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Nina swung round, her eyes flashing “You clumsy creature! I’ll never forgive you!” she exclaimed.

Sir Guy Rutherford sat glaring at the schoolgirl sitting at the other side of the table with a good deal of impatience. She glared back and there was furious indignation in the dark eyes that fronted him.

“I wish you’d hear reason!” he said suddenly. “You’re—how old? Fifteen, isn’t it? Very well, then. You’re still at an age when what you need is school and a jolly good school at that!”

She straightened herself. “There is no need,” she said. “I have read and I mean to go on reading. But at my age, and if I’m to make music my career as I intend, I simply haven’t time to waste on algebra and geometry and science and all the other stuff you seem to learn at school. I ought to be doing six hours’ practice a day. And there’s all the theoretical side of it as well—harmony, counterpoint, thoroughbass; and on top of that, sonata and fugue form. I’ve done next to nothing at those and honestly, Cousin Guy, they are necessary!”

“But bless me, what’s to become of your education if you spend all your time on that sort of thing?” he demanded irritably. “No, no, Nina! A couple of hours a day at the piano—or even three, perhaps, if you want extra. But seventeen or eighteen is quite soon enough to begin to specialize like that.”

“You don’t understand!” she retorted. “I want to be a concert pianist—and I don’t want to mess about at it. I mean to be in the first rank if I possibly can. That means starting young—almost as young as the great ballet dancers have to start. My father,” her lips quivered and she had to stop to steady her voice, “understood. I used to give three hours a day to lessons; but the rest of the time I gave to my music. Oh, don’t you see?”

To be strictly truthful, Sir Guy did not see. To his way of thinking, an education of this kind was ill-balanced in the extreme. He had not seen his cousin Alan for nearly fifteen years, since the latter had been seized with an incurable restlessness after the death, when Nina was a baby of eighteen months, of the wife he had adored.

He had gone off, taking the child with him, and from then on they had wandered over a good part of the inhabited globe, rarely pausing longer than a year anywhere. As a result the girl was meeting a relative for the first time and she did not like the experience overmuch. Sir Guy was given to plain speaking and he had let her see that he was horrified at the way her lessons had been treated.

He spoke now. “I wish to goodness my wife had been able to come with me and was here to talk sense to you! Look here, Nina, your father left me your guardian and that means that I’ve got to do the best I can for you——”

“And that means letting me go ahead with my training,” she broke in. “Dad saw that it was necessary. It was what he had wanted for himself, but my grandfather wouldn’t hear of it and pushed him into the business. When he met my mother and they fell in love, Grandpapa was furious and tried to put a stop to it just because she was a concert singer. Well, he didn’t succeed. Dad went off with Mammina and if he hadn’t had that accident to his hand, even then he might have made something of his playing. But you can’t do much when you’ve lost three fingers on your right hand. That was why he turned to composition and he made good there. You needn’t think you’ll have to pay for me. Dad told me years ago that there was enough money to keep me, whatever happened. He always intended that I should have what he had missed and he’s given it to me!” She stopped to swallow hard. Then she went on, “You can say what you like. His plans aren’t going to be upset!”

Sir Guy was silent from sheer amazement. He had come post-haste to the little village on the shores of Lake Maggiore where his cousin had been living with his daughter when the news came that Alan Rutherford had been drowned, in the lake, trying to save the life of a child which had tumbled in. He had arrived too late for the funeral, for Mr. Rutherford had held no communication with his family after the death of his wife and it had meant going through his papers to find someone who could come and take charge of Nina. Sir Guy had arrived only two days ago to find that the young cousin to whom he was guardian and trustee had very clear-cut ideas about her own future, and refused to entertain any suggestion about the good school where his own three girls were and to which he proposed to send her after Christmas.

He looked helplessly at the girl. She struck him as needing care. The white wedge of a face under the heavy black hair tumbling about the broad brow looked too small for the enormous dark eyes that were glaring defiance at him. She was thin to the point of lankiness and the beautiful, long-fingered hands with their square-tipped fingers showed every bone.

Meanwhile Nina, having made what she considered to be the full statement of the case, was silent, too. Music was her life. From her earliest days it had been her greatest joy. Even when she was a baby, her mother could hush her crying by playing to her. At three, she had picked out little tunes for herself on the piano and at four, her father had started her himself. At first, he had refrained from saying much about her undoubted gift. He had seen too much of child wonders who flowered early and then vanished from sight. But he had seen to it that she practised regularly and had the finest teachers he could manage.

As the years passed and it grew more and more clear what her future must be, he had seen to it that she knew about the hardships and disappointments she must meet if she went in for concert work. Nina had early understood that she must work hard and that there would never come a time when she might rest on her oars unless she meant to give it up for good. She also realized that it was a hard life from other points of view, with perpetual travelling in weather of all kinds, requiring great powers of self-control so that no matter how unhappy or poorly she felt she should not disappoint her audiences. All the same, it was the life she wanted. She had willingly spent hours on exercises, scales and arpeggii that she might gain the technique which would enable her to interpret the works of the great masters. Already, she was brilliant, with a mastery of her instrument that was amazing in a schoolgirl. Her passionate love of her art gave her an insight that had brought from one of her most recent masters the remark that when life and experience had given her the understanding, she might reach the first rank of pianists.

At the same time, she had missed a great deal that is commonplace to the average girl. She had never known the fun of school-life, nor the joy of playing for one’s side. She had never had a great friend, other than her father. Games were a sealed book to her, apart from tennis which her father had taught her.

One thing she had been saved. He had always flatly refused to allow anyone to exploit her gifts. He had seen too much of what can happen and, though she was far too old and serious for her age, Nina was free from any self-consciousness or conceit over her music.

Her cousin dimly felt this. He realized that the girl spoke from deepest conviction and, to be quite frank, he had not the faintest idea how to deal with her.

“Well,” he said finally, “we can’t settle anything now. The first thing to do is to take you to England. How soon can you be packed up?”

Nina started and looked round with a hunted look. “Go to England? But—my father said we should stay here till after Easter.”

“Yes,” Sir Guy said as gently as he could. “But things are changed now. I can’t stay here—I have a job of work of my own and I must get back by the end of the week and I can’t leave you here alone.”

“Why not? Signora Pecci would look after me and I should have my work.”

“No—and I mean it,” he added. “Sorry, Nina, but it’s England for you.”

He had the wisdom to say no more about school. Besides, he was sorry for the girl who looked at him with such woebegone eyes.

“But I don’t see how I can possibly be ready to go so soon. And how on earth are we to manage about my piano?”

“No need to worry about that. We have a very good one at home—and there’s the cottage piano in the schoolroom as well that will do for you to practise on.”

Nina drew herself up. “But this is my own—my very own. Dad gave it to me last Christmas when Herr Braun said it was time I had a good one of my own for practice. I can’t leave that behind.”

Sir Guy whistled. “I didn’t understand. And I don’t know where you’ll put it, even if we can manage to cart it half across Europe and up north to Northumberland.”

“I’m not leaving it behind,” Nina said decidedly. “It’s mine—Dad’s Christmas gift——” She suddenly stopped, swallowed, and then rushed out of the room, leaving him to rub his head and wish again that his wife had come with him.

“Alan must have been out of his mind to bring the girl up like this!” he ruminated as he went over to look at the piano. “A Bechstein! And for a schoolgirl to practise on! I don’t know what Yvonne will say about it. Oh, lord! What a mess it all is!”

In the end, he had to give in. Nina flatly refused to move without the piano and, in fact, it was five days later than he had settled that they did manage to leave and set out on their journey for England.

One thing happened before then. He came in from a stroll by the lakeside one morning when Nina was playing for her own pleasure and was amazed to find how she could play. His own three all learned, though Anthea had been promoted to a violin at her own request. Alix, the eldest, was considered to be good; but beside the fire and brilliance Nina put into a Brahms capriccio, she sank to the level of a junior schoolgirl. As for Alison, she would come nowhere, and he said so frankly.

“I begin to see what you mean,” he said slowly as he came to stand beside the piano. Nina looked up at him, her eyes alight and her cheeks glowing.

“But you see, Cousin Guy,” she said simply, “it is part of me as much as my breathing is. I couldn’t live without it. I suppose for my cousins it is just another lesson they learn at school.”

Sir Guy sat down. “Play me something else, Nina. The men are coming to-morrow to box the piano, so it’s your last chance for a few days.”

She turned back to the keyboard. “I don’t know what you like. Beethoven—Bach—Scriabin—what would you prefer?”

“Whatever you please.”

She played the first movement of the Moonlight sonata and followed it up with a Bach toccata and Débussy’s “La Cathédrale Engloutie”. He was more and more amazed for this was no schoolgirl playing but something of a far higher order. Under her fingers, the piano sang the lovely legato of the Moonlight and the Toccata called for an execution that even he could see was out of the common. Of the Débussy, he made very little, since he was not educated, musically, to such music; but he recognized the sweep and thunder of the sea through it.

“Oh, lord!” he ejaculated mentally. “What on earth are Yvonne and I to do with such a girl?”

Then she suddenly lapsed into a minuet, slight, but very dainty and fresh. When she had finished, she turned to look at him again and he saw that her eyes were full of tears.

“That was Dad’s,” she said with difficulty. She got up and closed the lid down. “I shan’t play again until it is in England. I wanted that to be the last I played, here in Italy where we have been so happy.”

“Thanks a lot,” he replied; and said no more.

But he had plenty to say next day when she appeared at breakfast in a black frock. Signora Pecci had helped her to get it and it was the deep mourning of the Latin races. It would have been trying for even his own Alison with her fair, rosy colouring. For Nina it was simply dreadful, turning her pallor to a sallowness that made her look even plainer than usual.

“Oh, my dear girl!” he protested. “Why have you got yourself up like this? Where’s that grey thing you’ve been wearing? For goodness’ sake go and change after breakfast. You look a complete sight in that and it isn’t necessary. People in England don’t go in for such mourning these days.”

Nina’s eyes flashed. “And let everyone think I don’t care!” she exclaimed. “I should have had it much sooner, but Signorina Cavaletti was taken ill and was only able to finish it last night.”

She stuck to it and completed it by appearing for the journey in a black beret and coat which put the finishing touches to the awfulness of the get-up. He had to yield. Nina was as obstinate as a mule when she chose and he could only be thankful that she had spared him the long black veil she informed him she should have worn.

“Only I thought it would be so horribly crushed after all those days of train travel,” she added.

Sir Guy said no more, and they set off for Basle where they were to join the Wien-Paris express in the evening. Nina had insisted on bringing everything with her and the array of trunks and cases made his heart sink into his shoes. He was going to have a bad time with the Customs. And what his wife would say about it all, he shuddered to think!

“Hello! Here’s Berne!” said Sir Guy. He pronounced it “Burn” with a good British accent and Nina was roused to wonder for a moment what he meant.

“Do we change here?” she asked anxiously, looking round in apprehension at the cases and boxes piled up between them, under the seat and on the rack.

“No, no!” he replied. “Change at Basle. Don’t worry, Nina. Why, bless me! There’s a school waiting here!” as the train swept into the great station and, obviously waiting for it, stood four ranks of girls of all ages from ten to eighteen, all very trig and smart in their long coats and berets of gentian blue. Each had a small case in her right hand and an umbrella and other oddments in her left.

Nina looked at them curiously; but already the train had stopped and, at a word from one of the ladies with them, the blue ranks had turned and were marching in orderly fashion along the platform, up the steps and into the long carriages. It was clear that they were well-drilled for there was little confusion and the girls filled compartment after compartment with the minimum of fuss. Their chatter rose as they settled themselves and Sir Guy broke into a laugh.

“An English school, by all that’s good! What’s an English school doing over here in the heart of Europe, I wonder?”

He got no further, for the doorway to their compartment was darkened by the figure of a tall, pretty young woman who exclaimed, “Oh, excuse me, but there has been some mistake and they haven’t booked enough seats for our girls. I wonder if you would very much mind if four of them came in here with you?”

“By all means,” Sir Guy said with alacrity. “Shove that basket under the seat, Nina and give me that case. Plenty of room,” he added to the lady, who smiled and thanked him before she turned and went off.

She was back in a minute or two with four girls, all clearly English, and all much about the same age as Nina.

“Thank you so much,” the lady said to Sir Guy as the girls packed themselves in. “Hilary, I put you in charge. Remember, all of you, that we change trains at Basle. Don’t forget anything and don’t lose either your tickets or your passports.”

“I’ll look after them, Miss Derwent,” the girl she had addressed as Hilary said cheerfully. “Anyway, it’s only to Basle. I don’t think any of us could lose anything in that short distance.”

Miss Derwent laughed and left them and Hilary, having disposed of her belongings, sat down and beamed on her friends. “Well, that’s that! For goodness’ sake, all of you, glue yourselves to your tickets and passports. Thank goodness we haven’t young Verity to worry about! She could lose anything anywhere in less than five minutes if she gave her mind to it.”

The other three laughed and a fair, curly-headed person remarked, “It’s not really much use settling down in this train. We change so soon.”

Then the train started and, as they rolled slowly and majestically out of the station, the girls crowded to the window to wave to another mistress who was left standing on the platform and who waved gaily back at them. Nina could just see her between the heads that bobbed about and was seized with a desire to know more of this school which had such pretty mistresses and where the girls seemed so happy and friendly and on such good terms with everyone.

She was too shy to speak, but she was saved any trouble by Hilary shifting the umbrella she grasped firmly in one hand and digging her foot with it.

“Oh, I’m frightfully sorry!” exclaimed the culprit. “I do hope I didn’t hurt you or hit a pet corn or something!”

Nina smiled shyly. “I haven’t any corns, thank you, and you didn’t hurt me at all.”

“That’s as well for you,” observed a girl who was so enchantingly pretty with her violet eyes and bronzy hair with glints of gold in it, that Nina already felt glad she was in the opposite seat so that she might look at her without being obvious. “Hilary’s a hefty wench and she can give you quite a jab with that everlasting brolly of hers! Do put the wretched thing up on the rack, Hilary, and don’t be such an ass!”

“Not me!” Hilary eyed the “brolly” with exceeding disfavour, but clutched it firmly all the same. “I’m sticking to it until we’ve changed trains. Then it can go where it likes till we get to Paris. But if I lose it, Mummy said I must buy the next myself after losing last term’s on the boat going home. With Christmas half-way over the horizon, I haven’t a sou to waste on things like brollies!”

Nina listened delightedly. Sir Guy gave her a quizzical look from behind his paper. Then he buried himself in it and left her to pursue her acquaintance with the girls. He was quite as much attracted to them as she was and he fully intended that when they changed trains at Basle, he would get hold of Miss Derwent and ask her to let them join himself and Nina in their compartment again.

Until the school had come aboard the train at Berne, Nina had sat silently in her corner, looking the picture of misery, and the soft-hearted Sir Guy had begun to feel almost a criminal for taking her to England against her will. But the influx of jolly girls had roused her and she already looked several degrees happier.

Hilary had been doing some looking on her own account.

“That kid looks awfully down,” she thought, calmly ignoring the fact that “that kid” was at least her own age if not older. “Mary-Lou would be safe to do something about her if she was here. I suppose it’s up to me to do it. What a ghastly lot of black! I didn’t know people ever dressed girls of our age like that, however much they might be in mourning.”

Aloud, she said, “Are you going home for the Christmas hols, too? What school do you go to?”

“I don’t go to school at all,” Nina replied, drawn despite herself to this jolly girl with her mischievous blue eyes and wide smile.

“You don’t?” Hilary exclaimed. “Oh, what a pity!”

“A pity?” Nina stared.

“Well rather! Think of all the fun you miss!” Hilary said briskly.

“What’s your name?” asked the pretty girl. “We can’t go on calling you ‘you’. It sounds so offish. I’m Vi Lucy and the thing that tried to maim you is Hilary Bennet. These other two are Barbara Chester and Lesley Malcolm. Barbara’s my cousin, by the way, and we both live in Guernsey.”

“Nina Rutherford,” Nina replied, giving her name the proper Italian pronunciation so that Lesley promptly asked, “Do you spell it with an E or an I?”

“N—I—N—A,” the name’s owner explained.

“Oh, Lesley, you gump, have you forgotten Nina Williams?” Hilary exclaimed.

“Not exactly. But we were Third Form in those days and she was a pree and we didn’t have an awful lot to do with her,” Lesley returned, unperturbed. “Why don’t you go to school, Nina? You miss an awful lot, as Hilary said.”

“Because I’m going to be a concert pianist and I haven’t time,” Nina explained.

