The Dad Next Door

But this left uncertain their appointment with Pastor Ledbetter for early tomorrow. Before Ian had left, she had called the pastor at home. He, hearing the concern in Kate’s voice, had agreed to meet them for an earlymorning appointment. Now if the streets were impassable maybe they couldn’t go. But even as she thought it the phone rang. She flipped off the TV. It was Ian.

“I knew you were still up. I saw your lights on,” he began. “Were you looking at the news?”

“Yes. Snow. The kids will be over the moon. I’ll have to dig out the snowsuits and extra sweaters. I thought winter was winding down.”

“Does this do anything to our early appointment with your pastor about the homeschooling thing? Will he be in the church office?”

“Yes. The parsonage is right next door. He’ll just shovel a path through. He did last year.”

“Well, we can keep the appointment, then. I’ll use my sports van. It’ll get us anywhere. Haven’t used it in a while.” There was a hint of wistfulness in his tone. The sports van, purchased just after Marsha had left and he had received the promotion that required traveling, had been another good idea gone wrong. He had bought the sports vehicle planning good-father fishing trips with Raymond to some of the many rivers nearby, but it hadn’t worked out.

Kate knew Ian was on the fast track at his company, being groomed for bigger things. He was employed by a manufacturer of security and surveillance devices, and the latest in laser and other equipment. His travel was usually as a consultant to rural police forces needing to upgrade their equipment for new procedures.

It wouldn’t have worked anyhow, since Raymond was a child who disliked fishing intensely. He had sat politely in the boat—another wasted effort—because he didn’t want to disappoint his father. But he had managed to cut several fingers on fishhooks, become nauseated at the motion of the boat, gagged when he watched Ian remove the fishook from the fish’s mouth, and had spent the rest of the day under a tree on the riverbank reading a book he had brought along. Kate thought again that Ian should have taken Tommy, who was the nature boy, with his rock collection, his leaf collection and his dead-fly collection.

“Fine,” she said. “We’ll go as scheduled, then.”

In the morning they awoke to a world of white. The children were elated, and by the time Kate and Ian had left for their seven-thirty appointment, all three of them were out in front, building a snowman. Ian had contributed a rakish, broad-brimmed safari-type hat she had never seen him wear and a red muffler. Kate got the feeling that he would rather stay with the snowman and the kids, but he dutifully drove her to Pastor Ledbetter’s office.

“It’ll be warm in a few minutes,” Pastor Ledbetter said as they settled themselves in the chairs around his small conference table. “I just turned on the heat.”

Everything in the pastor’s office had the look of leftover rummage sale, from his battered, paper-strewn desk to the refinished kitchen table and odd repainted chairs he used for conferences.

“I’ve laid all this stuff out for you,” he said. “There are many curricula and plans to choose from. If you want my recommendations, I’ll give them to you. But I need to start with a few cautions.”

Ian was leafing thoughtfully through some lesson plan material. “This does look very thorough,” he commented.

“It’s prepared for nonteachers,” Kate said hopefully.

“What cautions did you have in mind, sir?” Ian asked.

Cyrus sat down. Kate wondered again how old he was. He certainly never seemed to run out of energy. She knew this was the beginning of another long day for him.

“First and foremost, school authorities oppose homeschooling on principle. They are convinced that only credentialed teachers should teach, which has been proved to be invalid. With all the built-in wasted time in some of the large structured school districts, plus busing of students, often from a long distance, surveys have found that some students are spending less and less actual time in the classrooms. But they routinely object to homeschooling.”

“That seems a bit much,” Ian said. “Do you think this school district would actively object if Kate homeschooled Raymond?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But remember that homeschooling is perfectly legal in this state. Sometimes a district can put up roadblocks, but usually they can’t stop you. You can take precautions.”

“What precautions?” Kate asked, feeling a distinct qualm.

“I would suggest the first thing you do is join the Home School Legal Defense Association. It only costs a hundred dollars, and they are your counsel, your protection, just in case. If necessary they’ll go to court for you, but it doesn’t usually come to that. It sure beats hiring your own lawyer if push does come to shove. You need to first bone up on your rights, so you can’t be bluffed.”

“My rights?” Kate asked faintly. Suddenly the idea of homeschooling Raymond seemed very intimidating.

The pastor leaned over and patted her hand. “Don’t give in to faint heart yet, Kate,” he said, smiling. “Homeschooling is a grand solution in some cases and I think, in the case of your Raymond, it should work. Some public schools are very good. Some aren’t.

“Everything—remember this—everything depends on your child passing the exams. If he or she can pass the exams at the proficiency level for his or her grade, then the goal of teaching has been achieved, regardless of how, or where or from whom.”

Kate felt a bit overwhelmed. She’d be taking on a huge responsibility here. She wasn’t sure she was up to it.

“Do you know anything about actual results?” Ian asked. “How do homeschooled students compare with children from public and private schools?”

“Well, you can’t compare public and private schools—that’s apples and oranges. But statistically, homeschooled children can always outperform public school children.”

“Always?”

“According to everything I’ve seen so far.”

“That’s certainly food for thought,” Ian said. “Raymond is, I regret to say, just a so-so student—”

“Raymond’s been under a lot of stress,” Kate interposed quickly. “He wouldn’t be if…” She faltered. Was she really capable of taking on the teaching? Again, she wondered about it. She felt color rise into her face.

“Look at this new series,” the pastor was saying with enthusiasm, pulling out a brochure and unfolding it. “This looks like an awfully good approach to the teaching of chemistry.”

“Chemistry?” Kate asked faintly.

“Kate, don’t worry about it,” the pastor said. “Your home is full of chemistry experiments. This looks very practical. And remember, it’s designed for home teaching.”

“Let’s have a look,” Ian said, reaching for the brochure. “You know, Kate,” he added, “I could help out when I’m home. I remember I was fascinated by chemistry, got pretty good at it, and I didn’t blow up anything. And they offer this whole kit of stuff. See?” He handed the brochure to her.

Kate looked at it without really seeing it. Was he coming round? Was he accepting this? And could she do it if he agreed?

“And look at this,” the pastor said. “This comes with a complete set of videos. It would be like having your own private lecturer come into your home. All interactive with the students. And do you have a computer? They have a lot of things geared to the home computer.”

“I don’t—I don’t have a computer,” Kate said.

“I could get you a computer,” Ian said. “That’s no problem.”

“Me learning to use it might be a problem,” Kate responded without thinking, and Ian laughed.

“I’ll bet the kids could pick it up quickly,” he said.

The pastor plunged ahead, explaining, illustrating, advising.

“I think I’m sort of convinced,” Ian said after a while. “At least as a stopgap, for the time being. My boy’s grandparents want me to place him in a good military school, but my gut feeling is that my kid is not a military type. He’d hate it, but I do think just a good boarding school might be the solution for him.”

Kate’s heart, which had lifted, sank.

“Why don’t you give it a try?” the pastor asked kindly. “Be guided by his test scores at the end of the school year.”

“That would be the acid test,” Ian agreed.

“That and the fact that Raymond might thrive on it,” Kate heard herself saying somewhat testily. Boarding school, indeed. He had mentioned last night that Marsha had been “warehoused” in boarding schools, yet somehow he saw it as a good solution for Raymond.

The church secretary popped her head in the door.

“Mr. Barnes is here about the room dividers.”