The School Favourite
Mavis and Merle walked into the dining-room just in the nick of time to
satisfy Mrs. Tremayne's sense of propriety. She was a dear, nervous, old
lady, who had never had any daughters of her own, and had rather a hazy
notion of girls in general, and was indeed a little frightened of
schoolgirls; but she tried to be very kind to her great-nieces, and had
told Jessop to be sure and look after them. Jessop did not need any
telling. It was she who had arranged their bedroom, and had put the
little table in the window, and the two basket-chairs, and the bookcase
full of tales of adventure and bound volumes of _The Boys' Own Paper_.
The iced soda-cake was of her making, and so was the plateful of
delicious treacle toffee.
"It's twenty years since the boys used to come home from boarding-school
for their holidays, but I haven't forgotten what young folks like," she
explained to Mavis and Merle, as she helped them to unpack. "It's more
like a boys' bedroom than a girls' perhaps, but I just collected
anything of Master Richard's and Master Cyril's that I could find about
the house. If you don't care about them we'll take them out."
"But we _love_ boys' things," declared Merle, admiring the pictures of
dogs and horses on the walls, opening the drawers of the cabinet of
birds' eggs, and touching the whip and the cricket bat with friendly
fingers. Mavis was already deep in _Coral Island_, and temporarily deaf
to the outside world, but she had just sufficient sense of manners left
to grunt "It's a gorgeous bookcase!" before she lost herself in the
South Seas among the palm trees.
"Two very nice young ladies, and to have them here is like old times,"
Jessop had confided to Tom, the factotum. "The house has always seemed
dull since Master Cyril went away. Miss Mavis reminds me of him, with
her blue eyes and that gentle little voice of hers. Now, Miss Merle is
like Master Percy. He'd a way with him! I never knew what was going to
happen next when he was at home. 'Jessop' he'd say, 'you're a wonderful
woman!' Then I knew he meant to coax me to let him keep his rabbits in
his bedroom, or do something of that sort. Girls are quieter than boys,
but these two will cheer us up a little, I dare say. We all seem to have
grown old here lately."
And Tom, the factotum, polishing boots by the back door, agreed with
her. Twenty years ago he had been the coachman, and, immaculate in his
grey livery and silver buttons and top hat with the cockade at the side,
had driven the high gig about the country lanes. It had nearly broken
his heart when his master decided to give up the horses and take to
motoring instead. There were tears in his eyes when he groomed Czar and
Ruby for the last time. But, though Dr. Tremayne might march with the
century, and visit his patients more quickly in his new automobile, he
had no intention of parting with his old coachman, and determined to
turn him into a chauffeur instead. So Tom learnt to drive the car,
learnt almost too well, indeed, for, determined not to show the white
feather, he waxed foolhardy, and would career round corners with one
wheel off the ground, or dash down hills at such breakneck speed that
the doctor, not usually a nervous subject, would gasp with relief to
find himself alive at the bottom. Something plainly had to be done, or
Tom would soon have broken the family's bones, and the question was how
to shelve him without giving him offence. The riddle, fortunately,
solved itself by the retirement of Dalton, the factotum-gardener. Dr.
Tremayne decided to retrench and to keep only one man-servant. In future
he drove his own car, and Tom was installed in Dalton's place, to weed
the walks, clip the grass, polish the knives, and carry the coals. He
made friends at once with Mavis and Merle, or rather he merely
transferred to them the friendship he had given to their mother
twenty-five years ago, when she used to spend her holidays at Bridge
House, and rode Cobs, the white pony, whose grave lay at the bottom of
the paddock. To Tom, motoring was the sign of a degenerate age, and he
would descant to the girls about the good old days, when people were not
in such a frantic hurry and could wait for the doctor until he drove up
behind a well-groomed horse, and made such a case for the past times
that Merle, in spite of her ambition to drive a car, began to wish Czar
and Ruby and Cobs were still in the stable, and she herself could be
clad in Mother's old riding-habit and flourish Cousin Percy's discarded
whip as she ambled along the lanes on pony-back.
That, however, was before she had had a run in the little, yellow
Deemster car. After the first trip to Chagmouth she completely changed
her mind.
For a week life went on with the greatest regularity at Durracombe.
