11
“Are all here?”
Jimmie answered and Fräulein came to the table and stood leaning for a moment upon one hand.
The door opened and the housekeeper shone hard and bright in the doorway.
“Wäsche angekommen!”
“Na, gut,” responded Fräulein quietly.
The housekeeper disappeared.
“Fräulein looks like a dead body,” thought Miriam.
Apprehension overtook her ... “there’s going to be some silly fuss.”
“I shall speak in English, because the most that I shall say concerns the English members of this household and its heavy seriousness will be by those who are not English, sufficiently understood.”
Miriam flushed, struggling for self-possession. She determined not to listen.... “Damn ... Devil ...” she exhorted herself ... “humbugging creature ...” She felt the blood throbbing in her face and her eyes and looked at no one. She was conscious that little movements and sounds came from the Germans, but she heard nothing but Fräulein’s voice which had ceased. It had been the clear-cut low-breathing tone she used at prayers. “Oh, Lord, bother, damnation,” she reiterated in her discomfiture. The words echoing through her mind seemed to cut a way of escape....
“That dear child,” smiled Fräulein’s voice, “who has just left us, came under this roof ... nearly a year ago.
“She came, a tender girl (Mademoiselle—Mademoiselle, oh, goodness!) from the house of her pious parents, fromme Eltern, fromme Eltern.” Fräulein breathed these words slowly out and a deep sigh came from one of the Germans, “to reside with us. She came in the most perfect confidence with the aim to complete her own simple education, the pious and simple nurture of a Protestant French girl, and with the aim also to remove for a period something of the burden lying upon the shoulders of those dear parents in the upbringing of herself and her brothers and sisters.” (And then to leave home and be married—how easy, how easy!)
“Honourably—honourably she has fulfilled each and every duty laid upon her as institutrice in this establishment.
“Sufficient to indicate this fulfilment of duty is the fact that she was happy and that she made happy others——”
Fräulein’s voice dropped to its lowest note and grew fuller in tone.
“Would that I could here complete what I have to say of the sojourn of little Aline Ducorroy under this roof.... But that I cannot do.
“That I cannot do.
“It has been the experience of this pure and gentle soul to come, under this roof, in contact with things not pure.”
Fräulein’s voice had become breathless and shaking. Both her hands sought the support of the table.
“This poor child has had unwillingly to suffer the fact of associating with those not pure.”
“Ach, Fräulein! What you say!” ejaculated Clara.
In the silence the leaves of the chestnut tree tapped one against the other. Miriam listened to them ... there must be a little breeze blowing across the garden. Why had she not noticed it before? Were they all hearing it?
“With—those—not pure.”
“Here, in this my school.”
Miriam’s heart began to beat angrily.
“She has been forced, here, in this school, to hear talking”—Fräulein’s voice thickened—“of men....”
“Männer—geschichten ... here!”
“Männer—geschichten.” Fräulein’s voice rang out down the table. She bent forward so that the light from both the windows behind her fell sharply across her grey-clad shoulders and along the top of her head. There was no condemnation Miriam felt in those broad grey shoulders—they were innocent. But the head shining and flat, the wide parting, the sleekness of the hair falling thinly and flatly away from it—angry, dreadful skull. She writhed away from it. She would not look any more. She felt her neck was swelling inside her collar-band.
Fräulein whispered low.
“Here in my school, here standing round this table are those who talk of—men.
“Young girls ... who talk ... of men.”
While Fräulein waited, trembling, several of the girls began to snuffle and sob.
“Is there, can there be in the world anything that is more base, more vile, more impure? Is there? Is there?”
Miriam wished she knew who was crying. She tried to fix her thoughts on a hole in the table-cover. “It could be darned.... It could be darned.”
“You are brought here together, each and all of you here together in the time of your youth. It is, it should be for you the most beautiful occasion. Can you find anything more terrible than that such occasion where all may work and influence each other—for all life—in purity and goodness—that such occasion should be used—impurely? Like a dawn, like a dawn for purity should be the life of a maiden. Calm, and pure and with holy prayer.”
