Chapter Seven.
A Day At School.
If Hester Thornton went to sleep that night under a sort of dreamy, hazy impression that school was a place without a great deal of order, with many kind and sympathising faces, and with some not so agreeable; if she went to sleep under the impression that she had dropped into a sort of medley, that she had found herself in a vast new world where certain personages exercised undoubtedly a strong moral influence, but where on the whole a number of other people did pretty much what they pleased—she awoke in the morning to find her preconceived ideas scattered to the four winds.
There was nothing of apparent liberty about the Lavender House arrangements in the early morning hours. In the first, place, it seemed quite the middle of the night when Hester was awakened by a loud gong, which clanged through the house and caused her to sit up in bed in a considerable state of fright and perplexity. A moment or two later a neatly-dressed maid-servant came into the room with a can of hot water; she lit a pair of candles on the mantelpiece, and, with the remark that the second gong would sound in half an hour, and that all the young ladies would be expected to assemble in the chapel at seven o’clock precisely, she left the room.
Hester pulled her pretty little gold watch from under her pillow, and saw with a sigh that it was now half-past six.
“What odious hours they keep in this horrid place!” she said to herself. “Well, well, I always did know that school would be unendurable.”
She waited for five minutes before she got up, and then she dressed herself languidly, and, if the truth must be told, in a very untidy fashion. She managed to be dressed by the time the second gong sounded, but she had only one moment to give to her private prayers. She reflected, however, that this did not greatly matter as she was going down to prayers immediately in the chapel.
The service in the chapel the night before had impressed her more deeply than she cared to own, and she followed her companions downstairs with a certain feeling of pleasure at the thought of again seeing Mr Everard and Mrs Willis. She wondered if they would take much notice of her this morning, and she thought it just possible that Mr Everard, who had looked at her so compassionately the night before, might be induced, for the sake of his old friendship with her mother, to take her home with him to spend the day. She thought she would rather like to spend a day with Mr Everard, and she fancied he was the sort of person who would influence her and help her to be good. Hester fancied that if some very interesting and quite out of the common person took her in hand, she might be formed into something extremely noble—noble enough even to forgive Annie Forest.
The girls all filed into the chapel, which was lighted as brightly and cheerily as the night before; but Hester found herself placed on a bench far down in the building. She was no longer in the place of honour by Mrs Willis’s side. She was one of a number, and no one looked particularly at her or noticed her in any way. A shy young curate read the morning prayers; Mr Everard was not present, and Mrs Willis, who was, walked out of the chapel when prayers were over without even glancing in Hester’s direction. This was bad enough for the poor little dreamer of dreams, but worse was to follow.
Mrs Willis did not speak to Hester, but she did stop for an instant beside Annie Forest. Hester saw her lay her white hand on the young girl’s shoulder and whisper for an instant in her ear. Annie’s lovely gipsy face flushed a vivid crimson.
“For your sake, darling,” she whispered back; but Hester caught the words, and was consumed by a fierce jealousy.
The girls went into the school-room, where Mdlle. Perier gave a French lesson to the upper class. Hester belonged to no class at present, and could look around her, and have plenty of time to reflect on her own miseries, and particularly on what she now considered the favouritism shown by Mrs Willis.
“Mr Everard at least will read through that girl,” she said to herself; “he could not possibly endure any one so loud. Yes, I am sure that my only friend at home, Cecilia Day, would call Annie very loud. I wonder Mrs Willis can endure her. Mrs Willis seems so ladylike herself, but—Oh, I beg your pardon, what’s the matter?”
A very sharp voice had addressed itself to the idle Hester.
“But, mademoiselle, you are doing nothing! This cannot for a moment be permitted. Pardonnez-moi, you know not the French? Here is a little easy lesson. Study it, mademoiselle, and don’t let your eyes wander a moment from the page.”
Hester favoured Mdlle. Perier with a look of lofty contempt, but she received the well-thumbed lesson-book in absolute silence.
At eight o’clock came breakfast, which was nicely served, and was very good and abundant. Hester was thoroughly hungry this morning, and did not feel so shy as the night before. She found herself seated between two strange girls, who talked to her a little and would have made themselves friendly had she at all encouraged them to do so. After breakfast came half an hour’s recreation, when, the weather being very bad, the girls again assembled in the cosy play-room. Hester looked round eagerly for Cecil Temple, who greeted her with a kind smile, but did not ask her into her inclosure. Annie Forest was not present, and Hester breathed a sigh of relief at her absence. The half-hour devoted to recreation proved rather dull to the newcomer. Hester could not understand her present world. To the girl who had been brought up practically as an only child in the warm shelter of a home, the ways and doings of school-girl life were an absolute enigma.
Hester had no idea of unbending or of making herself agreeable. The girls voted her to one another stiff and tiresome, and quickly left her to her own devices. She looked longingly at Cecil Temple; but Cecil, who could never be knowingly unkind to any one, was seizing the precious moments to write a letter to her father, and Hester presently wandered down the room and tried to take an interest in the little ones. From twelve to fifteen quite little children were in the school, and Hester wondered with a sort of vague half-pain if she might see any child among the group the least like Nan.
“They will like to have me with them,” she said to herself. “Poor little dots, they always like big girls to notice them, and didn’t they make a fuss about Miss Forest last night! Well, Nan is fond enough of me, and little children find out so quickly what one is really like.”