Every morning the girls were called by Jessop promptly at half-past
seven. They started for school at twenty minutes to nine, returned home
for lunch, rushed back to The Moorings by 2.30, did their preparation
and practising in the evenings, and went to bed at nine o'clock. Uncle
David was nearly always out, or busy in the surgery, and Aunt Nellie sat
by the fire, knitting or taking little naps. She would ask very kindly
about their lessons, then, hardly giving them time to answer, would
plunge into reminiscences of her boys' schooldays. Life, for her, still
centred round Percy, Richard, and Cyril. When the girls wanted to talk
they went to Jessop. It was to her they poured out their experiences of
their new school, and she listened with the flattering interest of one
who really enjoys hearing. She never read any books, so perhaps the
little adventures described humorously by Mavis or Merle took the place
of chapters in a serial story. She was familiar directly with the names
of all the girls and teachers at The Moorings, and most delightfully
ready to "take sides", and like those whom they liked and agree about
the iniquities of those who offended them.
For this first week had not been all plain sailing. It is often really
easier to get on in a big school than a little one. There is more
elbow-room among two hundred girls than among two dozen. Nobody except
Iva Westwood had seemed particularly pleased to welcome them. Opal
Earnshaw palpably resented their presence.
"Miss Pollard is only supposed to take twenty pupils," she remarked, on
the day after their arrival. "I know she refused two other girls, so I
can't think why she should have broken her rule."
"But those girls would have been boarders," objected Iva.
"Well, where's the difference?"
"A great deal when it means two extra beds in a dormitory."
"It means two extra seats in a room that's already overcrowded,"
declared Opal loftily. "If the school is going to take any more new
girls it had better build an annexe and let them have classes there."
"Sorry to be on the earth!" said Merle sarcastically. "Perhaps you'd
like us to sit inside the cupboard? We shouldn't crowd you out there."
Opal looked her up and down, from her velvet hair-band to the tips of
her shoes, then she gave a kind of snort.
"I suppose you think yourself ever so clever," she retorted. "Girls from
big schools generally give themselves airs."
"Other people can give themselves airs," snapped Merle, warming to the
battle. "Big schools teach manners at any rate!"
"Oh, we don't mean anything against _this_ school," hurriedly put in
Mavis, who generally tried to take the edge off her sister's cutting
speeches. "We think it's going to be quite jolly. I'm sorry if we've
taken the desks where you've had your museum, but where _are_ we to keep
our books and things?"
Opal, who was grudgingly removing the contents of two desks, which for a
whole term had been devoted to a collection of natural history objects,
had the grace to look rather ashamed of herself.
"Oh, it's all right," she temporized, "but what I'm to do with all our
birds' eggs and butterflies goodness only knows! I daren't keep them in
any of the other classrooms or those juniors would be fingering them and
they'd be smashed to bits. I suppose I must pack them in boxes and get
Miss Fanny to stow them away somewhere."
"Can't I help?" said Mavis, coming to the rescue.
Iva had just arrived on the scene bearing some large cardboard boxes,
into which the three girls transferred the little collection. It seemed
quite a pity to have to move it, for it had been so carefully set out.
There were certainly grounds for Opal's ill humour, though even the most
unreasonable of head girls can hardly expect a mistress to reserve desks
for a museum when she can give them to two extra pupils. The fact was
that Opal had been "first favourite" at The Moorings for too long. It
would have done her all the good in the world to be sent to a large
boarding-school and find there were people more important than herself.
Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny, devoted friends of her mother, undoubtedly
spoilt her, lent a ready ear to her complaints, but listened coldly to
anybody who made accusations against her. The knowledge that she will
receive support at all costs from head-quarters is a dangerous weapon
for a girl in a position of authority. During the whole of last term
Opal had done pretty much what she liked, and when others grumbled would
declare: "Well, go and tell Miss Pollard and see which she'll believe,
you or me!" an argument which was so unfortunately well founded that the
luckless objectors preferred to suffer in silence.
It was not in the nature of things that a disposition such as Merle
Ramsay's could be in the same school with Opal Earnshaw without a clash.
