You might regulate your outward habit to the last button of what you
were expected to wear; you might conceal the tiny flaws and shuffle
over the big improprieties in your home life, which were likely to
damage your value in the eyes of your companions; you might, in brief,
march in the strictest order along the narrow road laid down for you by
these young lawgivers, keeping perfect step and time with them: yet of
what use were all your pains, if you could not marshal your thoughts
and feelings--the very realest part of you--in rank and file as well?
... if these persisted in escaping control?--Such was the question
which, about this time, began to present itself to Laura's mind.
It first took form on the day Miss Blount, the secretary, popped her
head in at the door and announced: "At half-past three, Class Two to
Number One."
Class Two was taking a lesson in elocution: that is to say Mr. Repton,
the visiting-master for this branch of study, was reading aloud, in a
sonorous voice, a chapter of HANDY ANDY. He underlined his points
heavily, and his hearers, like the self-conscious, emotionally shy
young colonials they were, felt half amused by, half-superior to the
histrionic display. They lounged in easy, ungraceful postures while he
read, reclining one against another, or sprawling forward over the
desks, their heads on their arms. It was the first hour after dinner,
when one's thoughts were sleepy and stupid, and Mr. Repton was not a
pattern disciplinarian; but the general abandonment of attitude had
another ground as well. It had to do with the shape of the master's
legs. These were the object of an enthusiastic admiration. They were
generally admitted to be the handsomest in the school, and those girls
were thought lucky who could get the best view of them beneath the
desk. Moreover, the rumour ran that Mr. Repton had once been an
actor--his very curly hair no doubt lent weight to the report--and
Class Two was fond of picturing the comely limbs in the tights of a
Hamlet or Othello. It also, of course, invented for him a lurid life
outside the College walls--notwithstanding the fact that he and his
sonsy wife sat opposite the boarders in church every Sunday morning,
the embodiment of the virtuous commonplace; and whenever he looked at a
pupil, every time he singled one of them out for special notice, he was
believed to have an ulterior motive, his words were construed into
meaning something they should not mean: so that the poor man was often
genuinely puzzled by the reception of his friendly overtures.--Such was
Class Two's youthful contribution to the romance of school life.
On this particular day, however, the sudden, short snap of the
secretary's announcement that, instead of dispersing at half-past
three, the entire school was to reassemble, galvanised the class.
Glances of mingled apprehension and excitement flew round; eyes
telegraphed [P.119] vigorous messages; and there was little attention
left for well-shaped members, or for the antics of Handy Andy under his
mother's bed.
But when the hour came, and all classes were moving in the same
direction, verandahs and corridors one seething mass of girls, it was
the excitement that prevailed. For any break was welcome in the
uniformity of the days; and the nervous tension now felt was no more
disagreeable, at bottom, than was the pleasant trepidation experienced
of old by those who went to be present at a hanging.
In the course of the past weeks a number of petty thefts had been
committed. Day-scholars who left small sums of money in their jacket
pockets would find, on returning to the cloakrooms, that these had been
pilfered. For a time, the losses were borne in silence, because of the
reluctance inherent in young girls to making a fuss. But when shillings
began to vanish in the same fashion, and once even half-a-crown was
missing, it was recognised that the thing must be put a stop to; and
one bolder than the rest, and with a stronger sense of public morality,
lodged a complaint. Investigations were made, a trap was set, and the
thief discovered.--The school was now assembled to see justice done.
The great room was fuller even than at morning prayers; for then there
was always an unpunctual minority. A crowd of girls who had not been
able to find seats was massed together at the further end. As at
prayers, visiting and resident teachers stood in a line, with their
backs to the high windows; they were ranged in order of precedence,
topped by Dr Pughson, who stood next Mr. Strachey's desk. All [P.120]
alike wore blank, stern faces.
In one of the rows of desks for two--blackened, ink-scored, dusty
desks, with eternally dry ink-wells--sat Laura and Tilly, behind them
Inez and Bertha. The cheeks of the four were flushed. But, while the
others only whispered and wondered, Laura was on the tiptoe of
expectation. She could not get her breath properly, and her hands and
feet were cold. Twisting her fingers, in and out, she moistened her
lips with her tongue.--When, oh, when would it begin?
These few foregoing minutes were the most trying of any. For when, in
an ominous hush, Mr. Strachey entered and strode to his desk, Laura
suddenly grew calm, and could take note of everything that passed.
The Principal raised his hand, to enjoin a silence that was already
absolute.
"Will Miss Johns stand up!"
At these words, spoken in a low, impressive tone, Bertha burst into
tears and hid her face in her handkerchief. Hundreds of eyes sought the
unhappy culprit as she rose, then to be cast down and remain glued to
the floor.
The girl stood, pale and silly-looking, and stared at Mr. Strachey much
as a rabbit stares at the snake that is about to eat it. She was a very
ugly girl of fourteen, with a pasty face, and lank hair that dangled to
her shoulders. Her mouth had fallen half open through fear, and she did
not shut it all the time she was on view.
