A World of Girls: The Story of a School

“Those who don’t want chicken hold up their hands,” here interrupted Annie, who had tossed her brown cap on the grass, and between whose brows a faint frown had passed for an instant at the mention of Cecil’s name.

The feast now began in earnest, and silence reigned for a short time, broken only by the clatter of plates, and such an occasional remark as “Pass the salt, please,” “Pepper this way, if you’ve no objection,” “How good chicken tastes in fairy-land,” etc. At last the ginger-beer bottles began to pop – the girl’s first hunger was appeased. Rover gladly crunched up all the bones, and conversation flowed once more, accompanied by the delicate diversion of taking alternate bites at meringues and cheesecakes.

“I wish the fairies would come out,” said Annie.

“Oh, don’t!” shivered Phyllis, looking round her nervously.

“Annie, darling, do tell us a ghost story,” cried several voices.

Annie laughed, and commenced a series of nonsense tales, all of a slightly eerie character, which she made up on the spot.

The moon riding high in the heavens looked down on the young giddy heads, and their laughter, naughty as they were, sounded sweet in the night air.

Time flew quickly, and the girls suddenly discovered that they must pack up their table-cloth and remove all traces of the feast unless they wished the bright light of morning to discover them. They rose hastily, sighing, and slightly depressed now that their fun was over. The white table-cloth, no longer very white, was packed into the basket, the ginger-beer bottles placed on top of it, and the lid fastened down. Not a crumb of the feast remained; Rover had demolished the bones, and the eight girls had made short work of everything else, with the exception of the cherry-stones, which Phyllis carefully collected and popped into a little hole in the ground.

The party then progressed slowly homewards, and once more entered the dark wood. They were much more silent now; the wood was darker, and the chill which foretells the dawn was making itself felt in the air. Either the sense of cold, or a certain effect produced by Annie’s ridiculous stories, made many of the little party unduly nervous.

They had only taken a few steps through the wood when Phyllis suddenly uttered a piercing shriek. This shriek was echoed by Nora and by Mary Morris, and all their hearts seemed to leap into their mouths when they saw something move among the trees. Rover uttered a growl, and, but for Annie’s detaining hand, would have sprung forward. The high-spirited girl was not to be easily daunted.

“Behold, girls, the goblin of the woods,” she exclaimed. “Quiet, Rover; stand still.”

The next instant the fears of the little party reached their culmination when a tall, dark figure stood directly in their paths.

“If you don’t let us pass at once,” said Annie’s voice, “I’ll set Rover at you.”

The dog began to bark loudly, and quivered from head to foot.

The figure moved a little to one side, and a rather deep and slightly dramatic voice said —

“I mean you no harm, young ladies; I’m only a gypsy-mother from the tents yonder. You are welcome to get back to Lavender House. I have then one course plain before me.”

“Come on, girls,” said Annie, now considerably frightened, while Phyllis, and Nora, and one or two more began to sob.

“Look here, young ladies,” said the gypsy in a whining voice, “I don’t mean you no harm, my pretties, and it’s no affair of mine telling the good ladies at Lavender House what I’ve seen. You cross my hand, dears, each of you, with a bit of silver, and all I’ll do is to tell your pretty fortunes, and mum is the word with the gypsy-mother as far as this night’s prank is concerned.”

“We had better do it, Annie – we had better do it,” here sobbed Phyllis. “If this was found out by Mrs Willis we might be expelled – we might, indeed; and that horrid woman is sure to tell of us – I know she is.”

“Quite sure to tell, dear,” said the tall gypsy, dropping a curtsey in a manner which looked frightfully sarcastic in the long shadows made by the trees. “Quite sure to tell, and to be expelled is the very least that could happen to such naughty little ladies. Here’s a nice little bit of clearing in the wood, and we’ll all come over, and Mother Rachel will tell your fortunes in a twinkling, and no one will be the wiser. Sixpence apiece, my dears – only sixpence apiece.”

“Oh, come; do, do come,” said Nora, and the next moment they were all standing in a circle round Mother Rachel, who pocketed her black-mail eagerly, and repeated some gibberish over each little hand. Over Annie’s palm she lingered for a brief moment, and looked with her penetrating eyes into the girl’s face.

“You’ll have suffering before you, miss; some suspicion, and danger even to life itself. But you’ll triumph, my dear, you’ll triumph. You’re a plucky one, and you’ll do a brave deed. There – good-night, young ladies; you have nothing more to fear from Mother Rachel.”

