Kitabı oku: «A World of Girls: The Story of a School», sayfa 6
Chapter Thirteen
Talking Over The Mystery
Annie Forest sitting in the midst of a group of eager admirers, was chatting volubly. Never had she been in higher spirits, never had her pretty face looked more bright and daring.
Cecil Temple, coming into the play-room, started when she saw her. Annie, however, instantly rose from the low hassock on which she had perched herself and, running up to Cecil, put her hand through her arm.
“We are all discussing the mystery, darling,” said she; “we have discussed it, and literally torn it to shreds, and yet never got at the kernel. We have guessed and guessed what your motive can be in concealing the truth from Mrs Willis, and we all unanimously vote that you are a dear old martyr, and that you have some admirable reason for keeping back the truth. You cannot think what an excitement we are in – even Susy Drummond has stayed awake to listen to our chatter. Now, Cecil, do come and sit here in this most inviting little armchair, and tell us what our dear head-mistress said to you in the chapel. It did seem so awful to send you to the chapel, poor dear Cecil.”
Cecil stood perfectly still and quiet while Annie was pouring out her torrent of eager words; her eyes, indeed, did not quite meet her companion’s, but she allowed Annie to retain her clasp of her arm, and she evidently listened with attention to her words. Now, however, when Miss Forest tried to draw her into the midst of the eager and animated group who sat round the play-room fire, she hesitated and looked longingly in the direction of her peaceful little drawing-room. Her hesitation, however, was but momentary. Quite silently she walked with Annie down the large play-room and entered the group of girls.
“Here’s your throne, Queen Cecil,” said Annie trying to push her into the little armchair; but Cecil would not seat herself.
“How nice that you have come, Cecil!” said Mary Pierce, a second-class girl. “I really think, we all think, that you were very brave to stand out against Mrs Willis as you did. Of course we are devoured with curiosity to know what it means; aren’t we, Flo?”
“Yes, we’re in agonies,” answered Flo Dunstan, another second-class girl.
“You will tell exactly what Mrs Willis said, darling heroine?” proceeded Annie in her most dulcet tones. “You concealed your knowledge, didn’t you? you were very firm, weren’t you? dear, brave love!”
“For my part, I think Cecil Temple the soul of brave firmness,” here interrupted Susan Drummond. “I fancy she’s as hard and firm in herself when she wants to conceal a thing as that rocky sweetmeat which always hurts our teeth to get through. Yes, I do fancy that.”
“Oh, Susy, what a horrid metaphor!” here interrupted several girls.
One, however, of the eager group of school-girls had not opened her lips or said a word; that girl was Hester Thornton. She had been drawn into the circle by an intense curiosity; but she had made no comment with regard to Cecil’s conduct. If she knew anything of the mystery she had thrown no light on it. She had simply sat motionless, with watchful and alert eyes and silent tongue. Now, for the first time, she spoke.
“I think, if you will allow her, that Cecil has got something to say,” she remarked.
Cecil glanced down at her with a very brief look of gratitude.
“Thank you, Hester,” she said. “I won’t keep you a moment, girls. I cannot offer to throw any light on the mystery which makes us all so miserable to-day; but I think it right to undeceive you with regard to myself. I have not concealed what I know from Mrs Willis. She is in possession of all the facts, and what I found in my desk this morning is now in her keeping. She has made me see that in concealing my knowledge I was acting wrongly, and whatever pain has come to me in the matter, she now knows all.”
When Cecil had finished her sad little speech she walked straight out of the group of girls, and, without glancing at one of them, went across the play-room to her own compartment. She had failed to observe a quick and startled glance from Susan Drummond’s sleepy blue eyes, nor had she heard her mutter – half to her companions, half to herself – “Cecil is not like the rocky sweetmeat; I was mistaken in her.”
Neither had Cecil seen the flash of almost triumph in Hester’s eyes, nor the defiant glance she threw at Miss Forest. Annie stood with her hands clasped, and a little frown of perplexity between her brows, for a moment; then she ran fearlessly down the play-room, and said in a low voice at the other side of Cecil’s curtains —
“May I come in?”
