"Nora, Nora! Where are you?" called a clear, girlish voice, and Cara
Burt dashed headlong into a pretty bedroom all draped in white, where a
tall girl was standing by an open window. "Nora!" she cried, "what are
you doing up in your room at this hour, when we are all busy in the
garden preparing our tableaux? Mrs Hazlitt says that she herself will
recite `A Dream of Fair Women,' and by unanimous consent you are to be
Helen of Troy. Did any one ever suit the part so well? `Divinely tall,
and most divinely fair.' Why, what is the matter, Honora? Why have you
that frown between your pretty brows, and why aren't you just delighted?
There is not a girl in the school who does not envy you the part. Why
are you staying here, all by yourself, instead of joining in the fun
downstairs? It's a heavenly evening, and Mrs Hazlitt is in the best of
humours, and we are all choosing our parts and our dresses for the grand
scene. Oh, do come along, they are all calling you! There's that
tiresome little Deborah Duke--Mrs Hazlitt's right hand, as we call
her--shouting your name now, downstairs. Why _don't_ you come; what is
the matter?"
"There is this the matter!" said Honora Beverley, and she turned and
flashed two dark brown eyes out of a marvellously fair face full at her
companion. "I won't take the part of Helen of Troy; she was not a good
woman, and I will have nothing to do with her. I will be Jephtha's
daughter, or Iphigenia, or anything else you like, but I will not be
Helen of Troy."
"Oh, how tiresome you are, Nora! What does the character of Helen
matter? Besides, we are not supposed to know whether she is good or
bad. Tennyson speaks of her--oh, so beautifully; and we have just to
listen to his words, and the audience won't know, why should they? All
you have to do is just to steal out of the dusky wood and stand for a
minute with the limelight falling all over you, and then go back again.
It's the simplest thing in the world, and there's no one else in the
school who can take the part, for there's no one else tall enough, or
fair enough. Now, don't be a goose; come along, this minute."
"It's just because I won't be a goose that I have determined not to act
Helen of Troy," replied Honora. "Leave me alone, Cara; take the part
yourself, if you wish."
"I?" said Cara, with a laugh. "Just look at me, and see if I should
make a worthy Helen of Troy!"
Now, Cara was exceedingly dark, not to say sallow, and was slightly
below middle height and also rather thickly built, and even Nora laughed
when she saw how unsuited her friend would be to the part.
"Well, I won't be it, anyhow," she said, with a shrug of her shoulders.
"I don't want to take part in the tableaux, at all."
"Then you will disappoint Mrs Hazlitt very cruelly," said Cara, her
voice changing. "Ah, and here comes Deborah. Dear old Deb! Now,
Deborah, I am going to leave this naughty girl in your hands. She is
the most obstreperous person in the entire school, and the most beloved,
for that matter. Just say a few words of wisdom to her and bring her
down within five minutes to join the rest of us in the garden. I will
manage to make an excuse for her non-appearance until then."
As Cara spoke, she waved her hand lightly towards Nora, who was still
standing by the open window, and then vanished from the room as quickly
as she had entered it. After she had gone, there was a moment's
silence.
Nora Beverley was close on seventeen years of age. She was practically
the head girl of the school of Hazlitt Chase--so-called after its
mistress, who was adored by her pupils and was one of the best
headmistresses in England. Mrs Hazlitt possessed all the
qualifications of a first-rate high-school mistress, with those gentle
home attributes and that real understanding of the young, which is given
to but few. She had married, and had lost her only child; husband and
child had both been taken from her. But she did not mourn as one
without hope. Her endeavour was to help girls to be good, and true, and
noble in the best sense. Her education was, therefore, threefold,
embracing body, mind, and soul. Her school was not an especially large
one, never consisting of more than thirty girls, but the time spent at
Hazlitt Chase was one unlikely to be forgotten by any of them in after
life, so noble was the teaching, so systematic the complete training.
Mrs Hazlitt knew quite well that, to make a school really valuable to
her young scholars, she must be exceedingly careful with regard to the
girls who came there. She admitted no girl within the school under the
age of fourteen, and allowed no girl to stay after she had reached
eighteen years of age. The girl who came need not necessarily belong to
the aristocracy, but she must be a lady by birth, and must have brought
from her former schools or teachers the very highest recommendations for
honour, probity, and good living. She must, besides, be intellectual
above the average. With those recommendations, Mrs Hazlitt--who
happened to be exceedingly well off--made the money part a secondary
consideration, taking many a girl for almost nominal fees, although, on
the other hand, those who could pay were expected to do so generously.
So great, did the reputation of this school become that girls' names
were on the books often for years before they were old enough to be
admitted, and, in after years, to have belonged to that select academic
group who walked the old cloisters at Hazlitt Chase and played happily
in the ancient grounds was in itself a distinction.
