Wild Kitty, L. T. Meade [namjoon book recommendations TXT] 📗

cried Kitty in a low voice. "Don't bother me, Annie, asthore. I can't be teased. I have got something in the back of my head."

"Something in the back of your head?" whispered Annie.

"Yes, yes; but hush, alanna! I can't let it out; it's bothering me entirely. There, if I must look at the stupid history, I must. What part are we doing, Mary Davies?"

"Oh, it's about Charles the First."

"Poor martyr! Shame to England to cut off his head!" Kitty bent over her book, but soon her erratic fancy had started off in another direction. She was sent to the bottom of the class when the history lesson came on, and was looked at with growing disfavor by Miss Worrick, a particularly painstaking and earnest young teacher.

"Really, Miss Malone, if this sort of thing goes on I must report you," she said. "It is pure inattention. If you wish to take any position in the school you must make up your mind that while in school you must work."

"And while out of school I must play," retorted Kitty. "Ah, then, it's little of the play I get. If I had my share of the play I could do my share of work."

"Come, you must not answer me," said Miss Worrick. "Now, sit down and read up that chapter in your history. You will not be allowed to go out during recess this morning."

"Not go out during recess?" cried Kitty in horror; "but it's most important. Ah, now, do let me out; just excuse me to-day, won't you? I'll be as good as gold to-morrow, and better; but excuse me to-day; please, please. Say you will; for I really must go. I was to meet Gwin Harley, the darling; and it's put out she would be awfully if I wasn't with her. You'll let me out to-day, won't you? Please say yes."

"I do not understand you, Miss Malone. When I say a thing I mean it.
You are not to go out during recess."

Kitty's bright face fell; the cloud which had more or less hovered round her during the entire morning deepened. She sank into her seat with a heavy sigh.

"Never mind, Kitty; we all of us have to stay in sometimes," whispered little Mary Davies.

"Take a chocolate out of my pocket, darlin', and don't talk to me any more," was Kitty's answer. "I am sad past bearing. Not to see Gwin when I had arranged it all; but I will, I must! There, take a second chocolate if you want it; they are full of cream. But just leave me to my own thoughts for a bit. I am so worried I don't know whether I am on my head or my heels."

"Silence, girls—no whispering!" called the mathematical teacher, who now came on the scene.

Poor Kitty's morning began badly, and it certainly was destined to go on badly. None of her lessons were prepared with the slightest care; she went down lower and lower in class, and each teacher gave her an imposition or some other punishment. When recess came she alone in the whole class was required to remain in the room.

The rest of the girls looked at her with pity.

"She's such an old dear, although quite the idlest and most ignorant person I ever came across," said Mary Davies to her companions.

"Yes," whispered another little girl with fat rosy cheeks and round eyes; "but did you ever taste such chocolate creams? Why, they must cost a halfpenny apiece. I do love to sit next to her; she says I may dive my hand into her pocket as often as I like."

"Oh, she's an old love!" echoed all the girls: "but what a pity it is that she won't learn."

"She does not want to learn," said Mary Davies. "Learning would spoil her; she is a pet."

Meanwhile in the playground Gwin Harley waited in vain for Kitty to join her.

"Does any one know where Kitty Malone is?" she said, addressing one of the girls in Kitty's class.

"She is kept in for an imposition; she did not know her history, and
Miss Worrick said she was to stay in," answered Mary Davies.

"Oh, well, I suppose I can see her another time," said Gwin. At that moment she met Elma's anxious eyes.

Elma was just about to dart to the side of her friend, when, to the amazement of all the girls, Kitty walked calmly across the playground.

"Oh Gwin, I must speak to you; it is about Alice. You know, you and Alice are great friends. Things get worse and worse, and they are almost past bearing. Last night I heard her sobbing in bed. She sobbed and sobbed, and at last I could stand no more of it, and sprang out of bed, and bent over her and said: 'Alice, is it about me you are crying?' and she said: 'Oh, yes, Kitty, it is;' and I said, 'And why 'Oh, yes, Kitty?' What has poor Kitty done to you?"

"'I am not happy,' answered Alice. 'Since you came everything has changed; you have made my home miserable to me. I don't like your ways.'

"'Have you made up your mind never to be friends with me?' I asked.

"'Yes,' said Alice. 'I wish you would go away.' She sat up in bed then with her tear-stained face, and looked at me ever so earnestly. 'Tell mother that you would rather go to some other house—that you won't stay here. I never could stand vulgar girls, and you are one.'

"Oh Gwin, I felt so mad. You don't think me a vulgar girl, do you?"

"Tell me the whole," said Gwin in a low voice.

"Oh, there is not much more. Alice was in a regular temper. She buried her face in the clothes, and though I tried pinching her, and pulling her, and petting her even, not another word would she utter. Now, you must see for yourself, Gwin, that if this sort of thing goes on I shall have to return home, and then the old dad will be fretted, and he will think that I don't want to learn manners nor to get learning into me. Oh dear, I don't want to fret him, although I hate England. I have just been wondering if you would speak to Alice."

