A Fourth Form Friendship (3 page)

Unfortunately, though Aunt Bertha had great experience and excellent skill in the making of jams and the care of linen, she had no aptitude for the handling of human souls. She was a stout, bustling, unimaginative, prosaic person, without an atom of romance or sentiment in her composition. A nature such as Aldred's was beyond her comprehension. She tried to do her best for the child, but it was such an unsympathetic best that it had the unhappy effect of setting a barrier between herself and her niece which neither seemed able to pass. Long and lucidly would Aunt Bertha reason and expound, and enjoin habits of neatness, order, and punctuality. All to no purpose! Arguments never appealed to Aldred. She would listen with an air of don't-care indifference, and do just the same next time. Yet if her aunt could have given her one warm kiss, the battle would have been won. It was a sad pity, for the girl had in reality a very sweet disposition, though at present it was like a neglected garden, where a few choice blossoms might be found, struggling with ugly weeds that threatened sometimes almost to strangle the flowers.

The precise governess carefully chosen by Aunt Bertha had not helped matters. She found her pupil bright indeed, but only ready to work by fits and starts, and quite unmoved by fear of punishment, or promise of reward. So strong at last had the friction grown that Miss Perkins had herself resigned her post, and recommended that Aldred should be packed off to school.

"I have done my utmost," she said to Miss Laurence, "but I feel that I am a complete failure. I have no influence over Aldred, and she is not making the slightest progress. In the circumstances I cannot honestly continue to teach her. In my opinion a little strict discipline is what she requires, and the sooner she experiences it the better."

The decision to send her away (long held over her head as a threat), instead of daunting Aldred, had delighted her. Aunt Bertha was much relieved. She had dreaded a storm when the question was raised, and though she considered it a bad characteristic in a girl to be glad to leave home, she felt it removed a difficulty when her niece accepted the situation so readily.

To Aldred the idea of forming herself on the prim pattern of her aunt was intolerable. She was ready to copy anybody whom she loved and admired, but to be obliged to repress her enthusiasms, and reduce her ideals to the level of the commonplace, seemed like being forced into a box too small to contain her.

"Aunt Bertha never understands," she thought. "She says I must try to grow up now, and be sensible. If growing up means getting cold and calm and stupid, and taking everything as a matter of course, I'd rather not. I'll just stop a child always, however hard they may try to make me different!"

Such was Aldred at the time our story begins,--a mass of contradictions, so wayward and yet so winning, a mixture of good impulses and weak points, equally ready to join a crusade or to follow the multitude to do evil; waiting, like a gaily painted but rudderless vessel, to be launched on to the stormy ocean of school life.

Mabel Farrington

Birkwood Grange was a rambling, roomy stone house, built at the edge of a breezy common, within sight and sound of the sea. It was a pleasant spot for a school; beyond stretched the broad downs, covered with short, fine grass, through which the dazzling white road wound like a ribbon to the distant horizon. There was a sense of air and space as one looked over the green upland, where for miles the view was interrupted only by the sails of a windmill, or an occasional storm-swept tree, the slanting branches of which showed the direction of the prevailing gale. In front, the chalky cliffs descended sharply to the beach; and beyond them, now blue as turquoise, now gleaming silver, now inky black, as calm as a lake, or lashing into foaming spray, always changing, yet ever beautiful, lay the wide waters of the English Channel. On one side of the house was a walled kitchen-garden, and on the other a field for hockey; while in front a large lawn provided ample space for several tennis courts.

On the afternoon of September 14th The Grange presented an extremely lively and animated scene. Girls were everywhere--tall girls, short girls, fat girls, slim girls; some fair, some dark, some pretty and some plain; and all in a state of excitement, and chattering as fast as their tongues would wag. No anthill, or hive of bees about to swarm, could have seemed in a greater ferment; there was a constant hum of conversation, a continual patter of feet, and a succession of young people, always moving in and out, searching for friends, claiming old acquaintances, exchanging greetings, and passing on items of news. It was the first day of the autumn term; a fresh school year had begun, and the party of thirty-nine girls who constituted Miss Drummond's little community were once more assembled for a season of work and play. Several changes had taken place; most of the rooms had been re-papered and painted, and there were alterations in the time-table, a revised practising list, and an entirely modified arrangement of some of the classes.

