04 The Head Girl of the Chalet School (25 page)

Miss Carthew glanced at her. “Yes; she is beginning to grow up, a little. But you needn’t regret it, Grizel.

We shall need some of our elder middles to grow up, for so many of you big girls are leaving this term.”

Grizel nodded. “I know,” she said. “Gertrud, Luigia, Lisa, Eva, Dorota, and me. Rosalie may go too, if her people come home, as they were saying. That leaves very few of our original girls indeed. Jo will be sixteen next term, though it hasn’t seemed possible till this last day or two. I think she will make a splendid senior, don’t you?”

“Yes,” said Miss Carthew. “She has been very young for her age, of course; but this has made her older.”

“Well, can you wonder? She adores Madame. We all do that, of course; but with Jo it’s something much bigger.”

“Someone else has grown tremendously this year, Grizel,” said Miss Carthew, as she passed through the gate the head-girl held open for her. “You have been a splendid head-girl, dear. I don’t know who will follow in your steps, but, whoever she is, she will have her work cut out to keep up with you four.”

Grizel coloured. “Thank you, Miss Carthew,” she said simply. “I
have
tried.”

“And succeeded.” The mistress laid her arm round the slender shoulders of the girl at her side. “I am only sorry I shall not he here next term to see how the school goes on when you, the last of the original ‘big’

girls, have left.”

Grizel sighed. “That’s the worst of getting fond of a place! You have to leave it. But after all, Miss Carthew, you are going because you are getting married. I’ve got to go because my people say so. Well, I’ve had four gorgeous years, and after all – I’m almost eighteen now; week after next I shall be – I suppose I’ve had my fair share of school-life. But I wish it wasn’t coming to an end. I’d give worlds if I could think I might come back here to teach, like Juliet! But I never shall. I wouldn’t teach music for anything on this earth, and father won’t let me have a physical training, as I want. He won’t even let me go to the Royal Holloway College to read maths., as I used to want. I did think he would agree to that, but he won’t. It’s to be two years in Florence, and then home, I suppose!”

Miss Carthew looked down at the pretty face at her shoulder. She was a very tall woman, and Grizel was small. Her curly crop somehow made her look older than the floating curls had done, and the mistress realised that the girl was growing up almost as fast as Joey. “Things may turn out differently, Grizel,” she said gently. “In two years’ time you will be twenty. Other things may have come into your life by that time –you might not want to come back.”

“Do you mean I might want to marry?” asked Grizel. “I don’t think so, Miss Carthew. I can’t imagine it, anyway.”

“Not now; and it’s as well not to worry about it till it comes – if it does. But if it does, Grizel, it’s one of the ends for which God made woman. Never forget that. Madame loved her school. She still loves it. But I think she would tell you that she is happier now than she ever thought she could be.”

She changed the subject after that. It was one rarely touched on at the Chalet School, although, in the very nature of things, the majority of these girls must go home to wed. Gisela and Wanda were going this term.

Probably it would not be long before others followed their example. Grizel would be far more alone presently than she had ever been before, and Miss Carthew felt that a word spoken now might come back as a help later on when she had to be entirely responsible for her own actions.

Grizel referred to it when they went in at the summons of the bell for
Fruhstuck
. “I will remember, Miss Carthew,” she said. “Thanks for what you said just now.”

There was no need for anything more, and Miss Carthew smiled gratefully at the girl. She was able to guess how shy Grizel felt of saying anything about it at all.

They went in to find Cornelia and Frieda in the middle of a battle royal – a rare thing for quiet Frieda, who lived up to the meaning of her name on most occasions, and had earned for herself the title of “Peacemaker”

among them.

Frieda wouldn’t, and Cornelia scarcely dared say what was wrong, so Grizel had to content herself with administering a conduct mark apiece to them, and sending them into
Fruhstuck
with the remark that they ought both to be ashamed of themselves.

“I’m not!” said Cornelia defiantly.

“Then you ought!” snapped Frieda, so surprisingly, that Grizel nearly sent her to Matron to have her temperature taken. It was so unlike Frieda.

