The Mystic Seven
"D'you know," said Morvyth, flopping down disgustedly on to a form,
and addressing an interested audience of three; "d'you know, my
children, that I consider these two new girls the very limit?"
"Absolute blighters!" agreed Raymonde hastily, "I was thinking so
myself only this morning. I can't decide which is the worst."
"Not a pin to choose between them!" commented Aveline with a yawn.
"I gave Cynthia Greene credit for shyness during the first twenty-four
hours," continued Morvyth. "I thought in my own mind, 'the poor thing
is suffering, no doubt, from home-sickness and general confusion, and
we must be gentle with her', but I kept a wary eye upon her, and I've
come to a conclusion. It's not shyness--it's swank!"
Ardiune nodded her head approvingly.
"Swank, and nothing else," she confirmed. "I know something about it
too, for I heard her expounding to her own Form this morning. It
almost made me ill. I had to take a run round the garden before I felt
fit again. It seems she's come from some much smaller school, where
she's been the head girl and show pupil, and the rest of it. She said
the younger ones had all looked up to her, and the Principal had
treated her as a friend, and that she'd always worked hard to keep up
the tone of the place."
"O Sophonisba!" ejaculated Raymonde. "Well, it strikes me we've got
the tone of this school to look after. We can't allow Fourth Form kids
to bring those notions and run them here. She won't find herself queen
of this establishment!"
"Hardly!" chuckled Aveline.
"Aren't her own Form attending to the matter?" enquired Morvyth.
"Naturally. They're giving her as bad a time as they know how, but
they don't make much headway. She tells them she fully expects to be
ragged, and she simply won't believe a word they say. They haven't
taken her in once yet."
"That's because they're not skilful," said Raymonde thoughtfully.
"They don't do the thing artistically. There's a finesse required for
this kind of work that their stupid young heads don't possess. I'm not
sure if it wouldn't be philanthropic to help them!"
"Set your own house in order first!" grunted Ardiune. "You'll have
your hands full with Maudie Heywood."
"I'm not going to neglect Maudie; don't alarm yourself! She's the best
specimen of the genus prig that I've ever come across in the course of
my life. She ought to have a Form all to herself, instead of being
plumped into the Fifth. I see dangerous possibilities in Maudie. Do
you realize what she did this morning? Learnt the whole of that
wretched poem instead of only the twenty lines that were set us."
"I heard Gibbie complimenting her, and thought she'd get swelled
head."
"Swelled head indeed! It's the principle that's involved. Don't you
see that if this girl goes and learns whole poems, Gibbie'll think we
can do the same, and she'll give us more next time. It's raising the
standard of work in the Form."
"Great Minerva! So it is!"
"We'll have to put a stopper on that," urged Aveline indignantly.
"There are a good many things that have given me spasms since I came
back," proclaimed Raymonde. "They're things that ought to be set
right. What I vote is, that our set form ourselves into a sort of
Watch Committee to attend to any little matters of this sort. It would
be a kindness to the school."
Ardiune chuckled softly.
"By all means! Let us be the Red Cross Knights, and go out to right
the wrong. We'll attack Duessa straight away, and teach her to mend
her morals. You'll let Val be in it?"
"Rather! And Fauvette and Katherine. Seven's a mystic number. You know
there were the Seven Champions of Christendom, and there are the Seven
Ages of Man, and the Seven Days of Creation, and seven years of
apprenticeship, and--and----"
"Seven deadly sins!" suggested Aveline cheerfully. "And the Seven
Vials--and----"
"Well, anyhow it's always seven, so we'll make ourselves into a
society. We'll have a star with seven rays for our secret sign. It has
a nice occult kind of smack about it. When we chalk that mark upon
anybody's desk, it means we've got to reform her, whether she likes
it or whether she doesn't."
"She probably won't," twinkled Ardiune.
"Then the sooner she submits the better. She'll find it's no use
fighting against fate--otherwise the Mystic Seven!"
"We'll start business with Cynthia Greene to-morrow," decided
Aveline.
Fauvette, Valentine, and Katherine were duly informed of the existence
of the new society and their initiation thereinto. They offered no
objections, and indeed would have been prepared at Raymonde's request
to join a Black Brotherhood, or a Pirates' League with a skull and
cross-bones for its emblem. A special committee meeting was held to
discuss the matter of Cynthia Greene.
"It needs finesse," said Morvyth. "She's been to school before, and
she's up to most dodges. Naturally she comprehends that her own Form
are trying to rag her."
