01 The School at the Chalet (22 page)

Never had the afternoon seemed so long to the Juniors. When at length Miss Maynard said, ‘Five minutes to four! Pack up your books and get ready for tea!’ they all sighed audibly with relief, much to her astonishment. She had barely taken her departure before a righteously indignant Grizel dashed in.

‘Where’s Joey Bettany?’ she cried. ‘Jo, you little horror, how dared you mess up the keys like that?’

‘I didn’t!’

‘She didn’t!’ ‘It wasn’t Jo!’ exclaimed several voices at once.

‘But she knew all about it! I know that!’

‘Jolly well I did! But I didn’t do it,’ returned Jo stoutly.

‘Then who did? I never heard of such nerve in my life! Who did it?’

‘Me,’ said a small voice, and Grizel turned to stare incredulously at the baby of the school.

‘Amy! You!’

Amy raised angelic blue eyes to the startled face above her. ‘Yes. It was a joke!’

‘Well! I-I’m-I’m jiggered!’ declared Grizel flatly.

She went slowly out of the room to her own quarters, where all the coaxing and teasing of the other Seniors could not get out of her what was wrong with her, and it was only after Gisela and Bette had heard from the delighted Juniors what had occurred that they understood. Then they were almost as startled as Grizel herself. Amy was the last person they would have suspected of such a trick. Margia, Joey, Maria, even Suzanne might have done it. But Amy! The Seniors were completely flabbergasted.

As for Amy herself, she was in high glee over it, and cut capers to such an extent that she called down upon herself a sharp reprimand from Miss Maynard, who coached them for tennis, and who, of course, had no idea why Amy Stevens was behaving with such sudden wildness.

On their way home after tennis in the evening, Gisela summed up the state of affairs rather neatly to Bette.

‘Amy is becoming a schoolgirl and ceasing to be a baby,’ she said. ‘But one doesn’t expect it so suddenly.’

‘No,’ agreed Bette-they were talking in their own language-‘but I think you are right.’

‘I know I am,’ said the Head Girl with finality.

Chapter 20.

And Still More!

The Juniors, having begun to play pranks-all, it must be admitted, of fairly harmless character-found it too pleasant a pastime to give up. The night after the affair of the French-chalked piano-keys, Juliet, on going to bed, barely suppressed a wild yell when she entered her cubicle, for there, sitting up in her bed, was a figure that looked curiously lifelike in the half light. A closer inspection informed her that the creature was made of her own pillow, decked in her own pyjama jacket, with a boudoir cap, hastily manufactured out of two handkerchiefs, stuck on top, while beneath this an amiably smiling face drawn in coloured chalks on a sheet of white paper made the thing natural enough to have scared her badly for the moment.

Grasping the ridiculous object, she marched into the cubicle where Joey Bettany, who had caught the extraordinary sound she had made, was choking her laughter with the sheet.

‘Joey!’ said Juliet indignantly, ‘did you do this?’

‘I-I–’ Joey was incapable of uttering more at the moment. The sight of the weird object completely upset her.

Dropping it, Juliet took her by the shoulders and shook her. ‘Joey! Stop giggling, and tell me if you were so stupid!’

‘Well, stop shaking me then!’ retorted Joey, as well as she could for lack of breath.

‘You deserve more than shaking, you little horror!’ declared Juliet, releasing her as she spoke.

‘If anyone hears you, there’ll be a row,’ said Joey calmly. ‘It’s “lights-out” for me, and you’re not supposed to talk to me now.’

Juliet was rendered speechless by her virtuous air, but she soon recovered herself.

‘Well, upon my word!’ she said. ‘For cool check, that beats everything! It would serve you right if I took this thing to Madame!’

‘You won’t, though,’ returned Joey with confidence. She was leaning back against her pillow, smiling up at the older girl as she spoke.

Juliet suddenly laughed back at her. ‘No; you’re quite right-I won’t! But be careful, my child! I’ll have my r-r-revenge, so don’t forget!’

‘I won’t,’ replied Jo cheerfully. ‘What! Must you go? So sorry! Good-night!’

She turned over on her side and snuggled down, and Juliet, with rather a grim smile, left her. All the time she was preparing for bed she was turning ideas over in her mind. Just as she was kneeling down to say her prayers, a smothered shriek from Grizel brought her to her feet with a bound.

‘Grizel! What on earth’s the matter? Are you hurt? Oh–’

‘Those little beasts! ‘ spluttered Grizel, as she drew her curtain back. ‘ Look at that! Two brushes in my bed! ‘ She held them out as she spoke.

