"MS. FOSTER, are you alone?" Startled as the loudspeaker sounded in her third-grade classroom during her Thursday-afternoon planning period, Meredith glanced up from the sloppily scrawled math problem she'd been trying to decipher.

"Yes, Mr. Shepherd." She used the formality, just as she always did when anyone else was around — or could possibly be around.

"Could you come down to my office?" The principal's inner sanctum — the only place in the building where one could be guaranteed an uninterrupted meeting.

Meredith dropped the purple pen she'd been using to grade papers.

"Yes, Mr. Shepherd. I'll be right there."

The beautiful March day had just taken a nosedive. She was in trouble again.

"YOU'RE THE BEST teacher I've ever had, Meredith. Year after year, your students average higher scores than any other students in the district on both national and local aptitude tests."

"I know." Hands clasped in her lap, one thumb rubbing the opposite palm, Meredith added, "Thank you."

"You're also the teacher who brings me the most parental phone calls."

She occupied one of the two wooden armchairs in front of the scarred but spotless desk while the principal, dressed in casual slacks, cotton shirt and tie, stood at the window behind it.

"I know."

"Those parents pay my salary."

"I know."

"And yours."

She nodded, pulling her hair in the process as her waist-length ponytail got caught in the corner of the chair's arm.

"Some of them make up the school board and the superintendent who oversee us."

It must be bad. "They are the community that &mdash