A Secret Society
Carmel seldom asserted herself, but if she set her heart on an object
she generally managed to persuade people to her way of thinking. This
case proved no exception, and she contrived with little difficulty to
transfer the amazed but willing Milner temporarily into the service of
Major Rogers, and to instal Everard, minus his chauffeur's uniform, and
looking once more an Ingleton, to drive the Daimler car back to
Cheverley Chase. Perhaps the talk which Major Rogers had with his
one-time "Johnson" partly worked the miracle. Exactly what he said was
entirely between themselves, but Everard burst out into eulogies
regarding the Major to Lilias, who was still his chief confidante.
"One of the best chaps I've ever met! A real good sort! I shan't forget
what he said to me. I can tell you I've come to look at things in a
different light lately. I'll do anything he suggests. I'd trust his
advice sooner than that of anybody I know. I'll have a good talk with
Bowden, and see if he agrees. By Jove! I shall be a surprise packet to
him, shan't I?"
Mr. Bowden was not nearly so much astonished as Everard had anticipated.
He took his ward's return quite as a matter of course, and, lawyer-like,
at once turned to the business side of affairs. After running away and
gaining his own living for so many months, it was neither possible nor
desirable for Everard to go back to Harrow. He had broken the last link
with his school days, and must face the problem of his future career.
His grandfather had wished him to go on to Cambridge, and his guardian
also considered it would be advisable for him to take a university
degree. Meantime his studies were very much in arrears. He had never
worked hard at school, and would need considerable application to his
books before being ready to begin his terms at college. By the advice of
Major Rogers, Mr. Bowden decided to engage a tutor to coach him at the
Chase. The house would be perfectly quiet while the girls and the
younger boys were away at school, and as Everard really seemed to take
the matter seriously, he might be expected to make good progress.
In the matter of a tutor, Major Rogers was fortunately able to recommend
just the right man. Mr. Stacey had been studying for orders at Cambridge
when he was called up, and had joined the army. After serious wounds in
France he had made a slow recovery, and though perfectly able to act as
coach, he would be glad of a period of quiet in the country before
returning to Cambridge. He was a brilliant scholar and a thoroughly good
all-round fellow, who might be trusted to make the best possible
companion for Everard in the circumstances. The whole business was fixed
up at once, and he was to arrive within ten days.
"I'm sorry we shall just miss seeing him!" said Carmel to Everard, on
the evening before the girls went back to Chilcombe Hall. "But I shall
think of you studying away at your Maths. You're clever, aren't you,
Everard? I don't know much about English universities, but isn't a
Tripos what you work for at Cambridge? Suppose you came out Senior
Wrangler! We _should_ be proud of you!"
"No fear of that, I'm afraid, Carmel! I'm a long way behind and shall
have to swat like anything to get myself up to even ordinary standard.
Burn the midnight oil, and all that kind of weariness to the flesh!"
"But you'll do it!" (Carmel was looking at him critically.) "You've got
the right shape of head. Daddy and one of his friends, Signor Penati,
were fearfully keen on phrenology, and they used to make me notice the
shape of people's heads, and of the Greek and Roman busts in the
museums. It's wonderful how truly they tell character: the rules hardly
ever fail."
"What do you make of my particular phiz, then, you young Sicilian
witch?"
"Great ability if you only persevere; a noble mind and patriotism--your
forehead is just like the bust of the Emperor Augustus. You'd scorn
bribes, and speak out for the right. I prophesy that you'll some day get
into Parliament, and do splendid work for your country!"
"Whew! I'm afraid I'll never reach your expectations. It's a big order
you've laid down for me."
"You could do it, though, if you try. Oh, don't contradict me, for I
know! I haven't studied heads with Signor Penati for nothing. First
you're going to make a good master of the Chase, and then you'll help
England."
"Not of the Chase, Carmel," said Everard gently. "We've argued that
point out thoroughly, I think."
"No, no! Let me tell you once again that I don't want to be mistress
here. I only came over to England to please Mother and Daddy. I'm going
back to Sicily to live, as soon as I can choose for myself. Directly I'm
twenty-one I shall hand over the Chase to you. You're a far more
suitable owner for it than I am. I feel that strongly. It ought never to
have been left to me. But I'll put all that right again. Why can't you
take it?" she continued eagerly, as Everard shook his head. "Surely I
can give it to you if I like? Why not?"
