Saying Grace by Beth Gutcheon Page B

said Chandler.
    44 / Beth Gutcheon
    “Not well.”
    “He’s a very bright guy, genius level.”
    Rue only nodded. To her Oliver Sale was a tall and angular but flabby man who seemed to glower even when he tried to smile. His head was strangely proportioned, as if it had been necessary to cram all his features together at the bottom of his face, and leave the other two-thirds for forehead. The wife, Sondra, was more approachable, although nervous, like Jonathan. Rue’s memory was that when they came in for their interview, Oliver did all the talking.
    “Oliver says that Lyndie doesn’t seem to have any homework.
    They ask what her assignment is and she doesn’t know.”
    Uh oh, thought Rue, here we go. She said, “I’ll speak to Mrs.
    Trainer.”
    “Thank you. You know I’ve heard nothing but complaints about Catherine Trainer since I joined the Board? I’d like to raise a point of curiosity. We’re in a recession here. Teachers are a dime a dozen; they’re stacked up over the airfield waiting for a job like this. Young kids with good degrees who would cost half as much as Mrs.
    Trainer. Isn’t that true?”
    “In a way.”
    She looked at him, feeling weary. Oh, he was going to be one of these kinds of presidents. She wished they could all be like Ann Rosen, intelligent and supportive, good at leading the baying hounds away from the wounded deer, so that Rue could do her job while Ann channeled the Board in directions that strengthened the school.
    “In what way?” Chandler asked.
    Rue said, “It isn’t true that good teachers are a dime a dozen. There are plenty of teachers, but not plenty of good ones. Mrs. Trainer has been one of the best teachers I ever saw. She has a history with the school that is worth a great deal to the faculty, to the alumni, and to me.”
    Chandler smiled, and took another roll. “Well, those points are well taken.”
    “Thank you.”
    “But in my business when we have a difficult personnel issue, we make a clean cut and go forward. We aren’t sentimental and no one expects us to be.”
    “Can business really be as simple as that?”
    Saying Grace / 45
    “Yes,” he said, though they both felt instantly that this was a lie.
    They sat silent another moment.
    “Let me ask you a question,” he said with an air of beginning over.
    “Just for my information. When a teacher is past it, what does it take to decide you’re cutting her too much slack?”
    “It’s a matter of judgment. The important thing is that I have to be sure to think with my own brain and not let parking-lot politics think for me. I’ve had years when a particular teacher will come under fire for no reason known to God or man, and then the storm blows out to sea and the next year’s class is delighted with her again.
    And when I do decide that a longtime employee of the school is ineffective, there are right ways and wrong ways to handle it. So I have to do what I have to do in the right way, at the right time.”
    Chandler seemed annoyed by this answer, and shot his cuffs to display heavy mother-of-pearl cufflinks. He put one hand in his pocket and fumbled around, a gesture that looked habitual, like looking for a lighter and then remembering you don’t smoke anymore. He put his hands back on the table, folded together. Finally, he said, “Do I understand you to say that you are going to fire her?
    In the right way, at the right time?”
    “You do not.”
    “What then?”
    “I’m saying that it is improper for school parents, and most especially for Board members, to interfere with the head in personnel matters. Maybe we should schedule another board retreat, at your convenience, to review this sort of thing.”
    There was an uncomfortable silence, during which they both looked around the room, as if suddenly enchanted with the decor.
    Each had come to the meeting determined to establish a rapport, hoping to make a new start with each other. Rue felt chagrin that once again she had let her