Miriam repeated these words in her mind trying to dwell on the beauty of Fräulein’s middle tones. “And the day shall come, I shall wish, for all of you, that the sanctity of a home shall be within your hands. What then shall be the shame, what the regret of those who before the coming of that sacred time did think thoughts of men, did speak of them? Shame, shame,” whispered Fräulein amidst the sobbing of the girls.
“With the thoughts of those who have this impure nature I can do nothing. For them it is freely to acknowledge this evil in the heart and to pray that the heart may be changed and made clean.
“But a thing I can do and I do.... I will have no more of this talking. In my school I will have no more.... Do you hear, all? Do you hear?”
She struck the table with both fists and brandished them in mid-air.
“Eh-h,” she sneered. “I know, I know who are the culprits. I have always known.” She gasped. “It shall cease—these talks—this vile talk of men. Do you understand? It shall cease. I—will—not—have—it.... The school shall be clean ... from pupil to pupil ... from room to room.... Every day ... every hour.... Shameless!” she screamed. “Shameless. Ah! I know. I know you.” She stood with her arms folded, swaying, and gave a little laugh. “You think to deceive me. You do not deceive me. I know. I have known and I shall know. This school is mine. Mine! My place! I will have it as I will have it. That is clear and plain, and you all shall help me. I shall say no more. But I shall know what to do.”
Mechanically Miriam went downstairs with the rest of the party. With the full force of her nerves she resisted the echoes of Fräulein’s onslaught, refusing to think of anything she had said and blotting out her image every time it rose. The essential was that she would be dismissed as Mademoiselle had been dismissed. That was the upshot of it all for her. Fräulein was a mad, silly, pious female who would send her away and go on glowering over the Bible. She would have to go, go, go in a sort of disgrace.
The girls were talking all round her, excitedly. She despised them for showing that they were disturbed by Fräulein’s despotic nonsense. As they reached the basement she remembered the letter crushed in her hand and sat down on the last step to glance through it.
12
“Dearest Mim. I have a wonderful piece of news for you. I wonder what you will say? It is about Harriett. She has asked me to tell you as she does not like to write about it herself.”
With steady hands Miriam turned the closely-written sheets reading a phrase here and there ... “regularly in the seat behind us at All Saints’ for months—saw her with the Pooles at a concert at the Assembly Rooms and made up his mind then—the moment he saw her—joined the tennis-club—they won the double handicap—a beautiful Slazenger racquet—only just over sixteen—for years—of course Mother says it’s just a little foolish nonsense—but I am not sure that she really thinks so—Gerald took me into his confidence—made a solemn call—admirably suited to each other—rather a long melancholy good-looking face—they look such a contrast—the big Canadian Railway—not exactly a clerk—something rather above that, to do with making drafts of things and so on. Very sweet and charming—my own young days—that I have reached the great age of twenty-three—resident post in the country—two little girls—we think it very good pay—I shall go in September—plenty of time—that you should come home for the long holidays. We are all looking forward to it—the tennis-club—your name as a holiday member—the American tournament in August—Harry was the youngest lady member like you—of course Harry could not let you come without knowing—find somebody travelling through—Fräulein Pfaff—expect to see you looking like a flour-sack with a string tied round its waist—all the dwarf roses in bloom—hardly any strawberries—we shall see you soon—everybody sends.”
Miriam got up and swung the half-read letter above her head like a dumb-bell.
She looked about her like a stranger—everything was as it had been the day she came—the little cramped basement hall—the strange German girls—small and old looking, poking about amongst the baskets. She hardly knew them. She passed half-blindly amongst them with her eyes wide. The little dressing-room seemed full of bright light. She saw everyone at once clearly. All the English girls were there. She knew every line of each of them. They were her old friends. They knew her. Looking at none of them she felt she embraced them all, closely, and that they knew it. They shone. They were beautiful. She wanted to cry aloud. She was English and free. She had nothing to do with this German school. Baskets at her feet made her pick her way. Solomon was kneeling at one, sorting and handing out. At a little table under the window Millie stood jotting pencil notes in a pocket-book. Judy was at her side. The others were grouped about the piano. Gertrude sat on the keyboard her legs dangling.