Hester walked boldly into the group. The little dots were all as busy as bees, were not the least lonely, or the least shy, and very plainly gave the intruder to understand that they would prefer her room to her company. Hester was not proud with little children—she loved them dearly. Some of the smaller ones in question were beautiful little creatures, and her heart warmed to them for Nan’s sake. She could not stoop to conciliate the older girls, but she could make an effort with the babies. She knelt on the floor and took up a headless doll.
“I know a little girl who had a doll like that,” she said.
Here she paused and several pairs of eyes were fixed on her.
“Poor dolly’s b’oke,” said the owner of the headless one in a tone of deep commiseration.
“You are such a breaker, you know, Annie,” said Annie’s little five-year-old sister.
“Please tell us about the little girl what had the doll wifout the head,” she proceeded, glancing at Hester.
“Oh, it was taken to a hospital, and got back its head,” said Hester quite cheerfully; “it became quite well again, and was a more beautiful doll than ever.”
This announcement caused intense wonder and was certainly carrying the interest of all the little ones. Hester was deciding that the child who possessed the headless doll had a look of Nan about her dark brown eyes, when suddenly there was a diversion—the play-room door was opened noisily, banged-to with a very loud report, and a gay voice sang out—
“The fairy queen has just paid me a visit. Who wants sweeties from the fairy queen?”
Instantly all the little feet had scrambled to the perpendicular, each pair of hands was clapped noisily, each little throat shouted a joyful—
“Here comes Annie!”
Annie Forest was surrounded, and Hester knelt alone on the hearth-rug.
She felt herself colouring painfully—she did not fail to observe that two laughing eyes had fixed themselves with a momentary triumph on her face; then, snatching up a book, which happened to lie close, she seated herself with her back to all the girls, and her head bent over the page. It is quite doubtful whether she saw any of the words, but she was at least determined not to cry.
The half-hour so wearisome to poor Hester came to an end, and the girls, conducted by Miss Danesbury, filed into the school-room and took their places in the different classes.
Work had now begun in serious earnest. The school-room presented an animated and busy scene. The young faces with their varying expressions betokened on the whole the preponderance of an earnest spirit. Discipline, not too severe, reigned triumphant.
Hester was not yet appointed to any place among these busy workers, but while she stood wondering, a little confused, and half intending to drop into an empty seat which happened to be close, Miss Danesbury came up to her.
“Follow me, Miss Thornton,” she said, and she conducted the young girl up the whole length of the great school-room, and pushed aside some baize curtains which concealed a second smaller room, where Mrs Willis sat before a desk.
The head-mistress was no longer dressed in soft pearl-grey and Mechlin lace. She wore a black silk dress, and her white cap seemed to Hester to add a severe tone to her features. She neither shook hands with the new pupil nor kissed her, but said instantly in a bright though authoritative tone—
“I must now find out as quickly as possible what you know, Hester, in order to place you in the most suitable class.” Hester was a clever girl, and passed through the ordeal of a rather stiff examination with considerable ability. Mrs Willis pronounced her English and general information quite up to the usual standard for girls of her age—her French was deficient, but she showed some talent for German.
“On the whole I am pleased with your general intelligence, and I think you have good capacities, Hester,” she said in conclusion. “I shall ask Miss Good, our very accomplished English teacher, to place you in the third-class. You will have to work very hard, however, at your French, to maintain your place there. But Mdlle. Perier is kind and painstaking, and it rests with yourself to quickly acquire a conversational acquaintance with the language. You are aware that, except during recreation, you are never allowed to speak in any other tongue. Now, go back to the school-room, my dear.”
As Mrs Willis spoke she laid her finger on a little silver gong which stood by her side.
“One moment, please,” said Hester, colouring crimson, “I want to ask you a question, please.”
“Is it about your lessons?”
“No—oh, no; it is—”
“Then pardon me, my dear,” uttered the governess, “I sit in my room every evening from eight to half-past, and I am then at liberty to see a pupil on any subject which is not trifling. Nothing but lessons are spoken of in lesson hours, Hester. Ah, here comes Miss Good. Miss Good, I should wish you to place Hester Thornton in the third-class. Her English is up to the average. I will see Mdlle. Perier about her at twelve o’clock.”
Hester followed the English teacher into the great school-room, took her place in the third-class, at the desk which was pointed out to her, was given a pile of new books, and was asked to attend to the history lesson which was then going on.
Notwithstanding her confusion, a certain sense of soreness, and some indignation at what she considered Mrs Willis’s altered manner, she acquitted herself with considerable spirit, and was pleased to see that her class companions regarded her with some respect.
An English literature lecture followed the history, and here again Hester acquitted herself with éclat. The subject to-day was “Julius Caesar,” and Hester had read Shakespeare’s play over many times with her mother.
But when the hour came for foreign languages, her brief triumph ceased. Lower and lower did she fall in her school-fellows’ estimation, as she stumbled through her truly English-French. Mdlle. Perier, who was a very fiery little woman, almost screamed at her—the girls coloured and nearly tittered. Hester hoped to recover her lost laurels in German, but by this time her head ached, and she did very little better in the German which she loved than in the French which she detested. At twelve o’clock she was relieved to find that school was over for the present, and she heard the English teacher’s voice desiring the girls to go quickly to their rooms, and to assemble in five minutes’ time in the great stone hall, equipped for their walk.
The walk lasted for a little over an hour, and was a very dreary penance to poor Hester, as she was neither allowed to run, race, nor talk a word of English. She sighed heavily once or twice, and several of the girls who looked at her curiously agreed with Annie Forest that she was decidedly sulky. The walk was followed by dinner; then came half an hour of recreation in the delightful play-room, and eager chattering in the English tongue.