Small wonder, therefore, that a babel of talk prevailed in every corner of the house, and that various groups of hair ribbons kept collecting and dispersing with the bewildering effect of a kaleidoscope, while such a general atmosphere of bustle and commotion pervaded the establishment as to turn the head of any onlooker in a complete whirl. Aldred, ensconced in an angle of a bow window, surveyed the whole spectacle, as yet, from the standpoint of an outsider. It is true, she had received a cordial welcome from Miss Drummond; she had been duly entered as a member of the Fourth Form; she had been allotted a desk in a classroom, a locker in the recreation-room, and a cubicle in a big, airy bedroom; and was already possessed of a pile of new books, a chest expander, and a hockey stick: yet, in spite of this initiation she was feeling decidedly like a fish out of water. She was not usually afflicted with shyness, but to find herself in the midst of a medley of strangers, all too occupied with their own affairs even to realize her existence, was a little disconcerting to even her easy self-confidence. She was beginning to wonder how long she would remain unnoticed, and was trying to screw up her courage to venture a remark to one of her nearest neighbours, when a plain girl in spectacles broke the ice.

"What's your name, and where do you come from?"

Aldred started at the abruptness of the question and turned to face the speaker, who continued with a smile: "We always put new-comers through a catechism. I want to know your age, and what class and dormitory you're in, and which teacher you're to learn music from, and whether you're going to take dancing and wood-carving. Oh! so you're in the Fourth--that's my form, as it happens. My name's Ursula Bramley, and I'm fourteen and a half. We have a very decent time at Birkwood. There's any amount of fun going on, as you'll soon find out. Wait till we start the Debating Society and the Cooking Class! Have you been measured yet for a gymnasium costume? Of course, there has not been an opportunity, but Miss Drummond is sure to see about it to-morrow--and a cooking apron too, if you haven't already got one."

Aldred replied as briefly as possible to these various interrogations, but Ursula seemed quite satisfied with "Yes" and "No" for an answer, and rattled on: "I'm rather sorry for you, being put in No. 2 dormitory, because you'll be with Fifth Form girls, and you can't expect them to be particularly chummy with you. If there had only been room, now, in No. 5! But we're full up, all six beds; there isn't even a corner for a shakedown. We have such jokes in the mornings, when we're getting up! It's a pity you'll be out of it. I'd like you to see Dora Maxwell acting a peacock; you'd simply scream! Of course, we daren't make too much noise, or we should have a monitress pouncing down upon us; but it's ever such fun, all the same. They're a very prim set in No. 2. They never lost a single order mark last term! Well, if you can't be in our dormitory you'll be with us in class, at any rate, and it isn't dull there by any means, I can tell you."

"How many girls are there in the Fourth Form?" asked Aldred.

"There were seven before, but you'll make eight. Why, most of them are in the room now, or on the lawn just outside, so I can point them out to you. That's Phoebe Stanhope standing by the fireplace,--the one with the long light pigtail and the blue blouse; she's talking to Lorna Hallam, and Agnes Maxwell is showing her camera to them both. Now, if you'll look through the window you'll see two girls walking arm in arm round the sundial; the fair one is Dora Maxwell, and the dark one is Myfanwy James. Dora is tremendously jolly; she and Myfanwy think of the most outlandish things to do. Why, one night they went to bed right underneath their bottom sheets, and put their pillows over their faces, and when Freda Martin (that's our prefect) came to turn out the lights she thought they weren't there at all, and was just going to make a tremendous fuss, when Myfanwy couldn't stand it any longer, and exploded! We six are in the same dormitory, and we're the greatest chums. We call ourselves 'The Clan', and each is pledged to back the others up through thick and thin, whatever happens."

"Who's the seventh girl in the class?"

"Mabel Farrington."

"And doesn't she belong to 'The Clan'?"

"Oh, no! Mabel wouldn't dream of such a thing."

"Why not?"

"Oh! because--well, she's rather particular. She's not very great friends with anybody."

"Don't you like her?"

