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weeks, those last ones. Sheila was in tears as often as not. Not angry tears, though, just tears, popping up at the most unexpected moments: while we were baking cookies on Wednesday afternoon, while giving water to our cantankerous rabbit, while reading on her own in the book corner. I felt they were a natural part of the separation process, so I accepted them, giving her what comfort she sought and otherwise letting her come to terms at her own pace. And tears were by no means her only expression. There were plenty of boisterous, happy moments too.
    I took her over to visit Sandy and her classroom and then we arranged for Sheila to go spend a trial day there. As I suspected would happen, Sheila was seduced by Sandy’s warm, cheerful personality and by the more stimulating environment of the third-grade classroom. These children were actively learning, busy with intriguing projects and undertakings, many of them self-generated. All in all, quite a different atmosphere from our classroom, where going to the toilet was considered an achievement. Sheila came back vibrant from her visit, her conversation full of “Next year, when I’m in Miss McGuire’s class …” I knew then I had been outgrown.
    Then the last day.
    We had a picnic in the park to celebrate our year together. All the parents were invited and we brought packed lunches and ice cream and all the trappings for a good day out. Ours was an extraordinarily beautiful municipal park with a long,winding lane lined with locust trees, a babbling brook that tumbled down through natural rock cascades to empty into a large duck pond ringed with weeping willows. In all directions there were large expanses of grass stretching out beneath ancient sycamores and oaks.
    Sheila loved the park. She had never been there before coming to our room, as it was a long way from the migrant camp; but it was only a few blocks from the school, so I had taken my class over on several occasions. Her father did not come that day, but it was obvious he was making more of an effort with Sheila. She came dressed in a bright-orange cotton sunsuit and excitedly told us how her father had taken her down to the discount store the night before and bought it, especially for her to wear to the picnic. She was so ebullient that day, skipping, dancing, pirouetting in the sunshine, that I still call to mind that bobbing form of sunlit orange every time I smell locust blossoms or see duck ponds.
    And then, finally, the end—the last good-bye at the door of the classroom to Anton, the last walk together over to the high school to meet her bus. I had given her the now dog-eared copy of The Little Prince to take with her, a tangible reminder of these last five months, and she clutched it to her as we walked.
    Running up the bus steps, she went straight to the back and clambered up on the bench seat to wave to me from the back window. The bus rumbled to life and diesel fumes overpowered the scentof locust blossoms. “Bye,” she was saying, although I couldn’t hear her because of the glass and the noise of the engine. The bus began to pull away and she waved frantically.
    “Bye-bye,” I said and lifted my hand to wave too, as the bus turned the corner and disappeared from sight. Then I turned to walk back to my classroom.

Chapter 5
    W hen autumn came, I was a thousand miles away from the school, the migrant camp and the locust trees. Settled into graduate school, I was devoting most of my spare time to research. Some years earlier I had become intrigued by psychologically based language problems, elective mutism in particular, where an individual can speak but does not do so for emotional reasons; however, I had had to put this on the back burner while teaching full-time, because there just hadn’t been time to pursue it. Now I was able to devote the kind of attention to the work I wanted. As a consequence, I was still in daily contact with children, but it was of a different kind and quality to what