Etheldreda the Ready: A School Story

by Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

Thunderous applause. Dreda walked down the little stairway, carrying her heavy load of books with the folded manuscript slipped beneath the cover of the topmost volume. The visitors on either side beamed congratulations as she passed; on the faces of her school friends was an expression which she had never seen before—proud and yet awed, affectionate yet shrinking. It was as if they said to themselves:

“Who is this Dreda who has changed into a genius before our eyes? We have laughed at her, and made fun of her pretensions, and behold, they are not pretensions at all—they are real! We have been blind. We have never really known her as she is.”

The girls in the second row made way for her as she came, pulling their skirts aside, and tucking their feet beneath the bench to allow her to pass along to her seat. She saw each face quite close as she passed along—Flora, Barbara, Nancy, Norah, Grace—all smiled shyly upon her—all except one. Norah’s eyes remained hard and cold—Norah was not glad. She wanted Susan to win the prize.

The clapping was dying down, and Mr Rawdon was beginning his promised address.

“My dear friends—It is my privilege this afternoon—” It was not possible to listen to an address at this supreme moment of realisation—even the words of Mr Rawdon himself were a meaningless jargon in Dreda’s ears. Someone tried to take the books from her, but she clung tightly to the volume containing the precious essay which had brought this triumph into her life. Such a wonderful essay that on the strength of it one of the greatest of living authors had confidently prophesied a worldwide reputation. She, Dreda Saxon, an author whom strange people talked about, whose name appeared familiarly in newspapers and magazines! She herself had dreamed of such fairy tales, had expatiated on their probability to sceptical friends; but now that Mr Rawdon had prophesied the same thing she was none the less surprised and tremulous. He who has experienced what the world calls triumph knows well that at those moments the inmost feeling of the heart has been humility rather than pride. He alone knows his own limitations, his own weakness; he trembles lest he may prove unworthy of the praise he has won. As the first delirious moments passed by, Dreda was amazed to feel a sense of depression chilling her blood. She questioned herself as to its cause, and discovered that it arose from a new and disagreeable doubt of her own capacities. Mr Rawdon thought her very, very clever; but was she—was she really? He believed that she could write books—long books of hundreds of pages, like the one lying on her lap; many books—one after another—all different, about different people, different things. Could she do it? Was her brain really full enough, wise enough, original enough for such a strain? Face to face with herself Dreda experienced some horrible moments of doubt. It had been so difficult to write that one essay—of herself she had seemed to have no ideas. She had merely pounced on what other people had written and said and rearranged their words. “I am quick, I am sharp. I am what they call ready,” said Dreda to herself in that rare moment of modesty; “but I am not really clever. I don’t think thoughts of my very own like Susan. It’s all a mistake. I shall fail, and everyone will know.”

She began to tremble again, and the form creaked behind her. Some one edged nearer and pressed a supporting arm against her side. It was Susan. Dear Susan! If she had been cross and jealous it would have spoiled those first wonderful moments of triumph. Dreda remembered her own prediction of how she would have felt had positions been reversed, and pressed lovingly against the thin little arm. Her eye fell on the sheets of manuscript folded within the book on her lap, and at the sight she knew a returning thrill of confidence. After all Mr Rawdon was a better judge than herself—he would not have spoken as he did if he had not been sure. It was one of the signs of greatness to distrust oneself.

Dreda smiled, and let her fingers touch the paper with caressing touches. She turned back a corner of the sheet and read some scattered words; even in this short time they seemed unfamiliar, and she searched mentally for the context. It refused to be recalled. She lifted another corner, and a third; her hand trembled, she turned a fourth corner; her fingers dropped the paper, and clenched themselves upon her knee, lay there motionless.

At the moment of tension when Dreda had been waiting for Mr Rawdon’s announcement, she had felt a strange bursting sensation in her head; but now something really did snap—it must have done, for she heard it with her ears—a sharp, splitting noise, so loud that it seemed impossible that others had not heard it also; yet they still sat smiling and complacent. No one knew, no one suspected. They still believed what she herself had believed, a moment ago—long, long years ago—which was it?—that she was the winner of the coveted prize, the clever, fortunate girl who had a future before her, whose name was to be a household word in the land. She had thought so too; she had walked down the room to the sound of applause, had felt every eye riveted on her face, had seen her mother’s tears; but this paper which lay on her knee, the paper with “Prize Essay” scrawled across the back—this was not her composition. The sentences which she had read were not her own; there had been some mistake—some horrible, incomprehensible mistake! The numbers must have been confused together. It was Susan’s essay which had won the prize, and not her own.

Three minutes ago she had been sure, yet she had not been happy; she had allowed herself to think of the future—to worry and to doubt. Oh, the folly of it! And now she could never be happy any more; her triumph was turned into humiliation and shame.

What would they think—do—say? Mr Rawdon, Miss Drake, father and mother, the other visitors, the girls? What could they say? It would be miserable for everybody—even for Susan. Susan could not enjoy her triumph at such a cost to her chosen friend. Susan’s arm pressed lovingly against her side—she was distressed that Dreda seemed unnerved, but she did not guess what had happened. Nobody guessed! No one could guess if she kept those sheets carefully folded, and destroyed them as soon as she reached the dormitory. It was not her own mistake. It was Mr Rawdon’s. Was one called upon to taste the very dregs of humiliation because another person had made a mistake?