National school children are at such times supposed to be all intent upon their lessons, and never to raise their eyes to look at visitors, especially such an awe-inspiring personage as an inspector; but it would be just as reasonable to expect a pinch of steel filings to refrain from turning towards a magnet plunged in their midst. Certainly the girls in Hazel Thorne’s charge followed the inspector, their eyes taking in every movement and Feelier Potts’s malicious features almost involuntarily moulding themselves into an excellent imitation of the peculiarities of his face.
When Mr Barracombe had solemnly walked round the school once, with the Reverend Henry Lambent hat in hand, behind him, and the other visitors forming themselves into a deferential audience, who watched him as if he were going through some wonderful performance, he said, with a loud expiration of his breath—
“Hah!” an ejaculation that might mean anything, and one that committed him to naught.
“Is—ah, this your first class. Miss—ah—ah—”
“Thorne,” said Hazel quietly. “No, sir, this is the second.”
“Thorne, ah—exactly. Yes, I see—ah. Yes, needlework—ah. Stand.”
The girls in the first class stood up smartly, and Feelier Potts’s thimble flew off, went tinkling across the floor, and was flattened beneath one of Ann Straggalls’s big feet.
“Oh, you see if I don’t serve you out for that,” began Feelier loudly, her face scarlet with rage.
“Hush! silence! How dare you, child?”
“Well, but she’s squeedged it flat.”