The Rebel of the School, L. T. Meade [best historical biographies .txt] 📗

also see you.—Girls, I have requested Ruth Craven to take the prominent position she now occupies in order that you may all see her. You all know her, do you not? Those who know Ruth Craven, hold up their hands."

Immediately there was a great show of uplifted hands.

"I presume that you all like her?"

Again the hands went up, and Kathleen's was raised the highest of all. Ruth's little face, however, remained perfectly white and still; only her eyes were dark with emotion. She kept thinking of her father.

"I should like that which would make me give my life if necessary," he had said; and her grandfather had said, "Sometimes when you come out on the right side of the ledger it means giving all that you possess."

Ruth could scarcely see the faces which rose up like a great ocean beneath her, but she remembered her father's words very distinctly.

"You all see Ruth Craven," continued Miss Mackenzie. "As far as I know, she is a good girl; and I judge by your method of answering my question that she is a popular girl. I know, alas! that she is poor. I have heard a great deal about her intellectual endowments, and believe that this school could be of immense advantage to her. I believe, in short, that she is the typical sort of girl of whom the founders thought when they instituted this great and noble house of learning. Nevertheless, Ruth Craven must fall if necessary for the good of the many.—Ruth, I wish to ask you a certain question. You were a member of that rebellious society, the Wild Irish Girls?"

"Yes, Miss Mackenzie."

Ruth's "Yes" was very clear; her face looked modest but firm. There was not the slightest hesitation in the words she uttered. Her speech was not loud, but it could be heard to the end of the great hall.

"You are no longer a member?"

"No."

"Three days ago I and the other governors sent for you to ask you certain questions. You refused to answer those questions then. We gave you three days to consider, telling you that if at the end of that time you still kept to your resolution there was only one thing for us to do, and that was to make an example of you in the presence of the entire school—in short, to take from you your right of membership, and to expel you from the school, taking from you all privileges, all chances of acquiring learning and the different valuable scholarships which this school was opening to you. We came to this most painful resolve knowing well that it would cast a blight upon your life, that wherever you went the knowledge that you had been publicly expelled from the Great Shirley School would follow you—that you would, in short, step down, Ruth Craven. I quite understand from the expression of your face that you are the sort of child who imagines that she is doing right when she keeps back the knowledge which she thinks she ought not to betray; but we governors do not agree with you. There are six of us here, and we wish to tell you that if you now refuse the information which we wish to obtain from you, you will do wrong. You are young, and cannot know as much as we do. We earnestly beg of you, therefore; not to make a martyr of yourself in a silly and ridiculous cause.—Mrs. Naylor, will you now say what you think to Ruth Craven?"

"I think, dear child," said Mrs. Naylor, speaking in a tremulous voice, which could scarcely be heard half-way down the room, "that it would be best for you not to conceal the truth."

"And I agree," said Mrs. Ross.

"We all agree," said the Misses Scott and Miss Jane Smyth.

"We all think, dear," continued Mrs. Naylor, "that for the sake of any chivalrous ideas, quite worthy in themselves, it is a considerable pity for you to spoil your life. You are not the sort of child who could stand disgrace."

"And you don't look the sort of child who would under ordinary circumstances act the idiot," said Miss Mackenzie sharply. "As to the chivalrous nature of your silence, I fail to see it. I hope you have carefully considered the position and are prepared to act openly and honorably. By go doing you will save the school and yourself. Now then, Ruth Craven, will you come a little more forward? Stand just there.—Girls, you can all see Ruth Craven, can you not?"

The girls held up their hands in token that they could.

"I will therefore at once proceed to question her," continued Miss Mackenzie.

There was just a moment's pause, and during that complete silence a dreadful rushing noise came into Kathleen O'Hara's head. The floor for an instant seemed to rise up as though it would strike her; then she felt composed, but very cold and white. She fixed her eyes full on Ruth.

"I will hear her out. I must hear the thing out," she kept saying to herself. "Afterwards—afterwards—But I must hear the whole thing out."

Miss Mackenzie turned, and in a very emphatic voice began to question.

"You are prepared to reply to the following questions?" she said.

Ruth's very steady eyes were raised; she fixed them on Miss Mackenzie. Her lips were firmly shut. Nothing could be quieter than her attitude; she did not show a trace of emotion. Always pale, she looked a little paler now than her wont. Her darks eyes seemed to darken and grow full of intense emotion; otherwise no one could have told that she was suffering or feeling anything in particular.

"But I know what she is going through," thought Kathleen. She clenched her hands so tightly that the nails went into the delicate flesh. She was glad of the pain; it kept her from screaming aloud.

"The first question I have to ask," said Miss Mackenzie, "is this: How many of the foundation girls have joined the rebels?"

Ruth came a step nearer.

"How many? I can't quite hear you."

"I am sorry," said Ruth then, "but I can't tell you."

Miss Mackenzie, without any show of emotion, immediately entered Ruth's answer in a little book which she held in her hand.