It was now early in June. The school would break-up in about five
weeks--for Mrs Hazlitt never kept to the usual high-school dates--and
all the girls were deeply interested in those guests who were to
assemble to witness the distribution of prizes, to see an old play of
the time of Queen Elizabeth acted in the Elizabethan garden, and, in
especial, to behold the tableaux of that masterpiece of Tennyson--"A
Dream of Fair Women."
Mrs Hazlitt was remarkable for her gifts as a reciter, and had arranged
to tell the story herself in Tennyson's immortal words and to allow
those girls who were best suited to the parts to appear in the tableaux
during the recitation.
By common consent, to Nora Beverley was assigned the part of Helen of
Troy. Nora had been at the school almost since she was fourteen, and
had grown up in its midst a gentle, reserved, dignified girl, who never
gave her heart especially to any one particular person, but was admired
and respected by all. She was clever, without being ingenious; very
beautiful in appearance, and was known to be rich.
Cara Burt was supposed to be her special friend, and was sent to her now
on this occasion to desire her to come at once to Mrs Hazlitt, who was
seated in the old Elizabethan garden, and was choosing the different
girls who were to take part in the coming tableaux. Cara returned
somewhat slowly up the box walk and stood before Mrs Hazlitt with
downcast eyes.
"Well," said that good lady; "and where is Honora? You were some time
away, Cara; why has she not come with you?"
"I don't know whether she will come at all," said Cara. "She seems
very--I don't mean undecided, but decided against taking the part."
A swift red passed over Mrs Hazlitt's cheeks. She was evidently quite
unaccustomed to the slightest form of insubordination.
"Did you tell Nora that I desired her to be present?" was her remark.
"Yes--of course I did, Mrs Hazlitt. Oh, may I sit near you, Mary?"
Cara seated herself cosily beside Mary L'Estrange.
"I told her, Mrs Hazlitt, that you wanted her immediately, and where we
were all to be found, and that she was to be Helen of Troy."
"Well--and--?" said Mrs Hazlitt.
"She said she did not want to be Helen of Troy--that Helen of Troy was a
wicked woman, and that she would not take the part."
Again the colour swept across Mrs Hazlitt's face. "We must regard
Helen as visionary," she said, "a vision of womanly beauty. There is no
one in the school who can take her, except Honora, but I override no
one's scruples. I presume, however, that she will be gracious enough to
give me an answer."
The headmistress was too calm ever to allow her real feelings to be
seen, but the girls who knew her well, and who clustered round her now
in pretty groups, watched her face with anxiety. Jephtha's daughter did
not wish to be deprived of her part, nor did Cleopatra, nor did Fair
Rosamond, nor did Iphigenia. How dreadful of Helen of Troy if she upset
all the arrangements and made the pretty tableaux impossible!
"Oh, of course she will yield," said Mary L'Estrange. But Cara Burt
shook her head.
"Nobody knows Honora well, do they?" she said, in a semi-whisper to her
companion.
"Perhaps not," replied Mary; "and yet, she has been in the school for
years."
"I consider her exceedingly conceited," remarked Cara again, dropping
her voice. "But, oh! here comes Deborah--dear old Deborah--and no
Honora, as I am alive! Now I wonder what is going to happen."
Deborah Duke was the English teacher and general factotum in the school.
All the girls adored her. It was not necessary to worship her. She
was the sort of person round whose neck you could hang, whose waist you
could clasp, whose cheeks you could kiss, whom you could shake, if you
liked, if she were in a bad humour--but, then, Deborah was never in a
bad humour--whom you could go to in all sorts of troubles and get to
intercede for you. She was plain, and dumpy, and freckled.
Nevertheless, she was Deborah, the darling of the school. As to her
knowledge of English, it is very much to be doubted whether it was
specially extensive; but, at any rate, she knew how to coddle a girl who
was not quite well and how to put a bad-tempered girl into a good
humour, and how, on all and every occasion, to come between Mrs Hazlitt
and the children whom she taught. The girls all owned that they could
be afraid of Mrs Hazlitt, but of Deborah--never.
"Here you are, Deborah!" called out Cara. "Take this seat, won't you?
There is plenty of room between Mary and me. Sit down, and tell us when
Helen of Troy intends to put in her appearance."
"Why does not Honora Beverley come when I request her presence?" said
Mrs Hazlitt, speaking in that tone of majesty which always impressed
the girls.
"Honora is coming in one minute, Mrs Hazlitt, and she will explain
matters to you herself. I am very sorry," continued poor little
Deborah, whispering her latter remark to Mary and Cara. "She must have
a bee in her bonnet; no one else could object to represent Tennyson's
beautiful lines."