‘Little horrors! ‘ laughed Juliet. ‘ I had an effigy in mine!’

‘They must have gone mad!’ declared Grizel. ‘It’s all Joey, of course! She thinks of the things, even if she doesn’t do them.’

‘She does not!’ said a third voice indignantly. ‘ ‘Twas me did that!’

‘Girls! What are you thinking of? Juliet! Grizel! Why are you not in bed?’

They all jumped, as the outer curtains parted to show Miss Bettany.

‘Why are you not in bed?’ she repeated. ‘And why have you drawn back the curtains between your cubicle and Juliet’s, Grizel? You know it is against the rules?’

Silence answered her. On hearing her voice, Grizel had dropped the brushes, so she did not see them. As no one seemed to have an answer ready, she bade the two Seniors hurry into bed.

‘I will see you in the morning,’ she said coldly. ‘I am very disappointed in both of you. I thought you could be trusted to keep rules!’

With this she left the room, while two unhappy people stared at each other. Then Grizel drew the curtain again and retired to her bed, after she had pushed the brushes underneath it. Juliet followed suit, and a deadly silence filled the room. It continued next morning, and, when Grizel met Simone on the stairs, she drew to one side. Simone lifted her dark eyes to the Senior’s face with the glimmer of a smile, but Grizel tilted her head and stalked downstairs with an offended dignity, that was rather marred by her missing the last step and staggering somewhat ignominiously across the hall.

‘Grizel is furious!’ reported Simone to the others. ‘She would not regard me.’

‘If you mean “look at,” I’d say so,’ murmured Joey. ‘When are you going to my sister to say it’s your fault?’

Simone’s eyes fell, and she began to play nervously with the end of her girdle. ‘I-I don’t know,’ she stammered.

‘Why not? I should go after breakfast an’ get it over.’

‘Ye-yes!’

Joey turned and looked at her incredulously. ‘You surely don’t mean you’re goin’ to funk it?’ she demanded.

‘N-no! No! Of course I will go! Will -will Madame be very angry?’

‘Couldn’t say! Shouldn’t think so,’ was the laconic response.

‘Oh, Joey, do not be angry with me!’ pleaded Simone, half crying. ‘I will go certainly, and say it was my fault.’

‘Righto!’ said Joey. ‘Come on to breakfast-there’s the bell!’

Simone would have made only a poor breakfast had Joey not kept a watchful eye on her. As it was, she was persuaded to eat her usual meal. And then Joey went with her as far as the study door.

‘Buck up, old thing!’ she said cheerfully. ‘She can’t eat you, an’ I’ll wait for you here.’

Thus adjured, Simone went in after tapping at the door. Miss Bettany looked up in surprise when she saw her; she had been expecting Grizel and Juliet.

‘Well, Simone,’ she said,’ what is it, dear?’

‘Please, Madame, I am come to say that it was my fault,’ said Simone.

‘Your fault? What is your fault? I don’t understand.’

Simone took hold of her rapidly departing courage with both hands and said, ‘The-the disturbance last night-I did it!’

‘You did it? But it had nothing to do with you!’

‘Yes, Madame. I had put two brushes in Grizel’s bed.’

For a moment Madge’s lips twitched. Simone’s expression was so serious. Then she pulled herself together. ‘That was very silly,’ she said gravely.

‘Yes, Madame. I know it was,’ agreed Simone. ‘But you will forgive them, since the fault is to me?’

‘”The fault is mine,”‘ corrected her headmistress. ‘I will see Grizel and Juliet, Simone. And please don’t do such a silly thing again. Run away, now.’

Greatly relieved, Simone trotted off, after making her little regulation curtsy, and a minute or so later Grizel and Juliet presented themselves, inwardly quaking a little. They met with an agreeable surprise.

‘Simone has been to me,’ said Miss Bettany soberly, ‘and she tells me that it was her fault that there was a disturbance in the dormitory last night, so we will say no more about it. But remember that for the future even brushes in your bed will not be accepted as an excuse for breaking rules. You may go now.’

They bobbed their curtsies and went. Outside, they turned and looked at each other.

‘Jolly good for Simone,’ said Grizel. ‘I didn’t think she had it in her.’

‘Joey would make her,’ responded Juliet. ‘But it was plucky for her.’

‘Rather! Joey’s a sporting kid all round; she’s awfully good for the others.’

‘Yes; she just sees the straight thing to do, and does it. Hullo! There’s Wanda! Let’s trot out and talk to her!’