At three o’clock the school assembled once more; but now the studies were of a less severe character, and Hester spent one of her first happy half-hours over a drawing lesson. She had a great love for drawing, and felt some pride in the really beautiful copy which she was making of the stump of an old gnarled oak-tree. Her dismay, however, was proportionately great when the drawing-master drew his pencil right across her copy.
“I particularly requested you not to sketch in any of the shadows, Miss Thornton. Did you not hear me say that my lesson to-day was in outline? I gave you a shaded piece to copy in outline—did you not understand?”
“This is my first day at school,” whispered back poor Hester, speaking in English in her distress. Whereupon the master smiled, and even forgot to report her for her transgression of the French tongue.
Hester spent the rest of that afternoon over her music lesson. The music-master was an irascible little German, but Hester played with some taste, and was therefore not too severely rapped over the knuckles.
Then came tea and another half-hour of recreation, which was followed by two silent hours in the school-room, each girl bent busily over her books in preparation for the next day’s work. Hester studied hard, for she had made up her mind to be the intellectual prodigy of the school. Even on this first day, miserable as it was, she had won a few plaudits for her quickness and powers of observation. How much better could she work when she had really fallen into the tone of the school, and understood the lessons which she was now so carefully preparing! During her busy day she had failed to notice one thing: namely, the absence of Annie Forest. Annie had not been in the school-room, had not been in the play-room; but now, as the clock struck eight, she entered the school-room with a listless expression, and took her place in the same class with Hester. Her eyes were heavy, as if she had been crying, and when a companion touched her, and gave her a sympathising glance, she shook her head with a sorrowful gesture, but did not speak. Glasses of milk and slices of bread and butler were now handed round to the girls, and Miss Danesbury asked if any one would like to see Mrs Willis before prayers. Hester half sprang to her feet, but then sat down again. Mrs Willis had annoyed her by refusing to break her rules and answer her question during lesson hours. No, the silly child resolved that she would not trouble Mrs Willis now.
“No one to-night, then?” said Miss Danesbury, who had noticed Hester’s movement.
Suddenly Annie Forest sprang to her feet.
“I’m going, Miss Danesbury,” she said. “You need not show me the way; I can find it alone.”
With her short, curly hair falling about her face, she ran out of the room.
Chapter Eight.
“You Have Woken Me Too Soon.”
When Hester reached her bedroom after prayers on that second evening, she was dismayed to find that she no longer could consider the pretty little bedroom her own. It had not only an occupant, but an occupant who had left untidy traces of her presence on the floor, for a stocking lay in one direction and a muddy boot sprawled in another. The newcomer had herself got into bed, where she lay with a quantity of red hair tossed about on the pillow, and a heavy freckled face turned upward, with the eyes shut and the mouth slightly open.
As Hester entered the room, from these parted lips came unmistakable and loud snores. She stood still dismayed.
“How terrible!” she said to herself—“oh, what a girl! and I cannot sleep in the room with any one who snores—I really cannot!”
She stood perfectly still, with her hands clasped before her, and her eyes fixed with almost ludicrous dismay on this unexpected trial. As she gazed, a fresh discovery caused her to utter an exclamation of horror aloud.
The newcomer had curled herself up comfortably in her bed. Suddenly, to her surprise, a voice said very quietly, without a flicker of expression coming over the calm face, or the eyes even making an effort to open—
“Are you my new school-mate?”
“Yes,” said Hester, “I am sorry to say I am.”
“Oh, don’t be sorry, there’s a good creature; there’s nothing to be sorry about. I’ll stop snoring when I turn on my side—it’s all right. I always snore for half an hour to rest my back, and the time is nearly up. Don’t trouble me to open my eyes, I am not the least curious to see you. You have a cross voice, but you’ll get used to me after a bit.”
“But you’re in my bed,” said Hester. “Will you please to get into your own?”
“Oh, no, don’t ask me; I like your bed best. I slept in it the whole of last term. I changed the sheets myself, so it does not matter. Do you mind putting my muddy boots outside the door, and folding up my stockings? I forgot them, and I shall have a bad mark if Danesbury comes in. Good-night—I’m turning on my side—I won’t snore any more.”
The heavy face was now only seen in profile, and Hester, knowing that Miss Danesbury would soon appear to put out the candle, had to hurry into the other bed as fast as she could; something impelled her, however, to take up the muddy boots with two very gingerly fingers, and place them outside the door.
She slept better this second night, and was not quite so startled the next morning when the remorseless gong aroused her from slumber. The maid-servant came in as usual to light the candles, and to place two cans of hot water by the two wash-handstands.
“You are awake, miss?” she said to Hester.
“Oh, yes,” replied Hester almost cheerfully.
“Well, that’s all right,” said the servant. “Now I must try and rouse Miss Drummond, and she always takes a deal of waking; and if you don’t mind, miss, it will be an act of kindness to call out to her in the middle of your own dressing—that is, if I don’t wake her effectual.”
With these words, the housemaid approached the bed where the red-haired girl lay again on her back, and again snoring loudly.
“Miss Drummond, wake, miss; it’s half-past six. Wake up, miss—I have brought your hot water.”
“Eh?—what?” said the voice in the bed sleepily; “don’t bother me, Hannah—I—I’ve determined not to ride this morning; go away—” then more sleepily, and in a lower key, “Tell Percy he can’t bring the dogs in here.”