The tall dark figure disappeared into the blackest shadows of the wood, and the girls, now like so many frightened hares, flew home. They deposited their basket where Betty would find it, under the shadow of the great laurel in the back avenue. They all bade Rover an affectionate “good-night.” Annie softly unlocked the side door, and one by one, with their shoes in their hands, they regained their bedrooms. They were all very tired, and very cold, and a dull fear and sense of insecurity rested over each little heart. Suppose Mother Rachel proved unfaithful, notwithstanding the sixpences?

Chapter Twenty Nine

Hester’s Forgotten Book

It wanted scarcely three weeks to the holidays, and therefore scarcely three weeks to that auspicious day when Lavender House was to be the scene of one long triumph, and was to be the happy spot selected for a Midsummer holiday, accompanied by all that could make a holiday perfect – for youth and health would be there, and even the unsuccessful competitors for the great prizes would not have too sore hearts, for they would know that on the next day they were going home. Each girl who had done her best would have a word of commendation, and only those who were very naughty, or very stubborn, could resist the all-potent elixir of happiness which would be poured out so abundantly for Mrs Willis’s pupils on this day.

Now that the time was drawing so near, those girls who were working for prizes found themselves fully occupied from morning to night. In play-hours even, girls would be seen with their heads bent over their books, and, between the prizes and the acting, no little bees in any hive could be more constantly employed than were these young girls just now.

No happiness is, after all, to be compared to the happiness of healthful occupation. Busy people have no time to fret and no time to grumble. According to our old friend, Dr Watts, people who are healthily busy have also no time to be naughty, for the old doctor says that it is for idle hands that mischief is prepared.

Be that as it may, and there is great truth in it, some naughty sprites, some bad fairies, were flitting around and about that apparently peaceful atmosphere. That sunny home, governed by all that was sweet and good, was not without its serpent.

Of all the prizes which attracted interest and aroused competition, the prize for English composition was this year the most popular. In the first place, this was known to be Mrs Willis’s own favourite subject. She had a great wish that her girls should write intelligibly – she had a greater wish that, if possible, they should think.

“Never was there so much written and printed,” she was often heard to say; “but can anyone show me a book with thoughts in it? Can anyone show me, unless as a rare exception, a book which will live? Oh, yes, these books which issue from the press in thousands are, many of them, very smart, a great many of them clever, but they are thrown off too quickly. All great things, great books amongst them, must be evolved slowly.”

Then she would tell her pupils what she considered the reason of this.

“In these days,” she would say, “all girls are what is called highly educated. Girls and boys alike must go in for competitive examinations, must take out diplomas, and must pass certain standards of excellence. The system is cramming from beginning to end. There is no time for reflection. In short, my dear girls, you swallow a great deal, but you do not digest your intellectual food.”

Mrs Willis hailed with pleasure any little dawnings of real thought in her girls’ prize essays. More than once she bestowed the prize upon the essay which seemed to the girls the most crude and unfinished.

“Never mind,” she would say, “here is an idea – or at least half an idea. This little bit of composition is original, and not, at best, a poor imitation of Sir Walter Scott or Lord Macaulay.”

Thus the girls found a strong stimulus to be their real selves in these little essays, and the best of them chose their subject and let it ferment in their brains without the aid of books, except for the more technical parts.

More than one girl in the school was surprised at Dora Russell exerting herself to try for the prize essay. She was just about to close her school career, and they could not make out why she roused herself to work for the most difficult prize, for which she would have to compete with any girl in the school who chose to make a similar attempt.

Dora, however, had her own, not very high motive for making the attempt. She was a thoroughly accomplished girl, graceful in her appearance and manner; in short, just the sort of girl who would be supposed to do credit to a school. She played with finish, and even delicacy of touch. There was certainly no soul in her music, but neither were there any wrong notes. Her drawings were equally correct, her perspective good, her trees were real trees, and the colouring of her water-colour sketches was pure. She spoke French extremely well, and with a correct accent, and her German also was above the average. Nevertheless, Dora was commonplace, and those girls who knew her best spoke sarcastically, and smiled at one another when she alluded to her prize essay, and seemed confident of being the successful competitor.

“You won’t like to be beaten, Dora, say, by Annie Forest,” they would laughingly remark; whereupon Dora’s calm face would slightly flush and her lips would assume a very proud curve. If there was one thing she could not bear it was to be beaten.

“Why do you try for it, Dora?” her class-fellows would ask; but here Dora made no reply: she kept her reason to herself.

The fact was Dora, who must be a copyist to the end of the chapter, and who could never to her latest day do anything original, had determined to try for the composition prize because she happened accidentally to hear a conversation between Mrs Willis and Miss Danesbury, in which something was said about a gold locket with Mrs Willis’s portrait inside.