Just at that moment there came a slow step down the centre walk of the
Elizabethan garden. Its edges of box, which were clipped very close and
thick, slightly rustled as a white dress trailed against them, and then
a very slim girl, with the fairest of fair faces and a head of thick and
very pale golden hair stood in their midst. She was taller than all the
other girls, and slimmer, and there was a wonderful darkness in her
eyes. She was out of the common, for the soft brown of her eyes was
rare to find in so fair a face.
"You have sent for me, Mrs Hazlitt," said Honora, "and I have come."
"You have been very slow in obeying my summons, Honora," said Mrs
Hazlitt, in her gentlest tones.
"I am sorry," replied Nora.
She came a step nearer, and stood before her mistress. She slightly
lowered her eyes. The girls, who looked on in extreme wonder and
interest, hardly breathed while waiting for the conversation which they
knew was about to ensue.
"I am very sorry, indeed," repeated Honora, "but I was detained. I had
made up my own mind, but your messenger sought to unmake it."
"Well, Honora," said Mrs Hazlitt, briskly, "you know, dear, that we
have decided, amongst the other interesting events of the eighth of
July, that Tennyson's `Dream of Fair Women' shall be recited by myself,
and that, in order to give meaning and depth to the wonderful poem, I
mean to present a series of tableaux to our guests. This will be
nothing more nor less than that the `fair women' who are represented in
the poem shall appear just when their names are mentioned, and,
surrounded by limelight and suitably dressed in character, shall give
point to my recitation. By unanimous consent, you, Honora, are elected
to take the part of Helen of Troy. I have sent for you, dear, to tell
you this. I shall study the dress of the period and will write to-night
to a friend of mine at the British Museum, in order to be sure of good
and suitable costumes. You will have nothing to do but simply to stand
before the audience for a few minutes. I think I have got all the other
characters, and I have sent for you mainly to express my desire. You,
Honora, will be Helen, you understand?"
"I understand what you wish," replied Honora.
There was a question in her voice, which caused the other girls to look
at her attentively. Mrs Hazlitt paused; she did not speak at all for a
minute; then she rose slowly.
"Being my scholar," she said then, "is but to know and to obey. You
will be Helen of Troy. Now, girls, I think our pleasant meeting can
come to an end, and it is supper time. Deborah, go into the house and
see if supper is prepared in the north parlour. Good-night, girls; I
may not see any of you again this evening." But, before Mrs Hazlitt
could retire, Honora came a step forward and laid her hand on her arm.
"You are mistaken," she said. "You must listen. Another girl must be
found to take the part of Helen of Troy, for I refuse to act."
The light was growing dim, for it was getting on to nine o'clock, but
again the girls perceived that Mrs Hazlitt's cheek was flushed, and
that her eyes looked almost angry.
"What do you mean?" she said, coldly.
"I don't like the character, and I won't appear in the tableau as the
character, that is all."
"But, when I desire you to be the character--"
"I don't think you will force me against my conscience. This is a case
of conscience: I will not be Helen of Troy."
"Do you quite know what you are saying?"
"Quite."
"She spoke to me very explicitly," said Deborah. "It is, I think, a
matter of conscience."
"She gave me her mind, also," called out Cara. "Hush, Deborah. Cara;
when it is time for you to speak, I will call upon you to do so. Do you
clearly understand, Honora, what this means?"
"I don't know what it means, except that I will not be Helen of Troy."
"Then who is to be Helen of Troy?"
"Anybody who is sufficiently indifferent to take the part."
"I want to put things quite clearly before you, Honora. You understand
that, on the day when the parents of my pupils arrive here to see their
children, when relations and friends cluster in the old garden, it must
be a member of the school who takes part in all the tableaux and all the
different events."
"Yes, I understand that."
"Will you have the goodness to point out to me amongst my thirty girls
who else could be Helen, `divinely tall, and most divinely fair'?"
Honora's dark eyes seemed to sweep her companions for a moment. Then
she said, slowly:
"That is for you to discover; not for me."
"It means this, then," said Mrs Hazlitt, very slowly. "That because
you pretend to know more than I know, we are to give up the tableaux
altogether, for there is no one else in the school to take the part."
Honora shrugged her shoulders.
"I am sorry," she said.
"You won't yield?"
"I will not."
"You have displeased me extremely. You talk of this as a case of
conscience. I declare that it is nothing of the sort. Helen of Troy
was the symbol of all that is beautiful in woman. Her name has come
down through the ages because of her loveliness and gracious character.
When a schoolgirl like you attempts to override her mistress' maturer
judgment, she acts with wilfulness and ungraciousness, to say the least
of it."
"I am sorry," said Honora.
She turned aside. There was a lump in her throat. After a minute, she
continued:
"But I will not act Helen of Troy."
"That being the case, girls," said Mrs Hazlitt, who had quite resumed
her usual calm of manner, "we must forego the tableaux--that is unless a
suitable Helen of Troy can be found within twenty-four hours. I will
now wish you good-night. I am disappointed in you, Honora, very much
disappointed."