The next morning Claire was introduced to the scene of her new labours,
and was agreeably impressed with its outside appearance. Saint
Cuthbert's High School was situated in a handsome thoroughfare, and had
originally been a large private house, to which long wings had been
added to right and left. On each side and across the road were handsome
private houses standing in their own grounds, owned by tenants who
regarded the High School with lively detestation, and would have borne
up with equanimity had an earthquake swallowed it root and branch.
Viewed from inside, the building was less attractive, passages and
class-rooms alike having the air of bleak austerity which seems
inseparable from such buildings; but when nine o'clock struck, and the
flood of young life went trooping up the stairways and flowed into the
separate rooms, the sense of bareness was replaced by one of tingling
vitality.
As is usual on an opening day, every girl was at her best and brightest,
decked in a new blouse, with pigtails fastened by crisp new ribbons, and
good resolutions wound up to fever point. To find a new French mistress
in the shape of a pretty well-dressed girl, who was English at one
moment, and at the next even Frenchier than Mademoiselle, was an
unexpected joy, and Claire found the battery of admiring young eyes an
embarrassing if stimulating experience.
Following Miss Farnborough's advice, she spent the first day's lessons
in questioning the different classes as to their past work, and so
turned the hour into an impromptu conversation class. The ugly English
accents made her wince, and she winced a second time as she realised the
unpleasant fact that just as her pupils would have to prepare for her,
so would she be obliged to prepare for them! Forgotten rules of grammar
must be looked up and memorised, for French was so much her mother
tongue that she would find it difficult to explain distinctions which
came as a matter of course. That meant more work at night, more
infringement of holiday hours.
The girls themselves were for the most part agreeable and well-mannered.
The majority were the daughters of professional men, and of gentle-
folks of limited means; but there was also a sprinkling of the daughters
of better-class artisans, who paid High School fees at a cost of much
self-denial in order to train their girls for teachers' posts in the
future. Here and there an awkward, badly-dressed child was plainly of a
still lower class. These were the free "places"--clever children who
had obtained scholarships from primary schools, and were undergoing the
ordeal of being snubbed by their new school-mates as a consequence of
their success.
From the teacher's point of view these clever children were a welcome
stimulus, but class feeling is still too strong in England to make them
acceptable to their companions.
At lunch-time the fifteen mistresses assembled in the Staff-Room, a dull
apartment far too small for the purpose, a common fault in High Schools,
where the different governing bodies are apt to spare no expense in
providing for the comfort of the scholar, but grudge the slightest
expenditure for the benefit of those who teach.
Fifteen mistresses sat round the table eating roast lamb and boiled
cabbage, followed by rhubarb pie and rice pudding, and Claire, looking
from one to the other, acknowledged the truth of Miss Rhodes's assertion
that they were all of a type. She herself was the only one of the
number who had any pretensions to roundness of outline, all the rest
were thin to angularity, half the number wore pince-nez or spectacles,
and all had the same strained pucker round the eyes. Each one wore a
blue serge skirt and a white blouse, and carried herself with an air of
dogmatic assurance, as who should say: "I know better than any one else,
and when I speak let no dog bark!" The German mistress was the veteran
of the party and was probably a good forty-five. Miss Bryce, the
Froebel mistress, paired with Claire herself for the place of junior.
Miss Blake, the Gym. mistress, was a graceful girl with an air of
delicacy which did not seem in accord with her profession. Miss Rose,
the Art mistress, was plain with a squat, awkward figure.
Rising from the table, Claire caught a glimpse of her own reflection in
the strip of mirror over the chimney-piece, and at the sight a little
thrill, half-painful, half-pleasant, passed through her veins. The soft
bloom of her complexion, the dainty finish of her dress, differentiated
her almost painfully from her companions, and she felt a pang of dread
lest that difference should ever grow less. While she affected to read
one of the magazines which lay on a side table, she was really occupied
making a number of vehement resolutions: Never to slack in her care of
her personal appearance; never to give up brushing her hair at night;
never to wear a flannel blouse; never to give up manicuring her hands;
never, no, never to allow herself to grow short-sighted, and be obliged
to submit to specs!