“I ain’t neither your Hannah, nor your Percy, nor one of the dogs,” replied the rather irate Alice—“There, get up, miss, do. I never see such a young lady for sleeping, never.”
“I won’t be bothered,” said the occupant of the bed, and now she turned deliberately on her side and snored more loudly than ever.
“There’s no help for it,” said Alice: “I have to do it nearly every morning, so don’t you be startled, miss. Poor thing, she would never have a good conduct mark but for me. Now then, here goes. You needn’t be frightened, miss—she don’t mind it the least bit in the world.”
Here Alice seized a rough Turkish towel, placed it under the sleepy head with its shock of red hair, and, dipping a sponge in a basin of icy cold water, dashed it on the white face.
This remedy proved effectual; two large pale blue eyes opened wide, a voice said in a tranquil and unmoved tone—
“Oh, thank you, Alice. So I’m back at this horrid, detestable school again?”
“Get your feet well on the carpet, Miss Drummond, before you falls off again,” said the servant. “Now then, you’d better get dressed as fast as possible, miss—you have lost five minutes already.”
Hester, who had laughed immoderately during this little scene, was already up and going through the processes of her toilet. Miss Drummond, seated on the edge of her bed, regarded her with sleepy eyes.
“So you are my new room-mate?” she said—“What’s your name?”
“Hester Thornton,” replied Hetty with dignity.
“Oh—I’m Susy Drummond—you may call me Susy if you like.”
Hester made no response to this gracious invitation.
Miss Drummond sat motionless, gazing down at her toes.
“Had not you better get dressed?” said Hester after a long pause, for she really feared the young lady would fall asleep where she was sitting.
Miss Drummond started.
“Dressed! So I will, dear creature. Have the sweet goodness to hand me my clothes.”
“Where are they?” asked Hester rather crossly, for she did not care to act as lady’s-maid.
“They are over there, on a chair, in that lovely heap with a shawl flung over them. There, toss them this way—I’ll get into them somehow.”
Miss Drummond did manage to get into her garments; but her whole appearance was so heavy and untidy when she was dressed, that Hester by the very force of contrast felt obliged to take extra pains with her own toilet.
“Now, that’s a comfort,” said Susan, “I’m in my clothes. How bitter it is! There’s one comfort, the chapel will be warm. I often catch forty winks in chapel—that is, if I’m lucky enough to get behind one of the tall girls, where Mrs Willis won’t see me. It does seem to me,” continued Susan in a meditative tone, “the strangest thing why girls are not allowed sleep enough.”
Hester was pinning a clean collar round her neck when Miss Drummond came up close, leaned over the dressing-table, and regarded her with languid curiosity.
“A penny for your thoughts. Miss Prunes and Prism.”
“Why do you call me that?” said Hester angrily.
“Because you look like it, sweet. Now, don’t be cross, little pet—no one ever yet was cross with sleepy Susy Drummond. Now, tell me, love, what had you for breakfast yesterday?”
“I’m sure I forget,” said Hester.
“You forget?—how extraordinary! You’re sure that it was not buttered scones? We have them sometimes, and I tell you they are enough even to keep a girl awake. Well, at least you can let me know if the eggs were very stale, and the coffee very weak, and whether the butter was second-rate Dorset, or good and fresh. Come now—my breakfast is of immense importance to me, I assure you.”
“I dare say,” answered Hester. “You can see for yourself this morning what is on the table—I can only inform you that it was good enough for me, and that I don’t remember what it was.”
“Oh, dear!” exclaimed Susan Drummond, “I’m afraid she has a little temper of her own—poor little room-mate. I wonder if chocolate-creams would sweeten that little temper?”
“Please don’t talk—I’m going to say my prayers,” said Hester.
She did kneel down, and made a slight effort to ask God to help her through the day’s work and the day’s play. In consequence, she rose from her knees with a feeling of strength and sweetness which even the feeblest prayer when uttered in earnest can always give.
The prayer-gong now sounded, and all the girls assembled in the chapel. Miss Drummond was greeted by many appreciative nods, and more than one pair of longing eyes gazed in the direction of her pockets, which stuck out in the most ungainly fashion.
Hester was relieved to find that her room-mate did not share her class in school, nor sit anywhere near her at table.
When the half-hour’s recreation after breakfast arrived, Hester, determined to be beholden to none of her school-mates for companionship, seated herself comfortably in an easy chair, with a new book. Presently she was startled by a little stream of lollipops falling in a shower over her head, down her neck, and into her lap. She started up with an expression of disgust. Instantly Miss Drummond sank into the vacated chair.
“Thank you, love,” she said, in a cosy, purring voice. “Eat your lollipops, and look at me; I’m going to sleep. Please pull my toe when Danesbury comes in. Oh, fie! Prunes and Prisms—not so cross—eat your lollipops; they will sweeten the expression of that—little—face.”
The last words came out drowsily. As she said “face,” Miss Drummond’s languid eyes were closed—she was fast asleep.
Chapter Nine.
Work And Play.