“Oh, but that’s rot,” Vi told her severely. “Everyone has time for school—or ought to. As for being a concert pianist, well, we’ve had Margia Stevens at the Chalet School in the Dark Ages and I suppose you’d call her a concert pianist?”

Nina looked startled. “I’ve heard her play—several times. She’s marvellous! Do you really mean she was at school with you?”

“Oh, not us,” a chorus told her, Hilary adding, “Vi said it was in the Dark Ages—when the school was in Tirol, as a matter of fact. That’s where it began and Margia was one of the first pupils. And Jacynth Hardy the ’cellist was in our time and a prefect into the bargain.”

Nina gasped. “But—but how did they manage?” she cried. “You’ve got to put in hours of practice if you mean to do anything worth while. How did they do it?”

“Oh, if you’re as good as all that you get extra time off for it, of course,” Hilary explained. “And they knock off unnecessary things like drawing and science and so on, and you get those times for your extra prac. Rather you than me!” she added feelingly.

Nina looked thoughtful. “Surely yours must be a—a very extraordinary school?” she said when she had digested these facts.

The four ruffled up like young turkey-cocks.

“Oh, no, it isn’t!” Barbara contradicted her flatly.

“Except in being an extraordinarily decent school,” Vi added. “It’s that all right and I ought to know—I’m the third of the family to be at it.”

“Oh no, you’re not!” Hilary said. “Counting all the Chesters and the two Ozannes you’re the seventh.”

“I meant of our own crowd. The rest are cousins,” Vi responded with a grin at Barbara who grinned back.

“Oh, I see.” Hilary turned to Nina. “Squads of them if you count the three families,” she explained. “Besides these two, there were Barbara’s sister Beth and Nancy—Nancy’s at the finishing branch now and Beth’s left, of course—and the Ozanne twins who’ve also left, and the two kids, Barbara’s kid sister Janice, who’s further along the train with the babies and Vi’s young Kitten who hasn’t gone anywhere so far.”

“She’s going to Carnbach to the other branch the term after next,” Vi said. “She’ll be eight, then, and she’s the last of us, so Mummy wouldn’t part with her sooner.”

“However many branches have you?” Nina demanded. She was looking, as her cousin thankfully noted, thoroughly interested and bright.

“Well, there’s us—the school proper, that is—and the finishing branch which is St. Mildred’s House. We’re up on the Görnetz Platz above Interlaken. The Carnbach branch is outside of Carnbach which is a little town on the South Wales coast.”

“I’ll tell you what it is,” Lesley said thoughtfully, “you ought to ask your people to let you come to us. Then you’d have school and all the time you needed for your music. Why don’t you?”

“Yes; why don’t you?” Barbara echoed her. She glanced at Sir Guy who seemed to be immersed in his paper but was secretly listening with all his ears.

“It’s such a frightful pity you should miss all the fun of school and friends and games and so on,” Hilary put in. “Do think it over, Nina!”

Barbara began to speak. “When I was a kid,” she said dreamily, “I was ghastly delicate. I never did any lessons—not to call lessons—until I was about twelve. I was always at home with Mummy before that. I was dying to go to school with Beth and Nancy and the rest, but they daren’t risk it. How I used to howl when the hols were over and they went off and left me at home! Then I got measles and was awfully ill, only when I got better, they found that it was really getting better. I got fitter and fitter until at last, a year past September, the doctors all said I could go. And was I glad! I’ve enjoyed every minute of the time and if you go and lose all the fun I’ve had, Nina, well—I’ll be sorry for you! That’s all!”

Nina looked unconvinced but, as a matter of fact, she thought more than she either looked or said. Vi took up the tale as she remained silent.

“You’d never think, to look at her now, that everyone in the family expected Babs—oh, well, Barbara, then, Fussy!—to pass out if a draught so much as looked at her. But we did! And now look at her! That’s what school has done for her!”

Nina naturally stared at Barbara who went scarlet and turned on her cousin with, “Really, Vi, you’re the utter edge!”

“That’ll do! Pipe down, you two!” Hilary felt that this had gone far enough. “Change the subject!”

Lesley changed the subject to a certain extent. “We have gorgeous excursions at the Chalet School. This term, we went to Zurich and then on to see the Falls of Rhine. That was marvellous!”

“And the term before,” added Vi, who was never easily squashed, “we spent Whit weekend above Lac Léman—that’s Lake Geneva,” she added kindly.

Nina laughed outright. “I know that, thank you. I’ve stayed there myself.”

“Basle—or very nearly!” exclaimed Lesley who had been looking out of the window. “Make sure you’ve got everything, folk.” She turned to Sir Guy and Nina to add, “Can we help you at all? Anyhow, Vi can hang out of the window and grab a porter. Barbara, you take Vi’s things and I’ll keep an eye on her case. Go on, Vi!”

As a result of these manœuvres, the change from one train to another was made quite easily. Sir Guy settled his young cousin in a corner of the Paris train, saw all their belongings and then hunted out Miss Derwent and arranged for the Chalet School quartette to come in with them, pointing out that it would enliven the long night journey for his young cousin. Finally, he presented them each with a box of what he called “goodies”.

“Now you’re all O.K.,” he said. “I’ll fetch you at dinner time.” With which he departed for a smoke.

Nina had dreaded the journey, for she had been miserable to leave Maggiore and she felt desperately unhappy about her music. However, thanks to the effervescent four, it turned out quite differently and by the time they had reached the Gare de l’Est where the Chalet School dispersed in various directions, many of its members being met by relatives or friends, while the Guernsey bunch went off in charge of Barbara Chester’s eldest sister Beth and the rest were shepherded off by the escort mistresses to seek breakfast before joining the train for Calais, she had made firm friends with all four. They said good-bye with promises to write—“if it’s only postcards”, Vi added cautiously—and Sir Guy whirled her away to Le Bourget for breakfast and the morning plane to London, whence a train from King’s Cross carried them north to Newcastle.

It is true that once in the northbound train, she lost most of her animation, but at least the look of intense misery did not return to her face. In fact, part of the journey she spent in wondering whether she should ask her cousin to let her go to the Chalet School if go to school she must. And this, for Nina, was something of a wonder!

Not that she mentioned it to Sir Guy. She still had hopes that when he came to think it over, he would realize that a girl who meant to go in for concert work and was aiming at the first rank at that could hardly be expected to spend time on subjects that, to her way of thinking would be of little or no use to her.

At Newcastle, they were met by the car from Brettingham Park. The morning which, in Paris, had been bright, had changed as they came north and the drive north-eastwards was made through a thick drizzle so that, even before darkness fell, little could be seen of the country, though Sir Guy assured his young cousin that once they had left the suburbs of the great city it was as beautiful as anything she had ever seen.

Coming from the warmth of north Italy, Nina turned cold and shivery, despite the rugs he wrapped round her, and it is scarcely surprising that Lady Rutherford felt aghast when she saw the white-faced creature her husband nearly carried up the steps to the great door where she stood waiting to welcome them. As for the three Rutherford girls, seventeen-year-old Alix, and Anthea and Alison, the twins of sixteen, they didn’t know what to make of her.

After an evening in which they did their best to be friendly while she had lapsed back into unhappy reserve and silence, they met in the twins’ bedroom out of which Alix’s pretty room opened.

“I’m awfully sorry for Nina,” Alix said. “I can see she’s awfully miserable, and it’s been a ghastly day to come here for the first time of course; but I do hope Father doesn’t mean to send her to Cecil’s with us next term!”

“You don’t hope it more than we do!” Alison retorted, brushing hard at the thick red curls she had inherited from her father. “And another thing I hope is that Mother confiscates that awful black dress and the other black things she’s wearing and puts her into something decent! She looks a complete freak as she is!”

“Oh, Mother will see to that all right,” Alix said serenely. “She told me before I came up that she must go through Nina’s things and persuade her to leave off all that deadly mourning. After all, no one bothers much about it nowadays—and certainly not girls of Nina’s age. Anyhow, for pity’s sake, twins, be decent to her. Father says she’s heartbroken over Cousin Alan’s death and she really has no one else but us to look to. Don’t rag her, whatever you do! I don’t believe she’d understand it at all.”

“Probably not,” Anthea agreed. “All right, Lal. We’ll not tease. I should imagine,” she went on thoughtfully, “that if she was roused sparks might fly.”

“Exactly! And, for everyone’s sake, we don’t want anything like that at present. Let her get accustomed to us.” And Alix, who was a thoughtful girl, nodded at her sisters and said good-night and closed the communicating door.

Meanwhile, Nina, in the pretty room at the end of the corridor which she had been told was hers for the future, tossed off her clothes, said her prayers hurriedly and then huddled under the bedclothes and cried till she could cry no more.

“Nina, dear, do you know you’ve been at that piano for the last two hours?” Lady Rutherford shivered slightly as she spoke and Nina, looking up from the Bach fugue with which she had been wrestling, noticed it.

“Are you cold, Cousin Yvonne? I suppose it is cold. I didn’t notice it before.”

Lady Rutherford looked at her. “My dear girl, you look blue with cold! We must try to arrange something better than this for you. At present, come along to the morning-room. There’s a good fire there and Alix has made cocoa. A hot drink will do you all the good in the world. Come along! Two hours at a time should be quite enough for anyone!” She shivered again and Nina reluctantly got up off the music-stool, closed her music, shut down the piano lids and followed her out of the room and along the winding passages to the little sitting-room which the Rutherfords mainly used.

A glorious log fire was burning in the grate and, as she came near it, Nina realized for the first time how cold she really was. Her piano had arrived at Brettingham Park the day before and had been put into another small sitting-room together with an oilstove. The fuel shortage made it difficult to give her a fire and Lady Rutherford had hoped that this would be enough for the present. But the day had broken with a heavy January fog which seemed to seep through every crevice and chill the air everywhere. Clearly some other arrangement must be made. However, the first thing now was to see that she warmed up properly, and her cousin put her into a chair by the fire and insisted on her drinking the big cup of boiling hot cocoa Alix brought her.

“I can’t think how you can bear to do it, Nina,” Alison said as she sipped her own cupful. “Two solid hours on end! Aren’t you frozen to death?”

“I never noticed it,” Nina said simply.

Alison stared and her twin said with a giggle, “Well, I’m glad I don’t have to work like that! I should die of inanition in a week!”

“It doesn’t mean to you what it means to me,” Nina replied shortly.

“Well, at least you aren’t going to starve any more,” Lady Rutherford told her. “I’ll see what we can do by to-morrow. In the meantime, Nina, no more practice to-day, please. We don’t want you to celebrate coming to England by an attack of pneumonia! We must think of something to do this afternoon.”

Nina’s face lengthened and she set down her half-empty cup. “Oh, Cousin Yvonne, I must practise! I’m getting all behind! Please don’t stop me! I—I’ll put on an extra woolly this afternoon and then I’ll be warm enough.”

Lady Rutherford shook her head. “Not nearly warm enough! Drink up you cocoa while it’s hot, dear. It’ll do you more good than if it’s lukewarm. Give her some more sugar, Anthea. Yes, dear; I mean it!”

Nina had already learned that when her Cousin Yvonne spoke in that tone, she meant to be obeyed. She helped herself to the sugar and drained her cup, but she looked very woebegone. It seemed to her that no one here either knew or cared how she felt about her music. The chances are that she would have disobeyed Lady Rutherford, but when she went back, she found the door locked and the key gone. Nor could she get in at the window. That was latched and, in any case, it would have meant a climb. The house stood on a slope, the ground falling away to the back, and the room where her beloved Bechstein stood, was at the side and towards the back.

As she realized this, anger grew in Nina. She felt that she must, she simply must be at work. She ran along to the drawing-room where the fifty-year old Broadwood which had been one of the wedding presents of Sir Guy’s mother stood. But that room was even colder than the other and Lady Rutherford had foreseen that this might happen and locked that door, too. There was nothing left but the schoolroom and what Nina thought of the piano there would hardly bear repeating. It had withstood the thumping of the three Rutherford girls through the last seven years and more and though it was kept tuned, it was tinny in tone and one or two of the notes were inclined to stick. Still, at this pitch, she felt that it would be better than nothing.

Alas for Nina! When she reached the schoolroom, it was to find her younger cousins already there, playing Canasta. They had invited her to join them, but she had refused with a curtness that set their backs up and now they looked up at her entrance with most unwelcoming glances. As Anthea had said, if she felt as scornful as all that about cards, she needn’t bother and neither need they.

“Did you want anything, Nina?” Alix asked politely.

“Yes; I want to practise,” Nina returned, flinging the words at her.

“But Mother said you weren’t to until to-morrow,” Alison exclaimed.

To judge from Nina’s expression, that mattered less than nothing. “You none of you understand!” she cried. “I’ve done only two hours to-day and I must put in at least four! How can I get on if I don’t?”

“One day won’t make all that difference,” Alix told her. “You play marvellously now, anyhow. It won’t hurt you to miss half your practice for once. Come along and join us and we’ll teach you Canasta.”

“I can’t play cards,” Nina responded briefly.

“We’ll show you. Shove up, Anthea, and make room.” Alix swept the cards already dealt into a pile and began to shuffle them together. “Come along, Nina. It’s good fun and I know you’ll enjoy it once you begin.”

But Nina was not card-minded. Her whole soul was filled with an overwhelming longing to feel the cold smoothness of the ivory keys under her finger-tips, and she was beginning to feel frantic because this longing was denied.

“Oh, you don’t understand!” she gasped. Then she swung round and fled for her own room where she flung herself on the bed and cried stormily.

In the schoolroom, the three she had left eyed each other uncertainly for a moment. Then Alison spoke impatiently.

“It’s no earthly use bothering. Deal the cards again, Alix. I suppose we must wash out what we’d gained and start over again. But I wish Father had never brought Nina back with him. Talk of a wild-cat! She looked as if she would fly at us the next moment!”

Alix began to deal, but she did it slowly. “I don’t like it,” she said as she added the cards left over to the pack in the middle. “Nina looks awfully wretched and it is a beastly day. Father said she was frightfully upset about Cousin Alan and—oh, let’s find her and see if we can think of something she would like to do.”

“She’ll have gone to her own room to howl, I expect,” Anthea replied sapiently. “Leave her alone, Alix. She’ll hate it if you go barging in on her like that—I should myself, I know. Anyhow, Mother said she would try to arrange for that room to be better heated to-morrow. She’ll just have to wait for it. But if being a musical genius means being as unbalanced as all that over it, then I’m thankful I’m not one! Your turn to begin, Alix.”

Alix was overruled, so no one went to Nina and she cried till she could cry no more and was shivering again, for though Sir Guy had had central heating put into the principal rooms and the hall before his marriage, there was none in the smaller bedrooms where the girls and the two boys who were the eldest of the family slept. Roger and Francis were both away from home at present, Roger with the Air Force and Francis in the Navy, and Nina had only seen their photographs.

By the time four o’clock brought teatime, the young stranger was shaking with cold and misery and when Anthea, sent by her mother to call her cousin to tea, tapped at the door and came in, she was sufficiently alarmed to go flying back to the cosy morning-room to announce that Nina seemed to be ill.

“How do you mean?” Lady Rutherford asked, getting to her feet.

“Oh, she’s all shivery and her teeth are chattering and she looks simply ghastly,” Anthea said vaguely.

“Where is she?”

“In her bedroom, lying on the bed.”

“On—not in?” Lady Rutherford waited for no more, but went swiftly through the corridor and up the stairs to the pretty bedroom where she found Nina as Anthea had described her.

Her first action was to switch on the little electric heater. Her next to hurry to the bathroom where she turned on a hot bath before she came back and made Nina undress and go and soak until she was warm again. By the time the girl had returned to her bedroom, it was comfortable and a couple of hot bottles were in the bed with her nightdress wrapped round one of them. Lady Rutherford saw her into it and tucked her in before she departed to bring up hot tea and buttered toast, telling Alix to attend to her father and the other two until she could come back.

By the time Nina had choked down the tea, she was warming up, but she could not touch the toast and her Cousin Yvonne did not try to force her. She set the cup aside, tucked the girl up once more with kindly words, and left her. A couple of dispirins in the tea would quiet her and relieve the headache which was the result of her passionate crying.

“And now,” Lady Rutherford said when she finally sat down to her own tea, “I want to know what started all this? Alix, you tell please.”

“I think it was partly she wanted to practise and couldn’t,” Alix said thoughtfully. “We were playing Canasta in the schoolroom and she came there and we asked her to play but she wouldn’t.”