The next joke was a harmless one, that nobody minded except the perpetrators, but which had far-reaching consequences. Two days after Simone’s confession, Joey and Grizel came up to Gisela and solemnly informed her that on the fifteenth of July, which was St Swithin’s Day, it was the custom in all good English schools to sip a cup of water, which was passed round, and wish as one did so.

‘But first you must take it to any foreign mistress in the school,’ said Grizel impressively, meaning, of course, that the water should be offered to Mademoiselle.

As the two practical jokers had already played tricks of a similar nature on her, Gisela looked at them sharply. Neither had the ghost of a smile on her face, and Joey’s expression was super-angelic-a bad sign, which her sister would have recognised at once. Gisela, however, was not so experienced, and she was completely taken in.

‘The fifteenth-that is to-morrow,’ she said seriously. ‘ I will remember!’

‘What a lark! Didn’t think she’d be had so easily!’ chuckled Joey.

‘Neither did I,’ replied Grizel. ‘Sha’n't we crow over them to-morrow!’

Unfortunately, Gisela had misinterpreted one part of Grizel’s speech. In her eyes, of course, all three mistresses were foreigners, and both Joey and Grizel were thunderstruck when, just before prayers, the Head Girl advanced to the little dais where the staff was, and offering the cup of water, murmured in her pretty English, ‘The cup of water for a wish, as is the custom in all English schools on St Swithin’s Day.’

There was a moment’s silence. Miss Bettany looked puzzled, Miss Maynard choked audibly, and Mademoiselle wore an outraged expression. Then the headmistress, with one rapid glance round the room, took in the affair at once. Quietly she accepted the cup, and drank from it.

‘Thank you, Gisela,’ she said, as she returned it. ‘And now we will have prayers.’

The ensuing events were lost on Joey and Grizel, who were almost petrified with horror. They were more horrified when, after she had given out the notices for the day, Miss Bettany added, ‘I should like to see Josephine and Grizel in my study now, before lessons.’ Then she dismissed the school and went to her own room.

The culprits presently appeared. She waited till they had shut the door.

‘Now,’ she said,’ I want to know what Gisela meant.’

‘It-it was only a lark,’ mumbled Joey at last.

‘Please speak correct English, Josephine. Repeat your sentence.’

‘It-it was only a joke,’ repeated her small sister rather faintly.

Miss Bettany’s eyebrows went up at the statement.

‘A joke? I’m afraid your sense of fun is too elemental to appeal to me. I see nothing humorous in a silly trick like that. Who suggested it?’

Joey went scarlet; Grizel hung her head and said nothing. Truth to tell, she was rather scared. She had never encountered her headmistress in this mood.

‘Who suggested it?’ repeated Miss Bettany, in a voice that intimated that she meant to know sooner or later.

‘It was me,’ said Grizel at last, as sulkily as she dared.

‘Indeed? Your grammar seems to stand in as much need of correction as your idea of humour. Well, I am going to send for Gisela, and you will both apologise to her before me for your silly impertinence towards her.’ She rang her little bell as she spoke, and presently Marie appeared and was dispatched for Gisela.

The two sinners, meanwhile, were left to their own thoughts, as Miss Bettany occupied herself with her letters. Presently Gisela appeared, wearing a rather startled expression. ‘ You have sent for me, Madame?’

she said.

‘Yes, Gisela. Josephine and Grizel wish to express their regret for being impertinent enough to play a silly trick on you about St Swithin’s Day observances.’

Gisela’s face cleared at that. ‘But it is all right,’ she said. ‘I knew when I had offered you the water that it was a-a take-in!’

‘Nevertheless, it was very impertinent of them,’ replied Miss Bettany. ‘Girls!’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Joey. ‘I suppose it was cheek, Gisela, but I didn’t think of it; honest Injun!’

‘It is all right,’ repeated Gisela, bending and kissing her, much to Jo’s discomfort.

‘Now, Grizel,’ said the headmistress.

‘I’m sorry,’ mumbled Grizel, and she ducked to avoid the kiss.

Miss Bettany was wise enough not to insist on anything more. After dismissing the Head Girl, she said a few more words on practical joking, and then sent them to their formrooms, where Jo, at any rate, was soon immersed in her history. Not so Grizel. She was intensely proud, and hated apologising to anyone. Besides this, her headmistress’s strictures on her sense of humour had offended her dreadfully. She sulked till half-way through the morning, then the sudden memory of a joke she had once heard of as being played on a master at her cousin’s school came to her.

‘I’ll do that!’ she thought. ‘Perhaps that may not seem kiddish! At any rate it’ll be something to rag me for!