In a few days Hester was accustomed to her new life. She fell into its routine, and in a certain measure won the respect of her fellow-pupils. She worked hard, and kept her place in class, and her French became a little more like the French tongue and a little less like the English. She showed marked ability in many of her other studies, and the mistresses and masters spoke well of her. After a fortnight spent at Lavender House, Hester had to acknowledge that the little Misses Bruce were right, and that school might be a really enjoyable place for some girls. She would not yet admit that it could be enjoyable for her. Hester was too shy, too proud, too exacting to be popular with her school-fellows. She knew nothing of school-girl life—she had never learned the great secret of success in all life’s perplexities, the power to give and take. It never occurred to Hester to look over a hasty word, to take no notice of an envious or insolent look. As far as her lessons were concerned she was doing well; but the hardest lesson of all, the training of mind and character, which the daily companionship of her school-fellows alone could give her, in this lesson she was making no way. Each day she was shutting herself up more and more from all kindly advances, and the only one in the school whom she sincerely and cordially liked was gentle Cecil Temple.
Mrs Willis had some ideas with regard to the training of her young people which were peculiarly her own. She had found them successful, and, during her thirty years’ experience, had never seen reason to alter them. She was determined to give her girls a great deal more liberty than was accorded in most of the boarding-schools of her day. She never made what she called impossible rules; she allowed the girls full liberty to chatter in their bedrooms; she did not watch them during play-hours; she never read the letters they received, and only superintended the specimen home letter which each girl was required to write once a month. Other head-mistresses wondered at the latitude she allowed her girls, but she invariably replied—
“I always find it works best to trust them. If a girl is found to be utterly untrustworthy. I don’t expel her, but I request her parents to remove her to a more strict school.”
Mrs Willis also believed much in that quiet half-hour each evening, when the girls who cared to come could talk to her alone. On these occasions she always dropped the school-mistress and adopted the rôle of the mother. With a very refractory pupil she spoke in the tenderest tones of remonstrance and affection at these times. If her words failed—if the discipline of the day and the gentle sympathy of these moments at night did not effect their purpose, she had yet another expedient—the vicar was asked to see the girl who would not yield to this motherly influence.
Mr Everard had very seldom taken Mrs Willis’s place. As he said to her, “Your influence must be the mainspring. At supreme moments I will help you with personal influence, but otherwise, except for my nightly prayers with your girls, and my weekly class, and the teachings which they with others hear from my lips Sunday after Sunday, they had better look to you.”
The girls knew this rule well, and the one or two rare instances in the school history where the vicar had stepped in to interfere, were spoken of with bated breath and with intense awe.
Mrs Willis had a great idea of bringing as much happiness as possible into young lives. It was with this idea that she had the quaint little compartments railed off in the play-room.
“For the elder girls,” she would say, “there is no pleasure so great as having, however small the spot, a little liberty hall of their own. In her compartment each girl is absolute monarch. No one can enter inside the little curtained rail without her permission. Here she can show her individual taste, her individual ideas. Here she can keep her most-prized possessions. In short, her compartment in the play-room is a little home to her.”
The play-room, large as it was, admitted of only twenty compartments; these compartments were not easily won. No amount of cleverness attained them; they were altogether dependent on conduct. No girl could be the honourable owner of her own little drawing-room until she had distinguished herself by some special act of kindness and self-denial. Mrs Willis had no fixed rule on this subject. She alone gave away the compartments, and she often made choice of girls on whom she conferred this honour in a way which rather puzzled and surprised their fellows.
When the compartment was won it was not a secure possession. To retain it depended also on conduct; and here again Mrs Willis was absolute in her sway. More than once the girls had entered the room in the morning to find some favourite’s furniture removed and her little possessions taken carefully down from the walls, the girl herself alone knowing the reason for this sudden change. Annie Forest, who had been at Lavender House for four years, had once, for a solitary month of her existence, owned her own special drawing-room. She had obtained it as a reward for an act of heroism. One of the little pupils had set her pinafore on fire. There was no teacher present at the moment—the other girls had screamed and run for help, but Annie, very pale, had caught the little one in her arms and had crushed out the flames with her own hands. The child’s life was spared, the child was not even hurt, but Annie was in the hospital for a week. At the end of a week she returned to the school-room and play-room as the heroine of the hour. Mrs Willis herself kissed her brow, and presented her in the midst of the approving smiles of her companions with the prettiest drawing-room of the sets. Annie retained her honourable post for one month.
Never did the girls of Lavender House forget the delights of that month. The fantastic arrangements of the little drawing-room filled them with ecstasies. Annie was truly Japanese in her style—she was also intensely liberal in all her arrangements. In the tiny space of this little inclosure wild pranks were perpetrated, ceaseless jokes made up. From Annie’s drawing-room issued peals of exquisite mirth. She gave afternoon tea from a Japanese set of tea-things. Outside her drawing-room always collected a crowd of girls, who tried to peep over the rail or to draw aside the curtains. Inside the sacred spot certainly reigned chaos, and one day Miss Danesbury had to fly to the rescue, for in a fit of mad mirth Annie herself had knocked down the little Japanese tea-table, the tea-pot and tea-things were in fragments on the floor, and the tea and milk poured in streams outside the curtains. Mrs Willis sent for Annie that evening, and Miss Forest retired from her interview with red eyes and a meek expression.
“Girls,” she said, in confidence that night, “good-bye to Japan. I gave her leave to do it—the care of an empire is more than I can manage.”
The next day the Japanese drawing-room had been handed over to another possessor, and Annie reigned as queen over her empire no more.