“Then she said we didn’t understand,” the younger twin put in, “and simply hurtled out of the room. Alix wanted to go after her but we said it wasn’t any use.”

“You speak for yourself, John! You never said a word from first to last,” Anthea rebuked her. “It was me that said she was probably howling her head off and she’d hate it if Alix went and dug her out as she wanted to. Mother,” she turned to her mother, “can’t you fix up some way to hot that room enough to let her practise? It’s the only thing she seems to want to do and it’s ghastly having her hanging about looking miserable or furious all the time.”

Lady Rutherford eyed her prettiest daughter thoughtfully. “How much is this for Nina, Anthea, and how much for your own comfort?”

“Six and two threes,” Anthea acknowledged, unashamed. “Honestly, Mother, it’s spoiling the hols for us. I’m sorry enough for her because she’s lost her father, but she really does seem crackers at times.”

“I like music,” Alix put in, “but I’m not as crazy on it as all that.”

“You’re not a genius, my good child,” Sir Guy said, stirring his tea.

“Alix plays jolly well—everyone says so,” Anthea said resentfully. “Miss Carins thinks her the pick of the lot at school. I don’t see that Nina is so awfully much better.”

“Oh, that’s rot!” said Alix herself. “I can’t touch her at music. I haven’t anything like the—the execution she has. And I can’t play so that it makes you all weepified as she did the other night in the drawing-room when she played that elegy thing. If Nina joins us at Cecil’s, I’m quite prepared for Miss Carins falling all over her and forgetting all about me.”

“Yes—is she coming to Cecil’s?” Alison asked her father.

He shook his head. “She is not. I don’t think she’d fit in and be happy there——”

“Oh, but that’s rubbish!” Anthea exclaimed. “It’s a smashing school and all of us have been frightfully happy there. Why on earth shouldn’t Nina?”

“Well, for one thing, she wouldn’t get all the music she wants. Reverend Mother is excellent, but I met her in Newcastle yesterday and had a talk with her and she told me that she made it a rule to allow no girl to give more than two hours a day to music as a good solid education must come before all accomplishments.”

“Yes,” Alix said thoughtfully. “But then, isn’t it more than just an accomplishment with Nina? It seems almost as if it were part of her—like a hand or an eye.”

“Where is she going?” Alison demanded.

“You’ll hear that as soon as I’ve told her,” her father told her. “She ought to hear first. But I’ll tell you this much. She’s going to a school where they allow for girls who are more than usually talented in any of the arts. They’ve had two or three near-geniuses before this and they seem to know how to tackle them. I’m sending Nina there and I must say I devoutly hope she’ll settle down and be happy. I don’t know how to handle her; that’s certain!”

“Is it anywhere near at hand?” Anthea asked in more subdued tones than usual. Her conscience was accusing her of jealousy and unkindness where her cousin was concerned and she didn’t like it.

“Not in this country at all.”

“Abroad? In France, then?” Alison exclaimed; but Sir Guy refused to tell them any more and insisted on the subject being dropped.

Nina was kept in bed for the rest of the day and was very glad to be there. When she woke up from the sleep the dispirins had given, she felt weak and tired though her head was better. Her Cousin Yvonne knew that part of the trouble was the shock of her father’s death and felt that rest and quietness might do more for her than even her beloved piano. So next day, she kept Nina to her room and forbade the other girls to go near her. She told the girl that she was making arrangements to have the room heated adequately so that she might practise four hours a day when she was released and Nina was satisfied with that. On the Sunday she came back into the family life again and on the Monday, when she went to seek her piano, she found that the fireplace, which had been boarded up, had been opened and a big wood fire, lit before breakfast, made the room cosy and comfortable. Coal and coke were a tremendous difficulty, but there was plenty of old wood in the park and the main difficulty would be for Nina to remember to keep her fire going properly.

“Now,” Lady Rutherford said as the girl exclaimed delightedly, “this fire will be lit every day and you may have your four hours’ practice on one condition.”

“Yes, Cousin Yvonne?” But Nina spoke absently. Her whole being was thrilled with the knowledge that she could practise to her heart’s content now.

Lady Rutherford looked at her absorbed face and guessed that she had only half-heard. “Nina!” she said sharply. “Pay attention to me for a minute, please.”

Nina woke up and knew that she had been rude. “I beg your pardon,” she said. “I didn’t mean to be rude. What is it, Cousin Yvonne?”

“It’s this. You can practise for four hours every day now, but it must be no more. And you may do it only on the understanding that you remember to keep the fire going as long as we have this bitter weather.” She glanced out of the window at the mixture of rain and sleet which a north wind was dashing against the panes.

“I’ll try to remember,” Nina promised.

“It must be more than that. The first time I find you have let the fire out, I shall lock the room again and what practice you do will have to be on the schoolroom piano. And there’s another thing. You must keep this room dusted yourself. Wood fires make a lot of dust and Carson has no time for more work than she already has. I’ll give you a set of dusters and you can borrow a brush and dustpan from the housemaid’s cupboard. Once a week you may use the Hoover. Now is that thoroughly understood?”

Nina nodded. “Oh, yes. I can clear the grate and light the fire, too, if you like,” she added. “I don’t want to be a nuisance.”

“We’ll see about that.” Lady Rutherford was inwardly surprised. She knew well enough that even Alix would have lucked at this extra housework for the sake of piano practice; and Alix was considered to be really musical.

“I shouldn’t mind in the least,” Nina said. “I’ve often had to light the stove—and clear it when—when I was—with Dad,” she added unevenly.

Lady Rutherford stooped—she was a tall woman and Nina was small and slight for her age—and kissed her. “You may do as you like about it, Nina. And child, remember that it is well with your father. He died a hero’s death, trying to save a life, so you may be very proud of him. And don’t feel alone in the world, Nina. Your home is here—at Brettingham. Perhaps we can’t quite understand what music means to you; but we’ll do our best to give you music. Now run along to your dear piano and work. I’ll send someone to call you for cocoa at half past ten and mind you come at once.”

She left the room on that and Nina, dropping her music on a nearby table, went to swing off the baize cover and open the lid before she sat down with a little shiver of sheer joy and began on her exercises.

Anthea tiptoed down the corridor shortly before half past ten, and stood listening as her cousin played a Chopin study with such a rippling of notes as made her own to herself that even though Alix was the star music pupil at St. Cecilia’s, she really couldn’t play like this! She listened for a minute or two. Then the study ended and she went in to find Nina frowning over some fingering. The fire was low by this time and Anthea’s first care was to toss some blocks of wood on it before she said, “Come along, Nina! Cocoa! And then Father wants to see you in the study. The fire’s all right. I’ve built it up again for you.”

Nina sighed as she rose, but she was too grateful for Cousin Yvonne’s kindness to delay. She had her cocoa and then was sent to the study where Sir Guy was sitting at his desk, writing a letter. He looked up as she came in and laid down his pen.

“Come away, Nina! Quite warm? You look a bit different from the misery I brought home three weeks ago! Well, I sent for you to tell you that your school’s all fixed up and I hope you’ll be happy there and all that. They’ll see you get all the practice you want and take you to concerts and so on. The Head assures me of that.”

He stopped there and Nina, coming closer, looked up at him with eager dark eyes. “Oh, thank you, Cousin Guy! But please, where am I going?”

“Didn’t I tell you at first? Bless my soul, I must be wandering! Where are you going? Why, the school I hope you’ll like. The school you’ve met already when we were travelling back—remember? You’re going to the Chalet School.”

“Well, here we are at last! Thank goodness for that! Oh, look, you folk! There’s Mary-Lou! Oh, and they must have cut her hair when she was ill. How weird she looks with short hair! Oh, why don’t that lot in front buck up and get out? I’m dying to see her and get all the hanes!” And Hilary gave such a mad wriggle, that if Nina, who was sitting next her, had not been holding on to the back of the seat in front, she would have shot out into the aisle.

“Keep calm—keep calm!” Vi Lucy behind remarked sweetly. “Don’t have a fit over it! There’s the last of them climbing down and off she goes! It’s our turn now—Hilary, you ass! Wait your turn! D’you want to start the term with a row? Don’t let her push, Nina.”

Nina, who had been brought to London by Sir Guy and handed over by him to Hilary, Vi, Barbara and Lesley, what time he sought out one of the escort mistresses and explained matters, laughed and clung to her hold while Hilary, recalled to her sense by Vi’s warning, sat still, though she turned round to make a horrible face at Vi.

However, they were sitting not far from the front of the coach and in a minute more, she was flying up to the tall fair girl whose head was covered by a short fuzz of hair that looked as if it might curl when it had grown a little longer. Her possessions lay where they were, for in her excitement, she ignored them completely. She was so excited, that the others, still getting out of the coach with due decorum, heard her shriek, “Oh, Mary-Lou! How marvellous to see you again! You look just like your old self—except for your hair! Are you really all right now?”

“Just like Hilary!” Vi remarked. “Grab her nightcase, Barbara, and I’ll see to her oddments. Nina, you might look after her rug. No sense her getting into a row first go off! Though I expect she’d think it well worth while to have first skim at Mary-Lou,” she added, laughing.

Nina had heard all about Mary-Lou Trelawney who seemed to be the leader among her new friends. She had also heard about the Gang to which they all belonged, though Lesley, who was a thoughtful girl, observed that it looked rather as though the Gang would have to break up now since its various members would be in three forms and one of them was a Middle School form which might make it difficult for them to mix as they had done. The other three exclaimed in horror at this, but Lesley stuck to her opinion and even said she had heard Mary-Lou say something of the kind at the end of the previous term when they had been told that she, Lesley, Vi and Hilary were to be moved up to Va next term.

Nina was curious to see this girl of whom they all seemed to think so much. She hurriedly folded up the rug Hilary had tossed aside and followed the others from the coach, but by the time they reached the door, Mary-Lou had vanished.

“Gone in out of the cold,” Vi observed. “I expect she’ll have to take care for a while yet. You’d expect nothing else after an accident like hers last term. Brr! How bitter it is! Come on, Nina. I’ll show you where to go. There’ll be no getting sense out of the others until they’ve seen Mary-Lou and had a good natter with her. She and I are in the same dormy, though, and I can wait. There’ll be plenty of time later. This way, Nina. Leave your case, though, and Barbara’ll see it put on the truck. Here comes Gaudenz. You’ll get our traps upstairs quickly, won’t you, Gaudenz?” she added, speaking in German, since Gaudenz declined to speak anything but his own tongue.

He nodded and seized the nightcases which were all the luggage the girls brought with them, all the rest being sent on in advance. Vi touched Nina’s arm and then drew her away across the hall where groups were scattered everywhere, all chattering eagerly to each other and the mistresses.

They left the hall and went down a long passage at the end of which Vi tapped at a door. “This is the study,” she said. “They moved it last term. I’ll leave you with the Head and when she’s done with you, she’ll send for someone to show you where your dormy is. I’ll be around presently.”

Anything further she might have had to say had to wait, for a deep, sweet voice called, “Come in!” and Vi opened the door, passed round a screen across it with a muffled exclamation of surprise and then paused to curtsy before she announced, “Good evening, Miss Annersley. I’ve brought the new girl, Nina Rutherford, to report to you.”

“Good evening, Vi,” said the musical voice while Nina, overcome with sudden shyness, remained behind the screen.

“Shut the door and bring her along. Did you have good holidays?”

“Oh, marvellous! Though we missed Auntie and Uncle and the rest of the Ozannes. The boys flew out to spend Christmas with them, so we didn’t even have Bill with us. Oh, and Auntie Nan had her fifth baby on Christmas Day—a little girl at last. She’s to be called Christine Natalie—because of being a Christmas baby, you know—and the boys are thrilled to bits about her.”

Miss Annersley smiled, even as she held out her hand to Nina. She knew Commander and Mrs. Willoughby well, and the four boys whose ages ranged from eleven to four into the bargain. “What a lovely Christmas gift!”

“Isn’t it? Auntie Nan said I was to tell you to book her a place here as soon as she is old enough.”

“Thank you, Vi. I’ll write to her as soon as I get a moment to myself. And now I want to talk to Nina, so you can run along. You know that Mary-Lou is back at school again, don’t you? I expect you’d like a short time to discuss this term’s changes and see for yourself that she is all in one piece again.”

Vi laughed, curtsied and went off, leaving Nina alone with the first Head she had ever met as her Head Mistress.

Miss Annersley smiled again at her. “Come and sit down, Nina. I’m very glad to welcome you to school and I hope you’ll be very happy with us. I’m sure it won’t be the fault of the girls if you are not, nor of the staff. Now to business! Your cousin told me that you would need extra time for your practice so we’re going to try you in Va with Vi and the others. I hope you’ll find you can manage the work there because it will be easier to give you the time than in the b division. And then, of course, there will be your extra lessons in all the theory.”

She had guessed that Nina was feeling anxious about her music. Not for nothing had she had to deal with Margia Stevens and Jacynth Hardy, as well as a number of other girls who were musical if not so highly gifted as those two. She saw that she had been right in dealing with the question at once for the faintly worried expression on the girl’s face vanished and her eyes and cheeks glowed as she said, “Oh, thank you so much, Miss Annersley! The girls said that in this school you were allowed extra time to make music your career. I do so want to go ahead——”

“I know. You shall have all the practice time you need. Miss Dene will see you to-morrow to discuss your timetable with you. Mr. Denny, our singing master, will take you for all the theory. Do you know any of his compositions—Tristan Denny? Have you heard of him?”

“Is that the Tristan Denny that wrote those three lovely sets of Elizabethan Songs?” Nina asked breathlessly. “Do you mean that he will teach me?”

“Yes; he has agreed to take you in harmony, counterpoint and all the rest. Now I’m going to make an appeal to you. In return for all this, I want you to do your honest best with the ordinary lessons you must take. Believe me, child, the more you learn apart from your music, the more you will have to give others through it. Your cousin tells me that you speak three languages besides your own, so I think we may cut out some of the work there, as well as most maths and all science and art, too, unless you are keen.”

“Not very,” Nina replied. “And though I speak and write French and German as easily as English, my Italian isn’t so good. We lived a good deal in France and Germany, but we’d only been eight months in Italy when—when——”

“When God called your father to Him? Yes, dear; I know it’s very hard on you, but think how much worse it would have been if you hadn’t had your cousins. And your father died a hero’s death. You must have a talk with Mary-Lou Trelawney some day. Her father, too, died, trying to save life. You may be very proud just as she is. And Nina; I know life seems sad to you now, but it won’t be always so. After a time, the pain will go out of your loss and the love and pride will remain to comfort you. And there’s another thing. What you have suffered and are suffering now will give more to your music. You will be a finer interpreter of great music because of your present pain.”

“Oh, Vi and the rest were right when they said you would understand!” Nina cried. “You do! Thank you, Miss Annersley. I’ll do my best with other lessons I promise you. And—and—I’ll try to—remember what you’ve said just now when—when things—get—difficult,” she added unevenly.

“Good! Then this sorrow won’t hurt you, but help you as it ought to do. Now, dear, I have heaps of other people to see, so I’ll send for someone to take you to your dormitory. Your cousin, Sir Guy, asked if it would be possible for you to be with the girls you already knew, so we’ve made one or two changes and put you into Cornflower with Vi and Barbara and the others. Mary-Lou is dormitory prefect. Now let me see.” She produced some long typed lists and glanced over them. Then she touched the bell on her desk. “Maeve Bettany came up this morning and is all unpacked. She can see to you. Oh, Miss Dene,” as a fair, pretty woman in the thirties came through the curtained doorway at the other side of the room, “would you find someone to send Maeve Bettany to me, please? And when she has found Maeve, ask her to tell someone in VIa that I’m ready for people to report to me now.”

“Maeve’s in the office now,” Miss Dene said with a smile. “She came to see if she could help, Matron having whisked off her own particular crew to their dormitories. The rest are milling around in the hall, all talking at the tops of their voices.”

“Bless them!” Miss Annersley exclaimed. “Well, they’ll have to get rid of their steam somehow, I suppose. Tell Maeve to come in, my dear.”

Miss Dene nodded and disappeared and Miss Annersley turned back to Nina to describe the winter sports the girls always enjoyed this term. She had only time for a sentence or two when a tap came on the outer door and was followed by the appearance of a girl of Nina’s own age or a little younger.

“There you are, Maeve,” the Head said. “This is Nina Rutherford who will be in Cornflower. Take her up there and show her what to do and where to go, please. When she is ready, you can take her to Senior Commonroom and leave her there. I expect some of the people she will be with will have turned up by that time.”