"That's where we come in," agreed Raymonde. "We're going to pose as
philanthropists. One or two of us have got to take Cynthia up. We'll
make her realize, of course, how very kind it is of Fifth Form girls
to befriend a lonely junior."
"And having taken her up--what then?" queried Fauvette.
"Bless your innocence, child! Why, we'll let her down with a run!"
"Are we all in it?"
"No; it would be too marked. Best leave the affair to Aveline and me.
You others must stand aloof and look disinterested but sympathetic.
I'll speak to her at lunch-time."
During the mid-morning interval, therefore, Raymonde singled out her
victim. Cynthia was standing slightly apart from her Form, consuming
thick bread and butter with an air of pensive melancholy, and twisting
a pet bracelet that adorned her wrist. Raymonde strolled up casually.
"Getting on all right?" she began, by way of opening the attack. "I
say, you know, I thought I'd just speak to you. I expect you're having
a grizzly time with those wretched juniors. They're a set of
blighters, aren't they?"
"I do find them a little trying," admitted Cynthia cautiously,
"especially as I was head girl at my old school."
"Rather a climb-down from Senior to Junior, isn't it? Why didn't Miss
Beasley put you in the Fifth?"
"My mother asked her to, but she said as I was only thirteen it was
quite impossible. It's all right. I expect to be ragged a little at
first. I'll live it down in time."
Cynthia's expression of patient resignation was almost too much for
Raymonde, but she controlled her countenance and continued:
"They'll respect you all the more afterwards, no doubt."
"I hope so. We didn't rag new girls at The Poplars. I always made a
point of showing them they were welcome. It seemed only fair to Miss
Gordon. She was more like a personal friend than a teacher, and she
looked to me, you see, to keep up the tone of the school."
"She must be lost without you!"
"I think they'll miss me," admitted Cynthia, with a little fluttering
sigh of regret. "The girls all subscribed before I left and gave me
this bracelet as a keepsake. It's got an inscription inside. Would you
like to look at it?"
Cynthia had unclasped her treasure, and handed it with an assumed
nonchalance for Raymonde's inspection. On the gold band was engraved:
"To Cynthia Greene, a token of esteem from her schoolfellows."
"Highly gratifying!" gurgled Raymonde.
"It was sweet of them, wasn't it? Well, I tried to do my best for
them, and I'll do my best for this school too when I get the chance.
I'm in no hurry. I'm content to wait, and let the girls come round."
"Quite the best plan. In the meantime, if there are any little tips I
can give you, come to me."
"Thanks awfully! I will. I'd have done the same by you if you'd been a
new girl at The Poplars."
Raymonde retired bubbling over with suppressed mirth.
"That girl's the limit!" she reported to her confederates. "For calm
self-complacency I've never seen anybody to equal her. The idea of
imagining _me_ as a new girl at her wretched pettifogging old school!
Oh, it's too precious! She'd patronize the Queen herself! The Poplars
must be executing a war-dance for joy to have got rid of her. Probably
they'd have subscribed for more than a bracelet to pass her on
elsewhere!"
"So she's waiting patiently till she wins the school," hinnied
Aveline. "Poor angel! Did you notice her wings sprouting, or a halo
glowing round her head?"
"I think we can put her up to a few tips," chuckled Ardiune.
"It would only be kind," gushed Raymonde. "The sort of thing she must
have done herself hundreds of times to many a poor neglected new girl
at The Poplars. The bread she cast upon the waters shall be returned
to her."
"With butter on it!" added Aveline.
"She can swallow any amount of butter," observed Raymonde. "She
evidently likes it laid on thick. Suggestions invited, please, for
kind and disinterested advice to be administered to her."
"Professor Marshall comes to-morrow," volunteered Aveline.
"The very thing! Ave, you old sport, you've given me an idea! Now just
prepare your minds for a pretty and touching little scene at the
beginning of the mediaeval arts lecture. No, I shan't tell you what it
is beforehand. It'll be something for you to look forward to!"