Mrs Willis, anxious at all times that her girls should be happy, made special arrangements for their benefit on Sunday. Sunday was by no means dull at Lavender House—Sunday was totally unlike the six days which followed it. Even the stupidest girl could scarcely complain of the severity of Sunday lessons—even the merriest girl could scarcely speak of the day as dull. Mrs Willis made an invariable rule of spending all Sunday with her pupils. On this day she really unbent—on this day she was all during the long hours, what she was during the short half-hour on each evening in the week. On Sunday she neither reproved nor corrected. If punishment or correction were necessary, she deputed Miss Good or Miss Danesbury to take her place. On Sunday she sat with the little children round her knee, and the older girls clustering about her. Her gracious and motherly face was like a sun shining in the midst of these young girls. In short, she was like the personified form of Goodness in their midst. It was necessary, therefore, that all those who wished to do right should be happy on Sunday, and only those few who deliberately preferred evil should shrink from the brightness of this day.
It is astonishing how much a sympathising and guiding spirit can effect. The girls at Lavender House thought Sunday the shortest day in the week. There were no unoccupied or dull moments—school toil was forgotten—school punishment ceased, to be resumed again if necessary on Monday morning. The girls in their best dresses could chatter freely in English—they could read their favourite books—they could wander about the house as they pleased: for on Sunday the two baize doors were always wide-open, and Mrs Willis’s own private suite of rooms was ready to receive them. If the day was fine they walked to church, each choosing her own companion for the pleasant walk; if the day was wet there was service in the chapel, Mr Everard always conducting either morning or evening prayers. In the afternoon the girls were allowed to do pretty much as they pleased, but after tea there always came a delightful hour, when the elder girls retired with their mistress into her own special boudoir, and she either told them stories or sang to them as only she could sing. At sixty years of age Mrs Willis still possessed the most sympathetic and touching voice those girls had ever listened to. Hester Thornton broke down completely on her first Sunday at Lavender House when she heard her school-mistress sing “The Better Land.” No one remarked on her tears, but two people saw them; for her mistress kissed her tenderly that night, and said a few strong words of help and encouragement, and Annie Forest, who made no comment, had also seen them, and wondered vaguely if this new and disagreeable pupil had a heart after all.
On Sunday night Mrs Willis herself went round to each little bed and gave a mother-kiss to each of her pupils—a mother-kiss and a murmured blessing; and in many breasts resolves were then formed which were to help the girls through the coming week. Some of these resolves, made not in their own strength, bore fruit in long after-years. There is no doubt that very few girls who lived long enough at Lavender House ever in after-days found their Sundays dull.
Chapter Ten.
Varieties.
Without any doubt, wild, naughty, impulsive Annie Forest was the most popular girl in the school. She was always in scrapes—she was scarcely ever out of hot water—her promises of amendment were truly like the proverbial pie-crust: but she was so lovable, so kind-hearted, so saucy and piquant and pretty, that very few could resist the nameless charm which she possessed. The little ones adored Annie, who was kindness itself to them; the bigger girls could not help admiring her fearlessness and courage; the best and noblest girls in the school tried to influence her for good. She was more or less an object of interest to every one; her courage was of just the sort to captivate school-girls, and her moral weakness was not observed by these inexperienced young eyes.
Hester alone, of all the girls who for a long time had come to Lavender House, failed to see any charm in Annie. She began by considering her ill-bred, and when she found she was the school favourite, she tossed her proud little head and determined that she for one would never be subjugated by such a naughty girl. Hester could read character with tolerable clearness; she was an observant child—very observant, and very thoughtful for her twelve years; and as the little witch Annie had failed to throw any spell over her, she saw her faults far more clearly than did her companions. There is no doubt that this brilliant, charming, and naughty Annie had heaps of faults; she had no perseverance; she was all passion and impulse; she could be the kindest of the kind, but from sheer thoughtlessness and wildness she often inflicted severe pain, even on those she loved best. Annie very nearly worshipped Mrs Willis, she had the most intense adoration for her, she respected her beyond any other human being. There were moments when the impulsive and hot-headed child felt that she could gladly lay down her life for her school-mistress. Once the mistress was ill, and Annie curled herself up all night outside her door, thereby breaking rules, and giving herself a severe cold; but her passion and agony were so great that she could only be soothed by at last stealing into the darkened room and kissing the face she loved.
“Prove your love to me, Annie, by going downstairs and keeping the school rules as perfectly as possible,” whispered the teacher.
“I will—I will never break a rule again as long as I live, if you get better, Mrs Willis,” responded the child.
She ran downstairs with her resolves strong within her, and yet in half an hour she was reprimanded for wilful and desperate disobedience.
One day Cecil Temple had invited a select number of friends to afternoon tea in her little drawing-room. It was the Wednesday half-holiday, and Cecil’s tea, poured into the tiniest cups and accompanied by thin wafer biscuits, was of the most recherché quality. Cecil had invited Hester Thornton, and a tall girl who belonged to the first-class and whose name was Dora Russell, to partake of this dainty beverage. They were sitting round the tiny tea-table, on little red stools with groups of flowers artistically painted on them, and were all three conducting themselves in a most ladylike and refined manner, when Annie Forest’s curly head and saucy face popped over the inclosure, and her voice said eagerly—
“Oh, may I be permitted to enter the shrine?”
“Certainly, Annie,” said Cecil, in her most cordial tones. “I have got another cup and saucer, and there is a little tea left in the tea-pot.”
Annie came in, and ensconced herself cosily on the floor. It did not matter in the least to her that Hester Thornton’s brow grew dark, and that Miss Russell suddenly froze into complete indifference to all her surroundings. Annie was full of a subject which excited her very much; she had suddenly discovered that she wanted to give Mrs Willis a present, and she wished to know if any of the girls would like to join her.