“Yes, Miss Annersley,” Maeve said very properly. She turned to Nina. “Will you come with me, Nina?”

She led the way to the door where she stopped to bob the curtsy that Nina had already marvelled at in Vi. She had had no idea that it could be a part of any English school. Later, she was to find out that when Lady Russell, then Miss Bettany, had started the Chalet School in Tirol, she had incorporated certain of the customs of that lovely land in the school’s unwritten laws and this particular one had persisted, even during the years spent in England.

Maeve led Nina along the passage, through another running at right angles to it and up the uncarpeted stairs that ran up from the further end to a broad corridor where several girls of all ages were hurrying about. All of them greeted Maeve, who returned the greetings, even as she piloted the new girl along to a room at the far end.

“Here we are!” she said, opening the door. “This is Cornflower. Come on in and we’ll find your cubey.”

Nina followed her and found herself in a long, narrow room, brilliantly lighted by four drop-lights from the centre of the ceiling. One side formed an alley and on the other were the cubicles. They were curtained off by curtains of white, cornflower-besprayed cretonne and there was one at the far end with a light directly over it. Maeve nodded towards it.

“That’s Mary-Lou’s. They’ve been changing the dormies round during the hols so she gets the end window to herself—lucky blighter! Now let’s see which is yours. The names are all pinned on to the curtains.” She moved down the aisle and stopped before one midway. “Here we are!” She swept back the screening curtain and Nina followed her and looked round delightedly.

It really was very pretty, for the cretonne was reversible. A curtain of the same was drawn across the half of a window which she knew already she shared with Vi Lucy, having seen that young lady’s name pinned to the curtains as they passed. The little bed with its fat plumeau had a counterpane of the rich cornflower blue over it and at the side of the bed was a washable rug with a cornflower design. A kind of table-bureau faced the bed and in the opposite corner was a wicker chair with cushions covered with cretonne matching the curtains.

Maeve went to the bureau and lifted up one end to show that the inside of the lid was a mirror and beneath was a neat cavity for toilet articles. The rest of the bureau was divided into two short drawers and two long ones, one very deep.

“There’s a cupboard on the landing where you hang your frocks,” she explained. “These are for undies and blouses and hankies and so on. You can use the top for your photos and vases and any books you’ve brought from home. Oh, and before I forget, you’ve got to hand your books in to Miss Derwent to be vetted. These shelves below the mirror are for best slippers and bedroom slippers. You hang your dressing-gown on this hook here—awfully handy if you have to get up in a hurry! You keep all outdoor shoes and boots in the splashery—oh, and your beret and coat, too. Your Sunday hat goes in the cupboard and your Sunday coat. This other peg here is for your gym tunic. You’ll have to wear that for gym and games. You hang your school skirt on it as well. Which form are you in or don’t you know yet?”

“Miss Annersley said I was to try Va,” Nina replied.

Maeve looked at her with respect. “I say! You must be a brain!”

“Oh, it isn’t that so much,” Nina said honestly. “Music is my chief subject and Miss Annersley says it’s easier to arrange for all the extra work in that that I must have, than in another form. I shan’t be taking a lot of ordinary lessons, you see.”

Maeve’s eyes danced wickedly. “Then you and I cancel each other out. I love to listen and I like singing, but I’d loathe to go in for it. I want to do P.T.—Physical Training,” she added, as Nina looked mystified. “The worst of it is I’ve got to have Matric if I want to go to a decent college and goodness knows I’m no brain. Bride and the boys got most of the brains that were going in our family. However, I s’pose I’ll just have to dig in, worse luck! Got your nightcase? Oh, hasn’t Gaudenz brought the trolley up yet? Well, you can’t do anything about it, then. I’ll lend you my soap if you’ll hang on till I get it and then you can wash.”

She vanished and Nina removed her beret and coat and settled her cream silk blouse with dainty fingers, by which time her shepherd had returned with soap, towel and comb.

“Here you are! I’m sure you’re dying for a wash and brush-up after the journey.”

“Well, I am,” Nina confessed. “Thank you so much, Maeve. You are kind.”

Maeve grinned. “Not kind—merely polite. And in this place, we put every farthing of tuppence on good manners, I can assure you!”

Nina looked bewildered, but Maeve gave her no chance to discuss it. “Come on and I’ll show you where to wash—though I warn you,” she added, “that during the day we wash downstairs in the splashery. No galloping up- and downstairs just as we like! Now let’s see.” She ran to a list pinned to the door. “O.K. You bath in III cubicle 2. Come on!”

She marched Nina off to a cross passage. “Here we are. This is your cubey. You always bath here. In the mornings you can either have your bath cold or chill-off. No hot baths except at night. The list will tell you which bath you go for each morning. I mean,” as Nina quite frankly gaped at her, “whether you’re first, second or third on the list. Go ahead!”

With her head whirling with all the information Maeve was ramming down her throat, Nina washed face and hands and they went back to the dormitory where she unloosened the long thick plait of black hair and combed it out before replaiting it into a shining tail. Maeve, perched precariously on the window-sill, watched her enviously.

“What a gorgeous mop you have! My sister Peggy has long hair, too, but Bride has hers bobbed and—well, you see what mine’s like!” She pulled a short curly tress over her shoulder. “Never any longer than that, no matter how hard I brush it.”

“But it’s a lovely colour,” said Nina, who had been admiring the gleaming bronze. “And it’s so curly. Mine’s as straight as—as—a bar-line.”

“You could always have it permed when you grew up,” Maeve said. “I like it straight on you, though. It goes with your face, same as Clare Kennedy’s.” Nina went scarlet at this frank comment. She finished her hair and having returned Maeve’s possessions with thanks, waited while that young woman raced back to Wallflower, of which she was one of the ornaments, to put them away. Then she came back and led the new girl off downstairs to a pleasant sitting-room where three or four girls were sitting talking eagerly. Maeve led Nina up to them.

“Hello, folks!” she said. “This is Nina Rutherford. She’s to try Va. Felicity, you’re there, aren’t you? Then will you look after her till Vi and Co. come along. She’s a pal of theirs, Barbara told me.” She gave Nina a friendly grin and added, “See you later! Best of luck!” before she shot out of the room, slamming the door after her with a good-will that set the ornaments on the shelf that ran round the room above shelves lined with books, rattling.

“That will have to stop to-morrow,” said Felicity, a pretty brown-eyed girl of nearly sixteen.

“It’s only Maeve,” observed another, a big, rather clumsily-built girl who was plain, but pleasant-faced. She added to Nina, “I’ll introduce us. Felicity is Felicity King and she and Rosemary Lamb—this is Rosemary—are in Va and so am I—I’m Hilda Jukes. And this is Penelope Drury who’s in Vb. We five all came back earlier which is why we’re here. Pen’s been here all the hols—her father lives up here just now—and Felicity and Rosemary have fathers who have jobs in Holland so they can get here earlier than people from England. And Dad had to go to Paris on business, so he said he’d take me with him and give me a couple of days and then shoot me off here the day before if the Head didn’t mind.”

“But you went to stay at Freudesheim instead,” Felicity interrupted. “Lucky you! Sit down, Nina. It’s as cheap as standing. Are you really in Va or was Maeve jiggling us? She’s a demon and she loves pulling people’s legs.”

Luckily for Nina, the door opened just then to admit Vi and Barbara and before long the room was full and Nina had been introduced to so many people that she felt bewildered. Mercifully for her, a bell sounded five minutes later and the noise of laughter and chatter ceased with what, to the new girl, was uncanny suddenness. She had yet to learn that while rules at the Chalet School were comparatively few, they were obeyed implicitly as a rule. The girls lined up at the door, Vi pulling Nina into place in front of her. A second bell sent them marching from the room and along the corridors to a very long room where tables, laid with gay cloths, coloured glasses and napkins to match the cloths ran in three rows of three tables each, while a tenth stood across them at the top of the room. Pretty peasant chairs were set at each place and Vi pushed Nina to one between herself and Mary-Lou, who gave the new girl a broad grin as she took her place.

There was a silence, followed by the arrival of the staff to the top table. Miss Annersley, sitting in the middle, bowed her head and spoke a brief Latin Grace and they all sat down to bowls of thick vegetable soup, very savoury and smoking hot. The baskets of rolls and twists were handed round and the girls fell to with appetite. They were hungry after the long journey and all their excitement.

Only Nina regarded her portion with dismay. She had a small appetite at the best of times and the prefects at the head of the tables served generously. When the soup was followed by risotto, the new girl’s face caught Mary-Lou’s attention. She had been talking eagerly to everyone. Now she turned and touched Nina gently.

“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Don’t you like it?”

“Oh, yes,” Nina said. “But I’m so very sorry, I really can’t eat all this. The soup was so—so——”

“So very filling,” Mary-Lou finished for her with a friendly grin. “I know. Don’t look so floored. Eat what you can and leave the rest. I’ll speak to Katharine in a moment. Anyhow, it’ll be only stewed fruit or something like that to follow.”

Nina looked her gratitude as she took up her fork. But it really was too much for her. She was finished long before the others. Mary-Lou accounted for her own share and then calmly rose and went to the head of the table where she had a word with the prefect who laughed and nodded. As a result, when the bottled gooseberries and custard were served, Nina was able to clear the small portion that reached her.

Supper, or Abendessen as they called it here, was followed by Prayers, when Nina had to part from her friends. Vi put her in charge of Clare Kennedy, a girl of misleadingly nun-like appearance, and when Miss o’Ryan had finished Prayers for the Catholic girls, she marched them all back to Hall where Miss Annersley told them that she had nothing to say to-night. Many of them were very tired and they would all go to bed in a few minutes.

“That is, all but the prefects,” she added with a smile at those stately young women. “They have another half-hour. I hope you’ll all sleep well and wake up fresh and ready for unpacking after Frühstück. That is all, girls. Stand! Good-night, everyone. Sleep well! Thank you, Miss Lawrence.”

Miss Lawrence at the piano struck up a march and the school marched out to bed.

Nina was so muddled with all the new impressions she had received, that she was thankful to undress, say her prayers and snuggle down under her plumeau from which Vi had helped her to remove and fold the blue counterpane. She was asleep almost at once and she never stirred until the clanging of the bell woke her at half past seven next morning to a realization that Cousin Guy had got his way after all and she was at school and felt she was going to enjoy it.

“Hello, folks! Here we come!” Thus Mary-Lou in her breeziest fashion as she headed the group of girls who had been promoted from Vb at the end of the previous term.

“Heaven help us!” retorted Bess Appleton, the form prefect. “Those five desks left vacant are yours, my loves. We’ve put Nina at that one so that she can have one of you beside her, seeing your Gang seems to have decided to look after her. ‘Sort yourselves!’ as the sexton said after the parson had married six couples at once!”

Mary-Lou looked thoughtful. “I don’t know so much about the Gang nowadays. It seems to me that we’ll have to give up going round in a bunch now that we four have been wished on to you and five are in B and the rest are still Middles in IVa Upper. However, that’s something we can discuss at another time.”

“I should just think so!” Vi said severely as she dived into the seat beside Nina. “I’ll sit here and Mary-Lou can come next to me. Hilary and Lesley, you bag those two end seats. Squattez-vous, everyone!”

“Who told you to arrange it all?” Lesley demanded as she sat down.

“No one,” Vi admitted. “But Mdlle will be landing in a minute and you know what she is if you’re not absolutely ready for her.” She opened the desk-lid and shot in her books. “That’s done! Buck up, you three! Dump your loads!”

As a result, when Mdlle de Lachennais arrived five minutes later, it was to find her form in a very tidy room and all sitting straight and looking abnormally good. They rose at her entrance to chant, “Bon jour, Mdlle,” to which she responded, “Bon jour, mes filles. Asseyez-vous, s’il vous plaît!” After which they all sat down.

Her next remarks were in English. “I will take register first. After Prayers, Matron wishes Bess Appleton and Hilda Jukes to go to her for unpacking. Nina Rut’erford,” she flashed a smile at Nina, “you will go to ze office to Miss Dene for your timetable. And now, mes chères, register, if you please!”

She took the register and signed it and sent Bess with the little paper-covered book to the office. When Bess returned, Mdlle was informing the five girls new to the form that they must take certain of their textbooks to stockroom after the afternoon rest. Others would be given them in exchange. Nina, of course, would have everything to get. However, the stationery monitress would see to her stationery during the course of the morning and someone would help her with the textbooks.

“I will, Mdlle!” announced at least half-a-dozen voices, whereat Mdlle beamed.

The next moment, she exploded a bombshell under them. “For the future,” she said, speaking in her own language, “I shall speak to you in French always—but always!”

The form gasped. This was something entirely new. Not that it held terrors for most of them. By the time they reached Va, most of them could talk, if not freely, at least with a certain degree of fluency. Some of them were fluent, notably Vi Lucy, whose mother’s early years had been spent in France with her sisters so that all the Lucy—Chester—Ozanne clans grew up trilingual. Mary-Lou, with a gift for languages, had decided a year previously that since they were in Switzerland partly to learn French and German thoroughly, it would be wise, to quote herself, to “hoe in” at them, and was almost as good. Yvonne de Gramont, being French, beamed happily at the announcement. Only Hilda Jukes looked horrified. She had little ear for language and she still found it difficult to construct her sentences to Mdlle’s satisfaction and was wont to declare that never, as long as she lived, could she get her tongue round the uvular R on which everybody insisted.

“Must we answer you in French, Mdlle?” she asked anxiously.

“Mais oui, vraiment,” Mdlle said inexorably; and Hilda heaved a deep sigh that nearly blew Felicity, sitting in front of her, out of the seat.

“Écoutez! La cloche qui sonne!” Jill Ormsby exclaimed as the bell for Prayers rang out.

Mdlle gave the command and the girls lined up at the door, Vi taking care that Nina, whom she seemed to have adopted completely, got into place with the rest. They marched away to Prayers, parting at the corner round which the Catholics had to go for their own morning offering.

There were three more Catholics in the form, besides Nina, and Clare Kennedy gave her a smile as they entered. Miss o’Ryan took the little service very reverently and Nina enjoyed it. She particularly liked the English hymn with which they began—“Just for to-day”—and the girls’ voices rang out very sweetly in it. Prayers ended, the mistress marched them all to Hall for Miss Annersley’s promised talk and when both staff and girls were sitting quietly in their places, the Head left the chair where she had been chatting quietly to some of the others and came forward to stand before the lectern on the daïs.

“I welcomed you all last night,” she began in the beautiful voice that rejoiced Nina’s heart every time she heard it. “This morning, I want to tell you about some changes we have made.”

There was a little rustle at this and every girl looked intently up at her as she went on: “So far, though you have always been divided for games into your Houses, with the exception of St. Mildred’s who are a branch to themselves, you have lived together and have been well mixed as to dormitories and commonrooms and so on. This term, that is ended. I don’t know how many of you have realized that you are now in dormitories belonging to your own Houses?” She gave them a smiling look, and nearly everyone shook her head. “Well, it is so. Ste. Thérèse girls are sleeping in Ste. Thérèse; St. Agnes, St. Hild and St. Clare, you are all in your own Houses. Furthermore, instead of you all using the commonrooms in St. Clare, you will use the ones in your Houses. On Saturdays, each House will take it in turn twice a term to entertain the others. The remainder of your Saturday evenings will be spent as usual in Hall—I imagine they must be given up to Hobbies Club and your work for the Sale this term.”

There was another murmur and she laughed outright before she went on. “Yes; we must think of our Sale. We made an excellent start out here last year and we don’t want to fall short of that this term, so I hope you’ll all do your best for it. The prefects are having a meeting to-morrow, so I expect we shall be hearing what form it is to take before long—Monday, perhaps?” She gave Betsy Lucy, the Head Girl, a questioning look, but Betsy only shook her head.

“No one seems to have an idea to bless herself with so far, Miss Annersley.”

“Well, you have till to-morrow to find some and I hope you’ll manage it!” Miss Annersley said with mock severity. “Now I must go on. The pantomime sponsored by St. Mildred’s will take place on the last Saturday in February so I expect rehearsals will be the order of the day. This means that you have a very full programme, especially as we are to be allowed to have a School Certificate Centre here this year and most of the Seniors will be taking either that, Higher, or London Matriculation.”

One or two people groaned at this prospect and the staff laughed. However, July was more than six months away, so they calmed down and the Head continued.

“Mr. Denny has sent word that he will be along to-morrow at eleven to take some of the choruses for the pantomime and after Mittagessen, if it is fine, we will go off for a ski-run.”