The staff at Marlowe Grange consisted of Miss Beasley, Miss Gibbs, and
Mademoiselle, but there were several visiting masters and mistresses
who had attended at the former house, and were now to continue their
instructions at the school in its present quarters. Among these
Professor Marshall was rather a favourite. As befitted a teacher in an
establishment of young ladies, he was grey-haired and elderly, and, as
the girls added, "married and guaranteed not to flirt," but all the
same he was jolly, had a hearty, affable manner, and a habit of making
bad jokes and weak puns to break up the monotony of his lectures. It
was decidedly the fashion to admire him, to snigger indulgently at
his mild little pleasantries, and to call him "an old dear." Some of
the girls even worked quite hard at their preparation for him. He had
written his autograph in at least nineteen birthday books, and it was
rumoured that, when the auspicious 10th of March had come round, no
less than fourteen anonymous congratulatory picture post-cards had
been directed to him from the school and posted by stealth. Having
already improved their minds upon a course of English Classics and
Astronomy, the school this term was booked for culture, and devoted to
the study of the fine arts of the Middle Ages. A few selected members
of the Sixth had been told off to search through back numbers of _The
Studio_ and _The Connoisseur_ for examples of the paintings of Cimabue
and Giotto, and the large engraving of Botticelli's "Spring," which
used to hang in Miss Beasley's study, now occupied a prominent
position on the dining-room wall to afford a mental feast during
meal-times.
Raymonde, anxious not to overdo things, left Cynthia to herself for
the rest of the day; but the following morning, after breakfast, she
seized an opportunity for a few words with her.
"You won't mind my giving you a hint or two on school etiquette?" she
observed casually. "You see, there are traditions in every school that
one likes to keep up, and of course you can't find them out unless
you're told."
"I'd be very glad," gushed Cynthia gratefully. "We'd a regular code at
The Poplars, and I used to initiate everybody. They always came
straight to me, and I coached them up. I can't tell you how many new
girls I've helped in my time!"
"Well, you're new yourself now," said Raymonde, detaching Cynthia's
mind from these reminiscences of past service and bringing it up to
date. "Professor Marshall's coming to-day, and you'll have to be
introduced to him."
"Oh dear! I'm so shy! I wonder what he'll think of me?" fluttered
Cynthia.
"Think you're the sickliest idiot he ever met!" was on the tip of
Raymonde's tongue, but she restrained herself, and, drawing her victim
aside, whispered honeyed words calculated to soothe and cheer, adding
some special items of good advice.
"Thank you," sighed Cynthia. "I won't forget. Of course, we never did
such a thing at The Poplars, but, if it's expected, I won't break the
traditions of the school. You can always depend upon me in that
respect."
Precisely at 11.30 the whole of the school was assembled in the big
hall awaiting the presence of their lecturer. Professor Marshall, who
had been regaling himself with lunch in Miss Beasley's study, now made
his appearance, escorted by the head mistress, and apparently
refreshed by cocoa and conversation. The girls always agreed that his
manners were beautiful. He treated everybody with a courtly deference,
something between the professional consideration of a fashionable
doctor and the dignity of an archdeacon. After Miss Gibbs's
uncompromising attitude, the contrast was marked. He entered the room
smiling, bowed a courteous good morning to his pupils, who rose to
receive him, and placed a chair for Miss Beasley with gentlemanly
attention.
The Principal, radiant after showing off her new quarters, refused it
with equal politeness.
"No, thank you, Professor. I'm not going to stay. I have other work to
do. You will find your class the same as before, with the addition of
two new girls. Maude Heywood--come here, Maudie!--and Cynthia Greene.
I hope they'll both prove good workers."
Maudie Heywood, blushing like a lobster, stepped forward and thrust
three limp fingers for a fraction of a second into the Professor's
large clasp, then thankfully merged her identity among her
schoolfellows. Cynthia, who was behind her, smiled bewitchingly
upwards into the florid, benevolent face of her new instructor, then,
falling gracefully upon one knee, seized his hand and touched it with
her lips.
The sensation in the room was immense. The Professor, looking
decidedly astonished and embarrassed, hastily withdrew his hand from
the affectionate salutation. Miss Beasley's eyes were round with
horror.
"Cynthia!" she exclaimed, and the tone of her voice alone was
sufficient reproof.
The luckless Cynthia, instantly conscious that her act had been
misconstrued, retired with less grace than she had come forward, and
spent most of the lecture in surreptitiously mopping her eyes. As she
walked dejectedly down the corridor afterwards, she was accosted by
Hermione Graveson, a member of the Sixth.
"Look here!" said Hermione briefly. "What prompted you to make such an
utter exhibition of yourself just now? I never saw anything more
sickening in my life!"
Cynthia's tears burst forth afresh.
"It wasn't my fault," she sobbed. "I didn't want to do it, but I was
told it was school etiquette and I must."
"Who told you such rubbish?"
"That girl with the dark eyes and a patriotic hair ribbon."
"Raymonde Armitage?"