“I will give her the present this day week,” said excitable Annie. “I have quite made up my mind. Will any one join me?”
“But there is nothing special about this day week, Annie,” said Miss Temple. “It will neither be Mrs Willis’s birthday, nor Christmas Day, nor New Year’s Day, nor Easter Day. Next Wednesday will be just like any other Wednesday. Why should we make Mrs Willis a present?”
“Oh, because she looks as if she wanted one, poor dear. I thought she looked sad this morning; her eyes drooped and her mouth was down at the corners. I am sure she’s wanting something from us all by now, just to show that we love her, you know.”
“Pshaw!” here burst from Hester’s lips.
“Why do you say that?” said Annie, turning round with her bright eyes flashing. “You’ve no right to be so contemptuous when I speak about our—our head-mistress. Oh, Cecil,” she continued, “do let us give her a little surprise—some spring flowers, or something just to show her that we love her.”
“But you don’t love her,” said Hester, stoutly.
Here was throwing down the gauntlet with a vengeance! Annie sprang to her feet and confronted Hester with a whole torrent of angry words. Hester firmly maintained her position. She said over and over again that love proved itself by deeds, not by words; that if Annie learned her lessons, and obeyed the school rules, she would prove her affection for Mrs Willis far more than by empty protestations. Hester’s words were true, but they were uttered in an unkind spirit, and the very flavour of truth which they possessed caused them to enter Annie’s heart and to wound her deeply. She turned, not red, but very white, and her large and lovely eyes grew misty with unshed tears.
“You are cruel,” she gasped, rather than spoke, and then she pushed aside the curtains of Cecil’s compartment and walked out of the play-room.
There was a dead silence among the three girls when she left them. Hester’s heart was still hot, and she was still inclined to maintain her own position, and to believe she had done right in speaking in so severe a tone to Annie. But even she had been made a little uneasy by the look of deep suffering which had suddenly transformed Annie’s charming childish face into that of a troubled and pained woman. She sat down meekly on her little three-legged stool and, taking up her tiny cup and saucer, sipped some of the cold tea.
Cecil Temple was the first to speak.
“How could you?” she said, in an indignant voice for her. “Annie is not the girl to be driven, and, in any case, it is not for you to correct her. Oh, Mrs Willis would have been so pained had she heard you—you were not kind, Miss Thornton. There, I don’t wish to be rude, but I fear I must leave you and Miss Russell—I must try and find Annie.”
“I’m going back to my own drawing-room,” said Miss Russell, rising to her feet. “Perhaps,” she added, turning round with a very gracious smile to Hester, “you will come and see me there, after tea, this evening.”
Miss Russell drew aside the curtains of Cecil Temple’s little room, and disappeared. Hester, with her eyes full of tears, now turned eagerly to Cecil.
“Forgive me, Cecil,” she exclaimed. “I did not mean to be unkind, but it is really quite ridiculous the way you all spoil that girl—you know as well as I do that she is a very naughty girl. I suppose it is because of her pretty face,” continued Hester, “that you are all so unjust, and so blind to her faults.”
“You are prejudiced the other way, Hester,” said Cecil in a more gentle tone. “You have disliked Annie from the first. There, don’t keep me—I must go to her now. There is no knowing what harm your words may have done. Annie is not like other girls. If you knew her story, you would perhaps be kinder to her.”
Cecil then ran out of her drawing-room, leaving Hester in sole possession of the little tea-things and the three-legged stools. She sat and thought for some time; she was a girl with a great deal of obstinacy in her nature, and she was not disposed to yield her own point, even to Cecil Temple; but Cecil’s words had, nevertheless, made some impression on her.
At tea-time that night, Annie and Cecil entered the room together. Annie’s eyes were as bright as stars, and her usually pale cheeks glowed with a deep colour. She had never looked prettier—she had never looked so defiant, so mischievous, so utterly reckless. Mdlle. Perier fired indignant French at her across the table. Annie answered respectfully, and became demure in a moment; but even in the short instant in which the governess was obliged to lower her eyes to her plate, she had thrown a look so irresistibly comic at her companions, that several of them had tittered aloud. Not once did she glance at Hester although she occasionally looked boldly in her direction; but when she did so, her versatile face assumed a blank expression, as if she were seeing nothing. When tea was over, Dora Russell surprised the members of her own class by walking straight up to Hester, putting her hand inside her arm, and leading her off to her own very refined-looking little drawing-room.
“I want to tell you,” she said, when the two girls found themselves inside the small inclosure, “that I quite agree with you in your opinion of Miss Forest. I think you were very brave to speak to her as you did to-day. As a rule, I never trouble myself with what the little girls in the third-class do, and of course Annie seldom comes under my notice; but I think she is a decidedly spoiled child, and your rebuff will doubtless do her a great deal of good.”
These words of commendation, coming from tall and dignified Miss Russell, completely turned poor Hester’s head.
“Oh, I am so glad you think so!” she stammered, colouring high with pleasure. “You see,” she added, assuming a little tone of extra refinement, “at home I always associated with girls who were perfect ladies.”
“Yes, any one can see that,” remarked Miss Russell approvingly.
“And I do think Annie underbred,” continued Hester. “I cannot understand,” she added, “why Miss Temple likes her so much.”
