A Pair of Schoolgirls, Angela Brazil [unputdownable books TXT] 📗

moment joined the group. "It's just been put up on the notice board."

"Well, I'm glad. Grace will make a good Warden."

"Yes, there's something solid about Grace. She never lets herself be carried away."

"Hope will be crestfallen."

"Never mind—it will do Hope Lawson good to find she's not the most important person in the Form."

"I say," interposed Noëlle, "isn't this a good opportunity to put in a word for Dorothy? She owned up when Hope didn't, so Miss Tempest ought to remember that. Let us strike while the iron is hot, and go to the study now."

"Right you are! Where are Mavie and Doris? I'm sure they'll come too."

Dorothy's champions walked boldly into the study, and put their case so successfully to Miss Tempest that she condescended to consider it. Perhaps, as Noëlle suspected, she thought she had given too severe a punishment, and was ready to remit it. In the end, she consented to forgive, not only Dorothy, but her companions in misfortune also, granting all six permission to enter the gymnasium again.

"It's a complete turning of the tables," said Ruth, as the girls returned triumphantly from their mission. "Dorothy's free, and Hope and Blanche will have to stay in the classroom and do their share of penance."

"Then they'll be out of rehearsals."

"Of course they will."

"And who's to take Becky Sharp?"

"I vote for Dorothy."

"So do I. She deserves it."

"Where is she? Let's take her her order of release."

The events of that day had an effect upon the Upper Fourth in more ways than one. Perhaps Miss Pitman had learnt a lesson, for in future she accepted no presents at all from her pupils, not even flowers, and showed special favour to nobody. The Form liked her much better now that she was more impartial.

"I can't stand a teacher who pets one girl and snubs another," said Ruth. "It isn't just, and one has a right to expect justice from one's Form mistress."

Grace Russell was a decided success as Warden. She was not the cleverest girl in the Upper Fourth by any means, but she was one of the oldest, and she had a strong sense of duty. She kept the rules scrupulously herself, and discouraged all the shirkings that had come in under Hope's regime. It was wonderful how rapidly most of the girls responded to her influence, and how soon the Form began to take a better tone.

Hope was very quiet and subdued after her deposition, till one day she caught Dorothy in the dressing-room.

"You're a mean sneak, Dorothy Greenfield!" she began hotly. "You promised on your honour you wouldn't tell Miss Tempest we'd been at the wedding, and yet you went and did it!"

"I didn't!" declared Dorothy, with equal heat. "I kept my promise absolutely. I never told a single soul."

"What's the quarrel?" said Margaret Parker.

"Why, Dorothy had seen Blanche and me at that wretched wedding—I wish we'd never gone!—and she promised she wouldn't tell, and then she must have done—I'm certain it was she!"

"It was Professor Schenk who told Miss Tempest," replied Margaret. "I know, because Beatrice Schenk said so. Do you mean to say you let Dorothy own up about that business, and then expected her to keep quiet about your share of it? It's you who are the sneak. Dorothy tell, indeed! We know her better than that. She flies into rages, but she'd scorn to get anybody into trouble at head-quarters. I think she's been a trump."

The feeling of the Form at present was decidedly in Dorothy's favour. Schoolgirl opinion veers round quickly, and a companion who is unpopular one week may be a heroine the next. Margaret Parker was so indignant at Hope's conduct that she published abroad the story of the promise, and the general verdict was that Dorothy had shown up very well in the affair.

"I don't believe I'd have kept such a secret and let Hope get off scot-free," said Ruth Harmon, "especially when she was being so rude; but I'm not quixotic, so that makes the difference."

After this the rehearsals in the gymnasium went on briskly. It was growing near Christmas, and there was still much to be done to perfect the performance. Dorothy threw herself with enthusiasm into the part of Becky Sharp; she did it to the life, and defied Miss Pinkerton with special zeal.

"She does it almost too well. I wish Miss Tempest could see her!" laughed Alison.

"She's going to," said Mavie. "She sent a message to say she'd like to come, and bring some of the mistresses."

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" exclaimed the girls.

The little play had only been intended to be acted before a select circle of day boarders, so the performers felt quite nervous at the idea of numbering Miss Tempest and the mistresses among their audience. It was to be given at two o'clock on the last Tuesday before breaking-up day. It was not possible to make many preparations in the way of scenery, but the girls did their best in respect of costumes. Alison coaxed two silk dresses and several other properties from her mother, not to speak of the gorgeous robes in the chest which she brought, though it was decided after all not to have tableaux. Poor Alison, still feeling sore about the invitation she had not been allowed to ratify, was determined to lend Dorothy the best pieces of her theatrical wardrobe, and pressed the handsomest things she possessed upon her. She was amply satisfied with the result when she saw her friend attired, as Becky, in a green silk dress and sandalled slippers.

"You're just like the illustrations to our Vanity Fair. That little muslin apron's sweet!" she exclaimed.

When the afternoon arrived, not only Miss Tempest and five mistresses, but several members of the Sixth Form took their places on the benches set ready for them.

