her knee. One quick nod to Dr. Holt, and she rose to her feet again.

  Then she stood there, waiting.

  “What was that for?” Dr. Holt said in a querulous voice. She glared at Sophie with her fierce eyes as if trying to scare her off, but Sophie didn’t budge. She knew what it was for; Sophie could tell she knew.

  She didn’t say a word.

  “Ha!” said Dr. Holt.

  This time, Sophie was absolutely sure there was a gleam in her eyes. “Bet you can’t do it again,” said Dr. Holt.

  Sophie did do it again. A perfect, dignified curtsy.

  Then she stared back at Dr. Holt in stubborn silence. It seemed to go on for quite a long time.

  “Oh, all right. Have it your own way,” Dr. Holt said at last. She waved a hand toward the pots. “Put blue next to purple. See if I care.”

  “Thank you,” said Sophie. She picked up another pot of flowers and put it down in the bed. Then another pot. Purple, blue, purple, blue. She stood back to take a look. “There. Doesn’t that look beautiful?” she asked.

  “Magnificent,” said Dr. Holt.

  Sophie set about digging a hole for each plant. “Isn’t it much nicer when we don’t argue?” she said conversationally.

  “We’re still arguing,” said Dr. Holt. “We’re just not doing it out loud.”

  “I hope Dr. Holt’s not being too hard on you,” Mrs. Hartley said on the drive home. She sounded worried. “Her daughter said she had quite a reputation for whipping her students into shape when she taught school.” She gave Sophie a quick glance. “She might have some old-fashioned ideas about how she wants you to treat her.”

  “She’s all right,” said Sophie. “Sometimes she’s a little grouchy, that’s all.”

  Her mother drove for a while, looking thoughtful. Then, “Didn’t I see you curtsying to her out there this afternoon?” she said finally when they came to a red light. “I just happened to be looking out the window.”

  Sophie nodded. “I was teaching her how to be polite.”

  Her mother sat up straighter and turned to look at her. It made Sophie feel even more satisfied than she’d been feeling when she first got in the car. She’d wanted to tell her mother about what had happened, but she wasn’t sure how. The fact that her mother had been spying on her made it easier.

  “You?” her mother said. “Teaching her?”

  “Yep.”

  “And you did that by curtsying to her?”

  “Talking back was getting me nowhere,” said Sophie. “Then I wondered what Queen Victoria would do.” She looked at her mother. “Do you know about Queen Victoria? The teenaged queen?”

  “I’ve never heard her referred to that way before,” her mother said. “But, yes. A bit.”

  “Queen Victoria was never mean to anyone, or yelled at them,” Sophie said. “She didn’t have to.” She wasn’t exactly sure if this was true, but she’d been thinking about it quite a bit. She couldn’t imagine a queen sitting on her throne, arguing. Not in an ermine cloak. She acted so dignified that everyone acted dignified back. If they didn’t, she waved her magic wand and made them disappear.

  Sophie thought maybe she was mixing her facts up a bit, but she liked the way it sounded. “If you act dignified to a person,” she explained to her slightly dazed-looking mother, “then the person acts dignified back. There’s a lot more to curtsying than just bobbing up and down, you know.”

  “Really, Sophie,” said Mrs. Hartley. She turned so abruptly into their street that the car ran up over the curb and thumped down again. “You say the most incredible things,” she said. “Sometimes I think there’s more going on in that brain of yours than meets the eye.”

  “That’s what Dr. Holt thinks, too,” said Sophie. “Except all she says is ‘Ha!’”

  Chapter Nine

  “I have a present for you,” Dr. Holt said when Sophie came around the corner into the backyard.

  “A present?” said Sophie. She stopped. This was even more shocking than strawberry shortcake. “For me?”

  “Don’t get your hopes up,” Dr. Holt said. “It’s not much.”

  But Sophie couldn’t help getting her hopes up; her hopes were always up when it came to presents. She loved everything to do with them. The wrapping paper. The bows. The feeling inside when someone handed her a present that maybe, just maybe, it was going to be the one thing she wanted more than anything in the world.

  Half the time, she didn’t even know what that one thing was. It was the not knowing that was so exciting.

  Dr. Holt waved her hand at a small square package on the glass-top table. “Go on,” she said gruffly. “Open it.”

  It felt awfully light. It didn’t really look like a present, either; it was wrapped in plain brown paper. There wasn’t a card or anything.

