“Jack was going to take me to the s–s–circus! I’ve never seen a clown in all me days! I was c–counting the hours!” stammered Pixie tearfully; and at the sound of her voice, as at a signal, all the girls stopped talking and fixed their eyes upon her. She looked pitiful enough with the tears streaming down her cheeks, but there was not much sympathy in the watching faces, and for the first time the growing resentment forced itself into words.
“You have only yourself to blame,” Kate said coldly. “If you had spoken up and told all you knew about that horrible night, it would have been forgotten by this time. I believe Mademoiselle is sorry already that she made such a fuss, but Miss Phipps won’t rest until she has found out what she wants. If you will be obstinate, you must expect to be punished, but it’s hard lines on the rest of us who have done nothing wrong.”
“And we were all so kind to you, Pixie O’Shaughnessy, and made a regular pet of you—you know we did! We helped you like angels when you couldn’t do your lessons. I’ve been in this school five years, and I’ve never seen a new girl made such a fuss of before. I call you an ungrateful serpent to turn and rend us like this.”
“Clowns indeed! I should think you have something else to think of than clowns! Do you realise that thirty girls are losing their fun for three whole weeks because you won’t speak? If you had any nice feeling, you would be too miserable for clowns.”
“Oh, Pixie, I’ve such a smashing headache! You might tell! I was so looking forward to a rest this afternoon. It makes the week so dreadfully, dreadfully long when there are no holidays!”
Flora’s voice was full of tears, and Pixie’s miserable glance, roving from one speaker to another, grew suddenly eager as it rested upon her, for she was skilled in the treatment of headaches, and was never more happy than when officiating as nurse.
“I’ll lend ye my smelling-bottle. It’s awful strong! Ye said yourself the last time you smelt it ye forgot all about the pain. Will I run up this minute and bring it for you?”
“No, thank you!” Flora’s tone was almost as cold as Kate’s. “I don’t want your loans. Smelling-bottles are no good to me if I have to rack my brains all the afternoon. You needn’t pretend to be sorry, for if you were you could soon cure me. Come along, girls, let’s go upstairs! It is no use talking to her any longer.”
The girls linked arms and filed to the door, only Lottie lingering behind to thrust her hand encouragingly through Pixie’s arm. Kate, standing near, caught the whispered words of consolation. “You shall go to the circus in the holidays. I’ll ask you to stay with me, and we will go somewhere nice every afternoon!”—and told herself reproachfully that Lottie was more forgiving than herself.
“I don’t feel in the least inclined to offer her treats, though I’m sorry for her all the same. She does look such a woe-begone little wretch! It’s my belief she thought it was a good opportunity to examine the scent-bottle when we were all upstairs, and that she put it down too roughly or let it slip from her hands and hadn’t the nerve to own up at once. I don’t wonder she is afraid to confess now; I should be myself. You don’t know what might happen—you might even be expelled! I don’t believe Miss Phipps would keep a girl who was so mean as to make all the school suffer rather than face a scolding. There’s one thing certain, I’m not going to have Pixie O’Shaughnessy fagging for me until this business is cleared up! I have tied my own hair bows before and can do them again, and I shall tell Flora and Ethel not to allow her in their cubicles either. If she is untruthful, how are we to know that she might not be dishonest next!”