"Mary Galloway's come! Aren't you nervous, Dorothy?" whispered Ruth, greatly excited, for Mary was the president of the College Dramatic Union, and a critic of matters theatrical.

Dorothy had got to a stage beyond nervousness. She felt as if she were going to execution.

"I expect I shall spoil the whole thing, but it can't be helped," she replied resignedly. With the first sentences, however, her courage returned, and she "played up" splendidly. Her representation of Becky was so spirited that teachers and elder girls applauded loudly.

"Very good indeed," commented Miss Tempest, when the act was over. "I had no idea you could all do so well."

"I should like a word with Becky Sharp," said Mary Galloway, slipping behind the scenes and drawing that heroine aside. Dorothy returned from the whispered conference with shining eyes.

"What is it? You're looking radiant!" said Alison.

"I may well be! Mary Galloway's going to propose me as a member of the College Dramatic Union!"

CHAPTER X

Martha Remembers

For Dorothy the Christmas holidays passed quietly and most uneventfully. She and Aunt Barbara saw little of the outside world. It had certainly cost Dorothy several pangs to hear the girls at the College discussing the many invitations they had received and the dances they expected to attend, and to feel that a visit to the vicarage was all the festivity that would be likely to come her way. There were no parties or pantomimes included in her holiday programme. Aunt Barbara had had many expenses lately, and her narrow income was stretched to its fullest extent to pay school fees and the price of the contract ticket.

"It's hateful to be poor," thought Dorothy. "I want pretty dresses and parties like other girls;" and she went home with the old wrinkle between her brows, and a little droop at the corners of her mouth.

If Aunt Barbara noticed these and divined the cause, she made no comment; she did not remind Dorothy of how much she had given up on her behalf, or of what real sacrifice it entailed to send her to Avondale. She took the opportunity, however, one day to urge her to work her hardest at school.

"You may have to earn your own living some time, child," she said. "If anything happens to me, my small pension goes back to the owner of the Sherbourne estate. I shall be able to leave you nothing. A good education is the only thing I can give you, so you must try to make the most of it."

"Shall I have to be a teacher?" asked Dorothy blankly.

"I don't know. It will depend on what I can have you trained for," replied Miss Sherbourne.

She was hurt sometimes by Dorothy's manner; the girl seemed dissatisfied, though she was evidently making an effort to hide the fact.

"It's hard for her to mix at school with girls who have so many more advantages," thought Aunt Barbara. "Was I wise to send her to Avondale, I wonder? Is it having the effect of making her discontented? It's only lately she's grown like this—she was never so before."

Discontented exactly described Dorothy's state of mind. She considered that Fate had used her unkindly. The prospect of gaining her own living was extremely distasteful to her. She hated the idea of becoming a teacher, and no other work seemed any more congenial.

"I'd always looked forward to enjoying myself when I was grown up," she thought bitterly, "and now it will be nothing but slave."

At present Dorothy was viewing life entirely from her own standpoint, and was suffering from an attack of that peculiar complaint called "self-itis". She was aggrieved that the world had not given her more, and it never struck her to think of what she might give to the world. It seemed as if she could no longer enjoy all the little simple occupations in which she had been accustomed to take so much pleasure—she was tired of her stamps and postcards, bookbinding and clay modelling had lost their attraction, and she was apathetic on the subject of fancy work.

"I don't know what's come over you," declared Martha. "You just idle about the house doing nothing at all. Why can't you take your knitting, or a bit of crochet in your fingers?"

"Simply because I don't want to. I wish you'd leave me alone, Martha!" replied Dorothy irritably.

She resented the old servant's interference, for Martha was less patient and forbearing than Aunt Barbara, and hinted pretty plainly sometimes what she thought of her nursling.

So the holidays passed by—dreary ones for Dorothy, who spent whole listless evenings staring at the fire; and drearier still for Aunt Barbara, who made many efforts to interest the girl, and, failing utterly, went about with a new sadness in her eyes and a fresh grief in her heart that she would not have confessed to anyone.

Everybody at Holly Cottage was glad when the term began again.

"I don't hold with holidays," grumbled Martha. "Give young folks plenty of work, say I, and they're much better than mooning about with naught to do. Dorothy's a different girl when she's got her lessons to keep her busy."

To do Dorothy justice, she certainly worked her hardest at the College, though the prospect of becoming a teacher did not strike her as an inspiring goal for her efforts. She put the idea away from her as much as possible, but every now and then it returned like a bad nightmare.

"I should hate to be Miss Pitman," she remarked one day at school. "It must be odious to be a mistress."

"Do you think so?" replied Grace Russell. "Why, I'd love it! I mean to go in for teaching myself some time."

"But will you have to earn your own living? I thought your father was well off," objected Dorothy.

"That's no reason why I shouldn't be of some use in the world," returned Grace. "Teaching is a splendid profession if one does it thoroughly. I have a cousin who's a class mistress at a big school near London, and she's so happy—her girls just