Merle loved fair play, and was always ready and willing to stand up for
anybody's rights, including Mavis's and her own. Her first instinct had
been to clear their new desks by tipping the unfortunate museum on to
the floor. That was Merle all over. She preferred forcible methods to
diplomacy. It generally needed all Mavis's tact to smooth over the
difficulties roused by Merle's ardent partisanship and freedom of
speech. Many were the squalls from which she had rescued her sister at
the Whinburn High School, and apparently she would be required to
perform the same office for her at The Moorings.
Opal calmed down and was fairly civil during the morning, but on that
very afternoon arose another unfortunate occasion of dispute. The
Ramsays had finished lunch early, and hurried back to school in order to
have a little fun with the boarders before lessons began at 2.30. They
liked Iva and Nesta, and also some of the younger ones, and meant to
enjoy half an hour with them in the playroom. Merle was by nature a
public entertainer. She could not spend ten minutes in the company of
other girls without wanting to start games or organize a sing-song or in
some way get up amusement. During the Christmas holidays she had been
poring over an article on palmistry which she found in a magazine. As
the result of her studies in that direction she offered to tell the
fortune of anybody who liked to consult her. She was instantly besieged
by an excited crowd, all thrusting forward their hands at once for
inspection and trying to push one another aside.
"Cheerio! This won't do!" decreed Merle. "One at a time, my hearties!
Take your places in an orderly queue and come up in your turns to the
witch, or she'll fly away on her broomstick and tell you nothing! Iva
first, then Nesta, then you others, and no squabbling. Anybody who tries
to push in front will be turned to the end of the queue. That's kismet!"
Merle could always keep order among juniors. The small fry giggled, but
formed into line and kept their places while Iva and Nesta consulted the
oracle. The prophecies were rather startling but sufficiently exciting
to make eight young heads bob up and down with eagerness to secure their
turns before the bell rang for afternoon school. Iva had been sent away
a little dubious between the attractions of "foreign travel" and a
warning of "danger by sea", while Nesta was openly rejoicing over a
prospect of "wealth and honours" in spite of the "accidents" scattered
over her future path. It was now the turn of Mamie Drew, and that
short-skirted damsel was just advancing with rather awed eyes and a
nervous chuckle, when the door opened and Opal Earnshaw strolled into
the room.
"Hello! What are you all doing here?" she exclaimed. "Fortunes! Oh, I
say! I _must_ have mine told. What can you make out of my hand?"
And, thrusting Mamie aside, she spread out her palm for Merle's
inspection.
Now it was partly Merle's love of fair play and partly her antipathy to
Opal, and partly a little bit of "katawampus", but the three feelings
combined made her thrust away the hand in a very peremptory fashion, and
brought an extremely tart note into her voice as she said:
"No pushing in front! Go to the end of the queue and take your turn with
the others. It's Mamie next."
"I don't mind," volunteered Mamie, making way for Opal.
"But _I_ mind!" snapped Merle. "It's I who's telling the fortunes and
I'll do it as I like, and take you in order. If you don't want to come
next, Mamie, get out of the way can't you, and let Joyce have her
innings! Opal must wait like other people."
Opal, however, as head girl, considered herself highly insulted.
"You needn't think I'm going to wait at the end of a queue of kids," she
retorted angrily. "I don't care about your old fortune-telling, thanks!"
and she flounced out of the room.
She was very glum indeed all afternoon, and would not look at either of
the Ramsays, though Mavis, to make amends, offered the loan of a new
penknife, and even tendered a surreptitious chocolate.
"I took her down, didn't I?" smirked Merle, as the sisters walked home
up the High Street, and watched the retreating figure of Opal, who had
scuttled past them with averted eyes, hurrying towards her own front
door.
Mavis sighed. Her naturally kind and peaceful disposition and her
loyalty to Merle were always pulling her in opposite directions.
"I'm afraid Opal just detests us. Perhaps you might have let her take
Mamie's turn as Mamie actually offered."
"Certainly not." (Merle's voice was firm.) "If you begin to let a girl
like that butt in whenever she wants, you never know where you are. I
think she's the limit. She'd no need to look so annoyed when we arrived
at school. What does it matter to her? The Moorings isn't run for her
private convenience!"
"She couldn't forgive us for taking those spare desks and turning out
the museum."
"Bother her museum!"
"It's rather a nice one anyway. It seems a pity it has to be put by in
cardboard boxes."
