The Christmas Holidays
"Stir-up Sunday" seemed to come almost directly after Sylvia's
birthday, and the girls began to count the weeks eagerly until the
holidays. There were many ingenious devices for marking the passage of
time. Hazel Prestbury cut notches on her ruler, Connie Camden put
twenty-two stones on her mantelpiece and threw one out of the window
every morning, and Nina Forster scored the calendar hanging in her
bedroom each evening with a very black lead pencil.
"I live only ten miles away," said Linda, "so I haven't a long
journey, have I? The first term I used to go home for weekends, but
Miss Kaye said it unsettled me, and she asked Mother to let me stay at
school like the other girls. I don't mind it now; it's rather nice
here on Saturdays and Sundays."
There still seemed a good deal to be done before the end of the term
arrived. All the girls had been working in the evenings at dressing
dolls and making other presents for a Christmas tree that was to be
given to the poor children attending a ragged school at Aberglyn. They
liked the employment, especially as Miss Kaye would come sometimes and
read aloud to them while they sewed.
"And there isn't anybody in the world who can read so beautifully as
Miss Kaye," said Linda.
"When I was at Mrs. Harper's school," said Hazel, "we were helped to
make Christmas presents to take home, instead of doing things for
ragged schools. I worked a most lovely afternoon-tea cloth; Mother's
quite proud of it still. I wish we did that here."
"I don't," said Marian. "I suppose you only like doing things for
yourself."
"It wasn't for myself. It was for my mother. How nasty you always are,
Marian!"
"It was for home, at any rate," retorted Marian. "Miss Kaye says we
can be quite as selfish for our families as for ourselves, and we
ought to remember outside people at Christmas, who don't get any
presents, and who won't give us nice things back."
"Well, really!" said Hazel; "do you mean to tell me I'm not to make
presents for my mother and my aunts?"
"I didn't say anything of the sort. You can give those too, but Miss
Kaye said they oughtn't to be the only ones. Even heathens are fond of
their own families, and it's not particularly generous just for all to
give things round in a circle."
"Well, we've done plenty for the ragged schools this year," said Nina,
reviewing the row of dolls in their pretty bright frocks, the wool
balls, the knitted reins, and the scrapbooks which formed the
contribution of the class. "They'll look splendid hanging on the
tree."
"I wish we could go and see the treat," said Sylvia.
"Miss Kaye won't let us do that," replied Linda. "She's afraid we
might catch measles or chicken-pox."
"I always go to our treats at home," said Jessie Ellis.
"Your father's a clergyman, so you're sure to," said Marian. "We do
sometimes, to the Scholars' Tea or the Congregational Teaparty.
Gwennie and I help to pass cups and hand the cake, while Mother pours
out."
"Let us tell what we're each going to do in the holidays," said Hazel.
"You go on, Marian, as you've begun. Don't you have anything but
school treats?"
"Of course we do," answered Marian. "We go on New Year's Eve to our
grandfather's, and have a big family party with all our cousins.
Everybody has to play a piece, or recite poetry, or do something, and
it's ever so jolly. We sit up till midnight, and bring in the New
Year. And we go skating with our brothers, and slide on the pond, and
if there's any snow we toboggan down the hill on teatrays and have
snowball fights with some boys who live near. It's great fun."
"Yes, lovely fun!" echoed Gwennie.
"I go to so many parties!" said Hazel. "I always have three or four a
week, and we give a dance ourselves too. Last year I went to the
Mayor's Children's Fancy Ball. I was dressed as a Dresden china
shepherdess, with a flowered skirt and a laced bodice and paniers, and
a big hat, and a crook in my hand. It's only to be a plain ball this
Christmas. Then there are the pantomimes; we generally go to two and
sometimes to the circus as well, and any concerts or entertainments
that may happen to be on. Now, Connie, it's your turn to say."
"There are so many of us," began Connie, "Mother says it's like a
party to see us all sitting round the table. We play games amongst
ourselves, and get up acts and charades. We have a huge room at the
top of the house, where we may make as much noise and mess as we like.
Sometimes the boys give a magic-lantern show up there, or make shadow
pictures. And Bertie has a lathe, and turns all kinds of jolly things
in it out of pieces of wood; and he helps us to build boats; and we
sail them across the reservoir; and we go long walks on the moors; and
we've a little hut at the end of the garden, with a stove in it where
we cook things. We make the most glorious toffee! I wouldn't change my
holidays for anybody else's!"
"They do sound nice," said Nina. "I go about with my sisters. They're
quite grown up, and they take me to pay calls. Then my brother's at
home as well, and he and I have fun together. I'm asked to plenty of
parties, but Mother is so terribly afraid of my catching cold that I
miss quite half of them. I don't always go to the pantomime, because
of draughts. I like the summer holidays best, when we stay at the
seaside. Jessie, you haven't said yet."
