The Early Stories of Truman Capote Read Online Free PDF Page A

I’ve always had a great interest in dramatics.” She smiled, and dropped her gaze from his thin face to the whirling blur of chain.
    “I see,” he said. “I ask this only because I would like to understand you. It’s quite important that I understand you.” He turned his chair around and sat up straight to the desk. “Yes, quite important.” She noticed that his air of informality had dropped.
    IV
    She fidgeted with her books nervously. He hadn’t said anything yet to accuse her, but she knew that her face was flushed; she felt very hot all over. Suddenly the closeness of the room was unbearable.
    He laid down the chain. He was fixing to speak, she knew because she heard his sharp intake of breath, but she didn’t dare look up at him because she knew what he was going to say.
    “Hilda, I suppose you know there has been a great deal of thieving going on here in the girls’ lockers.” He paused a moment. “It’s been going on for some time now—but we haven’t been able to lay our hands on the girl who would steal from her class mates.” He was stern and deliberate. “There is no place in this high school for a thief!” he said earnestly.
    Hilda stared down at her books. She could feel her chin trembling and she bit her lips. Mr. York half rose from his seat and then sat down again. They sat in a tense, strained silence. Finally he reached in his desk drawer and pulled out a small blue box and emptied the contents on the desk. Two gold rings, a charm bracelet, and some coins.
    “Do you recognize these?” he asked.
    She stared at them for a long time. Fully forty-five seconds. They blurred in front of her eyes.
    “But I didn’t steal those things, Mr. York, if that’s what you mean!”
    V
    He sighed. “They were found in your locker, and besides—we’ve had our eye on you for some time!”
    “But I didn’t—” she stopped short, it was hopeless.
    Finally Mr. York said, “But what I can’t understand is why a child like you would want to do such a thing. You’re bright, and as far as I can find out, you come from a fine family. Frankly, I am completely baffled.”
    She still sat silent, fumbling with her books, and feeling as if the walls were close and tight, as if something were trying to smother her.
    “Well,” he continued, “if you aren’t going to offer any explanation, I’m afraid there is little I can do for you. Don’t you realize the seriousness of this offense?”
    “It’s not that,” she rasped. “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you why I stole those things—it’s just that I don’t know how to tell you, because I don’t know myself.” Her slim shoulders shook, she was trembling violently.
    He looked at her face—how hard to punish frailty in a child. He was visibly moved, he knew. He walked to the window and adjusted the shade.
    The girl got up. She was overcome with a nauseous hate for this office and those bright shining trinkets on the desk. She could hear Mr. York’s voice, it seemed far and distant.
    VI
    “This is a very serious matter, I’m afraid I will have to see your parents.”
    Her eyes leaped with fear. “You aren’t going to have to tell my—?”
    “Of course,” Mr. York answered.
    Suddenly she didn’t care anymore about anything except getting out of this little white office with its ugly furnishings and its red-headed occupant and the rings and bracelet and money. She hated them!
    “You may go now.”
    “Yes, Sir.”
    When she left the office, he was occupied with putting the trinkets back in the little blue box. She walked slowly through the outer office and down the long empty corridor and out into the bright sunlight of the April afternoon.
    Then, suddenly, she began to run, and she ran faster and faster. Down the high school street, and into the town and down the long main street. She didn’t care if people did stare at her; all she wanted was to get as far away as she could. She ran away to the other side of town and into the