Cecil said “Yes,” and Annie, entering the pretty little drawing-room, flung her arms round Miss Temple’s neck.
“Cecil,” she exclaimed impulsively, “you’re in great trouble. I am a giddy, reckless thing, I know, but I don’t laugh at people when they are in real trouble. Won’t you tell me all about it, Cecil?”
“I will, Annie. Sit down there and I will tell you everything. I think you have a right to know, and I am glad you have come to me. I thought, perhaps – but no matter. Annie, can’t you guess what I am going to say?”
“No, I’m sure I can’t,” said Annie. “I saw for a moment or two to-day that some of those absurd girls suspected me of being the author of all this mischief. Now, you know, Cecil, I love a bit of fun beyond words. If there’s any going on I feel nearly mad until I am in it; but what was done to-day was not at all in accordance with my ideas of fun. To tear up Miss Russell’s essay and fill her desk with stupid plum-cake and Turkish delight seems to me but a sorry kind of jest. Now, if I had been guilty of that sort of thing, I’d have managed something far cleverer than that. If I had tampered with Dora Russell’s desk, I’d have done the thing in style. The dear, sweet, dignified creature should have shrieked in real terror. You don’t know perhaps, Cecil, that our admirable Dora is no end of a coward. I wonder what she would have said if I had put a little nest of field-mice in her desk. I saw that the poor thing suspected me, as she gave way to her usual little sneer about the ‘underbred girl:’ but, of course, you know me, Cecil. Why, my dear Cecil, what is the matter? How white you are, and you are actually crying! What is it, Cecil? what is it, Cecil, darling?”
Cecil dried her eyes quickly.
“You know my pet copy of Mrs Browning’s poems, don’t you, Annie?”
“Oh, yes, of course. You lent it to me one day. Don’t you remember how you made me cry over that picture of little Alice, the over-worked factory girl? What about the book, Cecil?”
“I found the book in my desk,” said Cecil, in a steady tone, and now fixing her eyes on Annie, who knelt by her side – “I found the book in my desk, although I never keep it there; for it is quite against the rules to keep our recreation books in our school-desks, and you know, Annie, I always think it is so much easier to keep these little rules. They are matters of duty and conscience after all. I found my copy of Mrs Browning in my desk this morning with the cover torn off, and with a very painful and ludicrous caricature of our dear Mrs Willis sketched on the title-page.”
“What?” said Annie. “No, no; impossible.”
“You know nothing about it do you, Annie?”
“I never put it there, if that’s what you mean,” said Annie. But her face had undergone a curious change. Her light and easy and laughing manner had altered. When Cecil mentioned the caricature she flushed a vivid crimson. Her flush had quickly died away, leaving her olive-tinted face paler than its wont.
“I see,” she said, after a long pause, “you, too, suspected me, Cecil, and that is why you tried to conceal the thing. You know that I am the only girl in the school who can draw caricatures, but did you suppose that I would show her dishonour? Of course things look ugly for me, if this is what you found in your book; but I did not think that you would suspect me, Cecil.”
“I will believe you, Annie,” said Cecil eagerly. “I long beyond words to believe you. With all your faults, no one has ever yet found you out in a lie. If you look at me, Annie, and tell me honestly that you know nothing whatever about that caricature, I will believe you. Yes, I will believe you fully, and I will go with you to Mrs Willis and tell her that, whoever did the wrong, you are innocent in this matter. Say you know nothing about it, dear, dear Annie, and take a load off my heart.”
“I never put the caricature into your book, Cecil.”
“And you know nothing about it?”
“I cannot say that; I never – never put it in your book.”
“Oh, Annie, exclaimed poor Cecil, you are trying to deceive me. Why won’t you be brave? Oh, Annie, I never thought you would stoop to a lie!”
“I’m telling no lie,” answered Annie with sudden passion. “I do know something about the caricature, but I never put it into that book. There! you doubt me, you have ceased to believe me, and I won’t waste any more words on the matter.”