The different mistresses seemed to be on friendly terms, but there was
an absence of the camaraderie which comes from living under the same
roof. School was a common possession, but home hours were spent apart,
except when, as in Claire's own case, two mistresses shared the same
rooms, and it followed as a matter of course that personal interests
were divided. To-day the conversation was less scholastic than usual,
the intervening holidays forming a topic of interest. The Art mistress
had been on a bicycle sketching tour with a friend; the German mistress
had taken a cheap trip home; Miss Blake announced that all her money had
gone on "hateful massage," and the faces of her listeners sobered as
they listened, for Sophy Blake, who led the exercises with such verve
and go, had of late complained of rheumatic pains, and her companions
heard of her symptoms with dread. What would become of Sophy if those
pains increased? One after another the mistresses drifted over to where
Claire sat turning the pages of her magazine, and exchanged a few
fragments of conversation, and then the great bell clanged again, and
afternoon school began.
The first half-hour of afternoon school proved the most trying of the
day. Claire was tired after the exertions of the morning, and a very
passion for sleep consumed her being. She fought against it with all
her might, but the yawns would come; she fought against the yawns, and
the tears flowed. To her horror the infection spread, and the girls
began to yawn in their turn, with long, uncontrolled gapes. It was a
junior class, and the new mistress shrewdly suspected that the infection
was welcomed as an agreeable interlude. It was obvious that she could
not afford to reject that cup of coffee. Good or bad it must be drunk!
Rich or poor that penny must be dedicated to the task of vitalising that
first hour of sleepiness.
At the end of six weeks Claire felt as though she had been a High
School-mistress all her life. The regular methodical days, in which
every hour was mapped out, had a deadening effect on one who had been
used to constant variety, and except for a difference in the arrangement
of classes there seemed no distinction between one and the other. She
was a machine wound up to work steadily from Monday morning until Friday
night, and absurdly ready to run down when the time was over.
Every morning after breakfast she started forth with Miss Rhodes, by
foot if the weather were fine, by Tube if wet; every mid-day she dined
in the Staff-Room with the fifteen other mistresses, and gulped down a
cup of chicory coffee. At four o'clock the mistresses met once more for
tea, a free meal this time, supplemented by an occasional cake which one
of the fifteen provided for the general good. At five she and her table
companion returned to their rooms, and rested an hour before taking the
evening meal.
Claire was sufficiently French to be intolerant of badly cooked food,
and instead of resigning herself to eat and grumble, after the usual
habit of lodging-house dwellers, resolutely set to work to improve the
situation. The coffee machine had now a chafing-dish as companion, and
it was a delightful change of work to set the two machines to work to
provide a dainty meal.
"High Tea" consisted as a rule of coffee and some light dish, the
materials for which were purchased on the way home. On hungry days,
when work had been unusually trying, the butcher supplied cutlets, which
were grilled with tomatoes, or an occasional quarter of a pound of
mushrooms: on economical days the humble kipper--legendary food of all
spinsters in lodgings!--was transformed into quite a smart and
restaurant-ey dish, separated from its bones, pounded with butter and
flavouring, and served in neat little mounds on the top of hot buttered
toast. Moreover, Claire was a proficient in the making of omelettes,
and it was astonishing how large and tempting a dish could be compounded
of two eggs, and the minutest scrap of ham left over from the morning's
breakfast!
"Every luxury of the season, with the smell thrown in! In _nice_
cooking the smell is almost the best part. All the cedars in Lebanon
wouldn't smell as good at this moment as this nice ham-ey coffee-y
frizzle," Claire declared one Friday evening as she served the meal on
red-hot plates, and glowed with delight at her own sleight of hand.
"Don't you admire eggs for looking so small, when they possess such
powers of expansion? All the result of beating. Might make a simile
out of that, mightn't you?"