Mavis was really concerned about the little collection of curiosities
that had been so neatly spread forth in the unoccupied desks. She
cogitated for a long time as to how the difficulty could possibly be
overcome. Finally she sought Tom, with whom she was already on terms of
great friendship. She found him in the greenhouse, repotting some ferns.
"Oh, Tom!" she burst out eagerly. "Do you think there's anything about
the place I might take to make a museum?"
Tom stroked the grey stubble on his chin reflectively.
"A museum?" he repeated. "That's a big order, Miss, isn't it? I went
through the museum in the castle grounds at Taunton once. It must be ten
years ago. Or will it be twelve now?"
"Oh, of course, I don't mean a museum like that," explained Mavis, "only
a kind of box arrangement with some glass over it, to put butterflies
and birds' eggs in, very like--" (her eyes wandered round the
greenhouse) "very like what you grow seeds in."
The nice part about Tom was the alacrity with which he caught up
suggestions. At his age it was really amazing.
"A very good idee, Miss," he agreed. "I know what you want. Master
Cyril used to keep his butterflies in boxes like that. I'll hunt about
and see what I can find for you."
"Smart-looking boxes and some pieces of glass to fit over them?" pleaded
Mavis.
"You leave it to me," was all Tom would promise, but there was a twinkle
in his eye as he stooped over his ferns again.
Every morning Mavis asked him for the boxes, and each time he either
pretended to have forgotten or was ready with some excuse. At the end of
four days, however, he took her into the old harness-room, where he had
a joiner's bench and a variety of tools, for he acted handy man to the
establishment.
"How will these suit you, Miss?" he enquired, in a would-be nonchalant
tone.
Mavis gave an absolute bounce of surprise. There on the bench lay two
most beautiful cases. Tom had planed the boxes and made lids for them,
into which he had fitted the pieces of glass. They were stained brown
and varnished, and were lined neatly with dark-blue cloth. The old man
was evidently bursting with pride at his handiwork, though he affected
an attitude of indifference.
Mavis made haste to congratulate him.
"It's the cleverest thing I've ever seen done in my life," she purred.
"Oh, they're just too lovely for words--absolutely topping! Thanks, a
thousand times over. You must have simply _slaved_ to finish them so
quickly."
"Oh, I just worked at them in odds and ends of my time," said Tom
casually, looking very pleased all the same. "That varnish is a bit
sticky yet, but I dare say it'll be dry by the morning. If you want the
boxes at school I'll carry them round for you to-morrow some time."
"Oh, thanks! Could you bring them at eleven o'clock 'break'? That would
be scrumptious. I must fetch Merle to look at them at once, and Jessop
too. You don't mind?"
Tom delivered the cases next day with admirable punctuality; indeed he
was standing on the school doorstep exactly as Miss Fanny rang the big
bell for break. The girls, pouring into the hall, saw him deliver the
treasures into the safe custody of Bella, the housemaid. Naturally they
crowded round to look.
"Hello! What are these for?" asked Opal. "What stunning cases!"
"They're for Miss Ramsay," proclaimed Bella.
Mavis, with rather a red face, stepped forward.
"If you think they'll do to keep the birds' eggs and butterflies and
things in will you please have them as a museum for the school," she
said quickly. "Tom, my uncle's coachman, made them on purpose."
"Jolly decent of him. They're A1," approved Opal. "Better than the
desks really, because of the glass lids. I say, I'm going to bolt my
lunch in two secs, and get down those boxes and spread out the
collection again. The things will look no end on that dark cloth."
"Spiffing," agreed Iva, who was also inspecting the new acquisitions.
"Hurry up with your lunch then, and help me to arrange them. No, I
can't have a dozen people's fingers interfering! I'm curator of the
museum and I won't have it smashed. Three are quite enough. Iva and
Mavis and I are going to do it, and we don't want anyone else, thank
you! You can come and look at it when it's finished. I'll put the cases
on the window-sill in the big schoolroom. Mavis Ramsay" (this last
communication was whispered) "I don't mind telling you I didn't care for
you before--it was mostly the fault of that sister of yours!--but I
think now you're an absolute sport. You and Merle aren't a scrap alike.
Nobody would ever take you for sisters."