Heaven for Roosters

by Sarah Wisseman

The day my daughter's laptop was stolen started like every other day—with a cacophony of roosters.

“Er-er-ooo! Er-er-ooo!”

The ubiquitous birds competed with the shrill voices of students changing classes and roaring mopeds just outside the school.

I gazed through the bars of Susan's classroom, wondering if the roosters were on campus or strutting around the lushly wooded property next door. Could be either, since the only fences around here were full of holes.

They weren't really bars, of course—just decorative pieces of iron replacing walls on two sides of Susan's science “laboratory” in the Dominican Republic . While I supposed four walls weren't necessary in a tropical climate, I was glad it wasn't hurricane season.

I surveyed the room's scanty furnishings: a tiny blackboard, tall stools, tables, and a double sink with defunct plumbing. Pages of student work describing pond biology decorated the cement walls.

Coffee-colored boys and girls surged around me, placing their knapsacks on the tables and chattering in Spanish.

Susan rummaged around in the alcove off the main room as the bell rang.

“Mom—” began Susan as a petite brunette dressed in khakis and a green school T-shirt hurried into the room. “Oh, hi, Marta. Mom, this is my assistant, Marta. You haven't met her yet.”

Marta and I nodded hello as Susan turned back to me. “Mom, have you seen my laptop? I put it back in my knapsack with my water bottle before classes started.”

“No, I haven't, not since we left your place. Gosh, I hope it isn't stolen—”

The very idea made Susan's green eyes widen. She ran a slender hand through her red hair, recently cropped short after the shower in her apartment failed one too many times. “Oh, God, I can't survive without that laptop. All my lesson plans, all my articles and pictures…”

Marta darted an avid look at my daughter's face. “Your computer's missing? Uh oh…not good…” Her eyes widened and her voice mellowed as a handsome young Dominican man appeared in the doorway. “ Hola , Ricardo! How are you today?”

Ricardo ignored Marta and turned liquid brown eyes on Susan. “Hi, Susan! I need to talk with you about this weekend.”

This produced a scowl from Marta and a quick smile from Susan.

“Not now, Ricardo. Class is about to start. Lunchtime, okay?”

The bell rang and Ricardo departed to teach his own class.

“Take your seats, please, everyone. Now, has anyone seen my little laptop? A white Macintosh?”

A few heads shook while chairs scraped and students fidgeted.

My daughter's lips thinned. “Right. We'll look for it after class. Pay attention, because I'm going to recreate my missing diagram on frog anatomy on the blackboard—”

A crash interrupted her as a skinny boy with curly hair knocked over his stool. I bet this was one of the three class troublemakers Susan had mentioned.

“Eduardo, sit down!” said Marta.

Eduardo shot her a cheeky smile and balanced his stool on one leg. It collapsed again, and the class giggled.

“Uh oh!” said a tall boy. He exchanged grins with Eduardo and elbowed his neighbor.

“Cut it out, Marco!” said the neighbor, elbowing back.

Marta strode toward them and the three boys backed away from her, laughing and nudging each other.

“Settle down, kids,” said Susan, giving the boys what I privately termed “The Look.”

Eduardo sat and Marta retreated, pouting.

“That means you too, Marco and Paco.” Susan nodded at Eduardo's co-conspirators and waited until they were seated again. “Angelina, you can help me up here while Marta passes out paper.”

A coltish teenager with long brown hair hurried up to the blackboard and the lesson began.

My husband Hank sidled into the room and took a stool at the back of the room next to me.

“Susan's laptop is missing,” I whispered.

“Oh, hell,” he said. “This visit is turning into more than we bargained for.”

We both knew this was a disaster for our daughter. She'd coped with the Jarabacoa Christian School 's scanty teaching resources by using her laptop to show slides and diagrams she'd downloaded in the States. Replacing a computer in the DR would be difficult and expensive—if not impossible.

Marta, finished with her paper passing, stood near an empty stool, observing Susan with a dissatisfied expression on her narrow face.