Cornelia contented herself by pulling a face at her adversary, and Grizel thought it wiser to take no further notice. As the priest was at Briesau, there would be Mass today, and most of the girls, including Frieda, would go with Mademoiselle and Miss Carthew. The rest would have their own little service with Miss Wilson and Miss Annersley. That would separate the pair for the morning, and in the afternoon she meant to keep them apart if she could.

“Cornelia’s a perfect little brute,” she thought, as she ate her rolls and honey. “Just like what I used to be.

Mercy, Simone! What
is
the matter?” For Simone had suddenly dissolved into tears. Matron, who was sitting at the next table, took matters in hand at once. She had been glancing across, wondering what made the head-girl so grave, and she had caught sight of Cornelia administering a sharp nip to her next-door neighbour.

“Mademoiselle, will you excuse Cornelia?” she said, rising.

“Certainly, Matron,” said Mademoiselle, who at the distant staff-table had seen nothing. “Go with Matron, Cornelia. Simone, why do you weep?”

Simone pulled herself together, and murmured something unintelligible to anyone. Seeing that she appeared to be all right, Mademoiselle ceased her inquiries. She knew her young cousin to he given to tears on all occasions, and came to the conclusion that the child was missing Joey, whom she adored. That Matron’s abstraction of Cornelia had anything to do with it never struck her at the time.

Meanwhile the new girl was marched off by Matron, and up to sick-room, where she was ordered to take off her clothes and go to bed.

“Why?” she demanded.

“You know well enough why,” retorted Matron. “If you really don’t, you can spend your time between now and
Mittagessen
in finding out! For sheer unpleasant, cowardly tricks, Cornelia Flower, you beat everything in my experience. A good whipping is what you deserve!”

Cornelia dared say no more. Matron was a martinet, and – well, that pinch bestowed on Simone would have an unpleasant sound if it were retailed to Mademoiselle. She undressed herself slowly and got into bed, while Matron closed the jalousies after opening the slats to let the air in. “There you stay till one o’clock,”

she said grimly, when she had seen Cornelia between the sheets. “If ever I catch you at such a nasty thing again, miss, I’ll take you straight to Mademoiselle! So just remember that, please! And don’t you dare to stir till I give you permission!”

With that she marched out, closing the door behind her, and leaving a thoroughly rebellious Cornelia to toss about and listen to the gay voices of the others as they wandered about the grounds in the interval before they went to church. She would have set Matron to defiance if she had dared. But even Cornelia the rebel drew the line at that. They were all rather in awe of Matron, and she was no exception to the rule. So she stayed there all through the pleasant, sunny hours, thinking how she could revenge herself on Jo, Matron, Frieda, Simone, and Grizel, whom she quite unfairly included in her vendetta, since that young lady had had no idea as to why she had been suddenly deprived of the American child, and was still wondering, since Matron had given her no explanation.

To Mademoiselle Matron had simply said that Cornelia was behaving very badly at table, and she had sent her to bed as punishment. Mademoiselle, her thoughts with her young Head on the Sonnalpe, had scarcely listened, and merely replied that it was all right.

The greater part of the school was, of course, Roman Catholic, so only a very few were present in the big school-room for the little service they had there, and inquiries as to Cornelia’s whereabouts were only answered by Grizel’s statement that Matron knew about it. When service was over the girls put on their hats, since the sun was hot, and once more went into the garden. Most of them got chairs and books and read quietly till the others came home. But Mary Burnett, Margia and Amy Stevens, and Signa Johansen elected to bring cushions, and sit under the great lime-tree that grew near the sick-room window. On the still air their voices floated up to the prisoner, and, even as Grizel herself had done long since, she heard their opinion of her stated in clear unvarnished terms

“I don’t like Cornelia,” said Amy, apparently
apropos
of nothing; for Margia answered, “Who on earth asked you to? And what makes you drag her up so suddenly?”

“Well, I was wondering where she was,” explained Amy. “No one’s seen her since Matey hauled her out from
Fruhstuck
.”

“She’s no loss,” declared Mary. “She’s an absolute little brute. Evadne’s a monkey, but she’s straight enough!”

“Cornelia tells lies,” observed Amy slowly.

“She cheats,” added Margia, who had already had one battle with Cornelia over the question.