"I believe that's her name."
Hermie shook her head solemnly.
"New girls are notoriously callow," she remarked, "but I should have
thought anybody with the slightest grain of sense could have seen at a
glance what Raymonde is. Why, she's simply been playing ragtime on
you. Did you actually and seriously believe that the girls at this
school were expected to go through such idiotic performances? Don't
believe a word Raymonde tells you again."
"Whom shall I believe? Everybody tries to stuff me!" wailed the
injured Cynthia. "I never treated anybody like this at The Poplars."
"Trust your common sense--that is, if you happen to have any; and, for
goodness' sake, don't snivel any more. Wipe your eyes and take it
sporting. And, wait a moment. If you want a bit of really good, sound
advice, don't mention The Poplars again, or the fact that you were
head girl there, and the idol of the school, and the rest of it.
You're only a junior here, and the sooner you find your level the
better. We're not exactly aching to have our tone improved by you!
And, look here! Take that absurd keepsake bracelet off, and lock it up
in your box, and don't let anybody see it again till the end of the
term. There! go and digest what I've told you."
Having settled with Cynthia Greene, it now remained for the Mystic
Seven to turn their attention to the matter of Maudie Heywood. The
situation was growing acute. Maudie had been ten days at the Grange,
and in that brief space of time she was already beginning to establish
a precedent. She was a tall, slim girl, with earnest eyes, a decided
chin, and an intellectual forehead. Work, with a capital W, was her
fetish. She sat during classes with her gaze focused on her teacher,
and a look of intelligent interest that surpassed everyone else in the
Form. Miss Gibbs turned instinctively to Maudie at the most important
points of the lesson. There was a feeling abroad that she sucked in
knowledge like a sponge. Nobody would have objected to her consuming
as much as she liked of the mental provender supplied had she stopped
at that. Maudie unfortunately was over-zealous, and finding the amount
of preparation set her to be well below the limit of her capacity,
invariably did a little more than was required. Her maps were
coloured, her botany papers illustrated with neat drawings, her
history exercises had genealogical tables appended, and her literature
essays were full of quotations. This was all very exemplary, and won
golden opinions from Miss Gibbs, but it caused heartburnings in the
Form. It was felt that Maudie was unduly raising the standard. Miss
Gibbs had suggested that other botany papers might contain diagrams,
and had placed upon the class-room chimney-piece a book of poetical
extracts suitable for use in essay-writing.
"If we don't take care we'll be having our prep. doubled," said
Aveline uneasily.
It was decided to reason with Maudie before taking any more active
measures. The united Seven tackled her upon the subject.
"I promised Mother I'd work," urged Maudie, in reply to their
remonstrances.
"But you've no need to work overtime," objected Ardiune. "We don't
mind how hard you swat during prep., but it isn't right for you to be
putting in extra half-hours while the rest of us are in the garden.
It's stealing an advantage."
"It's a work of supererogation," added Katherine.
Maudie wrinkled up her intellectual forehead anxiously.
"Works of supererogation are supposed to count," she interposed in her
precise, measured voice.
"Yes, if they're done with intention for somebody else!" flared
Raymonde. "But yours aren't! They're entirely for your own pride and
vanity. Do you come and translate my Latin for me in those extra
half-hours? Not a bit of it!"
"Oh, that wouldn't be fair!" Maudie's tone was of shocked virtue.
"It's more unfair to heap burdens on the rest of your Form."
"I'm bound to do my best."
"The fact is," burst out Aveline, "you're suffering from an
over-developed conscience. You've got an abnormal appetite for work,
and it ought to be checked. It isn't good for you. Promise us you
won't write or learn a word out of prep. time."
Maudie shook her head sadly. Her grey eyes gleamed with the enthusiasm
of the martyr spirit.
"I can't promise anything," she sighed. "Something within me urges me
to work."
"Then something without you will have to put a stop to it," snapped
Raymonde. "We've given you full and fair warning; so now you may look
out for squalls."
When preparation was over, the girls were allowed to amuse themselves
as they liked until supper. Most of them adjourned to the garden, for
the evenings were getting longer and lighter every day, and the tennis
courts were in quite fair condition. It was Maudie's habit to take a
pensive stroll among the box-edged flower beds in the courtyard, and
then repair to the class-room again to touch up her exercises. On this
particular evening Raymonde, with a contingent of the Mystic Seven,
lingered behind.
"We've just about ten minutes," she announced. "Old Maudie's as
punctual as a clock. She'll walk five times round the sundial and
twice to the gate."