"Why not? You're too young yet to understand. How could I be such an
utter slacker and sneak as to accept your inheritance? It's unthinkable.
Put that idea out of your little head, for it can never happen. As for
the rest of your prophecy, it's a long climb to get into Parliament. I'm
nothing like the man you think me, Carmel, though I'm going to make a
spurt now, at any rate. Don't expect to find me a Senior Wrangler by
Christmas though. Mr. Stacey will probably tell you I'm an utter
dunderhead."
"I shall quarrel with him if he does!" said Carmel decidedly.
The three girls went back to school on the following day, half regretful
to leave the Chase, but rather excited at the prospect of meeting their
companions. Now that Carmel had got over her first stage of
homesickness, she liked Chilcombe and had made many friends there. She
intended to enjoy the autumn term to the best of her ability. She had
brought the materials for pursuing several pet hobbies, and she settled
all her numerous possessions into her small bedroom with much
satisfaction. She kept the door into the Blue Grotto open, so that she
might talk during the process. Gowan, also busy unpacking, kept firing
off pieces of information, Bertha flitted in and out like a butterfly,
and girls from other dormitories paid occasional visits.
Phillida, who was a prime favorite, presently came in, and installing
herself on the end of Dulcie's bed, so that she could address the
occupants of both bedrooms, began to draw plans.
"I've got an idea!" she announced. "It's a jolly good one, too, so you
needn't smile. It's a good thing somebody does have ideas in this place,
or you'd all go to sleep! Well, it's this. I really can't stand the
swank of those girls in the Gold bedroom. They seem to imagine the
school belongs to them. They're not very much older than we are, indeed
Nona is actually six weeks younger than Lilias, and yet they give
themselves the airs of all creation. Just now Laurette said to me: 'Get
out of my way, child!' Child, indeed! I'm fifteen, and tall for my age!
I vote that we start a secret society, just among our own set, to resist
them."
"Jolly!" agreed Dulcie. "A little wholesome taking down is just what
they need. Laurette's the limit sometimes. Whom shall we ask to join?"
"Well, all of you here, and myself, and Noreen, and Prissie, and Edith.
That would make nine."
"Quite enough too," said Gowan. "A secret society's much greater fun if
it's small. Things are apt to leak out when you have too many members. I
take it we want to play an occasional rag on the Gold bedroom? Very
well, the fewer in it the better."
"What shall we call our society?" asked Dulcie.
"'The Anti-Swelled Headers' would about suit," suggested Lilias.
"No, no! That sounds as if we were afraid of getting swelled head
ourselves--at least anybody might take it that way."
"There's a big secret society in Sicily called 'The Mafia,'" vouchsafed
Carmel.
"Then let us call ours 'The Chilcombe Mafia.' No one will understand
what we mean, even if they get hold of the name. Indeed I shouldn't mind
casually mentioning it now and then, just to puzzle them. When things
get bad, 'The Mafia' will take them up."
"Strike secretly and suddenly!" agreed Dulcie with a chuckle.
"Let's sign our names at once!" declared Phillida enthusiastically.
At Carmel's suggestion, however, they made rather more of a ceremony of
the initiation of their new order. The prospective members retired into
the wood above the garden, and in strict privacy took an oath of
secrecy and service. Then, with Edith's fountain pen filled for the
occasion with red ink, they inscribed their autographs on a piece of
paper, rolled it up, placed it in a bottle, then solemnly dug a hole,
and buried the said bottle under a tree.
"It will be here for a testimony against any girl who breaks her oath!"
declared Phillida. "Carmel says the real Mafia sign their names in
blood, but I think that's horrid, and red ink will do quite as well.
Just as I was coming out now, Laurette said to me; 'Oh, don't go running
away, because I want one of you younger ones to do something for me
presently.' She said it with the air of a duchess!"
"Cheek!" agreed the others. "It's high time we made up a society against
her!"
Many and various were the offences that were laid to Laurette's score.
Lilias had a private grievance, because she fancied that Laurette had
never been so civil to herself and Dulcie since it was known that their
brother was not to inherit the Chase. Gowan, who liked plain speaking,
accused Laurette of telling "fiblets"; Bertha had had a squabble over
the bathroom, and Prissie a wrestle for the piano.