Dora instantly jumped at the conclusion that this was to be the great prize bestowed upon the successful essayist. Delightful idea; how well the trinket would look round her smooth white throat! Instantly she determined to try for this prize, and of course as instantly the bare idea of defeat became intolerable to her. She went steadily and methodically to work. With extreme care she chose her subject. Knowing something of Mrs Willis’s peculiarities, she determined that her theme should not be historical; she believed that she could express herself freely and with power if only she could secure an un-hackneyed subject. Suddenly an idea which she considered brilliant occurred to her. She would call her composition “The River.” This should not bear reference to Father Thames, or any other special river of England, but it should trace the windings of some fabled stream of Dora’s imagination, which, as it flowed along, should tell something of the story of the many places by which it passed. Dora was charmed with her own thought, and worked hard, evening after evening, at her subject, covering sheets of manuscript paper with pencilled jottings, and arranging and rearranging her somewhat confused thoughts. She greatly admired a perfectly rounded period, and she was most particular as to the style in which she wrote. For the purpose of improving her style she even studied old volumes of Addison’s Spectator; but after a time she gave up this course of study, for she found it so difficult to mould her English to Addison’s that she came to the comfortable conclusion that Addison was decidedly obsolete, and that if she wished to do full justice to “The River” she must trust to her own unaided genius.

At last the first ten pages were written. The subject was entered upon with considerable flourishes, and some rather apt poetical quotations from a book containing a collection of poems; the river itself had already left its home in the mountain, and was careering merrily past sunny meadows and little rural, impossible cottages, where the golden-haired children played.

Dora made a very neat copy of her essay so far. She now began to see her way clearly – there would be a very powerful passage as the river approached the murky town. Here, indeed, would be room for powerful and pathetic writing. She wondered if she might venture so far as to hide a suicide in her rushing waters; and then at last the brawling river would lose itself in the sea; and, of course, there would not be the smallest connection between her river, and Kingsley’s well-known song, “Clear and cool.”

She finished writing her ten pages, and being now positively certain of her gold locket, went to bed in a happy state of mind.

This was the very night when Annie was to lead her revellers through the dark wood, but Dora, who never troubled herself about the younger classes, would have been certainly the last to notice the fact that a few of the girls in Lavender House seemed little disposed to eat their suppers of thick bread-and-butter and milk. She went to bed and dreamt happy dreams about her golden locket, and had little idea that any mischief was about to be performed.

Hester Thornton also, but in a very different spirit, was working hard at her essay. Hester worked conscientiously; she had chosen “Marie Antoinette” as her theme, and she read the sorrowful story of the beautiful queen with intense interest, and tried hard to get herself into the spirit of the times about which she must write. She had scarcely begun her essay yet, but she had already collected most of the historical facts.

Hester was a very careful little student, and as she prepared herself for the great work. She thought little or nothing about the prize; she only wanted to do justice to the unfortunate Queen of France. She was in bed that night, and just dropping off to sleep, when she suddenly remembered that she had left a volume of French poetry on her school-desk. This was against the rules, and she knew that Miss Danesbury would confiscate the book in the morning, and would not let her have it back for a week. Hester particularly wanted this special book just now, as some of the verses bore reference to her subject, and she could scarcely get on with her essay without having it to refer to She must lose no time in instantly beginning to write her essay, and to do without her book of poetry for a week would be a serious injury to her.

She resolved, therefore, to break through one of the rules, and, after lying awake until the whole house was quiet, to slip downstairs, enter the school-room and secure her poems. She heard the clock strike eleven, and she knew that in a very few moments Miss Danesbury and Miss Good would have retired to their rooms. Ah, yes, that was Miss Danesbury’s step passing her door. Ten minutes later she glided out of bed, slipped on her dressing-gown, and opening her door, ran swiftly down the carpetless stairs, and found herself in the great stone hall which led to the school-room.

She was surprised to find the school-room door a little ajar, but she entered the room without hesitation, and, dark as it was, soon found her desk, and the book of poems lying on the top. Hester was about to return when she was startled by a little noise in that portion of the room where the first-class girls sat. The next moment somebody came heavily and rather clumsily down the room, and the moon which was just beginning to rise fell for an instant on a girl’s face. Hester recognised the face of Susan Drummond. What could she be doing here? She did not dare to speak, for she herself had broken a rule in visiting the school-room. She remained, therefore, perfectly still until Susan’s steps died away, and then, thankful to have secured her own property, returned to her bedroom, and a moment or two later was sound asleep.