A Patriotic Schoolgirl (WWI Centenary Series). Angela Brazil

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СКАЧАТЬ every night, and keeps a pot of complexion cream on her dressing-table. She always uses stephanotis scent that she gets from one special place in London, and it costs four and sixpence a bottle. She hates bacon for breakfast, and she has seventeen relations at the front. She’s thin and brown, and her nose wiggles like a rabbit’s when she talks.”

      “I shouldn’t mind her if she’d keep to her own cubicle,” commented Marjorie. “Sylvia Page will overflow into mine, and I find her things dumped down on my bed. She’s nicer than Irene Andrews, though; we had a squabble last night over the window. Betty Moore brought a whole box of chocolates with her, and she ate them in bed and never offered a single one to anybody else. We could hear her crunching for ages. I don’t like Irene, but I agreed with her that Betty is mean!”

      “Nellie Mason sleeps in the next cubicle to me,” continued Dona, bent on retailing her own woes. “She snores dreadfully, and it kept me awake, though she’s not so bad otherwise. Beatrice Elliot is detestable. She found that little Teddy bear I brought with me, and she sniggered and asked if I came from a kindergarten. I’ve calculated there are seventy-four days in this term. I don’t know how I’m going to live through them until the holidays.”

      “Hallo!” said a cheerful voice. “Sitting weeping under the willows, are you? New girls always grouse. Miss Broadway’s sent me to hunt you up and do the honours of the premises. I’m Mollie Simpson. Come along with me and I’ll show you round.”

      The speaker was a jolly-looking girl of about sixteen, with particularly merry blue eyes and a whimsical expression. Her dark curly hair was plaited and tied with broad ribbons.

      “We’ve been round, thanks very much,” returned Marjorie to the new-comer.

      “Oh, but that doesn’t count if you’ve only gone by yourselves! You wouldn’t notice the points. Every new girl has got to be personally conducted by an old one and told the traditions of the place. It’s a sort of initiation, you know. We’ve a regular freemasons’ code here of things you may do or mustn’t. Quick march! I’ve no time to waste. Tea is at four prompt.”

      Thus urged, Marjorie and Dona got up, shook the pine needles from their dresses, and followed their cicerone, who seemed determined to perform her office of guide in as efficient a fashion as possible.

      “This is the Quad,” she informed them. “That’s the Assembly Hall and the Head’s private house, and those are the three hostels. What’s it like in St. Githa’s? I can’t tell you, because I’ve never been there. It’s for Seniors, and no Intermediate or Junior may pop her impertinent nose inside, or so much as go and peep through the windows without getting into trouble. They’ve carpets on the stairs instead of linoleum, and they may make cocoa in their bedrooms and fill their own hot-water bags, and other privileges that aren’t allowed to us luckless individuals. They may come and see us, by special permission, but we mayn’t return the visits. By the by, you’d oblige me greatly if you’d tilt your chapeau a little farther forward. Like this, see!”

      “Why?” questioned Marjorie, greatly astonished, as she made the required alteration to the angle of her hat.

      “Because only Seniors may wear their sailors on the backs of their heads. It’s a strict point of school etiquette. You may jam on your hockey cap as you like, but not your sailor.”

      “Are there any other rules?” asked Dona.

      “Heaps. Intermediates mayn’t wear bracelets, and Juniors mayn’t wear lockets, they’re limited to brooches. I advise you to strip those trinkets off at once and stick them in your pockets. Don’t go in to tea with them on any account.”

      “How silly!” objected Dona, unclasping her locket, with Father’s photo in it, most unwillingly.

      “Now, look here, young ‘un, let me give you a word of good advice at the beginning. Don’t you go saying anything here is silly. The rules have been made by the Seniors, and Juniors have got to put up with them and keep civil tongues in their heads. If you want to get on you’ll have to accommodate yourself to the ways of the place. Any girl who doesn’t has a rough time, I warn you. For goodness’ sake don’t begin to blub!”

      “Don’t be a cry-baby, Dona,” said Marjorie impatiently. “She’s not been to school before,” she explained to Mollie, “so she’s still feeling rather home-sick.”

      Mollie nodded sympathetically.

      “I understand. She’ll soon get over it. She’s a decent kid. I’m going to like her. That’s why I’m giving her all these tips, so that she won’t make mistakes and begin wrong. She’ll get on all right at St. Ethelberta’s. Miss Jones is a stunt, as jinky as you like. Wish we had her at our house.”

      “Who is the Head of St. Elgiva’s?”

      “Miss Norton, worse luck for us!”

      “Not the tall fair one who met us in London yesterday?”

      “The same.”

      “Oh, thunder! I shall never get on with her, I know.”

      “The Acid Drop’s a rather unsweetened morsel, certainly. You’ll have to mind your p’s and q’s. She can be decent to those she likes, but she doesn’t take to everybody.”

      “She hasn’t taken to me—I could see it in her eye at Euston.”

      “Then I’m sorry for you. It isn’t particularly pleasant to be in Norty’s bad books. If you missed your train and kept her waiting she’ll never forgive you. Look out for squalls!”

      “What’s the Head like?”

      “Mrs. Morrison? Well, of course, she’s nice, but we stand very much in awe of her. It’s a terrible thing to be sent down to her study. We generally see her on the platform. We call her ‘The Empress’, because she’s so like the pictures of the Empress Eugénie, and she’s so dignified and above everybody else. Hallo, there’s the first bell! We must scoot and wash our hands. If you’re late for a meal you put a penny in the missionary box.”

      Marjorie walked into the large dining-hall with Mollie Simpson. She felt she had made, if not yet a friend, at least an acquaintance, and in this wilderness of fresh faces it was a boon to be able to speak to somebody. She hoped Mollie would not desert her and sit among her own chums (the girls took any places they liked for tea); but no, her new comrade led the way to a table at the lower end of the hall, and, motioning her to pass first, took the next chair. Each table held about twenty girls, and a mistress sat at either end. Conversation went on, but in subdued tones, and any unduly lifted voices met with instant reproof.

      “I always try to sit in the middle, unless I can get near a mistress I like,” volunteered Mollie. “That one with the ripply hair is Miss Duckworth. She’s rather sweet, isn’t she? We call her Ducky for short. The other’s Miss Carter, the botany teacher. Oh, I say, here’s the Acid Drop coming to the next table! I didn’t bargain to have her so near.”

      Marjorie turned to look, and in so doing her sleeve most unfortunately caught the edge of her cup, with the result that a stream of tea emptied itself over the clean table-cloth. Miss Norton, who was just passing to her place, noticed the accident and murmured: “How careless!” then paused, as if remembering something, and said:

      “Marjorie Anderson, you are to report yourself in my study at 4.30.”

      Very СКАЧАТЬ