  But still. Sophie started to unwrap it carefully.

  “I would have thought you were the type to rip right into it,” Dr. Holt said as Sophie slowly unstuck the first piece of tape so as not to tear the paper.

  “My mother likes to reuse the wrapping paper,” said Sophie. This paper had already been used, she could tell. The name of the local grocery store was written in red on the inside.

  “If you take much longer with that thing, you’re going to have to throw it away,” Dr. Holt growled.

  “Throw it away?” It didn’t surprise Sophie at all that Dr. Holt had strict rules about opening presents. She quickly tore off the paper, tape and all, and opened the top of the box.

  It was filled with worms.

  “Oh, thank you,” Sophie said. She didn’t stop to think that hugging Dr. Holt might be like hugging a statue with bones. She just hugged her. And even though Dr. Holt seemed a little startled, her return hug was surprisingly human.

  “How did you find them?” Sophie asked.

  “My daughter helped me,” Dr. Holt said gruffly. “You don’t think I touched those things, do you? Half of them had crawled away by the time we got out here. She had to dig up some new ones. It was hard work, let me tell you. I ought to make you split your profits with me.”

  “But they’re a present,” Sophie said, clutching the box to her chest.

  “I know, I know....” Dr. Holt leaned forward in her chair. “How much are you going to charge your father for them?” she asked.

  “Seven cents a worm,” Sophie said promptly.

  “Highway robbery,” said Dr. Holt.

  She had put the worms in her father’s bait bucket in the garage. Now she needed to go inside and figure out how much he owed her. As she came across the yard toward the back door, Sophie saw John and Thad sitting on the back steps. John was the picture of doom, with his elbows on his knees, his chin resting on his hands, and a heavy scowl on his small face.

  “I wouldn’t go in there if I were you,” Thad told her.

  “Why?” said Sophie. “What happened?”

  “Nora didn’t get the part.”

  Sophie stopped dead in her tracks. “She didn’t?”

  “Nope.”

  “I’m going in the army,” said John. He banged the heel of his boot against the stairs.

  “Who got it?” Sophie asked Thad. “Lauren?”

  “How should I know?”

  “If girls cry in the army, they kick ’em out,” said John.

  “Nora’s crying?” The bones in Sophie’s legs seemed to turn to jelly and she sank down onto the step next to Thad.

  “She was when she got out of the car,” reported John.

  “She was when I went into the kitchen,” said Thad. “Believe me, you don’t want to go in there.”

  Nora crying. It was worse than Sophie thought. “H
ow does she look?” she said.

  “Bad,” said John.

  “Pretty lame,” said Thad.

  “She’s got boogers running out of her nose,” said John.

  “John, that’s not nice,” said Sophie.

  “Yeah, come on, John.” Thad punched him playfully on the arm. “That’s not nice.”

  “It’s what you said,” protested John, punching him back.

  “You boys are mean,” said Sophie.

  “Hey, little brother.” Thad rubbed his arm where John had punched it. “You’re getting a bit of muscle there. Let me see.”

  John sat up straight and held his arm out like a weight lifter in a magazine. Thad squeezed the tiny lump that appeared and whistled. “Way to go,” he said admiringly.

  “Thad, what else?” Sophie said impatiently. “Stop making muscles for a minute, John.”

  “What more do you want?” said Thad. “Nora’s crying, Mom’s up in her bedroom trying to calm her down....”

  “And I’ve got a muscle,” said John. He punched Thad again.

  “Come on, Hot Stuff.” Thad jumped off the stairs and grabbed the neck of John’s T-shirt to drag him along. “Let’s go see what you can do with the weights in the garage.”

  “Don’t you even care?” Sophie shouted as John followed Thad across the yard, rolling up onto the balls of his feet to make himself as tall as possible. “Nora’s crying!”

  “What do you expect?” yelled Thad. “Girls are wimps!”

  “And boys are cool!” shouted John.

  Sophie stayed on the back steps as they disappeared into the garage. Nora was behind her, and those two dopes were in front of her. Sophie thought the safest thing to do was sit tight, in the middle, by herself.

  “We are not turning this into a national tragedy,” Mrs. Hartley said firmly to the living room at large as she came in carrying Maura. “Nora got a perfectly good part, and we’ve all had to worry with her long enough.”