Chapter Fourteen
“Sent To Coventry.”
There were many girls in the school who remembered that dismal half-holiday – they remembered its forced mirth and its hidden anxiety; and as the hours flew by the suspicion that Annie Forest was the author of all the mischief grew and deepened. A school is like a little world, and popular opinion is apt to change with great rapidity. Annie was undoubtedly the favourite of the school; but favourites are certain to have enemies, and there were several girls unworthy enough and mean enough to be jealous of poor Annie’s popularity. She was the kind of girl whom only very small natures could really dislike. Her popularity arose from the simple fact that hers was a peculiarly joyous and unselfish nature. She was a girl with scarcely any self-consciousness; those she loved, she loved devotedly; she threw herself with a certain feverish impetuosity into their lives, and made their interests her own. To get into mischief and trouble for the sake of a friend was an every-day occurrence with Annie. She was not the least studious; she had no one particular talent, unless it was an untrained and birdlike voice; she was always more or less in hot water about her lessons, always behindhand in her tasks, always leaving undone what she should do, and doing what she should not do. She was a contradictory, erratic creature – jealous of no one, envious of no one – dearly loving a joke, and many times inflicting pain from sheer thoughtlessness, but always ready to say she was sorry, always ready to make friends again.
It is strange that such a girl as Annie should have enemies, but she had, and in the last few weeks the feeling of jealousy and envy which had always been smouldering in some breasts took more active form. Two reasons accounted for this: Hester’s openly avowed and persistent dislike to Annie, and Miss Russell’s declared conviction that she was underbred and not a lady.
Miss Russell was the only girl in the first-class who had hitherto given wild little Annie a thought.
In the first-class, to-day, Annie had to act the unpleasing part of the wicked little heroine. Miss Russell was quite certain of Annie’s guilt; she and her companions condescended to discuss poor Annie and to pull all her little virtues to pieces, and to magnify her sins to an alarming extent.
After two or three hours of judicious conversation, Dora Russell and most of the other first-class girls decided that Annie ought to be expelled, and unanimously resolved that they at least, would do what they could to “send her to Coventry.”
In the lower part of the school Annie also had a few enemies, and these girls, having carefully observed Hester’s attitude toward her, now came up close to this dignified little lady, and asked her boldly to declare her opinion with regard to Annie’s guilt.
Hester, without the least hesitation, assured them that “of course Annie had done it.”
“There is not room for a single doubt on the subject,” she said; “there – look at her now.”
At this instant Annie was leaving Cecil’s compartment, and with red eyes, and hair, as usual, falling about her face, was running out of the play-room. She seemed in great distress; but, nevertheless, before she reached the door, she stopped to pick up a little girl of five, who was fretting about some small annoyance. Annie took the little one in her arms, kissed her tenderly, whispered some words in her ear, which caused the little face to light up with some smiles and the round arms to clasp Annie with an ecstatic hug. She dropped the child, who ran back to play merrily with her companions, and left the room.
The group of middle-class girls still sat on by the fire, but Hester Thornton now, not Annie, was the centre of attraction. It was the first time in all her young life that Hester had found herself in the enviable position of a favourite; and without at all knowing what mischief she was doing, she could not resist improving the occasion, and making the most of her dislike for Annie.
Several of those who even were fond of Miss Forest came round to the conviction that she was really guilty, and one by one, as is the fashion not only among school-girls but in the greater world outside, they began to pick holes in their former favourite. These girls, too, resolved that, if Annie were really so mean as maliciously to injure other girls’ property and get them into trouble, she must be “sent to Coventry.”
“What’s Coventry?” asked one of the little ones, the child whom Annie had kissed and comforted, now sidling up to the group.
“Oh, a nasty place, Phena,” said Mary Bell, putting her arm round the pretty child and drawing her to her side.
“And who is going there?”
“Why, I am afraid it is naughty Annie Forest.”
“She’s not naughty! Annie sha’n’t go to any nasty place. I hate you, Mary Bell.” The little one looked round the group with flashing eyes of defiance, then wrenched herself away to return to her younger companions.