"Yes, certainly," answered Gwin. "I—" Her words were interrupted.

"Miss Malone, do I see you in the playground?" said a stern voice. Miss
Worrick had appeared on the scene.

"Why, then, yes, Miss Worrick, you do. It's a fine day, isn't it; and the air is most refreshing," said Kitty in her most impertinent tones.

"Do you know that you have distinctly disobeyed me? I forbade you to leave the schoolroom during recess. How dared you do so?"

"There wasn't much daring about it. I walked to the door, opened it, and came out. I had made a previous engagement, and it was not at all convenient to break it. I told you so at the time, did I not?"

For answer Miss Worrick took Kitty by the arm and led her across the playground.

"I must take you to Miss Sherrard," she said. "I cannot manage a disobedient girl like you."

She opened a side door, and, still holding Kitty by the arm, led her down a long passage and into a small room, where she desired her to wait while she fetched the head-mistress.

Miss Sherrard was a little woman, but she had a native dignity which is beyond and above all mere personal appearance. She had a keen and commanding eye, a somewhat pale face, an upright little figure. She was not only short in stature, but slight; nevertheless, there was not a mistress in the great school who did not hold her in awe as well as admiration, and not a girl, with the exception, perhaps, of Kitty Malone, who did not do her reverence.

When the door was shut behind Kitty, she drummed impatiently on the bare mahogany table near which she had been placed, then walked to the window and looked out. From her position she could catch a glimpse of Gwin Harley pacing up and down the playground with Elma Lewis. She saw Alice come up and talk to Gwin; she noticed that Gwin and Elma paused, then that Alice slipped to the other side of Gwin, and the three walked slowly up and down. As they walked they talked. Alice nodded her head once or twice; Elma made emphatic grimaces; Gwin alone looked quiet, calm, and stately.

"They are talking about me," thought the Irish girl, and an angry feeling rose in her heart. "Is it for this I have left the dear old dad, and the beautiful home, and the animals, and Aunt Bridget, and Aunt Honora? Oh, is it for this I have left dear Old Ireland, may her heart be blessed! to come here to be slighted, to be made little of, to be joked at! Am I Kitty Malone, or am I somebody else? Oh! my heart will break, my heart will break!"

"Miss Malone, I am sorry to hear this of you," said a very calm, very distinct, and withal very kind voice, just at Kitty's back. Kitty turned abruptly, and said aloud:

"Oh, and did you overhear me?" She then involuntarily dropped a courtesy to the head-mistress.

Miss Sherrard shut the door behind her.

"I am sorry," she began, "to learn from Miss Worrick that you are showing insubordination and disobedience."

"Why, then, now, and won't you let me tell my own story in my own way?" said Kitty.

In spite of herself, Miss Sherrard gave an involuntary smile. It soon vanished, but Kitty had caught the glint in the eye and the tremble round the lips. "Why, then I see at a glance that you have the kind heart," she said; "you thought to keep it in, but I saw it breaking out just then. You'll let me tell my own story, won't you?"

"That seems fair enough," said Miss Sherrard. She seated herself as she spoke on one of the bare, comfortless chairs, and looked full up at Kitty.

Kitty was dressed according to Rule IV. of the Tug-of-war Society. She wore a decidedly fashionable dress, the sleeves well puffed out at the shoulders, fitting nicely at the elbows, and with ruffles of lace, real lace, round the wrists. Round Kitty's throat also there were ruffles of lace; the neck of her dress was cut a little low, showing the soft, full contour of her exquisitely-curved throat. Her waist was clasped with a belt of solid silver, and in front she wore a great bunch of cabbage-roses. The cabbage-rose has a scent which, when once it assails the nostrils, can never afterward be forgotten. Miss Sherrard, in spite of herself, gave a little sniff.

Quick as lightning Kitty saw it, and detached the bunch of roses from her belt.

"Now, will you have them?" she said. "Ah, do now, just to please me, Kitty Malone; they came all the way from Old Ireland this morning. Stay, I'll pin them into the front of your dress. Hold easy a moment dear woman, and you'll have as neat a little bunch as ever you clapped your two eyes on."

Miss Sherrard could not help once again letting that ghost of a smile play round her lips, and then vanish.

"But really," she said—"oh, thank you for the roses; yes, they are very sweet; yes, delicious! She bent her head and sniffed quite audibly.

"Ah, then, aren't they refreshing, and aren't they melting the anger down in your heart? Say they are now—say they are. You see you never had an out-and-out wild Irish girl to manage before. Well, and what is it you want with me? I'll be as civil as you please, and as willing to listen to the words of wisdom, if only you'll let me first tell my own story."

"It is only fair that you should be allowed to tell your own tale," said Miss Sherrard; "but please understand that I am very angry. Miss Worrick's story has amazed me. Do you know. Kitty Malone, of what you are accused?"

"Well, I do, and I don't; but I should like to hear the crime spoken of by your pretty lips. What is it? Something black of course; black things are always laid to the door of Kitty Malone."

"The crime, Miss Malone, is the very grave sin of disobedience. You must know that in a great school of this kind, if there were not perfect obedience there would