I watched Susan's performance—and it was a performance—with pride and something approaching awe. Who would have guessed that our formerly shy child would grow into such a competent teacher? She held the attention of her students so well—

An explosion of laughter off to my right proved me wrong.

All eyes focused on Marta, who sprang off her stool with an oath. The back of her pants was covered with egg.

“All right, which of you little demons did this?” she hissed.

“Marta, I'll take care of this,” said Susan. “You go clean up.”

Marta shot a furious look at Eduardo and left the room.

Susan crossed her arms. “Okay, students, that was both unkind and unnecessary. Who is responsible for putting the egg on Marta's chair?”

Everyone fidgeted. No one spoke.

“Fine,” said Susan. “I'll give you all until the end of the day to persuade whoever did it to talk to me. If no one comes forward, there will be an extra homework assignment tomorrow for all of you—”

“Oh, Miss Susan!”

“Or maybe I'm make you all miss soccer practice—”

“Not again!”

“No fair!”

“Class dismissed,” said my daughter as the bell rang.

The students poured out of our classroom, eager for recess and lunch.

Susan sighed as she gathered up her papers. “Mom, Dad. I'm going to search the storage alcove again for my computer and then talk to the Director. Could you guys wander around before lunch and see if you can spot it? It's got to be still on campus; I had it in my possession before classes started, and the guard at the gate won't let any of the students leave without permission.”

“Sure,” I said, wondering which student would risk expulsion by stealing a computer. Or maybe it wasn't a student. Not very many people in the DR could afford fancy electronics, especially cute little Macs like Susan's.

Hank and I headed down the narrow flight of stairs, crossed the blue-and-green painted lobby, and stepped outside. We scanned the lawn near the entrance of the main building, the flower-laden bushes, and the picnic tables for lurking laptops.

We strolled toward the piles of dirt around the recently completed pond—a massive, interdisciplinary and interfaith church work project.

Hank whipped out his digital camera and shot a few pictures of the pond.

“That won't help,” I said sourly.

“Can't hurt,” he replied. “Besides, it gives me an excuse to wander all over the campus.”

“Hey, Mr. Taylor, can I see your camera?” Marco approached with an engaging grin.

Right—the two of them would play with Hank's new camera while I turned snoop. Feeling indignant on Susan's behalf, I moved toward the cafeteria, another semi-open structure with a thatched roof and a long wooden counter already laden with vats of rice and beans, chicken, and chopped mangoes. My stomach rumbled.

Where would a thief hide a laptop around here? Several classroom spaces were entirely outdoors, none of the rooms were locked, and there was plenty of undergrowth. Hmm.

A squawk near the main office caught my attention. I turned in time to see a flurry of feathers as Eduardo triumphantly held up a chicken he'd just captured.

“Good job , Eduardo!” said Paco, who was standing nearby.

Several other boys crowded around, joking in Spanish and paying no attention to my flapping ears.

“Hey, is that bird going to give you more eggs for some teacher to sit on?”

“How much will you take for that chicken? I'm hungry!”

Eduardo laughed and stuffed the chicken in a plastic bag.

So, Eduardo was the culprit—I wondered just where and when he was planning to release the chicken. Hank had promised to teach the eighth grade English class this afternoon…

***

A tricky afternoon turned into a rough night. As we lay in Susan's narrow bed, unhappily awake because of sticky heat, loud radio music, and yet more roosters, Hank recalled how Eduardo had disrupted English class.

He'd locked the chicken in the tiny bathroom until one of the girls opened the door. Hank's beautiful presentation on Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn was drowned out by laughter and catcalls as the chicken raced around the room.

I giggled. “You have to admit, it was funny.”

“Yes, very funny—if you're the observer and not the poor benighted teacher who's trying to instill a love of literature—”

“Er-er-ooo! Er-er-ooo!”

“Damn roosters!” he growled. “Sounds like they're right in the room.”

They weren't, but sound transmitted very well from the narrow alley a few feet away.

I stared at the wall opposite our bed, unable to relax. There was a gap between the corrugated tin roof and the top of the wall, illuminated by a faint light from the neighboring house.