"Laurette always reminds me of that rhyme that the undergrads made up
about the Master of Balliol," said Edith.
"'Here come I, my name is Jowett,
All there is to know, I know it;
I'm the head of this here College,
What I don't know isn't knowledge!'
That's Laurette's attitude exactly. She's so superior to everybody!"
"We'll take her down, don't worry yourself!" smiled Dulcie. "We must
just wait for a good opportunity, and then----"
"The secret hand will smite!" laughed Carmel, who enjoyed the fun as
much as anybody.
Laurette's aggravatingly superior pose was especially apparent in her
attitude towards the mistresses. She monopolized Miss Herbert, treated
her almost like a friend, wrote notes to her, left flowers in her
bedroom, and walked arm-in-arm with her in the garden. Perhaps the
mistress was lonely, possibly she was flattered by receiving so much
attention, at any rate she allowed Laurette to be on terms of great
intimacy, and gave her a far larger share of her confidence than was at
all wise. Laurette, after a hot affection lasting three weeks, got tired
of Miss Herbert, and suddenly cooled off. Gowan and Carmel, going into
the sitting-room one day, found her discussing her former idol with a
group of her chums.
"Do you call her pretty? Well, now, I _don't_!" she was saying
emphatically. "She may have been pretty once, but now she's getting
decidedly _passée_. I can't say I admire faded sentimental people!"
"Sentimental?" said Truie. "I shouldn't call her sentimental at all.
She's only too horribly practical, in my opinion!"
"You don't know her as I do! My dear! The things she's told me! The love
affairs she's been through! I had the whole history of them. And she
used to blush, and look most romantic. It was all I could do not to
burst out laughing. You'd scream if I were to tell you! First there was
a clergyman----"
"Here, stop!" interrupted Gowan, breaking abruptly into the
conversation, and turning two blazing blue eyes on Laurette. "Anything
Miss Herbert may have told you was certainly in confidence, and to go
and blab it over the school seems to me the meanest, sneakiest trick
I've ever heard of! You're an absolute blighter, Laurette!"
"Well, I'm sure! What business is it of yours, Gowan Barbour, or of
Carmel Ingleton's either? Cheek!"
"It _is_ our business!" flared Carmel, as indignant as Gowan. "It's
horribly mean to make friends with any one, and hear all her secrets,
and then go and make fun of them!"
"It's playing it low!" added Gowan, determined to speak her mind for
once. "And I hope somebody will make fun of _you_ some day just to
serve you right! Some day _you'll_ be _faded_ and _passée_, and people
will giggle and say you haven't 'got off' in spite of all your efforts,
and they wonder how old you really are, and they remember when you came
out, and you can't be a chicken, and they don't like to see 'mutton
dressed like lamb,' and all the rest of the kind pleasant things that
people of your type find to say. _I_ know! Well, I shan't be in the
least sorry for you! It will be a judgment!"
Laurette had made a desperate attempt to interrupt Gowan's flow of
words, but she might as well have tried to stop the brook. When Gowan
began, she never even paused for breath. Her wrath was like a whirlwind.
Laurette's three chums had turned away as if rather ashamed, and began
hastily to get out books and writing-materials. They pretended not to
notice when Laurette looked at them for support.
"Yes, you needn't think Truie and Hester and Muriel will back you up!"
continued Gowan. "Unless they're as mean as you are. There! I've
finished now, so you needn't butt in! You know exactly what I think of
you. Come along, Carmel!"
The two immediate results of this episode were a bitter feud between
Laurette and Gowan, and a sympathetic interest in Miss Herbert by all
the members of the Mafia. They felt that her confidence had been
betrayed, and they would have liked somehow to make it up to her. They
brought so many floral offerings to her bedroom that her vases were
almost inconveniently crowded.
Carmel, hearing that she was collecting post cards, sent home for some
special ones of Sicily; Dulcie tendered chocolates; Lilias crocheted her
a pincushion cover, and Bertha painted her a hair-tidy. She accepted
their little kindnesses with mild astonishment, but not a hint of the
real reason of their sudden advances flashed across her mind.
"We mustn't let her suspect!" said Dulcie.
"Rather not!" agreed Carmel.
"Not for worlds!" said Gowan emphatically.