The girls clapped at this and she laughed again. “Yes; I thought that would be the jam for the pill! But this is our winter sports term and we must make the most of the snow and ice. It doesn’t, as a rule, last much beyond midway through March. However, in March we are hoping for an expedition somewhere. Several places have been suggested, including Zermatt and the Matterhorn; Lake Anneçy and, in quite another direction, St. Moritz. I can’t tell you yet which we shall choose, but I’m sure you’ll all enjoy whichever it is.”

There was a fresh outburst of clapping at this and the Head waited a minute before she held up her hand for silence which, much to Nina’s amazement, came with almost stunning suddenness.

Miss Annersley resumed. “I have one alteration for you there. Hitherto, we have taken our expeditions in a body. This term, we are dividing up—Seniors, Middles and Junior Middles and Juniors. We really are too many to parade about the streets of any town and it will be easier all round.”

This statement was met with silence, but one or two of the elder Middles pulled long faces. These were the members of The Gang who had not seen as far as Mary-Lou and had no idea that in future they would be going about in smaller groups, though a special sense of friendship would always remain among them.

Miss Annersley knew all about it, of course. She had foreseen it last term. She had even heard Mary-Lou on the subject while that young woman was in the big Sanatorium at the other end of the Görnetz Platz, recovering from what might have been a tragic accident though, being Mary-Lou, once she found that there was no serious damage, she had set herself to recovering at top speed and had done it far faster than anyone had expected. No one had thought she would be ready for school at the beginning of the term, but she had turned up as usual, her old insouciant self to all appearances, and both Head and staff were thankful to see that she had clearly suffered no lasting harm.

At the moment, the Head contented herself with a few final remarks about the need for keeping such rules as there were and then dismissed them to their formrooms with the reminder that Matron would be sending for them for unpacking and they must go as soon as they were summoned and not keep her waiting. More than a hundred girls take some unpacking and “Matey”, as they all affectionately called her, always overlooked it herself so as to make sure that all inventories were correctly fulfilled.

She dismissed them, but Miss Lawrence at the piano, came forward and said something to her in an undertone. The Head’s face filled with dismay which changed to amusement, she then broke into laughter and swung round to the interested school.

“Girls! Just a moment! I nearly forgot to make one of the most important announcements of the lot! As you are now definitely to live in your own Houses, you will want to know who are your matrons. Your House mistresses will be with you of course, but we have had to provide three new matrons who have just arrived. One of them is an Old Girl whom a good many of you will remember—Barbara Henschell. She will take charge of St. Agnes. She is bringing two other people with her, Matron Wood and Matron Bellenger who will go to Ste. Thérèse and St. Hild—in that order. Now that really is all, except that I would like to remind you that while you must be loyal to your House, your entire loyalty must be given to the school. The House is only a part of the whole and while we all want you to be ready to stand up for your own, the school comes first all the time. That is all. Turn!”

Miss Lawrence had sat down at the piano again and at the word, she crashed into one of the Pomp and Circumstance marches and the school marched away to its several formrooms having plenty to think about.

The Va people, mindful of the fact that they were very senior Seniors, went to theirs in silence, though rules about not talking on the stairs or in the corridors were not strictly in force until Monday. But once they were safely in their own room, their tongues were loosed and they commented fully and freely on the Head’s speech.

“Well!” Bess Appleton exclaimed as Lesley, the last, shut the door behind her. “What do you think of all that about the Houses?”

“It’s just going back more or less to what the school was in Tirol, isn’t it?” Mary-Lou said.

“Is it? I wouldn’t know. Who told you, anyhow?—Oh, but of course you’d get it all from Joey—I mean Mrs. Maynard.”

“Right in one! Aunt Joey told me yards during the hols. Verity and I spent Christmas at Freudesheim as Mother and Dad didn’t come out here till the New Year. Mother was rocky after the ’flu and couldn’t risk travelling until then. So Aunt Joey had us two to spend Christmas and we had a marvellous time. She told us reams about her own schooldays.” Mary-Lou stopped and thought a moment. “I wonder! She knew about this, of course. She was probably trying to give us a leg up about it all——”

“Bess Appleton to Hilda Jukes! Matey wants to know if you mean to come and unpack to-day or to-morrow,” said an exasperated voice from the doorway.

The culprits looked up with horror while Katharine Gordon, the Games prefect, stalked into the room looking as exasperated as she sounded. “I wish you people would try to remember messages!” she said tartly. “Now, perhaps, you’ll go if you don’t want your heads bitten off——”

She stopped there for, so far as the six mentioned were concerned, she was talking to thin air. They had fled without ceremony. To keep Matron waiting when she had sent for you simply wasn’t done if you valued your peace of mind.

“Heavens!” cried Mary-Lou, giving up the question of Joey Maynard’s schooldays for the time being. “Where’s Nina? Come on, Nina! Miss Dene said you were to go to her after Prayers. Come on! I’ll go with you and explain that it wasn’t your fault you’re late!”

She grabbed Nina by the shoulder and hustled her out of the formroom and along the corridor to the office. “What’re you going to do that you have a special time-table?” she found time and breath to ask as they reached the last winding passage.

“Music,” Nina panted. Mary-Lou had raced her along and she only hoped that young woman intended to wait for her, for she would never find her way back to the formroom.

“Oh, I see. You must be jolly good. Here we are. Tap on the door and you don’t have to curtsy to her—we only do it to the Head. I’ll hang about here until you come out.” And Mary-Lou made for the window-seat at the end and curled herself up comfortably while Nina nervously gave the door a fumbling rap.

“Come in!” said an abstracted voice; and Nina entered to find the pretty secretary rapidly opening envelopes, stripping them of their contents and examining those before she dropped them into one or other of the two flat baskets that stood in front of her. She looked up with a smile.

“Please,” Nina said, “I’ve come for my timetable.”

“Oh, yes. Pull up that chair and sit down. I’ll be finished with this in a minute.” And Miss Dene went on with her letters, working at a speed that amazed Nina, who had never seen a secretary at work before.

She was as good as her word. The new girl had just sat down when she picked up the last letter, glanced at its contents and consigned them to the right-hand tray. Then she pushed both to the far side of her big desk, opened a drawer and drew from it a big sheet of paper which she spread in front of her.

“Bring your chair up to mine while I go through this with you,” she said. “Here’s your timetable. We’ve had rather a tough time with it, but I think it’s settled at last. Now listen carefully. As music is to be your main subject, you will take no science or art or algebra and geometry. Arithmetic, we can’t spare. You must be able to manage your own money affairs and you can’t do that without arithmetic. So that stays in; but as you won’t want any of the public exams, it shouldn’t worry you unduly. Miss Wilmot understands and she’ll see you understand all you do need.”

Nina listened with respect. This was indeed taking her intended career seriously. “I rather like arithmetic,” she said shyly. “I don’t mind about the rest but I know I must be able to manage for myself.”

“Good! Then that’s all right. Now for languages. Miss Annersley says your guardian told her that you read and write French and German fluently and also Italian.”

“I’m not frightfully fluent in Italian yet,” Nina said honestly.

“No? Well, never mind. That can come when you’re Sixth Form. Literature, history, geography—you should have all those so they’ve been left in. You’ll have two lessons a week in German and French. The others, you’ll miss. You’ll take all the games and gym that the rest of the form do. You won’t go far in any job without good health and those are necessary while you’re growing.”

Which effectually stopped Nina’s protest against this before she could utter it.

“Handcrafts—you may please yourself whether you do those or not. I’d advise you to go to the first lesson or two and see how you like it. Most of the girls are very keen and it’s always well to have something of that kind for recreation.” She looked up at the girl. “You see, Nina, if things go as we all hope, you will probably have long journeys to take when you won’t be able to practise. You couldn’t do much of that in a train or a plane. No one can read all the time and it’s soothing to have one’s hands occupied at such times. So go and try it. That’s my advice.”

“Yes, Miss Dene,” Nina said thoughtfully. “I’ll do that.”

“Good!” Miss Dene said again. “Now for the music. You will get the two hours a day that all advanced pupils get. You’ll see your name on the practice timetable in Hall. Only remember; if for any reason you can’t have your usual piano, you must ask one of the music mistresses which you may have. No taking someone else’s place!”

“Oh, no!” Nina said, rather shocked. Apart from her experience at Brettingham, she had never had to consider anyone else over practice and she was yet to experience the irritation it is to find that you can’t use your instrument when you wish.

“Then, in these other times when the rest of Va are having ordinary lessons, you will go to Hall and practise wherever you’ve been put down for it—see?” She rapidly indicated the places on the timetable and Nina nodded.

“Here—and here—and here, you will have lessons in all the theoretical side with Mr. Denny, our singing master. He’s very good and I think you’ll like him. Oh, and by the way, you’ll go to all singing lessons of course. That’s part of your musical training. Then, on Saturday, Herr von Eberhardt comes up to spend the weekend with his wife who’s in the San, poor soul. He’ll come here at ten and take you from ten to eleven for piano.”

“Herr von Eberhardt!” Nina exclaimed, her cheeks flushing with excitement. “Oh—but—is it Herr Ernst von Eberhardt, Miss Dene?”

“Yes. Do you know him?” Miss Dene asked.

“Three years ago I had two terms with him. And I know Frau von Eberhardt, too, for she used to give me coffee and cakes after my lesson,” Nina replied. “Is she ill? Oh, I’m so dreadfully sorry! We were in America at the time, and my father and I were so sorry when he told us that they were going back to Germany and so he could give me no more lessons. Am I really to have him? Oh, how—how wonderful!”

Miss Dene laughed outright. “I’m very glad you’re so keen. Well, that’s your timetable. Suppose you take it and go and study it. You must try to get to know it because it’s been a hard job giving you four hours a day and we can’t manage a minute more, so you must make the most of it.”

“Oh, I shall!” Nina breathed as she took the sheet Miss Dene had rolled up and handed to her. Then she added, “And thank you very much for all your trouble, Miss Dene. I’m so grateful to you.”

“My job,” Miss Dene told her brusquely. “Anyhow, you’ve got it now. If by any chance we can put in a half-hour extra at any time, we will—though I warn you it won’t always be the piano in Hall which is where you will generally practise. It’s away from the schoolrooms, so you won’t disturb ordinary classes, and I understand you’ve been accustomed to a Bechstein.”

Nina’s face lit up again. She had already noted the beautiful piano on the daïs and to know that she was to use it for her regular practice completed her joy.

“That’s marvellous! And if I have to use some other piano for anything extra, it won’t matter because I can always use it for scales and exercises.”

“Then off you go. I haven’t another minute to spare just now.”

“Oh, I beg your pardon!” Nina jumped up and put her chair back in its place. “I’ll go at once. But oh, you have been kind to me!”

Miss Dene nodded, laughed, and turned to her next job and Nina slid out of the door feeling that, after all, Cousin Guy had been right in sending her to school—so long as it was here.

Mary-Lou was waiting for her. “All O.K.?” she asked, with a quick look at the new girl’s face. “But I can see it is. Now come on! Matey has probably been shrieking for us and there’s no point in getting her goat. Scram!”

“Well!” said Betsy Lucy—and she said it expressively.

“Don’t mind us,” Blossom Willoughby rejoined sweetly.

“I haven’t the least intention of doing so. Really, things are at such sixes and sevens this term, that half the time I don’t know whether I’m coming or going!”

“The Head did say at the beginning of the first term we came up here that things would take a little time to sort themselves,” Carola Johnstone reminded her. “She said a lot of our first arrangements were experimental and there would almost certainly be changes. I suppose it’s taken them till now to decide what should be changed and what not.”

“Including the prefect arrangements,” Katharine Gordon chimed in. “You can’t grumble, Bets. At St. Briavel’s, we always did have at least twelve prees and we had more at Plas Gwyn, according to all I’ve heard.”

“True for you!” Hilary Wilson’s dark eyes danced as she remembered old times. “And of course we were all in the one building there, Houses or not. Now we’re divided up properly for living, I suppose we really do need more prees.”

“I should imagine it was more than necessary, remembering what some of the Middles can be like,” Carola said. “Anyhow, it’s only giving us three full prees and one sub to each House. That’s none too many Bets!”

“How right you are! But we’d better drop this conversation and get cracking on the real business. Bring up chairs, you three, and let’s begin. There’s a good deal to settle and we haven’t any too much time.”

It was Saturday morning and the prefects were having a full-dress prefects’ meeting. At Prayers that morning, the Head had announced the appointment of three new sub-prefects and the promotion of Ailsa Thompson, Lalla Winterton and Elinor Pennel to full-blown prefectship. Sybil Russell, eldest daughter of Lady Russell, who, as Madge Bettany, had founded the school in what all the girls called “the Dark Ages”, had been appointed a sub-prefect half-way through the previous term. The other three were new to the job. They pulled up chairs and sat down at the foot of the table and Betsy brought the meeting to order by tapping her pen on the pad in front of her.

“Well, everyone,” she began, standing up, “I’m glad to see you all once more—and to welcome our new additions. That being that, I now call on Jean Ackroyd to read the Minutes of the last meeting.”

She sat down with a puckish grin at Jean who returned it as she rose in her turn. Jean was Second prefect, a tall, brawny Scotswoman, with reddish hair and the peppery temper that goes with such hair and the keen blue eyes under her reddish lashes. For all that, she was a favourite with the girls, for if she was quick-tempered, she possessed an innate sense of justice and would apologize if her temper had led her into any unfairness.

She read the Minutes of the last meeting of the Christmas term in a voice pleasantly tinged with a Scots lilt and sat down, pushing the Minute-Book before Betsy who scrawled her signature to them when the rest had waved their hands in agreement.

“That’s done!” the Head Girl said as she closed the book and returned it to Jean. “The next thing is to appoint the duties. In view of the changes, I think we shall have to shuffle them round a little. Jean, Katharine, Carola and I are all Head’s appointments so we shan’t be affected. But with three new people to call on and Sybs who might be described as half-new—or would you call it second-hand?” with a grin at Sybil who promptly made a face at her—“we can afford to make a few alterations and additions. For one thing, what do you think of having a second library prefect?”

“I couldn’t agree more!” This was the Library prefect, Peggy Adams. “It takes me all my time to keep track of the Junior Library and the Senior has had to look after itself more or less. And what happened at the end of last term?” Her voice grew shrill with indignation. “No fewer than seventeen books were missing when I came to check up! That won’t do, you know. I spent the best part of the last day hunting up criminals who hadn’t bothered to return the books they were down for, not to speak of the pair of beauties who had never entered their last borrowings at all! A second pree for Library is a jolly good idea!”

“Very well, then,” said Betsy, having listened to this diatribe unmoved. “The point is, does any full pree feel like giving up her present job and taking that on? Don’t all speak at once!”

“I do!” Hilary Wilson leapt to it promptly. “I’m not exactly sold on Stationery and I’d far rather be on Library. So you can think of my name, Betsy.”

“Right you are!” Betsy made a note on her pad. “Anyone else feel she’s a heaven-sent librarian?”

“I wouldn’t mind taking it on,” Sally Winslow replied. “What about putting Sybil in as Art prefect instead of me? If you could say that Herr Laubach has a blue-eyed boy in this establishment, it’s Sybil Russell.”

“Heavens! If you call the way he regards me as being his blue-eyed boy, I’m sorry for the rest of you!” Sybil cried. “I’d rather be excused, Sal, thanks all the same!”

“In any case with the Sale in the offing, I think we’ll have to have a second Hobbies prefect. Some of the kids need a lot of help,” Betsy pointed out. “That sort of thing is right up Sybil’s street. Oh, no, Sal, you must be Art prefect. Herr Laubach likes you as much as he likes any pupil. But I agree with Hilary about the stationery. Shall we vote on that? Hands up everyone who thinks Hilary could take on the Senior Library?—I suppose that’s what you want her for, Peggy?”

“Either she likes. We can arrange it between us later,” Peggy said amiably. She and Hilary were very good friends.

“Right! It’s your affair, after all. Vote, please!”

Every hand but Hilary’s was hoisted and she nodded. “Carried unanimously! That’s so much settled. And now what about Sybs for second Hobbies pree?”

There was no objection to that, either. Sybil was an expert needlewoman, very artistic, and with skilled fingers. Also, she seemed to be possessed of endless patience where helping the Juniors was concerned. She received a unanimous vote and Freda Lund, who was first Hobbies prefect, moved down one in case there was any chance of a side-chat.

“And now,” Katharine Gordon observed, “Miss Burnett told me last night to remind you that we really needed a third Games prefect. I take the tennis and Carola sees to most of the rest, but we want help with coaching the Juniors in both ski-ing and tennis. Some of those kids didn’t get nearly enough proper coaching last summer and Miss Burnett can’t do it all.”