“Oh, Cecil is so amiable; she sees good in every one,” answered Miss Russell. “Annie is evidently not a lady, and I am glad at last to find some one of the girls who belong to the middle school capable of discerning this fact. Of course, we of the first-class have nothing whatever to say to Miss Forest, but I really think Mrs Willis is not acting quite fairly by the other girls when she allows a young person of that description into the school. I wish to assure you, Miss Thornton, that you have at least my sympathy, and I shall be very pleased to see you in my drawing-room now and then.”
As these last words were uttered, both girls were conscious of a little rustling sound not far away. Miss Russell drew back her curtain, and asked very sharply, “Who is there?” but no one replied, nor was there any one in sight, for the girls who did not possess compartments were congregated at the other end of the long play-room, listening to stories which Emma Marshall, a clever elder girl, was relating for their benefit.
Miss Russell talked on indifferent subjects to Hester, and at the end of the half-hour the two entered the class-room side by side, Hester’s little head a good deal turned by this notice from one of the oldest girls in the school.
As the two walked together into the school-room, Susan Drummond, who, tall as she was, was only in the fourth class, rushed up to Miss Forest, and whispered something in her ear.
“It is just as I told you,” she said, and her sleepy voice was quite wide awake and animated. Annie Forest rewarded her by a playful pinch on her cheek; then she returned to her own class, with a severe reprimand from the class teacher, and silence reigned in the long room, as the girls began to prepare their lessons as usual for the next day.
Miss Russell took her place at her desk in her usual dignified manner. She was a clever girl, and was going to leave school at the end of next term. Hers was a particularly fastidious, but by no means great nature—she was the child of wealthy parents, she was also well-born, and because of her money, and a certain dignity and style which had come to her as nature’s gifts, she held an influence, though by no means a large one, in the school. No one particularly disliked her, but no one, again, ardently loved her. The girls in her own class thought it well to be friendly with Dora Russell, and Dora accepted their homage with more or less indifference. She did not greatly care for either their praise or blame. Dora possessed in a strong degree that baneful quality, which more than anything else precludes the love of others—she was essentially selfish.
She sat now before her desk, little guessing how she had caused Hester’s small heart to beat by her patronage, and little suspecting the mischief she had done to the girl by her injudicious words. Had she known, it is to be doubted whether she would have greatly cared. She looked through the books which contained her tasks for the next day’s work, and, finding they did not require a great deal of preparation, put them aside, and amused herself during the rest of preparation time with a story-book, which she artfully concealed behind the leaves of some exercises. She knew she was breaking the rules, but this fact did not trouble her, for her moral nature was, after all, no better than poor Annie’s, and she had not a tenth of her lovable qualities.
Dora Russell was the soul of neatness and order. To look inside her school-desk was a positive pleasure; to glance at her own neat and trim figure was more or less of a delight. Hers were the whitest hands in the school, and hers the most perfectly kept and glossy hair. As the preparation hour drew to a close, she replaced her exercises and books in exquisite order in her school-desk and shut down the lid.
Hester’s eyes followed her as she walked out of the school-room, for the head class never had supper with the younger girls. Hester wondered if she would glance in her direction; but Miss Russell had gratified a very passing whim when she condescended to notice and praise Hester, and she had already almost forgotten her existence.
At bed-time that night Susan Drummond’s behaviour was at the least extraordinary. In the first place, instead of being almost overpoweringly friendly with Hester, she scarcely noticed her; in the next place, she made some very peculiar preparations.
“What are you doing on the floor, Susan?” inquired Hetty in an innocent tone.
“That’s nothing to you,” replied Miss Drummond, turning a dusky red, and looking annoyed at being discovered. “I do wish,” she added, “that you would go round to your side of the room and leave me alone; I sha’n’t have done what I want to do before Danesbury comes in to put out the candle.”
Hester was not going to put herself out with any of Susan Drummond’s vagaries; she looked upon sleepy Susan as a girl quite beneath her notice, but even she could not help observing her, when she saw her sit up in bed a quarter of an hour after the candles had been put out, and in the flickering firelight which shone conveniently bright for her purpose, fasten a piece of string first round one of her toes, and then to the end of the bed-post.
“What are you doing?” said Hester again, half laughing.
“Oh, what a spy you are!” said Susan. “I want to wake, that’s all; and whenever I turn in bed that string will tug at my toe, and, of course, I’ll rouse up. If you were more good-natured, I’d give the other end of the string to you; but, of course, that plan would never answer.”
“No, indeed,” replied Hester; “I am not going to trouble myself to wake you. You must trust to your sponge of cold water in the morning, unless your own admirable device succeeds.”
“I’m going to sleep now, at any rate,” answered Susan; “I’m on my back, and I’m beginning to snore; good-night.”
Once or twice during the night Hester heard groans from the self-sacrificing Susan, who, doubtless, found the string attached to her foot very inconvenient.
Hester, however, slept on when it might have been better for the peace of many in the school that she should have awakened. She heard no sound when, long before day, sleepy Susan stepped softly out of bed, and wrapping a thick shawl about her, glided out of the room. She was away for over half an hour, but she returned to her chamber and got into bed without in the least disturbing Hester. In the morning she was found so soundly asleep that even the sponge of cold water could not arouse her.
“Pull the string at the foot of the bed, Alice,” said Hester: “she fastened a string to her toe, and twisted the other end round the bed-post, last night—pull it, Alice, it may effect its purpose.”
But there was no string now round Susan Drummond’s foot, nor was it found hanging to the bed-post.