A Stolen Meeting
At the very first available moment Marjorie went to the library and
consulted the latest number of the _Brackenfield School Magazine_. She
turned to the directory of past girls at the end and sought the letter
P. Here she found:
1912-1915. PRESTON, Kathleen Hilary } The Manor,
1913-1916. PRESTON, Joyce Benson } Wildeswood, Yorks.
"Each here for three years," she soliloquized. "I wonder what they're
doing now? I'll look them up in the 'News of Friends'. This is
it:--'Kathleen Preston has been doing canteen work in France under the
Croix Rouge Francaise at a military station. This canteen is run by
English women for French soldiers, and is a specially busy one, the
hours being from 6 a.m. to 12, and again from 2 to 7 p.m. A recreation
hut is in connection with it. Owing to her health, Kathleen returned to
England on leave, but is now in the north of France driving an ambulance
wagon.'
"'Joyce Preston is at Chadley College learning gardening and
bee-keeping. She says: 'If any Brackenfield girls want to go in for
gardening, do send them here. I am sure they would love it.' Joyce was
able to get up a very excellent concert for the soldiers in the Red
Cross Hospital at Chadley, the evening being an immense success.'
"Enterprising girls," thought Marjorie. "Those are just the sort of
things I want to do when I leave school. I'd like Kathleen best, because
she drives an ambulance wagon. I wish I knew them! I'd write to them and
tell them I've seen their brother in hospital, only they'd think it
cheek. They must feel proud of him getting the V.C. I know how I should
cock-a-doodle if one of our brothers won it! Oh dear, we haven't seen
Leonard or Bevis for nine months! It's hard to have one's brothers out
at the war. I wonder what convalescent home Private Preston will be sent
to? I must ask Elaine."
Next morning, when Marjorie met Dona at the eleven o'clock "break", she
found the latter in a state of much excitement.
"I had a line from Mother, enclosing a letter from Larry," she
announced. "This is what he says:
"'DEAR OLD BUNTING,
"'I hope you're getting on all serene at school, and haven't
spoilt the carpets with salt tears. I'm ordered to the Camp at
Denley, and shall be going there to-morrow. I promised if I went
I'd look you up and take you out to tea somewhere. If I can get
leave I'll call on Saturday afternoon at Brackenfield for you
and Squibs, so be on the look-out for me. The Mater will square
your Head. Love to Squibs and your little self.
"'Your affectionate
"'LARRY.'"
"Oh, I say, what gorgeous fun!" exclaimed Marjorie. "So he's sent to the
Denley Camp after all. It's just on the other side of Whitecliffe. How
absolutely topping to go out to tea with Larry! I hope he'll get leave."
The girls confided their exciting news to their room-mates and their
most intimate friends, with the result that on Saturday afternoon at
least sixteen heads were peeping out of windows on the qui vive to see
the interesting visitor arrive.
When a figure in khaki strode up the drive and rang the front-door bell
the event was signalled from one hostel to another. Now Mrs. Morrison
was very faithful to her duties as Principal, and during term-time
rarely allowed herself a holiday; but it happened on this particular
Saturday that she went for the day to visit friends, and appointed Miss
Norton deputy in her absence.
Larry Anderson was shown by the parlour-maid into the drawing-room where
parents were generally received, and left there to wait while his
presence was announced. After an interval of about ten minutes, during
which he studied the photographs of the school teams that ornamented the
mantelpiece, the door opened, and a tall fair lady with light-grey eyes
and pince-nez entered.
"Mrs. Morrison, I presume?" he enquired courteously.
"I am Miss Norton," was the reply. "Mrs. Morrison is away to-day, and
has left me in charge. Can I do anything for you?"
"I've come to see my sisters, Marjorie and Dona Anderson, and to ask if
I may take them in to Whitecliffe for an hour or so."
"I'm sorry," freezingly, "but that is quite impossible. It is against
the rules of the school."
"Yes, of course I know they're not usually allowed out, but the Mater--I
mean my mother--wrote to Mrs. Morrison to ask her to let the girls go."
"Mrs. Morrison left me no instructions on the subject."
"But didn't she give you my mother's letter?"
"She did not."
"Or leave it on her desk or something? Can't you find out?"
"I certainly cannot search my Principal's correspondence," returned Miss
Norton very stiffly. "It is one of the rules of Brackenfield that no
pupil is allowed out without a special exeat, and in the circumstances I
have no power to grant this."
"But--oh, I say! The girls will be so awfully disappointed!"
"I am sorry, but it cannot be helped."
"Well, I suppose I may see them here for half an hour?"
"That also is out of the question. Our rule is: 'No visitors except
parents, unless by special permission'."
"But the permission is in my mother's letter."
"Neither letter nor permission was handed to me by Mrs. Morrison."
"Excuse me, when I've come all this way, surely I may see my sisters?"
"I have said already that it is impossible," replied Miss Norton,
rising. "I am in charge of the school to-day, and must do my duty. Your
sisters will be returning home next Tuesday, after which you can make
your own arrangements for meeting them. While they are under my care I
do not allow visitors."
Miss Norton was a martinet where school rules were concerned, and the
Brackenfield code was strict. She knew that Mrs. Morrison would at least
have allowed Marjorie and Dona to see their brother in the drawing-room,
but in the absence of instructions to that effect she chose to keep to
the letter of the law and refuse all male visitors.
Larry, with an effort, kept his temper. He was extremely annoyed and
disappointed, but he did not forget that he was a gentleman.