“It was stupid of you to say that, Mary,” remarked one of the girls. “Well,” she continued, “I suppose it is all settled, and poor Annie, to say the least of it, is not a lady. For my own part, I always thought her great fun, but if she is proved guilty of this offence I wash my hands of her.”
“We all wash our hands of her,” echoed the girls, with the exception of Susan Drummond, who, as usual, was nodding in her chair.
“What do you say, Susy?” asked one or two – “you have not opened your lips all this lime.”
“I – eh? – what?” asked Susan, stretching herself and yawning, “oh, about Annie Forest – I suppose you are right, girls. Is not that the tea-gong? I’m awfully hungry.”
Hester Thornton went into the tea-room that evening feeling particularly virtuous, and with an idea that she had distinguished herself in some way.
Poor foolish, thoughtless Hester, she little guessed what seed she had sown, and what a harvest she was preparing for her own reaping by-and-by.
Chapter Fifteen
About Some People Who Thought No Evil
A few days after this Hester was much delighted to receive an invitation from her little friends, the Misses Bruce. These good ladies had not forgotten the lonely and miserable child whom they had comforted not a little during her journey to school six weeks ago. They invited Hester to spend the next half-holiday with them, and as this happened to fall on a Saturday, Mrs Willis gave Hester permission to remain with her friends until eight o’clock, when she would send the carriage to fetch her home.
The trouble about Annie had taken place the Wednesday before, and all the girls’ heads were full of the uncleared-up mystery when Hester started on her little expedition.
Nothing was known; no fresh light had been thrown on the subject. Everything went on as usual within the school, and a casual observer would never have noticed the cloud which rested over that usually happy dwelling. A casual observer would have noticed little or no change in Annie Forest; her merry laugh was still heard, her light step still danced across the play-room floor, she was in her place in class, and was, if anything, a little more attentive and a little more successful over her lessons. Her pretty, piquant face, her arch expression, the bright, quick and droll glance which she alone could give, were still to be seen; but those who knew her well and those who loved her best saw a change in Annie.
In the play-room she devoted herself exclusively to the little ones; she never went near Cecil Temple’s drawing-room, she never mingled with the girls of the middle school as they clustered round the cheerful fire. At meal-times she ate little, and her room-fellow was heard to declare that she was awakened more than once in the middle of the night by the sound of Annie’s sobs. In chapel, too, when she fancied herself quite unobserved, her face wore an expression of great pain; but if Mrs Willis happened to glance in her direction, instantly the little mouth became demure and almost hard, the dark eyelashes were lowered over the bright eyes, the whole expression of the face showed the extreme of indifference. Hester felt more sure than ever of Annie’s guilt; but one or two of the other girls in the school wavered in this opinion, and would have taken Annie out of “Coventry” had she herself made the smallest advance toward them.
Annie and Hester had not spoken to each other now for several days; but on this afternoon, which was a bright one in early spring, as Hester was changing her school-dress for her Sunday one, and preparing for her visit to the Misses Bruce, there came a light knock at her door. She said “Come in,” rather impatiently, for she was in a hurry, and dreaded being kept.
To her surprise Annie Forest put in her curly head, and then, dancing with her usual light movement across the room, she laid a little bunch of dainty spring flowers on the dressing-table beside Hester.
Hester stared, first at the intruder and then at the early primroses. She passionately loved flowers, and would have exclaimed with ecstasy at these had anyone brought them in except Annie.
“I want you,” said Annie, rather timidly for her, “to take these flowers from me to Miss Agnes and Miss Jane Bruce. It will be very kind of you if you will take them. I am sorry to have interrupted you – thank you very much.”
She was turning away when Hester compelled herself to remark —
“Is there any message with the flowers?”
“Oh, no – only Annie Forest’s love. They’ll understand.” She turned half round as she spoke, and Hester saw that her eyes had filled with tears. She felt touched in spite of herself. There was something in Annie’s face now which reminded her of her darling little Nan at home. She had seen the same beseeching, sorrowful look in Nan’s brown eyes when she had wanted her friends to kiss her and take her to their hearts and love her.