"Like her? Yes; everybody likes Mabel. That's not the reason at all. Somehow she's a little different from other people. You see, her grandfather is Bishop of Holcombe, and her uncle is Lord Ribchester."

"You mean, she gives herself airs?"

"Not in the least; she's not at all conceited. But she never cares about playing tricks, and having all kinds of jokes, like the rest of us."

"Then she's a prig!"

"No, she isn't. Wait till you've seen her; she's extremely nice. As I said before, she always seems different--just a trifle above everyone else, perhaps."

"Which dormitory is she in?"

"She's allowed a bedroom to herself, and she's the only girl in the school who has one--even the monitresses have to sleep in cubicles."

"Why is she so specially privileged?"

"Her mother, Lady Muriel Farrington, is a friend of Miss Drummond's. I believe Mabel was sent here rather as a favour, because Miss Drummond was so anxious to have her at The Grange."

"Then you all make a fuss over her?"

"No, not particularly; but we certainly like her."

"I'm sure I shan't."

"You can't help it, when you know her. By the way, here she is now, coming in at the door. I must tell her who you are."

Aldred turned, and saw a girl of her own age, so remarkably pretty and attractive that, in spite of her preconceived prejudice against the aristocrat of the school, she could not repress a certain amount of admiration.

Mabel had a very fair complexion, with cheeks pink as apple blossom, a pair of frank, thoughtful blue eyes, straight features, and a quantity of beautiful red-gold hair that hung almost to her waist. Her expression was particularly pleasant and winning, and as she crossed the room in response to Ursula's call, and smiled a welcome to the new-comer, Aldred began already to reverse her unfavourable opinion.

"I'm glad we shall be eight in class now," said Mabel. "It's a much nicer number than seven. Don't you remember, last term Miss Drummond said she hoped we should get a new girl? Of course, we were Third Form then, but it has not made any difference to be moved up to the Fourth, except that we are going to have Miss Bardsley for a teacher, instead of Miss Chambers--we're just the same set altogether."

"I like our new classroom far better than the old one," remarked Ursula. "The desks are more comfortable, and there's a nicer view out of the window. From my place I can catch a little glimpse of the sea, if I screw my neck."

"Miss Bardsley won't let you crane your neck in school, I'm sure," said Phoebe Stanhope, who had joined the group. "She has the reputation of being much stricter than Miss Chambers."

"Ugh! Then I wish I could go back to the Third," declared Ursula.

"We'd a fairly easy time with Miss Chambers," said Lorna Hallam. "One could always give a headache as an excuse, if one didn't know one's lessons."

"I don't care for a slack teacher like poor Miss Chambers," put in Agnes Maxwell. "She has no more idea of keeping order than a jellyfish; I could teach as well myself."

"Go and tell Miss Drummond so, and propose that you should take the Third," laughed Ursula. "I should like to see her face when you suggest it!"

"There's the dressing-bell! Aldred, you must go and get tidy for tea, which will be ready in exactly ten minutes."

There was no doubt that Mabel Farrington was a particularly nice girl; the more Aldred saw of her, the more she liked her. Her popularity at The Grange was thoroughly well deserved, for it rested more on her character than on her social standing. She was extremely high-principled and conscientious, a plodding worker, and always anxious to uphold the general tone and credit of the school. If she had a fault, it was her exclusiveness. So far, though she was pleased with everyone, she had made no bosom friend, and, as Ursula had said, kept slightly aloof from the other girls in the form.

Aldred also found herself rather left out; "the clan" of six were so thoroughly absorbed in their own interests, so taken up with various amusements, secrets, and private jokes that could not be shared by anyone who did not sleep in their dormitory, that it was impossible for them to include her in their fun.

They were not unkind to her, but they simply took no notice of her; and as the Fifth Form girls in No. 2 dormitory were equally stand-off, Aldred's first week at The Grange was a very lonely one.

It was an unpleasant and unwelcome experience for her; she had come to school full of confidence that she would win immediate favour, and it was humiliating to find herself not appreciated as she had expected.

After her first catechism by Ursula no one had exhibited further curiosity about her home or her family; and any information which she volunteered was received without enthusiasm. It was plain that "The Clan" thought her of small consequence, and did not trouble to cultivate her acquaintance.