“Will someone propose someone?” Betsy asked, looking round the table.

“I will.” Amy Dunne, a roundabout girl with a cosy manner, stood up. “Ladies, I should like to propose Blossom Willoughby for the post.”

“I’ll second that,” added Freda. “Blossom’s tennis is awfully good—no; I’m not flattering her. It really is!—and she doesn’t mind helping the duds. And now she’s begun to think before she does anything, she ought to make an excellent coach.”

Blossom reddened to the roots of her fair curls at this handsome tribute, but she said nothing.

“I’ll second that,” said Ailsa Thompson who was music prefect and had no wish to change.

So that was decided and Betsy turned to Leila Norris and Nan Herbert, the last of the newcomers. “Then that means one of you for Stationery and one for Magazine.”

“What, exactly, does Magazine mean?” Nan asked cautiously.

“You collect in all the stories and poems and articles and so on and sort them out and choose which you think most suitable,” Betsy replied. “Then you arrange them in order and hand them over to Miss Derwent for vetting. Then you have to see to getting the thing printed—but I rather think Miss Dene helps you there. You’ll have to find that out for yourself. I’ve never had anything to do with Magazine, though Julie was Magazine prefect that last year at St. Briavel’s. I think that’s how it goes though.”

“I see. Thanks!” Nan relapsed into silence and Betsy glanced at Leila.

“It lies between you two. What about it, Leila? Feel like taking on Stationery?”

Leila nodded. “I don’t mind in the least. Certainly, Nan would be much better at that sort of thing than I would. She can write quite decent essays and it’s all I can do to keep in Miss Derwent’s good books there. Besides, her father’s a journalist. She ought to inherit that sort of mind.” She gave the blushing Nan a broad grin.

“Daddy edits a scientific magazine,” said Nan with dignity. “It isn’t at all the same thing—at least, I don’t think so.”

“No; but I imagine you have to have the same sort of tidy mind for any kind of magazine,” Leila retorted, “and that’s what you have, my girl!”

“Well, what about it?” Betsy asked patiently. “And I’d like to point out that tempus is fugiting like mad and we’ve still got to do something about the Sale. Hurry up and make up your minds. No one else will worry.”

“Oh, I’ll take over Stationery,” Leila said. “Nan can have The Chaletian.”

“What about duties?” Jean asked.

“That has to be arranged between the prefects of each House,” Betsy said. She had had a talk with the Head about it the previous evening. “Splashery and ordinary rules duties are all we have to worry about now. There are fifteen of us and three lots of splasheries to attend to. I propose that we divide up into five lots of three each and keep on the job for a week at a time. That would mean that it would come only once in five weeks for anyone.”

No one objected, so Betsy said that she would get out the lists as soon as she could—before Monday, anyway—and it was left at that.

The great subject for discussion was the Sale. All the official jobs having been got out of the way, the girls relaxed a little, but Betsy, with one eye on the clock, thumped on the table. “Order, you people! Freda and Sybil, you can natter about Hobbies all you like, once this meeting is over, but there just isn’t time for it now! We’ve got to discuss the Sale.”

The meeting came to order in a hurry. Apart from the pantomime, and St. Mildred’s was mainly responsible for that, the Easter Sale was always the big event of this term. It was held in aid of the poor children who came to the big Sanatorium at the end of the Görnetz Platz and the girls were accustomed to straining every nerve to make it a huge success.

It always had to be a Fancy Fair. They could have had an ordinary bazaar, but there would have been an immediate outcry from the rest if that had been proposed. Half the fun, to the younger girls at any rate, lay in the dressing-up and making the setting. ^[1]Last year, they had revived a much earlier idea and illustrated the Willow Pattern Legend. The year before, when they had still been on St. Briavel’s, they had used the charming allegory, ^[2]The Crown of Success by the once popular author, A.L.O.E. There had been others, notably a Fairy Tales Sale when Joey Maynard, then Joey Bettany and a sinful Middle, had done her best during the preparations to slay Miss Wilson who was co-Head of the school and now Head of the finishing branch at St. Mildred’s. ^[3]It had been an accident, of course, but as Joey herself had complained more than once, no one ever let her forget it and it had passed into the legends of the Chalet School. Now the girls set their brains to work to consider what they could provide for this year’s Sale.

“Let’s be original if we can,” Betsy urged. “Yes; I know it’s difficult, but let’s have a shot at it all the same. Suggestions, please!”

Naturally this bland request paralysed all original thought and a dead silence followed. It was broken by Freda.

“Could we do a Georgian Sale, do you think?” she asked.

“Where would you get all the dresses and wigs?” Sally wanted to know. “We’ve only about a dozen all told in Acting Cupboard and who’s going to have time to sit down and manufacture any more?”

So that was out. A proposal from Amy Dunne that they should do Little Women scenes was vetoed as too much like The Crown of Success. Jean’s idea of a Scottish Sale held the same objection as the Georgian one. It would be a hard matter to provide kilts and sporrans for everyone and Acting Cupboard held only two such dresses. Nor did Nan Herbert’s suggestion that they should do scenes from Jane Austen meet with any greater success.

At length Elinor Pennell, who had been staring thoughtfully at the ceiling, suddenly directed her gaze at Betsy. “I wonder—do you think we could manage an Old English Fair?” she asked with a little diffidence. “We might have a May Queen and a maypole. And we could use all the stage cottages—we might even manage one or two more. The men would make the frames and it’s easy enough to get canvas and paint them.”

“That’s an idea!” Betsy said. “And it would be something quite new.”

“And what about having a merry-go-round?” Sybil put in excitedly. “Oh—not a real one, idiots!” as they protested at this. “I meant we might manage to cut horses out of cardboard and fix up a canopy top. Someone could use it as a stall and arrange the goods for sale on the horses.”

“Gaudenz and the other men could move that swingboat stand the Juniors have,” added Katharine. “And the kids could have a wishing-well for a lucky dip.”

Suggestions followed thick and fast and they made so much noise over it that no one heard a light tapping on the door. It opened finally to admit a tall, dark person who wore a great silk shawl flung round her, sweeping in graceful folds to the hem of her skirt. She stood for a moment, watching the excited girls with dancing eyes. Then she chuckled long and loud and they heard and swung round.

“Mrs. Maynard!—Joey!—Auntie Jo!” exclaimed a dozen voices while Sybil sprang up and pulled out her chair with an eager, “Auntie Joey! How lovely to see you so soon! Come on and sit down here! I can use the table.”

“Oh, I had to tool along and welcome you all back again,” said the newcomer as she sat down, tossing off her shawl which she laid on the table. “Admire my Christmas gift from Madeira! How many of you remember Miss Stewart who used to be our history mistress? What—none of you? But you’ve all heard of her, I know. ^[4]It was she who wished our one and only Emerence on to us, more or less.”

“Do you mean Mrs. Mackenzie?” Betsy asked. “Oh, but I do remember her faintly. Sybs, you ought to. You must have known her in Tirol. ^[5]She married the first year the school was in England and went to Singapore with her husband—not that they were there long,” she added thoughtfully.

Joey Maynard nodded. “That’s her,” she said with a charming disregard for the rules of grammar. “Well, the Mackenzies are coming home for a long holiday. They broke the journey at Madeira and are still there so far as I know, and this arrived for me during the hols. Well, what’s the meaning of all the barney?”

“We were discussing the Sale,” said Betsy with dignity.

Joey laughed. “So that’s what you call discussion! It sounded to me a lot more like several free fights—all violent! Have you reached any conclusion?”

“Yes; we’re going to have an Old English Fair,” the prefects replied in unison.

“An Old English Fair? Who’s the genius who thought that one up? You, Elinor? Go up top! I should say you’d certainly rung the bell this time! I’d love to see it, but you’ll have to do without my inspiriting presence this year, I’m afraid.”

“Why on earth?” Betsy cried in dismay.

“Because, my lamb, we’re expecting Number Nine to come along early in April. I’ll be far too busy by then for even the School Sale. It’s a pity, but there it is. I told Julie and Co. last year that the Sale ought to be moved to the end of the summer term in future. They should have passed on my words of wisdom to you and then you could have had me with you. You’ll have to be satisfied with my blessing this time—oh, and anything I can do for you during the next few weeks. But you certainly won’t see me at it. Now that’s enough about me. Who’s going to do what with the stalls? It’ll mean House stalls this year, you know.”

“Oh, do you think so?” Sybil asked from her perch on the table beside her aunt.

“Positive sure! Oh, I suppose the Juniors must have the lucky dip as usual. That’s become a tradition. But the rest of you should be at your own House Stall. Let’s see. How many will that give you? Five, isn’t it?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” Jean said. “But we haven’t got that far yet. We ought to consult with the St. Mildred’s people before we arrange it, too.”

“Yes; that’s so,” Joey assented. “Well, have you thought out the entertainments?”

“We’d only got as far as suggesting sets for the stalls,” Katharine said.

“We must have a Country Dance display, of course,” Peggy said. “We can use the gym for that. And give eats in the dommy sci. rooms.”

“That’s an idea. It will leave the Speisesaal for something else. And what about a Folk Play? Here’s one for you!” She tossed a bundle of manuscript down the table. “I had a sudden inspiration one day during the hols and tossed that off as a result. When I reread it, it struck me that it might just do for the Sale. It shouldn’t take more than forty minutes though you could lengthen it by introducing a few more songs and dances if you wanted to. You can include as many people as you like, too, for there are only ten main characters and the rest can be crowd. I should use mainly Morris in it if you’re planning to give a Country Dance display.”

“That’s a smash—er—gorgeous idea!” Carola cried as she looked up from the play which she had promptly grabbed. “I was wondering how we could introduce Morris.”

“And I’ll tell you what,” Hilary interposed. “What about making a skittle alley and running a skittles competition? I’m sure that’s Old English enough. Doesn’t Shakespeare mention it in one of his plays?”

“I couldn’t tell you offhand, but it would certainly fit in,” Joey agreed. “And if it’s fine, what about having tilting at the ring?”

“Tilting at the ring?” Again it was a chorus.

“Yes, you could do it with bicycles, seeing we don’t have horses much in these parts. Oh, I know you people don’t bring bicycles with you, but at least a dozen of us residents have them and you could borrow—if you guarantee to make good any damage that might be done to them,” she added prudently.

“But how do you do it?” Amy asked.

“Hang rings the size of embroidery hoops by strings from boughs of tree and people try to pass wands through them as they ride past.”

“It sounds rather fun,” Carola said. “We’d need four or five people to run it, though. Still, I expect St. Mildred’s will rally round. All of them won’t be needed on their stall. And some of us could help out, too.”

“If you do it, I’ll promise a dozen little prizes for it,” Joey said, “and I expect we can scratch up some more amongst us. Hilary Graves would help out; and Phoebe Peters would, too. I’ll do some writing round among the folk I know in these parts and get what I can so you can count that one worry off your chests, anyhow.”

“And if it’s not fine, we could use the gym after the country dancing,” Lalla Winterton added.

“It might be fine and the garden still unfit for us,” Blossom said suddenly. “If it’s a sea of mud as it was last year, no one’s going to let us ride bikes all over the lawn. Still, I suppose, as you say, we could use the gym. We could fix up the rings with sticks lashed to the ribstalls.”

“So long as they are dangling, I don’t see that it matters,” Joey said. “How will you manage for dresses, by the way?”

“Not too badly. There’s a complete set of Cavalier dresses we could use for the Squire and the doctor and people like that. The rest can either wear smocks and their gym knickers under, or blouses with fichus and long, full skirts and aprons. That would do, wouldn’t it?”

“Caps for the girls, of course. And if you can manage it, buckled shoes for everyone. Tie up the girls’ sleeves with flying ribbons—and you could introduce some Puritans with close-fitting caps and collars to make a little variety.”

“And that’s an idea!” Carola ejaculated.

Ailsa looked up. “We’ve got a musical genius this term. Did you know, Mrs. Maynard? She’s Nina Rutherford. I heard her practising in Hall last night and I was simply stunned! I never heard any other girl play like that. It was marvellous! I felt as if my efforts were just a schoolkid’s strumming beside that.”

“Of course I know about Nina Rutherford,” Joey said calmly. “And don’t be disheartened because she can play like that, Ailsa. Your own music is good. But Nina, unfortunately for herself, has genius.”

“Unfortunately, Aunt Joey?” Sybil asked. “Why that? I should say she was jolly lucky to have such a wonderful gift.”

“In one way, so she is. But you always have to pay heavily for a valuable thing and the geniuses of this world pay very heavily for their gifts.” Joey thought a moment before she went on. “I wonder if you’ll understand me, girls? It’s like a lever, propelling you along one straight path and it won’t let you side-track—or not for long, at any rate. Sooner or later, you have to come back to it and no one and nothing can ever really come between it and you. That’s why so many geniuses make unhappy marriages. They’re so absorbed in their art and it means so much to them, that they have very little time for anything else. You see, it’s an obsession and obsessed people are never quite—well—sane. I don’t mean they’re mad and need shutting up; but I do mean that they’re lopsided. And the ordinary happinesses of life can never be theirs. Now do you understand?”

“I think so,” Betsy said hesitatingly. “I never thought of it before, of course. But I can see that being like—well—like Nina, for instance, may mean that you find it hard to live like other people.”

“Exactly!” Joey said impressively. “And as we’re on the subject, I’d like to warn you people that if Nina says and does things that strike you as utterly selfish, she won’t understand how they look to you. You’ll have to try and make allowances for her.”

“But Jacynth Hardy is a genius and she wasn’t like that—or not altogether,” Sybil protested.

“Jacynth is very highly gifted, but from what I can gather, Nina is even more so. And all her previous training has helped to deepen her idea that her art must come first and foremost and I doubt if there can be very much done about it now.”

The girls were silent. It was something quite new in their experience and they would have to live with it before they could come to much understanding of it. As Joey knew, some of them might never reach that point. She decided that she had said enough for the moment and turned to something else.

“I think, on the whole, I’d better provide something for every stall. Make up your minds who does which and I’ll send my contributions along as soon as possible. And now I must go. By the way, Sybs, give this to Nina. I want her to come to me for the afternoon to-morrow. Tell her I’ve seen Miss Annersley and it’s all right.”

“Can’t I come too?” Sybil asked as she tucked the note into her blazer pocket.

“No, my love, you may not. I want Nina all to myself. You can come over any time you can get leave and well you know it!” Joey threw her shawl over her shoulders, stood up and draped it. “What are you people planning to do this afternoon?”

“Go ski-ing if it keeps fine,” Katharine said.

Joey glanced out of the window. “In that case, my pets, you’re going to be disappointed. There are some very suspicious clouds drifting around the sky. It wouldn’t surprise me if we had a young blizzard shortly. That sky means mischief or my name’s not Joey Maynard! I’m going while the going’s good! Farewell!”

She waved to them from the doorway and vanished, leaving them all clustered round the window whither they had rushed on hearing her remarks.

“Well,” Betsy said as she returned to her seat, “I’m awfully afraid she’s right and ski-ing will be definitely off! In that case, Freda and Sybil, you’d better go and ask the Head if we can have a session of the Hobbies Club this afternoon. I suppose we must sort this out and then we can go and see Miss Annersley about it. Hello! Is that the bell? Then it can wait a while. I want my elevenses after all this hard labour. Come on, everyone! We’ll come back after and finish up. There’ll be no ski-ing. Here come the first snowflakes!”

And the prefects, taking a last look before they descended to the Speisesaal in quest of cocoa or hot milk and biscuits, were forced to agree that Mrs. Maynard had prophesied truly. There would be no expedition that day.

As it turned out, Nina was unable to accept Joey’s invitation for Sunday. What that experienced young woman had described as “a small blizzard”, turned out to be a full-grown one which continued the major part of Saturday, all Sunday and all Monday. No one was going to hear of allowing anyone, least of all a schoolgirl, going out in such a storm, not even when it meant just crossing the two gardens. Miss Annersley rang up Mrs. Maynard early on Sunday to tell her so and the would-be hostess fully agreed with her.

“Oh, you’re right, of course, Hilda. Tell the kid it’s not cancelled—only postponed,” she said. “This isn’t likely to last more than a day or two and she can come next Sunday instead. Tell her I’ll be looking forward to it.”

“I’ll tell her,” the Head agreed. “But I shouldn’t care to prophesy about the snow just now. Have you forgotten that this is January? It’s mid-winter and anything might happen!”