“It’s a jolly good thing she’s not a Guide! She’d let us down wholesale!”

“Perhaps it’s Guides she needs,” suggested Mary. “After all, Margia, that’s what Guides are for – to help people to play straight.”

Grizel’s voice was to be heard at this juncture calling Mary, so she evidently went, for Cornelia heard her no more. However, Signa had something to say on the subject. “Is it because Cornelia is American and not English zat she does not play zee game?”

“Rats!” said Margia. “That’s got nothing to do with it! Evvy’s American, and she’s as straight as a die!

No; it’s just general nastiness.”

They must have gone away after this, for Cornelia heard no more, but what she
had
heard had roused every bad feeling in her. She literally squirmed as she lay there thinking, thinking what she could do. Suddenly she sat up, rubbing her fair hair out of her eyes. “The caves!” she said aloud. “That’s how I can get back at them!”

Till that moment she had never given another thought to the caves since Thursday, which had been so eventful. Now they came rushing back to her memory. She knew no more than she had heard on that day, but she had realised then that they were of enormous importance to Jo. She had said something about the school having discovered them. Well, if she, Cornelia, were to go and find out the way herself, it wouldn’t he the school, because she meant to write to her father and ask him to take her away at the end of the term. If she coaxed hard enough, she felt sure he would! Then, if she had to go and look for them, it would give the people in charge a nice fright when she wasn’t to be found. It was a lovely plan!

She was so pleased with herself that she actually laid still, and when Matron came upstairs an hour later to tell her to get up and dress, she found the child sound asleep. It took some shaking to waken her, she was so sound, but Matron accomplished it at last, and bade her hurry up and come downstairs. “And just try and keep your hands to yourself for the future!” she concluded.

Cornelia got up meekly, and dressed herself and came downstairs, looking, so Margia said, as if butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. Inwardly she was hugging herself with glee over her plan. She was very subdued for the rest of the day, and Matron, watching her, congratulated herself on having found a method of subduing a most unsubduable child. But all the time she was watching her opportunity, and late in the afternoon, she managed to catch Marie von Eschenau alone, and asked her to come for a stroll.

Marie was a very nice child, but she was by no means clever. She felt sorry for Cornelia, who had had such a had morning of it, so she agreed, and by the time they came in for
Kaffee und Kuchen
, Cornelia knew as much as she did about those caves. She also knew just why Jo Bettany was so keen on finding them.

Cornelia had never spent a winter here, so she was unable to appreciate the reason behind Jo’s idea, and it struck the American child as “rather mad, but just like that horrid Jo!” She didn’t say so to Marie, who would have been up in arms at once at the merest suggestion of it. All she
did
say was, “What a funny idea!”

“But I think it is a very good one,” said Marie in her soft, pretty voice. “The people here are so poor, and such a sight would mean a great deal to them. So I hope Jo and Grizel find the caves, for that would be a very nice thing to he able to say that it was they who had done it; though I know they do not think of it that way.”

Cornelia said nothing, and as the bell rang just then, summoning them to
Kaffee und Kuchen
, she had a good excuse for making no answer. But to herself she thought, “Oh,
will
they? I know better!”

CORDELIA FULLY INTENDED to carry out her great scheme as soon as possible, but various events occurred which made it impossible. To begin with, she was watched carefully by Matron and the prefects.

Matron’s opinion of the young lady was that she was a little demon, and goodness knew what she would do if left to herself. The prefects’ impression was that there was more in her than met the eye. Grizel, who had herself been a nuisance in the early days of the school, was aware that the American child was quite likely to break out sooner or later, so warned the others to he careful.

Time was fully planned out at the school, and, though the girls had a certain amount of freedom, there was also a good deal of supervision -more so than in many English boarding-schools. Besides, in the summer term there was always more to do, and the girls devoted a great deal of their time to games. All played tennis, and most of them were keen about cricket. Games were compulsory, and had to be played in the evenings, as the afternoons in summer were very hot as a rule. Work began at half-past eight, and went on till a quarter to one. This included preparation periods. After
Mittagessen
there was an hour’s rest, when they went to their cubicles and lay down. After that they had singing, sewing, hand-work, or music-lessons.