“I wouldn’t tell stories like that if I were you, Pixie,” said the head girl gravely, at the end of this recital. She had not laughed as the others had done, but looked at the little chatterbox with a grave, steady glance. Margaret had gained for herself the title of “School-Mother”, by thinking of something better than the amusement of the moment, and being brave enough to speak a word of warning when she saw a girl setting out on a path which was likely to bring her into trouble. “I wouldn’t tell stories like that!” she repeated, and when the swift “Why not?” came back, she was ready with her reply. “Because I am sure your people would not like it. It is all right for you to tell us about your brothers and sisters, and it was very interesting. I wish Bridgie and Esmeralda had come to school with you; but we don’t tell stories of our home doings of which we are,”—she was about to say “ashamed,” but the child’s innocent eyes restrained her—“about which we are sorry! We keep those to ourselves.”
“But—but we got the mutton! He gave us the mutton!” cried Pixie, agape with wonder. It seemed to her an interesting and highly creditable history, seeing that Bridgie had had the better of the butcher, and maintained the family credit in the eyes of the neighbourhood. She could not understand Margaret’s gravity, and the half-amused, half-pitiful glances of the older pupils.
The girl standing nearest to her put an arm round her neck, and said, “Poor little girlie!” in such a soft, tender voice that her tears overflowed at the moment, and she returned the embrace with startling fervour. Pixie’s emotions were all on the surface, and she could cry at one moment and laugh at the next, with more ease than an ordinary person could smile or sigh. When the gong sounded for tea, she went downstairs with her arms twined fondly round the waists of two new friends, and there was quite a quarrel among the girls as to who should sit beside her.
Miss Phipps was at one end of the table, and Mademoiselle, the resident French teacher, at the other, and between them stretched a long white space flanked by plates of bread-and-butter, and in the centre some currant scones, and dishes of jam. These latter dainties were intended to supply a second course when appetite had been appeased by plainer fare, but the moment that grace was said the new-comer helped herself to the largest scone she could find, half covered her plate with jam, and fell to work with unrestrained relish, while thirty pairs of eyes watched with fascinated horror. She thought that everyone seemed uncommonly quiet and solemn, and was casting about in her mind for a pleasant means of opening the conversation, when a sound broke on her ears which recalled one of Pat’s prophecies with unpleasant distinctness. Mademoiselle was talking in her native tongue, and it was not in the least like the French which she had been accustomed to hear in the schoolroom at Bally William. The agonising presentiment that her ignorance was about to be discovered before her schoolmates reduced Pixie at one blow to a condition of abject despair. She hung her head over her plate, and strove to avoid attention by keeping as quiet as possible.
“They speak too quick. It’s rude to gabble!” she told herself resentfully. “And I know some French meself. ‘J’ai, tu as, il a, nous sommes, vous êtes, ils sont.’ Listen at that, now!” She felt a momentary thrill of triumph in her achievement, but it quickly faded away, as further efforts showed how scanty was the knowledge upon which she could draw. “Je suis faim” was the only phrase which occurred at the moment, and appropriately enough too! She stretched out her hand to take a second scone, but was immediately called to order by Miss Phipps’s soft voice.
“Bread-and-butter this time, Pixie! You are not supposed to take scones until you have had at least three pieces of bread. You must do as the other girls do, you know, dear!”
“Oi like a relish to my tay!” sighed Pixie sadly, and five separate girls who happened to have their cups to their mouths at the moment, choked immediately, and had to be patted on the backs by their companions. All the girls were laughing; even the victims smiled amidst their struggles, and Mademoiselle’s brown eyes were sparkling with amusement. There was not one of them half so beautiful as Esmeralda, nor so sweet as Bridgie, but they were good to look at all the same, reflected the new pupil critically. Right opposite sat her three room-mates—Flora, plump and beaming; Kate, sallow and spectacled; Ethel, the curious, with a mane of reddish brown hair, which she kept tossing from side to side with a self-conscious, consequential air. Margaret sat by Miss Phipps’s side, and helped her by putting sugar and milk into the cups. Glance where she would, she met bright, kindly smiles, and her friend on either side looked after her wants in the kindest of manners. Pixie did not know their names, so she addressed them indiscriminately as “darlin’,” and was prepared to vow eternal friendship without waiting to be introduced.
“Do you always speak French at meals?” she asked under cover of the general conversation a few minutes later, and the reply was even worse than her fears.
“We are supposed to speak it always, except in the quarter of an hour before tea, and on Sundays, and holidays. But of course, if you do not know a word you can ask Mademoiselle, or look it up in a dictionary, and the new girls get into it gradually. Miss Phipps is a darling; she can’t bear to see a girl unhappy, and of course it is difficult to get into school ways when you have been taught at home. I have been here for two years, and am as happy as possible, though I cried myself sick the first week. If you do what you are told and work hard, you will have a very good time at Holly House.”
Pixie looked dubious.