"I don't know what to tell," said Jessie, who was not gifted with
great powers of description.
"Oh, but you must say something! I don't suppose you spend the
holidays in bed."
"Well, no!" said Jessie, laughing. "Though I did once, when I had
scarlet fever. I go walks with my brother, and we help to decorate the
church, and people ask us to tea. I think that's all."
"I still think mine are the nicest," said Hazel. "Linda, we want
yours."
"We live quite in the country," said Linda. "The carol singers come on
Christmas Eve, and we ask them in and give them hot coffee. There's a
big pond, where we skate if it freezes hard enough, and once, when
there was very deep snow, we had out our sledge. Sometimes we stay
with Granny in London, and then we go to the pantomime and the circus,
and have a lovely time. We've got a new puppy, and I want to teach him
some tricks these holidays. Now, Sylvia, you're the last."
"I've nobody to do anything with," said Sylvia rather wistfully,
almost forgetting, in listening to the glowing accounts of the others,
how she had once said she did not wish for young companions. "Not at
home at any rate; but of course there are parties, and we have people
to tea. I just read and paint, and do things by myself."
The girls appeared to consider this must be very slow, and pitied
Sylvia to such an extent that she was quite surprised.
"I'm perfectly happy," she remonstrated.
"But it can't be so nice as having brothers and sisters," said Marian
in her decisive manner. "I should miss our little ones most
dreadfully, and Fred and Larry too. Holidays wouldn't be holidays
without seeing them. I think it must be wretched to be an only child."
Talking of the holidays did not make them come any the faster, and
there was plenty of hard work to be gone through before the end of the
term arrived. For the first time in her life Sylvia had real
examinations. She rather enjoyed the solemnity of the occasion, the
typed questions, the large sheets of lined paper with margins ruled in
red ink, the clean blotting paper, the new pens, and even the awesome
silence of the room, with Miss Arkwright sitting at her desk reading
instead of teaching as usual. She came out top in history, grammar,
and geography, but Marian beat her easily in French, writing, and
arithmetic, and in the end their marks were so exactly even that they
were bracketed together.
Then there was an agitating afternoon when everybody had to recite
poetry to Miss Kaye, each being expected to choose a different piece.
Sylvia selected "John Gilpin", which she had learnt with Miss Holt,
but unfortunately grew nervous and got so mixed that she was obliged
to sit down in confusion, and hear Marian sail glibly through "The
Little Quaker Maiden", a poem which she rendered with great effect.
Connie Camden and Jessie Ellis had a furious quarrel as to which
should say "Hohenlinden", that being the shortest on the list of both;
but in the end Jessie gave way and took "The May Queen" instead.
Miss Denby did not allow the music to be neglected, and made each
pupil learn a grand Christmas piece which seemed to need much more
practising than any other, and had the added ordeal that it must be
played on the last day before an audience of the whole school.
The party which was always held on the Saturday before breaking-up was
also a new experience to Sylvia. The first class acted a short French
play, under the excited direction of Mademoiselle, who had spent much
time in coaching them for their parts. The second class took a scene
from _The Midsummer-Night's Dream_. Trissie Knowles made a pretty
Titania, and Stella Camden such a mischievous Puck that everybody
clapped heartily, though Miss Barrett said she was only acting her
natural character, and of course it came easily to her. Connie Camden
climbed up and sat on the window sill in order to see better, and fell
down with a terrible crash, grazing her knee on a form and making a
big bump on her forehead, and Dolly managed to upset a bottle of ink
which Miss Coleman thought she had put most securely away.
When the plays were over, the girls had dancing and games in the large
classroom, and finished with a dainty supper of fruit, cake, and
jellies, which fully justified Linda's remark that "Heathercliffe
House seemed almost as much parties as school".
Then came the exciting afternoon when the boxes were carried down from
the boxroom and everybody set to work to pack, with the help of the
monitresses and Miss Coleman. It was a most delightful, noisy,
blissful time, when there were no forfeits if one ran into anybody
else's room, or even jumped on the bed, when nobody had to practise or
learn lessons, and one could shout and sing in the schoolroom. Connie
Camden flung her history up to the ceiling, and did not mind in the
least when it lost its back in its descent.
"Miss Arkwright will be dreadfully cross about it when we begin
history again," said Marian.
"I don't care! That's a whole month off, and we've all the holidays
first. No school for four weeks, and going home to-morrow! Hooray!"
shouted Connie at the pitch of her lungs, waltzing among the desks
with such vigour that she knocked over the blackboard, and got a
scolding after all from Miss Arkwright, who happened at that moment to
enter the room.