"Might, but won't," the English teacher replied, sipping luxuriously at
her coffee. "I'm not a teacher any more at this moment. I'm a
gourmand, pure and simple, and I'll stay a gourmand straight on till
this omelette is finished. When all trades fail, you might go out as a
missioner to women living in diggings, and teach them how to prepare
their meals, and sell chafing-dishes by instalment payments at the door,
as the touts sell sewing machines to the maids. It would be a noble
vocation!"
Claire smirked complacently. "I flatter myself I _have_ made a
difference to your material comfort! Poor we may be, but we do have
nice, dainty little meals, and there's no reason why every able-bodied
woman shouldn't have them at the same cost. I've just remembered
another nice dish. We'll have it to-morrow night." She paused, and a
wistful look came into her eyes, for the next day was Saturday, and it
was on holiday afternoons that the feeling of loneliness grew most
acute. School life was monotonous, but it was never lonely; from
morning to night one lived in a crowd, and already each class had
furnished youthful adorers eager to sit at the feet of the pretty new
mistress, and bring her offerings of chocolates and flowers; for five
long days there was always a crowd, always a hum and babble of voices,
but at the end of the week came a dead calm.
On the first Saturday of the term Miss Farnborough had invited the new
French mistress to tea, and had been all that was friendly and
encouraging; but since that time no word had passed between them that
was not strictly concerned with the work in hand, and Claire realised
that as one out of sixteen mistresses she could not hope for frequent
invitations.
On one Sunday the Gym. mistress had offered her company for a walk, and
there the list of hospitalities ceased. No invitations came from that
friend of Mrs Fanshawe's who was so fond of girls who were working for
themselves. Claire had hardly expected it, but she was disappointed all
the same. A longing was growing within her to sit again in a pretty,
daintily-appointed room, and talk about something else than time-tables,
and irregular verbs, and the Association of Assistant Mistresses which,
amalgamated with the Association of Assistant Masters and the Teachers'
Guild, were labouring to obtain a settled scale of salaries, and that
great safeguard, desired above all others, a pension on retirement!
On this particular Friday evening the longing was so strong that she had
deliberately gone out of her way to try to gain an invitation by walking
home with a certain Flora Ross in the sixth form, who was the most
ardent of her admirers. Flora lived in a cheerful-looking house about a
quarter of a mile from the school, and every morning hung over the gate
waiting for the chance occasions when her beloved Miss Gifford
approached alone, and she could have the felicity of accompanying her
for the rest of the way. On these occasions she invariably turned to
wave her hand to a plump, smiling mother who stood at a bay window
waving in return. An upper window was barred with brass rods, against
which two little flaxen heads bobbed up and down. Both the house and
its inmates had a cheerful wholesome air, which made a strong appeal to
the heart of the lonely girl, and this Friday afternoon, meeting Flora
waiting in the corridor, she had accepted her companionship on the way
home with a lurking hope that when the green gate was reached, she would
be invited to come inside.
Alas! no such thought seemed to enter Flora's brain. She gazed
adoringly into Claire's face and hung breathlessly on her words, but for
all her adoration there was a gulf between. Claire was the sweetest and
duckiest of mistresses, but she _was_ a mistress, a being shut off from
the ordinary interests of life. When Flora said, "Isn't it jolly, we
are going to have a musical party to-morrow! We have such lovely
parties, and mother always lets me sit up!" she might have been speaking
to a creature without ears, for all the consciousness she exhibited that
Claire might possibly wish to take part in the fray. When the green
gate was reached, the plump mamma was seen standing outside the drawing-
room window and recognising the identity of her daughter's companion,
she bent her head in a courteous bow, but she made no attempt to
approach the gate.
"See you on Monday!" cried Flora fondly, then the gate clicked, and
Claire walked along the road with her head held high, and two red spots
burning on either cheek. That evening for the first time she felt a
disinclination to change into the pretty summer frock which she had
chosen as a compromise for evening dress; that evening for the first
time the inner voice whispered to her as it had done to so many before
her: "What's the good? Nobody sees you! Nobody cares."