"Oh, don't, Miss Mackenzie! Don't be harsh," gasped little Mrs. Naylor.

Miss Mackenzie, as though she had not heard the voice of her sister governor, proceeded:

"What is the name of the founder of the society?"

"I am not prepared to say," replied Ruth.

Again this answer was recorded.

"Can you give me an exact account of the rules of the society, its motives, its bearing generally?"

The same negative reply was the result of this question.

"Do you know anything whatever of the disgraceful escapade which took place last night, when a certain number of the members of this society went to London and returned by themselves at midnight?"

Ruth's face cleared a little at this question.

"I cannot answer because I know nothing," she said.

A slight look of relief was visible on the faces of the unfortunate girls who had gone to town with Kathleen on the preceding night. A few more questions were asked, Ruth replying on every occasion in the negative. "I can't say," or "I will not say," were the only words that were wrung from her lips.

"In short," said Miss Mackenzie very quietly, "you have decided, Ruth Craven—you, an ignorant, silly little girl—to defy the governors of this school. All justice has been dealt out to you, and all patience. The consequence of your mad action has been explained to you with the utmost fullness. You have been given time—abundant time—to consider. You have chosen, from what false motives it is impossible to say—"

"My dear," interrupted Mrs. Naylor, "the child means well, I am assured."

"From what false motives it is impossible to say," continued Miss Mackenzie, not taking the slightest notice of the little governor's futile appeal, "you have decided to wreck your own life and to ruin the school. It was to have been your noble privilege to save the school in a time of extremity. You have chosen the unworthy course. It is therefore my painful duty to call upon Miss Ravenscroft as head-mistress to expel you, Ruth Craven, from this school. You are no longer a member of the Great Shirley School; you are—"

"Hold!" cried Kathleen.

Her voice rang out sharp and clear. It was heard all over the school, and was so imperative, so startling, so unexpected, that even Miss Mackenzie lost her self-control and fell back in silence.

"Hold!" cried Kathleen again. "You have said enough. I don't think you ought to go on. You are torturing the noblest girl in the world. But Kathleen O'Hara, bad as she is, cannot endure this last insult. Girls—Wild Irish Girls, you who belong to my society—I as your queen desire you to come forward. Come forward in a body at once."

What was there in the young voice that impelled? What was there in the young face that stimulated, that caused fear to slink out of sight and courage to come to the fore, that caused hearts to beat high with generous emotion? Not a single girl failed Kathleen in this moment of her appeal. They clambered over their seats; they bent under the forms; they got out in any fashion, until she was surrounded by the sixty girls who formed her society. She glanced round her; her dark-blue eyes grew full of sweetness, and there was a look on her face which made the girls for the moment feel that they would die for her.

"Come, girls," said their queen—"come; there is room on the platform."

She sprang up the couple of steps without another word, and the girls followed her.

"Do what you like with Ruth Craven, Miss Mackenzie," she cried; "but put your questions over again to me, and I will answer them one after the other. Then expel me and my companions; turn us out of the school, but keep the girl who would be a credit to you."

CHAPTER XXIX. END OF THE GREAT REBELLION.

No one quite knew what happened next. Some of the girls went off into violent hysterics; others rushed out of the great hall, half-fainting; while others controlled themselves and listened as best they could. The scene was vivid and picturesque. Mrs. Naylor sobbed quite audibly, and took hold of Ruth's hand, and even kissed it. But as she did so Kathleen herself came near and flung her arm round Ruth's neck.

"If you mean to expel Ruth you will expel me," she said. "But won't you forgive her? If her ideas were wrong, they were at least generous; and you know that I won't trouble you any more. I am very sorry, but I don't think that I was made to suit a great school like this, and I give up the society—yes, absolutely—so you won't have any rebels present in your midst again. Expel me, but keep her, for she will be the flower of your school, the greatest ornament, one you will talk of in the dim years of the future. Don't let me feel that I have spoilt her life."

"But why did you act so, Kathleen O'Hara?" said Miss Mackenzie. "Why did you, a silly young girl, come over here, a stranger, to ruin the school and make us all unhappy?"

"I can't answer you that," said Kathleen, flinging out her hands. "I did what I was made to do. I am a rebel by nature. I believe I shall always be a rebel. I shall go home to father and mother and tell them I am not suited for a school like this. But don't expel Ruth, and don't expel the others."

"But we will all go if you are not kept," suddenly cried one of the sixty, Kathleen never quite knew which; and suddenly one girl after another began to speak up for her, and all promised that if Kathleen were allowed to remain, and if the whole story of the great rebellion was allowed to blow over, they would work as they had never done before. They wanted their queen to stay with them. Would the governors forgive their queen, just because she was an Irish girl and like no one else?

How it came to pass it was impossible to tell. There was something about Kathleen—the bold, bright, and yet generous look on her face, the love which darted out of her eyes when she grasped Ruth's hand—that even impressed Miss Mackenzie. She said after a pause that she was willing to reconsider matters, and that she and all the other governors would meet in