Laura could not take her eyes off the scene: they travelled, burning
with curiosity, from Annie Johns to Mr. Strachey, and back again to the
miserable thief. When, after a few introductory remarks on crime in
general, the Principal passed on to the present case, and described it
in detail, Laura was fascinated by his oratory, and gazed full at him.
He made it all live vividly before her; she hung on his lips,
appreciating his points, the skilful way in which he worked up his
climaxes. But then, she herself knew what it was to be poor--as Annie
Johns had been. She understood what it would mean to lack your
tram-fare on a rainy morning--according to Mr. Strachey this was the
motor impulse of the thefts--because a lolly shop had stretched out its
octopus arms after you. She could imagine, too, with a shiver, how easy
it would be, the loss of the first pennies having remained
undiscovered, to go on to threepenny-bits, and from these to sixpences.
More particularly since the money had been taken, without exception,
from pockets in which there was plenty. Not, Laura felt sure, in order
to avoid detection, as Mr. Strachey supposed, but because to those who
had so much a few odd coins could not matter. She wondered if everyone
else agreed with him on this point. How did the teachers feel about
it?--and she ran her eyes over the row, to learn their opinions from
their faces. But these were as stolid as ever. Only good old Chapman,
she thought, looked a little sorry, and Miss Zielinski--yes, Miss
Zielinski was crying! This discovery thrilled Laura--just as, at the
play, the fact of one spectator being moved to tears intensifies his
neighbour's enjoyment.--But when Mr. Strachey left the field of
personal narration and went on to the moral aspects of the affair,
Laura ceased to be gripped by him, and turned anew to study the pale,
dogged face [P.122] of the accused, though she had to crane her neck to
do it. Before such a stony mask as this, she was driven to imagine what
must be going on behind it; and, while thus engrossed, she felt her arm
angrily tweaked. It was Tilly.
"You ARE a beast to stare like that!"
"I'm not staring."
She turned her eyes away at once, more than half believing her own
words; and then, for some seconds, she tried to do what was expected of
her: to feel a decent unconcern. At her back, Bertha's purry crying
went steadily on. What on earth did she cry for? She had certainly not
heard a word Mr. Strachey said. Laura fidgeted in her seat, and stole a
sideglance at Tilly's profile. She could not, really could not miss the
last scene of all, when, in masterly fashion, the Principal was
gathering the threads together. And so, feeling rather like "Peeping
Tom", she cautiously raised her eyes again, and this time managed to
use them without turning her head.
All other eyes were still charitably lowered. Several girls were crying
now, but without a sound. And, as the last, awful moments drew near,
even Bertha was hushed, and of all the odd hundreds of throats not one
dared to cough. Laura's heart began to palpitate, for she felt the
approach of the final climax, Mr. Strachey's periods growing ever
slower and more massive.
When, after a burst of eloquence which, the child felt, would not have
shamed a Bishop, the Principal drew himself up to his full height, and,
with uplifted arm, thundered forth: "Herewith, Miss Annie Johns, I
publicly expel you from the school! Leave it, now, this moment, and
never darken its doors again!"--when this happened, Laura was shot
through by an ecstatic quiver, such as she had felt once only in her
life before; and that was when a beautiful, golden-haired Hamlet, who
had held a Ballarat theatre entranced for a whole evening, fell dead by
Laertes' sword, to the rousing plaudits of the house. Breathing
unevenly, she watched, lynx-eyed, every inch of Annie Johns' progress:
watched her pick up her books, edge out of her seat and sidle through
the rows of desks; watched her walk to the door with short jerky
movements, mount the two steps that led to it, fumble with the handle,
turn it, and vanish from sight; and when it was all over, and there was
nothing more to see, she fell back in her seat with an audible sigh.
It was too late after this for the winding of the snaky line about the
streets and parks of East Melbourne, which constituted the boarders'
daily exercise. They were despatched to stretch their legs in the
garden. Here, as they walked round lawns and tennis-courts, they
discussed the main event of the afternoon, and were a little more
vociferous than usual, in an attempt to shake off the remembrance of a
very unpleasant half-hour.
"I bet you Sandy rather enjoyed kicking up that shindy."
"DID you see Puggy's boots again? Girls, he MUST take twelves!"
"And that old blubber of a Ziely's handkerchief! It was filthy. I told
you yesterday I was sure she never washed her neck."
Bertha, whose tears had dried as rapidly as sea-spray, gave Laura a dig
in the ribs. "What's up with you, old Tweedledum? You're as glum as a
lubra."
"No, I'm not."
"It's my belief that Laura was sorry for that pig," threw in Tilly.
"Indeed I wasn't!" said Laura indignantly.
"Sorry for a thief?"
"I tell you I WASN'T!"--and this was true. Among the divers feelings
Laura had experienced that afternoon, pity had not been included.
"If you want to be chums with such a mangy beast, you'd better go to
school in a lock-up."
"I don't know what my father'd say, if he knew I'd been in the same
class as a pickpocket," said the daughter of a minister from Brisbane.
"I guess he wouldn't have let me stop here a week."