Miss Rhodes finished her share of the omelette, turned on to bread and
jam, and cast a glance of inquiry at her companion, who had relapsed
into unusual silence.
"Anything wrong?"
"Yes, I think so. Usual symptoms, I suppose. I want to wear all my
best clothes and go out to do something gay and exciting, Cecil!" The
English teacher's name being Rhodes, it was obvious that she should be
addressed as Cecil, especially as her parents had been misguided enough
to give her the unsuitably gentle name of Mary. "Cecil, do none of the
parents _ever_ ask us out?"
"Why should they?"
"Why shouldn't they? If we are good enough to teach their children, we
are good enough for them. If they are interested in their children's
welfare, they ought to make a point of knowing us to see what kind of
influence we use."
"Quite so."
"Well?"
"Well, my dear, there's only one thing to be said--they _don't_! As I
told you before, there's a prejudice against mistresses. They give us
credit for being clever, and cultivated, and hard-working; but they
never grasp the fact that we are human girls, who would very much enjoy
being frivolous for a change. I _have_ been asked out to tea at rare
intervals, and the mothers have apologised for the ordinary
conversation, and laboriously switched it on to books. I didn't want to
talk books. I wanted to discuss hats and dresses, and fashionable
intelligence, and sing comic songs, and play puss-in-the-corner, and be
generally giddy and riotous; but my presence cast a wet blanket over the
whole party, and we discussed Science and Art. Now I'm old and
resigned, but it's hard on the new hands. I think it was rather brutal
of your mother to let you come to London without taking the trouble of
getting _some_ introductions. Don't mind me saying so, do you?"
Claire smiled feebly.
"You have said it, anyhow! I know it must seem unkind to anyone who
does not know mother. She's really the kindest person in the world, but
she's very easy-going, and apt to believe that everything will happen
just as she wishes. She felt quite sure that Miss Farnborough and the
staff would supply me with a whirl of gaiety. There _was_ one lady, who
said she would write to a friend--"
Cecil groaned deeply.
"I know that friend. She comes from Sheffield. A dear kind friend who
would love to have you out on holidays. A friend who takes a special
interest in school-mistresses. A friend who gives such nice inter-est-
ing parties, and would certainly send you a card if she knew your
address. Was that it, my dear--was that the kind of friend?"
Cecil chuckled with triumph at the sight of Claire's lengthening jaw.
In truth there seemed something uncanny in so accurate a reproduction of
Mrs Fanshawe's description. Was there, indeed, no such person? Did
she exist purely as a dummy figure, to be dangled before the eyes of
credulous beginners? Claire sighed, and buried her last lingering hope;
and at that very moment the postman's rap sounded at the door, and a
square white envelope was handed in, addressed in feminine handwriting
to Miss Claire Gifford.
Claire tore it open, pulled forth a white card, gasped and flushed, and
tossed it across the table with a whoop of triumph.
"Raven, look at that! What do you think now of your melancholy croaks?"
Cecil picked up the card, inscribed with the orthodox printed lines,
beneath which a few words had been written.
Mrs Willoughby,
At Home
May 26th, 9 p.m.
Music.
"Have just received your address from Mrs Fanshawe. Shall hope to see
you to-morrow.--E.B.W."
Cecil screwed up her face in disparagement.
"Nine o'clock. Mayfair. That means a taxi both ways. Can't arrive at
a house like that in a mackintosh, with your shoes in a bag. Much wiser
to refuse. It will only unsettle you, and make you unfit for work.
She's done the polite thing for once, because she was asked, but she'll
never do it again. I've been through it myself, and I know the ropes.
A woman like that has hundreds of friends; why should she bother about
you? You'll never be asked again."
But at that Claire laughed, and beat her hand on the table.
"But I say I shall! I say I'll be asked _often_! I don't care if
you've had a hundred experiences, mine shall be different. She has
asked me once; now, as the Yankees say, `it's up to me' to do the rest.
I'll make up my mind to make her _want_ to ask me!"