CHAPTER XV
THE GYMNASTIC DISPLAY
The junior division, drawn up in double file, stood assembled in the anteroom of the gymnasium, on the day of the great competition for the Canon’s prize. The figure-marching by the whole class was over, and the senior division had just begun the wand exercises to the piano accompaniment of the German music-master, who, being the unlucky possessor of an unpronounceable name in three syllables, was generally known as ‘Scales.’ The applause which had followed after the marching had taken away the first shyness of the younger children; and even the prospect of doing separate exercises presently, before an audience of strangers, did not seem to be having much effect on the sixteen little girls in scarlet frocks who were waiting in the anteroom for their turn to come. Hurly-Burly, though supposed to be superintending affairs in the gymnasium, had to look in at the door more than once, to remind them that the crashing chords of ‘Scales’ did not drown everything; but just as she had succeeded in reducing them at last to order, a piece of information passed down the file from Charlotte Bigley, who stood nearest the doorway and had the best view of the gymnasium, upset them all once more.
‘Margaret has forgotten the figure,’ ‘Margaret has put the others out,’ ‘Margaret has gone wrong,’ ‘Margaret Hulme has clean forgotten everything, and she’s got to step out,’ were the various forms in which the news travelled down to the end of the file, the last of all being the version of Angela Wilkins and therefore generally discredited.
‘I don’t believe a word of it!’ said Jean, stoutly.
‘Why, Margaret couldn’t go wrong if she tried,’ exclaimed Barbara, whose belief in the head girl, though slow in coming, was quite equal by this time to Jean’s.
‘She has, though,’ declared Angela, who stood with Mary Wells just in front of Jean and Barbara.
Mary Wells, who had stepped out of rank on hearing the surprising news, now returned, and in her slow and conscientious manner proceeded to reprove Angela.
‘How you do exaggerate, Angela!’ she said, frowning. ‘Margaret only went a little wrong; and she’s caught up again all right. Isn’t it funny, though?’ she was obliged to add immediately, with a thrill of amazement in her voice.
The two children behind her for once were dumb. The head girl, according to their simple creed, could do no wrong; so when she did, what words had they left to use? Babs was the first to see a way out of the difficulty.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘I expect she’s nervous. It makes you forget like anything, if you’re nervous. Once, when Egbert was being prepared for confirmation, he was so nervous–it was a strange clergyman, you know, and Egbert said he blinked–that he clean forgot his catechism, even the easy first part about your godfathers and godmothers. So that’s why Margaret forgot her steps, you see if it wasn’t!’