“Don’t be so pessimistic,” was all she got in return. “It wouldn’t dream of going on after to-morrow. It’s not that kind of blizzard. Besides, I want to have Jo Scott and Mary-Lou and Jessica Wayne and one or two other people before I’ll have to give up parties for a few weeks. You give Nina my message.”

“I will. Are you all right, Joey?”

“Flourishing like the green baytree—or no; I don’t think that’s a very nice simile, seeing I don’t think I’m what old King David meant by ‘the wicked’. But we’re all very well. I’m having a treat to myself. Jack was at home last night and as he can’t possibly get to the San through this, I’ll have him to myself all day for once and the other men can run the San on their own. It doesn’t happen very often, so I’m making the most of it. Give my love all round. I’m ringing off now.”

“One moment, Joey. You’ll like to know that we all think the Old English Fair is a stroke of genius. And your idea of tilting at the ring has intrigued everyone hugely.”

“Thought it would!” quoth Joey. “I must go! It’s breakfast time.”

“At ten to ten? You’re very late!”

“Well, rather! This was a chance for Jack to have a good long sleep after a series of either broken or late nights, so I left him to have his sleep out. Anna gave me some coffee when I showed up so that I wasn’t fasting. He roused half-an-hour ago and now I hear Anna bringing things into the Speisesaal so I must go. See you sometime sooner or later!” And Joey rang off with great firmness.

Miss Annersley laughed as she turned away from the telephone. “It’s a blessing Anna’s there to keep an eye on Jo and her doings! Send Nina to me, will you, Rosalie, and I’ll explain to her what’s happening.”

Miss Dene laughed. “Did you know that Joey means to offer the loan of her piano for Nina to practise on when Hall is otherwise engaged? She told me when she ran in yesterday morning. It’s as well the child doesn’t know, isn’t it? But Joey told me to leave it to her, so I said nothing.”

“That’s like Joey,” the Head said appreciatively. “Run along and fetch her, will you? I said we’d have our home services at half past ten and I want to explain to her before then.”

Miss Dene went off and Nina came to the study and listened to the explanation with a gravely polite air.

“I see. Thank you, Miss Annersley. If you are ringing up Mrs. Maynard, will you please tell her I shall be looking forward to next Sunday?”

Miss Annersley agreed and dismissed her, thinking to herself that while politeness was a desirable thing in girls, she preferred something a little less grown-up in teen-agers. Then she turned to sort out her books and forgot the matter for the time being.

On Tuesday, the school woke up to find that the storm was over though, even so, there could be no going out for them at present. The newly-fallen snow was too soft and they must wait until either the men had beaten out some paths or the frost firmed it enough for skis. There were deep drifts all round and no one wanted the bother and anxiety of having to dig down into them for buried girls!

Nina, practising happily while the rest of Va attended an algebra lesson with Miss Wilmot, thought that, on the whole, things might have been very much worse. She had already enjoyed a session on Henry V with Miss Derwent and another on the effects of the great ocean currents on the climates of various parts of the world with Miss Moore. Now she had an hour at the piano, since algebra for Va was followed by dictée this morning and from that, she was excused. She settled down to a Bach three-part Invention with much enjoyment and worked with a will. Her first lesson with Herr von Eberhardt had been delightful. She had liked him when she had had lessons from him in America and he was rejoiced to have under his teaching again the girl he had felt sure was to make history in the world of music.

Actual trouble first began after Abendessen, as the school called supper. The members of St. Clare, to which House she had been assigned, were in their commonroom. The Juniors and Junior Middles had a playroom next door. Everyone else used the commonroom in free times and that evening, they were all there, reading, knitting, doing embroidery or making jigsaw puzzles. A bunch of the Middles had annexed the big table to one side of the room and were playing a noisy game of rummy. Nina had sat down with the library book Vi Lucy had seen she got on the Saturday, but Nina’s fingers were itching for the touch of the cold ivory keys. Everyone else was fully occupied, even Vi sharing a jigsaw with Mary-Lou and Hilary. She looked round, saw that nobody was bothering about her and slipped quietly out of the room and made for Hall.

The place was in darkness, but already she knew where the switches were. She switched on the double lights over the daïs, opened the piano and sat down. A minute later, she was lost to the world as she wrestled with the Bach again. She had not been there more than five minutes, however, when the door opened and Miss Dene came in.

“So it is you, Nina?” she said as she mounted on to the daïs. “I thought so! My dear girl, I’m very sorry, but whether you know it or not, you’re breaking all sorts of rules by practising now. You’ve had your four hours to-day, haven’t you?”

“Yes; but there are two passages I simply couldn’t get right and I did want to finish them to-day if I could. Oh, Miss Dene, please let me go on! Just for half-an-hour! I promise to give up after that!”

Even as she spoke, her fingers were back on the keys again, touching them lovingly, as Rosalie could see, though she shook her head at the request. “I’m afraid I mustn’t, Nina. Rules say that no girl may do any work after the end of prep—and that includes practice, I’m sorry to say. You must stop now.”

“But I’m not interfering with anyone and no one will miss me,” Nina urged.

“That isn’t the point, my lamb. You girls have a full timetable and are expected to work hard at the proper time. But a certain amount of recreation you must have, so the end of prep is the end of all work. Believe me, you’ll do much better work to-morrow if you take a story book or join in some game or other. Besides,” she added, laughing, “if we gave way to you, we should have to give way to someone who wanted to do science, or art or history or gym. It can’t be done. Staff need rest as much as you girls. Come along! Put your music away and close up the piano and run along back to the commonroom.”

Nina’s face fell, but she remembered her promise to Miss Annersley on that first morning, so she did as she was told without any more fuss and went back to the commonroom where Mary-Lou and Vi called to her to come and help them with their jigsaw. She went and found that this pursuit, which, was new to her, was an absorbing one, so that she was well occupied for the rest of the evening.

Once she had gone, however, Miss Dene locked the piano and removed the key which she took to Miss Lawrence, the head of the resident music staff.

“You’d better see to that piano being locked every night,” she warned that lady. “Judging by what Joey had to say on Saturday morning, if you’re a genius, ordinary rules mean less than nothing to you if they happen to run counter to your art.”

“Oh, she’s quite right there,” Miss Lawrence agreed. “All right; I’ll see to the piano. And it may be as well to keep the others locked, too. If she really yearns to practise, she’ll find somewhere if it’s humanly possible.”

“So Joey says. All right; I’ll leave it to you, Dorothy, and don’t, I implore you, go and lose any of the keys.”

“What do you take me for?” Miss Lawrence said scornfully. “That would be a lovely excuse to some of those lazy monkeys to get out of practice!”

It was left at that, but Nina did not discover what was happening for a day or two.

On Wednesday, they found that the frost had struck during the night. The snow was hard as iron and Miss Annersley decreed that after Prayers they were all to wrap up and go out for a ski-run until eleven o’clock. It was winter and the rule of the school had always been that in winter every opportunity must be taken of open-air exercise. During the long snowstorms they had to be penned up so closely, and the doctors from the big Sanatorium were insistent on this. From the very beginning the school had been run in conjunction with the Sanatorium, first when both were at the Tiernsee in Tirol; then with the one opened in the Welsh Hills; now with the new one at the farther end of the Görnetz Platz. Many of the girls were delicate or came from families with a bad medical history and health was set first and foremost all the time.

“Must we wear our coloured glasses?” Betsy asked when the Head had made her announcement.

Miss Annersley shook her head as she glanced out of a nearby window at the grey sky. “No; there’s no need,” she said. “The radio prophesies a further fall of snow later on and I very much doubt if the sun struggles through that ceiling of cloud at all to-day.” She paused. Then she added, “Wrap up well, all of you. It’s bitterly cold outside.”

“Have you ever ski-ed before?” Hilary Bennet asked Nina as they pulled on their ski-ing suits with the close-fitting hoods that protected their ears and then pulled on warm, woolly mitts.

“Oh, yes, often,” Nina replied—it was English day and the English girls were taking every advantage of that fact. “I’ve always enjoyed it—I think it comes the nearest thing to flying. I’m so glad we do it here.”

“We toboggan, too,” Vi put in as she picked up her skis. “Only we haven’t done much at that since Mary-Lou’s accident last term.” She shuddered. “That was a ghastly time. She was concussed, you know, and she didn’t come to for days and no one could say whether she’d be all right or not.”

“Is that why her hair’s so short?” Nina asked with interest.

“Yes; Uncle Jack—Dr. Maynard, you know—had it all shaved off. She used to have the loveliest long pigtails—she called them her ‘Kenwigses’. Then she went in for one tail. I’ve heard that when she found she was minus hair of any kind, she blew up good and hearty. Luckily, her hair has always grown quickly, and she doesn’t look too bad now. And it’s growing in curly, so she’s resigned.”

“Aren’t you folk ready yet?” demanded Mary-Lou herself. “Come on then!”

Nina followed them out of the splashery, along the narrow passage and out into the corridor Gaudenz, one of the men who worked at the school, had dug out early that morning. Then she strapped on a pair of well-worn skis. When she stood up and moved out of the way, it was clear that she was no novice. Her motion as she skimmed over the frozen snow was delightfully easy.

“Good for you!” Hilary remarked as she joined her. “Come on—this way. We meet the crowd in the front drive and then we’ll be told which way we’re to go.”

In the front drive, the sixteen people who made up Va gathered together and were joined by Miss o’Ryan who was an expert on skis, thanks to many years spent in Tirol in her childhood. She told them to follow her and when they were in the road, directed them to turn to the left. “We’ll try to get as far as St. Anton,” she added. “Let me see. Nina, you can obviously use skis, so we haven’t any novices here. We ought to do it easily and be back by eleven for Break. Lead on, Mary-Lou and Hilary. And don’t go too far ahead, please.”

The pair set off and the rest of the form followed, flying over the snow, looking not unlike a flock of brightly coloured birds in their gentian-blue suits with the crimson trimmings. It was bitterly cold as the Head had said, but the strenuous exercise soon warmed them up and by the time they had reached St. Anton, a tiny village of chalets with a small, white-washed church with the usual bulbous spire, at the far end of the place, even Nina’s usually pale cheeks were pink. They skimmed round the church and then set off for home. Their chatter and laughter carried on the crisp air and Nina laughed and talked with the rest. If Sir Guy could have seen her just then, he would have been thankful. He had worried considerably about the miserable appearance of his young cousin.

“It’s just as well you ski so well,” Vi said as she and Nina raced along, side by side. “Do you skate, or don’t you dare in case of accidents? I suppose one has to be careful about wrists and fingers. It would be rather bad if you broke anything, wouldn’t it? I mean, how could you practise?”

“I can skate all right,” Nina said. “My father taught me when I was just a little thing of six or so. But you’re quite right, Vi. I should be frightfully worried if I had any sort of an accident like that.”

“Oh, well, if you’ve done it practically all your life, I don’t suppose you need worry about it,” Vi said soothingly.

“Can’t we hurry?” Nina asked. Vi’s remarks had reminded her that time was flying and she did not want to miss any of her practice.

“Not to get ahead of the leaders,” Vi replied. “That’s never allowed.”

Nina sighed. She felt in her bones that at least half her practice time was going to be cut this morning and she didn’t like it. However, Mary-Lou and Hilary made good time and they swept round the house to their own door just as the clock was chiming eleven. But even then, as Nina found, there was no just discarding her suit and flying to her beloved piano. She had to go and get her milk and biscuits with the rest and it was quite a quarter past eleven before she was able to sit down and begin work in the Schumann sonata in G minor that Herr von Eberhardt had given her at her lesson on the Saturday morning.

She wasted no time. She set to work at once and Miss Lawrence, happening to pass the upper door of Hall as she crossed over to the study, was attracted by the sounds and opened the door quietly. She was amazed at what she heard. Nina was working with a concentration that the mistress wished her own pupils would use. She let nothing slip. The music mistress noted how she played one stiff passage over and over, first the right hand, then the left, then both together until she had it as she felt it should be. Further, she was listening intently to what she was doing. She stopped and tried two or three different fingerings of one run before she was satisfied that she had the right one.

“That girl should go far,” the mistress thought as she closed the door softly and went on her way. “But what a touch—what technique for a child of fifteen—how she can work! I’d like some of my own beauties to hear her! It might open their eyes a little.”

Twelve o’clock came all too soon for Nina, but when the bell rang, she had the sense to stop, pack up her music, close the piano, pulling its baize cover over it, and hurry off to her formroom where she was due for a lesson in English.

For the first hour of the afternoon session, she was practising again. After that, Va had games. Ordinary games were out of the question, however, for the snow had come back—much more gently, but still it was falling again—and the girls had to resign themselves to no outdoor exercise until it stopped.

Word came from Miss Burnett that as ski-ing or tobogganing was out of the question, the girls were to change into tunics and plimsolls and come to the gym. This no longer meant going outside, for during the long summer holidays, wooden passageways had been built, linking the art room, domestic science kitchens, geography room, science laboratories and the gym with the school proper. In fine weather, the girls might and did cross over outside; in weather like this, they had to march decorously along the corridors.

Led by Bess as form prefect, Va went quite joyfully, so far as most of them were concerned. Miss Burnett was waiting for them and with her was Mdlle Lenoir, the junior music mistress.

“Well,” said the P.T. mistress when they were all in the big room, “any sort of outdoor games can be counted out at the moment. Mdlle Lenoir has twenty minutes to give us, though, so we’ll begin with country dancing. Let me see; Nina, have you done any?”

“Only what we did on Saturday night,” Nina replied, having been hauled in and dragged through half-a-dozen of the easier dances by Mary-Lou and the rest of that quartette.

“Oh, well, we’ll begin with Butterfly. That’s easy enough. Take your partners, girls. Yes, Hilary; you take Nina and help her through.”

Butterfly was followed by Bonnets So Blue. Then, with an eye to the needs of the others, Miss Burnett told Nina to sit out and took her place while the girls danced Parson’s Farewell and Maid in the Moon. Then Mdlle Lenoir had to go to give music lessons and Miss Burnett suggested a round of Beanbags to give them a chance to get their breath. Two of the girls “picked up” for sides and then they all sat on the floor cross-legged in two circles with a good distance between each girl.

For Nina’s sake, the mistress explained the game. “Beginning with your leader, you toss the bags from one to another all round the circle. The last girl to receive the bag runs with it to me and collects the next one which she tosses as soon as she has sat down properly. That means cross-legged and right down on the floor. There are eight bags for each ring, so everyone will have a turn at bringing the bag and beginning the tossing. The ring who first brings me the last bag wins. Got your bags, Bess and Hilda? Then begin—NOW!”

The fun began. The bags went whirling round the rings and Mary Yates, the last in Nina’s ring, was up half a second before Vi Lucy and tearing up the length of the gym to toss the bag to Miss Burnett, grab the second one, come racing back and sit down. However, Vi gained time by crossing her legs and dropping to the ground that way so that the new bags started the round together. By the time it came to Nina’s turn, she had grasped what was wanted and she was on her feet and flying down to the mistress before Rosemary King had sprung up. Back came Nina, full tilt, moving Hilary to mutter to Lesley Malcolm who was next to her, “Some sprinter!” She dropped into her place, feet crossed, and the bag went on its journey before Rosemary could sit down. Thanks to this, Hilda’s side won by one second and the other ring clapped them vigorously.

“Leapfrog to wind up,” Miss Burnett decided. “That ought to shake all the fidgets out of you! Round the room, and mind you space out evenly. Mary-Lou, show Nina what to do. And remember, girls; you only touch the back of the girl you are leaping over. Don’t press with all your weight. Hilda, be careful! People being leaped over, remember to keep your heads down.”

Mary-Lou took over Nina in her usual capable manner. “Stand here,” she said. “Stoop down and grip your ankles—or as near them as you can get. No; keep your feet apart a little to get a firm stance. Now, you’re the last, so you’ll jump last. When we do it in the garden, of course, we start off as soon as we’ve been jumped but we can’t do that here. Grass is soft to fall on and wood isn’t. Now do you quite understand?”

Nina said she did and Mary-Lou went off to her own place, while Bess got ready to do the round. The new girl gasped as she saw long-legged Bess leap lightly over girl after girl in her run round the room. Then the form prefect was coming up to her, so she remembered what Miss Burnett had said and tucked her head in. A minute later there was the light touch of hands on her back and Bess was over and running to stand further along, bent down for Mary-Lou to follow her example.