"That girl's destined for the cloister," said Aveline pityingly.
"She's evidently thirsting to live her life by rule. Mark my words,
she'll eventually take the veil."
"No, she'll pass triumphantly through College and come out equal to a
double-first or Senior Wrangler, or something swanky of that kind, and
get made head mistress of a high school," prognosticated Ardiune.
"In the meantime, she won't swat any more to-night!" grinned Raymonde.
"Wait for me here, girls; I've got to fetch something."
Raymonde performed her errand with lightning speed. She returned with
a lump of soft substance in one hand, and a spirit-lamp and
curling-tongs in the other. Her chums looked mystified.
"Cobblers' wax!" she explained airily. "Brought some with me, in case
of emergency. It's useful stuff. And I just looted Linda Mottram's
curling apparatus from her bedroom. Don't you twig? What blind bats
you are! I'm going to stick up Maudie's desk!"
Raymonde lighted the spirit-lamp and heated the tongs, then spreading
a thick coating of the wax along the inside edge of the desk, she
applied the hot iron to melt it, and put down the lid.
"It will have hardened by the time Maudie has finished her
constitutional among the flower beds," she giggled. "I'll guarantee
when she comes back she won't be able to open her desk."
"It's only right for her to feel the pressure of public opinion,"
decreed Ardiune. "We're working in a good cause."
"But we're modest about it, and don't want to push ourselves forward,"
urged Raymonde. "I vote we go for a stroll down to the very bottom of
the orchard, near the moat."
A quarter of an hour later, Miss Beasley and Miss Gibbs were sitting
together in the Principal's study enjoying a well-earned period of
repose and a chat. Their conversation turned upon the varied
dispositions of their pupils.
"Maudie Heywood strikes me as a very earnest character," observed Miss
Beasley, toying with the violets in her belt. "Her work is really
excellent."
"Almost too good," agreed Miss Gibbs, who was perhaps beginning to
find out that Maudie's exercises took twice as long to correct as
anybody else's, and thus sensibly curtailed her teacher's leisure.
"The child is so conscientious. In my opinion she needs to concentrate
more on physical exercise. I should like to see her in the tennis
courts instead of copying out reams of poetry."
"Yes," said Miss Beasley, looking thoughtful. "Her activities perhaps
need a little adjustment. We mustn't allow her to neglect her health.
She looks over-anxious sometimes for a girl of fifteen."
"She is always such a calm, self-controlled, well-regulated child,"
remarked Miss Gibbs appreciatively.
At that moment there was a hurried rap-tap-tap; the door opened, and
Maudie burst in unannounced. Her calm self-control had yielded to an
agitated condition of excitement and indignation. Her earnest eyes
were flashing angry sparks, and her cheeks were crimson.
"Oh, Miss Beasley!" she began, "those girls have actually gone and
stuck up my desk, so that I can't get out my books. They say I work
overtime, and it's not fair, for if I like to work, why shouldn't I? I
just detest the whole lot of them! I hate this place!"
"I think you're forgetting yourself, Maudie," returned the Principal.
"It is hardly good manners to enter my study so abruptly and to speak
in this way to me. If you wish to please me, I should much prefer you
to spend your leisure time at games instead of lessons. To-morrow
evening I hope to see you playing tennis. If you ask the cook for a
screw-driver you'll probably be able to wedge open your desk easily.
But in future you'll be wiser to confine your work to the preparation
hours. The bow must be unstrung sometimes, or your health will suffer.
If you join with the other girls at their games you'll soon get to
know them, and feel more at home here. Try to be sociable and make
yourself liked. Part of the training of school life is to learn to
accommodate yourself to a community."
The crestfallen Maudie retired, murmuring apologies. Miss Beasley
picked up her copy of _The Graphic_ and laughed.
"As a rule, we may trust the girls themselves to do any necessary
pruning. They're the strictest Socialists that could be imagined. They
instinctively have all the principles of a trade union about them. On
the whole, it's good for Maudie to be restrained. A little innocent
practical joke will do her no harm for once. She must be able to take
her share of teasing. Humour is her one deficiency."
"I think I can guess who's at the bottom of the business," sniffed
Miss Gibbs. "Raymonde Armitage is the naughtiest girl in the school."
"Pardon me!" corrected Miss Beasley. "The most mischievous, perhaps,
and the most troublesome; full of bubbling spirits and misplaced
energy, but straightforward and truthful. There is something very
lovable about Raymonde."