Susan had told me this part of the DR had bats. Did bats fly in and settle on the face of a sleeping person?

“I'm going to turn on the light for a minute.”

I pushed the sheet down and slid to the end of the bed, scraping my thigh against the bulge of an uncovered electrical outlet. My feet hit the cool tile floor and I flicked the wall switch. No visitors—at least not yet.

“Worried about bats again?” said Hank.

“Yep,” I said. I turned off the lights and crawled back into bed.

“Hmph,” he said, punching his pillow into a more comfortable shape. “What a place, dysfunctional plumbing, bats, and—”

“Er-er-ooo! Er-er-ooo!”

“—those blasted birds.” Hank flopped over, making the flimsy bed shudder like an earthquake.

“Too bad we can't understand rooster talk,” I said as I shifted my spine between two lumps in the thin mattress. “I bet the roosters at Susan's school could tell us who took her laptop.”

“Oh, sure,” said Hank. “Or the roosters dragged it off into the bushes and their stupid wives are laying eggs on it right now.”

“Do you think it was Eduardo? He seems like a harmless prankster to me—someone who just wants extra attention.”

“Depends on whether you think disrupting my class was harmless,” he said. “My money's on Eduardo's friend, Marco. He admired my camera, my watch, and my cargo pants. I think he covets all things American—especially clothes and electronics.”

“What about that other boy, Paco, the one who—”

“Save it for morning. Try and get some sleep.”

“Right,” I said as my gaze locked on the wall gap and my mind skittered between bats, roosters, and missing computers.

I really didn't believe Eduardo was the thief. Was it Marco? Paco? Or maybe one of the girls? Surely not Angelina…

***

The next morning, while the toilet stopped up and the power failed, we consumed fragrant coffee and jam omelets cooked on Susan's cantankerous gas stove.

Soon the three of us were walking to school, picking our way along the gutter because loose chunks of concrete and uncovered manholes made the sidewalk hazardous.

Political announcements blared from a pickup truck that passed us, followed by an oxen-drawn cart, two mopeds, and a slew of cars.

Just when I thought I'd seen every kind of conveyance the DR had to offer, I spotted a skinny old man riding a rickety bike in the middle of the road. He balanced a full tank of propane with one hand while trying to steer with the other.

“Did you see that?” I gasped.

“Yup,” said Hank as we entered the gates of the school and waited while Susan asked the security guard if her laptop had turned up.

“Er er ooo! Er er ooo!” The school's resident fowl greeted us.

Observing Hank's look of disgust, I bit back a smile.

Susan rejoined us, her face glum.

“No luck?” I asked.

“ Nada ,” she said.

Hank veered off to the Annex to teach third grade English as Susan and I entered the main building. We passed a pile of the younger children's knapsacks—each one big enough to hide a notebook computer.

I clutched Susan's arm. “I think you should check all the student knapsacks. Your laptop would fit easily in any one of them.”

She stared at me. “You're right. And we should have checked all the knapsacks before everyone went home yesterday! What are the chances my laptop is still on campus?”

Susan increased her pace toward her classroom. “The Director may have some ideas—she said she was going to visit our class today. Right now, I have to decide how Eduardo gets punished for his chicken-and-egg pranks.”

“Someone told on him?” I asked, glad that I had kept my mouth shut and not interfered.

“Yeah. His ‘best friend' Marco did. Although I have a feeling Marco is more of a partner in crime than an informant—and Eduardo's the ringleader of that little group.”

I nodded. “Maybe they'll settle down later in the semester. What do you want me to do today?”

“Just hang around. If the kids aren't too disruptive, I'd like to do a chemistry experiment. I'll need extra hands for that.”

I helped Susan and Marta set up the classroom. Marta chatted civilly enough with me, but her face tightened when she looked at Susan. Hmm…I bet the hunky Ricardo's obvious preference for Susan was the explanation.

We muddled through a simple experiment involving acids and bases with only two spillages—fortunately on the concrete floor.

