And almost before her ladyship knew what had happened, she had been well hugged, and found herself alone, staring blankly into the closet under the stairs.
A few days later Madame Ribaud received a month's notice, and Lady Dudgeon never attempted extreme measures with Sophia after that time.
It is not improbable that she had this very incident in her mind during her first interview with Miss Deane after the latter's arrival at Stammars. "I place them entirely in your hands," said her ladyship, in reference to her two girls. "Exercise whatever discipline over them you may think best, only don't box their ears, and don't trouble me. If you find that they are becoming your master instead of you being theirs, don't come and complain in the expectation that I shall assist you to maintain an authority that you are not strong enough to keep in your own hands. Should such a contingency arise, it would be better for you to resign your situation at once."
For the first two or three days all went tolerably well, but hardly to Olive's satisfaction. There were no overt signs of rebellion, but the girls seemed unaccountably stupid. Whether their stupidity arose from inattention, from weakness of memory, or from a natural lack of intelligence, she was for some time at a loss to judge. But, by-and-by, she began to suspect that this stupidity was merely an assumption on their part purposely to annoy her, and that all the time they were laughing at her in their sleeves. But at such a game as that, Olive knew that her patience was far more than a match for theirs, and so it turned out. Miss Deane seemed so quiet and easy, that there was evidently no fun to be got out of her without trying something more practical than stumbling over one's French verbs, or making mistakes in the spelling of one's copies. Thus it fell out on a certain morning when Miss Deane was going out for a walk, that she found it impossible to get her arms into the sleeves of her waterproof On examination, it was found that the sleeves had been sewn up at the wrist. Miss Deane hung the waterproof up without a word, and took off her bonnet. Then she said, "I think, young ladies, we will not go for our usual walk this morning." Sophy and Carry, half frightened and half defiant, were nudging each other and making believe that it was great fun.
When they got back into the schoolroom, said Miss Deane: "As you young ladies appear to be so fond of playing off practical jokes on other people, you cannot reasonably object to one being played off on you. You will, if you please, write out in detail and learn by heart, pages twenty-five to twenty-nine of the irregular verbs in your French Instruction Book. And you will not leave the room till you can repeat the lesson to my satisfaction."
The two girls made a face at each other, but said nothing. It was not the first time they had had a big task set them for a punishment, but they had always contrived to win the day either by force or stratagem, and they did not doubt their ability to do so in the present case.
By luncheon time they had got the lesson written out. It was not pleasant to have to sacrifice their luncheon, but they were prepared to submit to that: dinner would make up for everything. They did not expect that Miss Deane would let them go down to dinner as usual, but they did expect that she would go down herself, as Madame Ribaud had done in similar cases. When this had happened, one of the housemaids had always supplied them surreptitiously with a basket of provisions, which they had drawn up to their window by means of a cord, and had afterwards feasted on in secret. No dinners had ever tasted half so sweet. Thus provisioned, they had been able to set Madame Ribaud at defiance, who, indeed, had never the heart to extend their quarantine beyond the usual hour for tea, and would then set her rebels free, with a little sigh and an ominous shake of her head. As it had happened before, so would it fall out again, thought the girls; but they did not know Olive Deane.
Between luncheon and dinner-time they dawdled over their lesson, skimming it carelessly over a few times, but employing themselves more in drawing caricatures than in anything else. After a time the dinner-bell rang--they dined early at Stammars when there was no company--but apparently Miss Deane took no notice.
"Did you not hear the dinner-bell, Miss Deane?" asked Caroline, timidly.
"Yes, I heard it; but I don't want any dinner to-day. I am going to stay here with you."