"Then I will not trouble you further, and must apologize for
interrupting you," he said stiffly but courteously. "I am afraid I have
trespassed upon your time."
"Please do not mention it," answered Miss Norton with equal politeness.
They parted on terms of icy civility. Larry, however, was not to be
entirely defeated. He had only left Haileybury six months before, and
there was still much of the schoolboy in him. He was determined to find
a way to see his sisters. He paused a moment on the steps after the maid
had shown him out, and, taking a notebook from his pocket, hastily
scribbled a few lines, then, noticing some girls with hockey sticks
crossing the quadrangle, he went up to them, and, handing the note to
the one whose looks he considered the most encouraging, said:
"May I ask you to be so kind as to give this to my sister, Dona
Anderson? It's very important."
Then he walked away down the drive.
Meantime Marjorie and Dona had been waiting in momentary expectation of
a call to the drawing-room. They could hardly believe the bad news when
scouts informed them that their brother had left without seeing them.
"Gone away!" echoed Dona, almost in tears.
"But why? Who sent him away?" demanded Marjorie indignantly.
At this crisis Mena Matthews hurried in with the note. Dona read it,
with Marjorie looking over her shoulder. It ran:
"DEAR OLD BUNTING,
"Your schoolmistress guards you like nuns, but I must see you
and Squibs somehow. Can you manage to peep over the wall,
right-hand side of gate? I'll walk up and down the road for half
an hour, on the chance. Yours,
"LARRY."
There was a hockey match that afternoon between the second and third
teams, and all the school was making its way in the direction of the
playing-fields. Within the next minute, however, Marjorie and Dona, with
a select escort of friends to act as scouts, had reached the garden
wall, and were climbing up with an agility that would have delighted
their gymnasium mistress, could she have witnessed the performance.
Larry, in the road below, grinned as the two familiar heads appeared
above the coping.
"It isn't safe to talk here," called Marjorie. "Go down that side lane
till you come to some wooden palings. We'll cut across the plantation,
and meet you there."
"All serene!" laughed Larry, hugely enjoying the joke.
The school grounds were large, covering many acres, and a private road
led down the side towards the kitchen garden. Larry found his sisters
already ensconced on the palings, looking out for him.
"I say, this is rather the limit, isn't it?" he greeted them. "The Mater
wrote and said I might take you to Whitecliffe, and that icicle in the
drawing-room wouldn't even so much as let me have a glimpse of you. Is
this place you've got to a convent? Are you both required to take the
veil, please?"
"Not just yet. But what happened?" asked Marjorie. "Mena says the
Empress is out this afternoon. Whom did you see?"
"A grim, fair-haired Gorgon in glasses, who withered me with a look."
"The Acid Drop, surely."
"Probably. She certainly wasn't sweet."
"And she wouldn't let us go?" wailed Dona.
"No, poor old Baby Bunting. It's a rotten business, isn't it? No dragon
in a fairy tale could have guarded the princess more closely. If I'd
stayed any longer she'd have thrust talons into me."
"Oh, it's too bad! And you'd promised to take me to have tea at a cafe."
"So I did. I meant to give you a regular blow-out, so far as the
rationing order would allow us. Look here, old sport, I'm ever so sorry.
If I'd only foreseen this I'd have brought some cakes and sweets for
you. I'm afraid I've nothing in my pockets except cigarettes and a cough
lozenge. Cheer oh! It's Christmas holidays next week, and you'll be
tucking into turkey before long."
"How do you like the camp, Larry?" asked Marjorie.
"First-rate. We have a wooden hut to sleep in. There are thirty of us;
we each have three planks on trestles for a bed, and a palliasse to put
on it at night, and a straw pillow. We get four blankets apiece. I make
my own bed every night--double one blanket underneath, and roll the
others round me, and have my greatcoat on top if I'm cold. Aunt Ellinor
has lent me an air-cushion, and it's a great boon, because the straw
pillow is as hard as a brick. We do route marches and trench-digging,
and yesterday I was on scout duty, and three of us captured a sentry. If
we'd been at the front, instead of only training, he'd have shot me
certain."
"Do you have to learn to be a soldier?" asked Dona.
"Why, of course, you little innocent. That's what the training-camp is
for--to teach us how to scout, and dig trenches, and all the rest of
it."
"Oh! I thought you just went to the front and fought."
"It would be a queer war if we did."
"Are you coming home for Christmas?"
"No, I can't get leave; I only wish I could."
"Cave!" called Ailsa Donald, the nearest in the line of girls who had
undertaken to keep guard. "Miss Robinson is coming across the field this
way."
"We must go, or we shall be caught," said Marjorie. "It's too bad to
have to see you like this."
"But it's better than nothing," added Dona. "You can send me those
sweets you talked about for Christmas, if you like."
"All right, old Bunting! I won't back out of my promise."
The girls dropped from the palings, and dived into the plantation just
before Miss Robinson, on her way to the kitchen garden, passed the spot.
If she had looked through a crack in the boards she would have seen
Larry walking away, but happily her suspicions were not aroused.
Marjorie and Dona strolled leisurely towards the hockey field. The
latter was aggrieved, the former highly indignant.
"It's absurd," groused Marjorie, "if one can't see one's own brother,
especially when Mother had written to say we might. We had to see him
somehow, and I think it's a great deal worse to be obliged to go like
this and talk over palings than to meet him in the drawing-room. It's
just like Norty's nonsense. She's full of red-tape notions, and a
Jack-in-office to-day because the Empress has left her in charge. I feel
raggy."
"So do I, especially to miss the cafe. I hope Larry won't forget to send
those sweets."