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'Can't you explain to her that the doctors mean no harm? Bloomah asked. 'Oh, don't they, indeed? Just you read this! She flourished a handbill, English on one side, Yiddish on the other. Bloomah read the English version, not without agitation: 'Mothers, look after your little ones! The School Tyrants are plotting to inject filthy vaccine into their innocent veins.
Then a curious calamity befell. A girl who had left the school for another at the end of the previous week, returned on the Thursday, explaining that her parents had decided to keep her in the old school. An indignant heart-cry broke through all the discipline: 'Teacher, don't have her! From Bloomah burst the peremptory command: 'Go back, Sarah!
For Bloomah was the black sheep that spoilt the chances of the fold the black sheep with the black marks. Perhaps those great rings round her eyes were the black marks incarnate, so morbidly did the poor child grieve over her sins of omission.
Bloomah's heart was in her mouth when Mrs. Beckenstein clucked her tongue in reading it. She felt sure that the epidemic had invaded one of those numerous family hearths. Her mother handed her the card silently. 'DEAR MOTHER, 'I am rakked with neuraljia. Send Bloomah to fry the fish. Bloomah turned white; this was scarcely less tragic. 'Poor Becky! said her heedless parent.
They might have been forgiven for not connecting Bloomah with blooms, for she was a sad-faced child, and even in her tenth year showed deep, dark circles round her eyes. But they were beautiful eyes, large, brown, and soft, shining with love and obedience. Mrs. Beckenstein, however, found neither of these qualities in her youngest born, who seemed to her entirely sucked up by the school.
Poor Bloomah paused in her breathless career ready to cry at this malicious fate fighting against her, and for the first time allowing herself time to speculate on what was up. All around her she became aware of weeping and wailing and shrieking and wringing of hands.
While Bloomah was reading, a head-shawled woman fainted, and the din and frenzy grew. 'But I was vaccinated when a baby, and I'm all right, murmured Bloomah, half to reassure herself. 'My arm! I'm poisoned! And another pupil flew frantically towards the gate. The women outside replied with a dull roar of rage, and hurled themselves furiously against the lock.
Daniel was thereafter looked upon at home as a lamb who had escaped from the lions' den, and must be the object of their vengeful pursuit, while on Bloomah devolved the duties of shepherd and sheep-dog. It was in the midst of all these diverse duties that Bloomah tried to go to school by day, and do her home lessons by night. She did not murmur against her mother, though she often pleaded.
'Hold on, missie! The policeman grimaced. 'The King ist vaccinated, went on Bloomah, 'and the Queen, and the Prince of Wales, yes, even the Teachers themselves. There are no devils inside there. This paper' she held up the bill 'is lies and falsehood. She tore it into fragments. 'No; it is true as the Law of Moses, retorted a man in the mob. 'As the Law of Moses! echoed the women hoarsely.
Tears of humiliation and distress dripped down her cheeks over the dark rings. If she were thus hauled off ere she had received two hours of secular instruction, her attendance would be cancelled. The class was all in confusion. 'Fold arms! cried the teacher sharply, and the girls sat up rigidly. Bloomah obeyed instinctively with the rest.