"You must control yourself, Connie. I can't have such wild behaviour
even if it is the last day," she said firmly.
"Oh, Miss Arkwright," cried Connie, "you can't want to go home half as
badly as I do!"
"Indeed I do," said the mistress. "I shall enjoy my holidays quite as
much as anybody, though I have learnt not to dance round the desks to
show my pleasure."
The girls laughed. The idea of Miss Arkwright executing a Highland
fling or a jig between the forms tickled their fancy.
"I could imagine Miss Kaye doing it easier than Miss Arkwright,"
whispered Linda. "She did dance a reel, you know, at the party."
Everybody got into bed that night with the happy feeling that boxes
were packed and ready, and that to-morrow morning, when the last
necessaries were popped in, they would only need to be strapped and
labelled, and then the joyful opening would be at home. Most of the
girls were too excited to eat much breakfast, but Miss Kaye, knowing a
reaction would probably take place in the train, had provided packets
of sandwiches and biscuits, and did not scold for once at the
half-finished plates of porridge.
At ten o'clock cabs began to drive up to the door, and parties of
chattering, laughing girls departed to the railway station under the
care of Miss Barrett.
Sylvia had enquired anxiously some time ago if Mercy were to stay at
school, having a secret hope that she might persuade her mother to ask
her friend home with her, but May Spencer had already given an
invitation which Miss Kaye had allowed Mercy to accept.
Linda's parents drove over to fetch her, so Sylvia had the pleasure of
making their acquaintance. There was not time to do much more than
shake hands, still it was nice to see the father and mother of whom
Linda had spoken so often, and hear them express a wish that she
should some day pay a visit to Craigwen.
Sylvia was to travel with Miss Coleman, who would pass through Crewe,
where Mrs. Lindsay had arranged to meet her, and she had the four
Camdens and Sadie and Elsie Thompson as companions for part of the
way. The Camdens were welcomed at a wayside station by a jolly crew of
brothers, who appeared to have reached home first, and the Thompsons
were handed over at Chester to a gloomy-faced aunt, who did not look
particularly pleased to receive them, and remarked at once how fast
they had worn out their clothes.
"I wish I could have taken them home with me, poor little dears," said
Miss Coleman afterwards in the train, "but my sister is ill, and
could not do with any noise. Perhaps their aunt may brighten up more
at Christmas, and remember that she too was once a child, and then we
must see what can be managed for them at Easter."
At last came the longed-for arrival at Crewe, the anxious search among
the crowd in the station, and the joyful sight of not only Sylvia's
mother but her father also, hurrying along the platform. She hugged
them both as if she had not seen them for years instead of eleven
weeks.
"My precious child," exclaimed Mrs. Lindsay, "I declare you have
grown, and are ever so much fatter, and you've quite a colour too!"
"School evidently agrees with you, Sylvia," said her father. "It's a
good thing you went, isn't it?"
"It was quite different from what I thought it would be," Sylvia
confided to her mother when they sat in the drawing-room together for
a long talk after tea. "Miss Kaye isn't cross, she's lovely and kind;
and even Miss Arkwright isn't bad, and I like Marian better than I
did, and I just love Linda and Mercy. I tried to explain about Mercy
in my letters, but I'm afraid you didn't exactly understand, so I'll
have to tell it you over again. And Marian and I were both bracketed
together top, and Miss Arkwright said we must be friends and not
rivals, and I quite forgot the middle of "John Gilpin", and made a
horrible mistake in my Christmas piece; but Miss Kaye said I might
tell you that she thought I had done very well, but my report will
come in a day or two, so then you can see everything for yourself."
Sylvia had a particularly happy holiday, and thought she enjoyed home
twice as much with having been away from it for a whole term. Her
father found time to label the specimens in her museum, and to show
her how to develop her photographs and print them afterwards, and her
mother gave up the afternoons specially to be with her. All her
friends came to her New Year's party, and to her astonishment she
found she got on perfectly well with the once-detested Fergusson boys,
who now seemed hardly more lively than Connie or Stella Camden, and
who did not tease her, since, as they described it, "she had left off
putting on airs". Her experiences with the little ones at school made
her quite motherly with Bab and Daisy Carson, and she enjoyed the
games with Effie and May as much as they did.
"You said you wouldn't care to run about when you came back," they
reminded her, "but you play more with us now than you did before."
"I believe Sylvia has learnt it as part of her lessons," said Aunt
Louisa, who looked on with much approval, adding quietly to Mrs.
Lindsay: "The child is immensely improved. She is brighter and
stronger and better in every way. I was sure Miss Kaye would soon work
a change, and I think we may feel that so far our experiment has been
a complete success."