Then Susan said, “Okay, everyone, time for homework assignments. Give your papers from last night to Marta or my mom, Mrs. Taylor, and take out your notebooks.”

“Will there be extra work, Miss Susan? I mean, you say yesterday that the egg trick would make us extra assignment…” said Angelina.

“Our practical joker has confessed and will be staying after school today,” said Susan.

Eduardo avoided Susan's gaze and ducked into the bathroom.

The room buzzed with speculation and laughter as the kids rummaged in their knapsacks. Piles of wadded homework papers, water bottles, soccer shoes, and extra T-shirts grew on the tables.

A rooster slid between the iron bars on the far side of the classroom and wandered between the students' feet. A couple of girls giggled, but most of the kids ignored the bird.

The rooster stopped at Eduardo's table and pecked at his knapsack.

Must be food in there, I thought, amused at the bird's persistence.

Just as Eduardo emerged from the bathroom, the rooster stuck its head in the open top of his knapsack and pulled out a white cord.

“Susan—” I said, but she was already there. She reached inside the knapsack and pulled out her laptop.

“How do you explain this, Eduardo?”

Eyes huge, Eduardo gasped, “I didn't take it, Miss Susan, I promise I didn't! I don't know how it got there!”

“What's going on?”

We turned as Diana, the director of the school, entered the room.

Susan took a deep breath and said, “My missing laptop has just turned up in Eduardo's knapsack.”

“I didn't do it!”

Diana listened to Eduardo's frantic denial for the second time. “Anyone else see anything yesterday morning—or today?” she asked, scanning the scared and eager faces around her.

Silence. Then Angelina spoke up. “I see her. I see Miss Marta put computer in Eduardo's knapsack while Miss Susan was in bathroom this morning.”

All eyes turned toward Marta, who sputtered, “You surely don't believe her? Why would I do such a thing?”

“I saw something too,” said another girl. “Yesterday I saw Miss Marta put something in her locker when everyone else was at lunch. It was square, sort of, and wrapped in a cloth.”

“Well, Marta?” said the Director.

“No, they're lying, it wasn't me—”

“I've only been here a couple of days,” I said. “But I've noticed that Marta is unhappy about Ricardo's attraction to Susan. And Eduardo acts up, especially with Marta. Maybe Marta took the laptop to make life difficult for Susan and then put it in Eduardo's knapsack so he'd be charged with theft?”

Marta twisted her hands and avoided Susan's appalled gaze. “Oh, crap. It was just a joke—I didn't mean any harm—Diana, I'm really sorry…”

“It's Susan and Eduardo you should apologize to, Marta. We can't have a student suspected of theft when a staff member is responsible. You and I need to have a chat.” Diana gripped Marta by the elbow and steered her toward the door. “Carry on, Susan.”

“Come here, Eduardo,” said my daughter.

Eduardo slouched to the front of the class.

“Class, I want you to remember this incident, because things aren't always what they seem,” said Susan. “Our Eduardo may be a practical joker, but he's no thief.”

She patted the boy's shoulder. “Angelina and Clea, thanks for having the courage to speak up. Okay, everyone, back to work now…”

***

The last few days of our visit were relatively normal—we taught a few more classes at the school, suffered tourista from sampling salad at a local wedding shower, and played cards by candlelight when the power went out at Susan's apartment.

After we got home to Iowa , Susan sent us a long email about the aftermath of the computer theft. Marta had been fired and was on her way back to the States. Eduardo and Paco beat up Marco for being a tattletale.

After she broke up the fight, Susan persuaded all three boys to put their extra energy into playing soccer instead of chasing chickens and causing mischief.

And Ricardo bought her flowers—and a locking cable for her laptop.

Our house seemed almost too quiet, I thought, as I prepared a special dinner for Hank. No salsa music, no shouting in Spanish, no roosters…

The back door slammed and Hank wandered into the kitchen. “Smells great, what is it?”

“ Coq au vin .”

His face split in a huge grin. “Isn't that French for old rooster simmered in red wine?”

“You got it.”

“Er er ooo!”