Hester would not allow herself, however, to feel any tenderness toward Annie. Of course she was not really a bit like sweet little Nan, and it was absurd to suppose that a great girl like Annie could want caressing and petting and soothing; still, in spite of herself, Annie’s look haunted her, and she took great care of the little flower-offering, and presented it with Annie’s message instantly on her arrival to the little old ladies.
Miss Jane and Miss Agnes were very much pleased with the early primroses. They looked at one another and said —
“Poor dear little girl,” in tender voices, and then they put the flowers into one of their daintiest vases, and made much of them, and showed them to any visitors who happened to call that afternoon.
Their little house looked something like a doll’s house to Hester, who had been accustomed all her life to large rooms and spacious passages; but it was the sweetest, daintiest, and most charming little abode in the world. It was not unlike a nest, and the Misses Bruce in certain ways resembled bright little robin redbreasts, so small, so neat, so chirrupy they were.
Hester enjoyed her afternoon immensely; the little ladies were right in their prophecy, and she was no longer lonely at school. She enjoyed talking about her school-fellows, about her new life, about her studies. The Misses Bruce were decidedly fond of a gossip, but something which she could not at all define in their manner prevented Hester from retailing for their benefit any unkind news. They told her frankly at last that they were only interested in the good things which went on in the school, and that they found no pursuit so altogether delightful as finding out the best points in all the people they came across. They would not even laugh at sleepy, tiresome Susan Drummond; on the contrary, they pitied her, and Miss Jane wondered if the girl could be quite well, whereupon Miss Agnes shook her head, and said emphatically that it was Hester’s duty to rouse poor Susy, and to make her waking life so interesting to her that she should no longer care to spend so many hours in the world of dreams.
There is such a thing as being so kind-hearted, so gentle, so charitable as to make the people who have not encouraged these virtues feel quite uncomfortable. By the mere force of contrast they begin to see themselves something as they really are. Since Hester had come to Lavender House she had taken very little pains to please others rather than herself, and she was now almost startled to see how she had allowed selfishness to get the better of her. While the Misses Bruce were speaking, old longings, which had slept since her mother’s death, came back to the young girl, and she began to wish that she could be kinder to Susan Drummond, and that she could overcome her dislike to Annie Forest. She longed to say something about Annie to the little ladies, but they evidently did not wish to allude to the subject. When she was going away, they gave her a small parcel.
“You will kindly give this to your schoolfellow, Miss Forest, Hester dear,” they both said, and then they kissed her, and said they hoped they should see her again: and Hester got into the old-fashioned school brougham, and held the brown-paper parcel in her hand.
As she was going into the chapel that night, Mary Bell came up to her and whispered —
“We have not got to the bottom of that mystery about Annie Forest yet. Mrs Willis can evidently make nothing of her, and I believe Mr Everard is going to talk to her after prayers to-night.”
As she was speaking, Annie herself pushed rather rudely past the two girls; her face was flushed, and her hair was even more untidy than was its wont.
“Here is a parcel for you, Miss Forest,” said Hester, in a much more gentle tone than she was wont to use when she addressed this objectionable school-mate.
All the girls were now filing into the chapel, and Hester should certainly not have presented the little parcel at that moment.
“Breaking the rules, Miss Thornton,” said Annie; “all right, toss it here.” Then, as Hester failed to comply, she ran back, knocking her school-fellows out of place, and, snatching the parcel from Hester’s hand, threw it high in the air. This was a piece of not only wilful audacity and disobedience, but it even savoured of the profane, for Annie’s step was on the threshold of the chapel, and the parcel fell with a noisy bang on the floor some feet inside the little building.
“Bring me that parcel, Annie Forest,” whispered the stern voice of the head-mistress.
Annie sullenly complied; but when she came up to Mrs Willis, her governess took her hand, and pushed her down into a low seat a little behind her.