Miriam plumped down on a full basket.
“Hullo, Hendy, old chap, you look all right!”
Miriam looked fearlessly up at the faces that were turned towards her. Again she seemed to see all of them at once. The circle of her vision seemed huge. It was as if the confining rim of her glasses were gone and she saw equally from eyes that seemed to fill her face. She drew all their eyes to her. They were waiting for her to speak. For a moment it seemed as if they stood there lifeless. She had drawn all their meaning and all their happiness into herself. She could do as she wished with them—their poor little lives.
They stood waiting for some word from her. She dropped her eyes and caught the flash of Gertrude’s swinging steel buckles.
“Wasn’t Fräulein angry?” she said carelessly.
Someone pushed the door to.
“Sly old bird.”
“Fancy imagining we shouldn’t see through Mademoiselle leaving.”
“H’m,” said Miriam.
“I knew Mademoiselle would sneak if she had half a chance.”
“Yes, ever since she got so thick with Elsa.”
“Oh!—Elsa.”
“You bet Fräulein looks down on the two of them in her heart of hearts.”
“M’m—she’s fairly sick, Jemima, with the lot of us this time.”
“Mademoiselle told her some pretty things,” laughed Gertrude. “Lily thinks we’re lost souls—nearly all of us.”
“Onny swaw, my dears, onny swaw.”
“It’s all very well. But there’s no knowing what Mademoiselle would make her believe. She’d got reams about you, Hendy—nothing bad enough.”
“H’m,” said Miriam, “I can imagine——”
Her thoughts brought back a day when she had shown Mademoiselle the names in her birthday-book and dwelt on one page and let Mademoiselle understand that it was the page—brown eyes—les yeux brunes foncés. Why did Mademoiselle and Fräulein think that bad—want to spoil it for her? She had said nothing about the confidences of the German girls to anyone. Elsa must have found that out from Clara.
“Oh, well it’s all over now. Let’s be thankful and think no more about it.”
“All very fine, Jemima. You’re going home.”
“Thank goodness.”
“And not coming back. Lucky Pigleinchen.”
“Well, so am I,” said Miriam, “and I’m not coming back.”
“I say! Aren’t you coming to Norderney?” Gertrude flashed dark eyes at her.
“Can’t you come to Norderney?” said Judy thickly, at her elbow.
“Well, you see there are all sorts of things happening at home. I must go. One of my sisters is engaged and another going away. I must go home for a while. Of course I might come back.”
“Think it over, Henderson, and see if you can’t decide in our favour.”
“We shall have another Miss Owen.”
Miriam struggled up out of her basket. “But I thought you all liked Miss Owen!”
“Ho! Goodness! Too simple for words.”
“You never told us you had any sisters, Hendy,” said Jimmie, tapping her on the wrist.
“What a pity you’re going just as we’re getting to know you,” Judy smiled shyly and looked on the floor.
“Well—I’m off with my bundle,” announced Gertrude. “To be continued in our next. Think it over, Hendy. Don’t desert us. Hurry up, my room. It’ll be tea-time before we’re straight. Come on, Jim.”
Miriam moved, with Judy following at her elbow, across the room to Millie. She looked up with her little plaintive frown. Miriam could not remember what her plans were. “Let’s see,” she said, “you’re going to Norderney, aren’t you?”
“I’m not going to Norderney,” said Millie almost tearfully. “I only wish I were. I don’t even know I’m coming back next term.”
“Aren’t you looking forward to the holidays?”
“I don’t know. I’d rather be staying here if I’m not coming back after.”
“To stay in Germany? You’d rather do that than anything?”
“Rather.”
“Here, with Fräulein Pfaff?”
“Of course, here with Fräulein Pfaff. I’d rather be in Germany than anything.”
Millie stood staring with her pout and her slightly raised eyebrows at the frosted window.
“Would you stay here in the school for the holidays if Fräulein were staying?”
“I’d do anything,” said Millie, “to stay in Germany.”
“You know,” said Miriam gazing at her, “so would I—any mortal thing.”
Millie’s eyes had filled with tears.
“Then why don’t ye stay?” said Judy, with gentle gruffness.