All went well with the first seven and Nina was enjoying the fun. Then Hilda Jukes came. Now Hilda was a big creature, kind, pleasant and very well-meaning, but as heedless a girl as you could find anywhere. Miss Burnett warned her once more about not bearing with her whole weight on the bent backs and started her off. Hilda remembered most of the way round. Then she came to Vi who was behind Nina. In her excitement, she forgot and if Vi had not been prepared, she would have been bowled over. As it was, she just managed to keep her balance. Nina, new to the game, was not prepared at all. Hilda clamped a pair of big hands firmly on her, bore down and leapt. Nina gave way and the pair of them rolled over, Nina undermost.

Miss Burnett rushed to the spot at once and hauled Hilda off with more speed than gentleness. Then she bent over the new girl who was sitting up, holding her left wrist with the other hand and biting her lips to keep from crying out with the pain. Somehow, she had bent the wrist under her and Hilda’s weight on top had done the mischief.

The mistress examined the injured wrist gently but thoroughly, while Hilda, having come to her senses, stood gasping out apologies.

“Shut up, ass!” Mary-Lou said, hushing her. “Shall I get Nina some water, Miss Burnett?”

“Yes—do,” Miss Burnett replied. “No, Nina; no bones broken, but you’ve given that wrist a nasty wrench. You must go to Nurse and she’ll bandage it for you and give you a sling to rest it. It’ll be all right in a day or two. Thank you, Mary-Lou!” as that young woman brought the water. “Sip this, Nina, and then I’ll take you to Nurse. Thank goodness there’s no serious harm done!”

No one was prepared for what followed. Nina gave her a look of horror. “But—what about my practice?” she cried.

“I’m afraid it’ll have to go for the present. Don’t look so upset, Nina,” Miss Burnett said soothingly. “A couple of days’ rest will probably be all your wrist will need. You ought to be able to get back to your piano by Monday.”

“Oh, I’m awfully sorry, Nina!” cried tactless Hilda at this moment.

Nina swung round on her, her eyes flashing. “You clumsy creature!” she exclaimed. “You were warned twice! Now you’ve stopped my practice! I’ll never forgive you—never!” And with the final words, she burst into a passion of tears.

“And so, you see, although Hilda’s said over and over again how sorry she is, Nina just won’t listen to her. The last time I saw it happen, she turned her back and walked away before Hilda had well begun. I think, myself, she’s an idiot—Nina, I mean—for it was an accident, even though Hilda should have had more sense than to bear all her weight down on anyone, let alone a girl who, to judge by what she says, had never played leapfrog before in her life. I should think,” concluded Mary-Lou seriously, “that that’s one thing Hilda will never do again.”

“Then that’s so much to the good—so far as Hilda is concerned,” Joey Maynard said ruthlessly. “I’m sorry for her, but she really is a heedless creature and always has been. If she’s learnt her lesson through this silly business, it’ll be a mercy!”

“Yes, but it’s not helping Nina. Everyone’s told the silly kid that her wrist will be all right in a few days’ time, but the way she’s going on about it, you’d think she was maimed for life. Matey sent for Dr. Graves as Uncle Jack wasn’t available and he’s stopped her practice altogether until Monday and you’d think the world was coming to an end!” Mary-Lou said graphically. “What can we do about it, Auntie Jo?”

Joey finished clipping together the last sheets of the carbon copy of her new book. Then, as she added them to the pile, she said slowly, “But the trouble is that’s exactly what she does feel.”

Mary-Lou gaped at her. “Just because she’s wrenched her wrist and is cut off from practice for a few days? She couldn’t possibly!”

“Oh, yes, she could. You’re forgetting that the be-all and end-all of life for her is music.” Then, as Mary-Lou still looked completely incredulous, she added, “I can understand to a certain extent for I’ve had spasms of feeling that way myself when I had a chapter of the current book all boiling up in my brain and haven’t been able to get down to it at once. And remember this: with Nina it’s genius and that makes it a thousand times worse.”

“Then what is it with you?” Mary-Lou demanded. “If anyone asked me, I’d say you were a genius—writing, not music,” she added.

Joey shook her head. “No, thank heaven! I’d be sorry for your Uncle Jack and the family if it were. It’s talent where I’m concerned, Mary-Lou, and that’s not nearly such an urgent thing as genius.”

Mary-Lou turned this over in her mind and then dismissed it until she had leisure to think it out for herself. At present, she was limited to one hour away from school and nearly half of that had gone already. It was the Saturday after the accident and, as she had said, Nina stayed grimly unforgiving where the penitent Hilda was concerned. She either could not or would not see that the whole thing was an accident—one due to sheer carelessness, it is true; but still an accident.

Hilda herself had heard all about her part in the affair, first from Miss Burnett who had been righteously angry because all her warnings had been ignored. She had not spared Hilda a severe tongue-lashing which had reduced the culprit nearly to tears. The Head who came next had pointed out that if she could still be so heedless at her age, she was hardly fit to be in Va with every likelihood of going up to one or other of the Sixths in September and the possibility of being otherwise eligible for a prefectship.

“If you are going to behave so irresponsibly, Hilda, how can we promote you?” Miss Annersley had said gravely. “You are sixteen and a half now—seventeen in May, isn’t it? And yet in some ways you are nearly as heedless and careless as little Margot Maynard. How can we dare to rely on you if you aren’t going to try to improve?”

When Hilda got herself out of the study, what was left of her might have gone into a half-pint mug!

Her own form, needless to state, told her their opinion with brutal frankness. Miss Lawrence had crowned everything that morning when she happened to meet the girl, by telling her exactly what she thought of her for upsetting Nina’s music. This had been the finish so far as Hilda was concerned. She had vanished from sight and when Mary-Lou at last found her in the art storeroom where she had hidden herself, she had cried until she was fit for nothing but Matron’s care. Being a canny young person, Mary-Lou had refrained from any comments about absence from mending and letter-writing. Instead, she fetched Matron and Matron marched Hilda off to her cubicle and told her to lie down for an hour or two after she had sponged her face.

During Break, Mary-Lou and her three chums had neatly cut Nina out from the rest of the Seniors and tried by every means in their power to coax her to forgive Hilda. Nina remained implacable and, in despair, Mary-Lou had gone to the Head and begged leave to go to Freudesheim as she wanted to see Aunt Joey about “something frightfully important—and it is frightful, too,” she had added consideringly.

Miss Annersley asked no questions though she guessed what was behind the request. She gave leave at once—the more readily because she herself had had a session with Nina after Frühstück and had made no greater impression on her than the girls had. Nina could see only her own point of view. She had no pity for Hilda’s real unhappiness and all the Head could get out of her was a sullen, “It serves her right if she’s miserable. She was warned and she didn’t bother to remember. I can’t practise and I couldn’t have my lesson this morning.”

“There are more important things than music, even,” Miss Annersley said sternly. “I hope, until you feel differently about Hilda, you won’t try to say Our Father, Nina. Have you ever thought what a terrible condemnation of yourself you are calling down if you ask to be forgiven your trespasses exactly as you forgive those of others? Think that over, please, and ask God to give you the grace of pity.”

Nina had looked rather startled, but she said nothing and the Head had dismissed her with a heavy heart. She had almost decided to consult Joey herself, for if Hilda was miserable, Nina was no better, to judge by her looks. So she had instantly gone to ring up Freudesheim and returned to give Mary-Lou permission to wrap up and run across provided she was back within an hour. Mittagessen was to be early to-day and the girls were to have a long afternoon out-of-doors, tobogganing and ski-ing.

Mary-Lou had skipped across and poured out the whole story to Joey. Now she said anxiously, “But what can we do about it, Auntie Jo? Hilda’s awfully miserable and,” she added with a flash of insight that Joey had hardly expected of even her, “so is Nina. It can’t be let go on, you know.”

“Your English!” Joey said. Then, “It’s no use going on at Nina. You’ll only make her dig her toes in more. The best thing you can do is to pray for her. But Mary-Lou, there is something to be said for her. Try to understand a little.”

“I can see that she had every reason to be mad at first,” Mary-Lou replied. “But she’s gone on being mad and that’s what I don’t understand.”

“You can try. Listen to me. Do you remember last term after your accident when you first roused up and thought for some days that you might never walk again?”

Mary-Lou stared at her with parted lips. “I do, of course. I don’t think I could ever forget. But,” she added, “it didn’t make me hate Emerence.”

“Although it was really all her fault. I wasn’t thinking of that side of it exactly but as you’ve brought it up, I’d just like to point out that you find it easy to forgive and Nina obviously doesn’t. What I was getting at was how you felt until you knew that it would be all right sooner or later.”

The blue eyes darkened at the memory. “I felt simply awful!”

“Yes; well, that’s how Nina is feeling just now about her wrist.”

“Auntie Joey, she simply can’t! She’s known from the first that it was only a few days before she was all right again. I didn’t—or not at first.”

“Didn’t you feel sick to get up and move about sometimes?” Joey asked.

“I did, of course.” Mary-Lou paused. Then she said suddenly, “I’ll tell you. There was one day when I felt if I had to lie there a moment longer I must scream and scream and scream! I wanted almost maddeningly to get up and go flying around as I’ve always done. It seemed to me that if I had to lie like that for the rest of my life I’d go completely crackers. In fact, I rather hoped I’d die if it meant that.”

“Nina is longing to be at her music in just that way,” Joey said; and left it at that.

“But that’s mad! She’ll be at it again by the middle of next week at latest. It wasn’t a really bad wrench, you know, though it did hurt. Must have done, for she was as white as chalk when we’d hauled Hilda off her.”

“Don’t you think Nina may have been terrified in case the damage was really bad? To be a concert pianist, your hands and wrists and arms must be perfect. Shall I tell you how it looks to me?”

“I wish you would! I quite like the kid, you know,” said Mary-Lou, sublimely ignoring the fact that “the kid” was a bare three weeks younger than herself. “And, of course, we’re all fond enough of poor old Hilda and she’s a long, wet week over it all. You see, everyone went for her about it, because Miss Burnett did warn her twice about being careful. So what with that and knowing that the whole thing was her fault and Nina saying she won’t have anything to do with her, Hilda’s on the verge of weeps half the time. And we honestly don’t know what to do about it.”

“I’ve told you the best and only thing you can do. However, what strikes me is that for the first hour or so Nina really did think her career was done in,” said Joey cheerfully forgetting that she was a grown-up, the mother of a long family and a well-known writer, and reverting to schoolgirl language. “Well, she’s had a series of quite nasty shocks in the past two months and she wasn’t able to take it. She lost her father when he plunged into Maggiore to try to save a kid that had fallen in. She was whisked off to England by her guardian who is a very nice man—I met him when he came to fix her up at the Chalet School—but I should think that his highlight in music is Handel’s Largo and perhaps the Moonlight. At any rate, I’m certain he hasn’t the foggiest notion how Nina feels. In fact, I doubt if any of his family has. Then, after never being at school but just living round with her father, she was plunged headlong into a very fair-sized one and she hasn’t had anything like time to feel her feet yet. Her mind must be a whole jumble of muddled impressions and she can’t sort them out. It’s a pity Hilda made such an ass of herself, but you other people have got to be patient with Nina and do your best for her. Let the subject alone altogether in future. Keep her occupied with other ideas and don’t give her a chance to brood on it.”

“Then what happens to her mind if it’s in a jumble to start with?” Mary-Lou demanded.

“Your ideas will be on the surface. Deep down inside I hope things will begin to straighten themselves out a little. But nothing you crowd can say will do it, so ignore it. That’s my advice. She’s coming to tea with me to-morrow and if I find I can do anything, I will. But I won’t promise. I may decide that I should leave it alone, too. Now your hour is up and you must go. Before I forget, you can ask leave to come along on Sunday week. I must get all my parties over during this half of the term. After that, I shan’t be able to manage.”

Mary-Lou flashed her a look and she laughed. “Oh, I’m all right. Don’t you start to worry about me. But I’d like a few weeks of peace and quiet just then. That’s all.”

“Well, thanks a million,” Mary-Lou said, getting up from her lowly seat on a hassock. “I feel better about things now. I’ll tell our crowd what you say and try to get the rest to lay off Nina. Perhaps,” hopefully, “when she can play again she’ll come round and forgive Hilda.”

“I fully expect she will—if she doesn’t forget all about it. Don’t forget what I said about genius. It isn’t selfishness in the ordinary sense. It’s just that music means more to her than everything else put together. Only, for her own sake, she must learn to live with other people.”

“Are all geniuses like that?” Mary-Lou asked as she pulled on her coat.

“It’s a very common habit with them—though Bach, at any rate, must have been able to manage music and other folk. He had twenty children and married twice!”

“Gosh! He was worse than you!” cried the candid Mary-Lou.

“What on earth do you mean? I’ve only eight, so far! And one husband!”

Mary-Lou giggled. “I don’t suppose you’ll ever want more than the one husband. You’d have a ghastly time finding anyone else as nice as Uncle Jack! But about the family I wouldn’t be so sure. I can just see you with a string of infants coming along for years to come!” She turned and fled to the door after this piece of impertinence and Joey giggled herself.

“You deserve to have your ears well boxed for that! However, I’ll let it pass. Off you go or someone will have something to say to you. It’s after twelve now.”

Mary-Lou gave a shriek of horror and sped off as fast as she could go. Luckily, she had put on her nailed boots or she would have floundered all over for the ground was like glass. But she kept her balance and as Joey’s clock was five minutes fast, she was able to join her fellows in the commonroom at St. Clare’s just before the bell rang for Mittagessen.

“What luck?” Vi muttered as they lined up at the door.

“Tell you later. But Aunt Joey says we’ve got to lay off Nina, so we’ll have to get at the rest on that point. There’s second bell!” And Mary-Lou firmly held her tongue until they were all sitting down when she equally firmly changed the subject to the afternoon’s sport and no more was said for the present.

Nina duly went to have “English tea” with Mrs. Maynard on the Sunday. No one ever knew what really occurred, but when the young woman returned, the first thing she did was to hunt out Hilda who had cheered up a little by this time.

“Hilda,” she said shame-facedly, “I’m so very sorry I was so unkind to you. Please forgive me if you can.”

This took place in the splashery where Hilda, coming for a drink of water, had encountered Nina in the act of hanging up her coat. Being Hilda, she held out her hand at once. “Of course I will! And will you forgive me for being such an ass? Miss Lawrence told me I might have injured your wrist permanently and that would have been simply ghastly.”

As a result, the startled members of Va beheld the pair coming into the formroom together and if Hilda looked her old happy self, Nina had certainly lost her brooding look. By Wednesday, her arm was out of the sling and Dr. Graves gave her permission to practise with the left hand for ten minutes at a time. The wrist remained weak for some days, but by the time February was half over, Nina was taking her full four hours a day. More than that, she was gaining in colour and weight and seemed to have settled down happily.

The thing that occupied most minds by then was the St. Mildred pantomime.

The girls had elected to produce Beauty and the Beast and they had roped in a goodly number of the school proper as they wanted to make a really big thing of it. Verity Carey, Mary-Lou’s “sister-by-marriage”, since Commander Carey had married Mrs. Trelawney, was the Fairy Queen. The whole bunch of prefects with the exception of Betsy Lucy were Robin Hood and his Merry Men. Betsy herself was Puck. Others of the elder girls were servants, messengers, palace guards and other oddments. Seventeen people who knew something about ballet had been handed over to Tatiana Khavasky whose aunt was, to quote Margot Maynard, “a real ballet dancer”, and the younger folk were fairies, elves, pixies, and goblins. The chief characters were, naturally, in the hands of the St. Mildred girls. Julie Lucy, sister of Betsy and Vi, was the Beast and her Beauty was an extremely pretty girl who had come from another school, one Joy Venn. Big Ruth Wilson was the Merchant and his elder daughters were Dorothy Watson and Polly Winterton, also Chalet School girls. Clem Barras, another Chaletian, was the Wicked Fairy, having laid claim to it from the beginning, and Annis Lovell, a friend of hers, was the Boatman who suffered from spoonerisms. A big girl from Carnbach Grammar School was the Coachman and the last word in pomposity. The Horse was composed of Bride Bettany and a girl from a Brighton school, Mary Elliot.

The pantomime came off in the afternoon. It was necessary to make a matinée of it since part of the audience might not be out after dark, even though the place was the hall built by subscription from various friends just beyond the gates of the Sanatorium. It began at fourteen o’clock—two, in English time—and by half past thirteen, the body of the hall was crowded. Sundry people from the main school were very busy acting as doorkeepers and usherettes and during the second interval, coffee and cakes were to be provided at a moderate sum. As Bride Bettany had remarked, “We want to make all we can for the San, as well as giving them a lot of fun.”

There was resounding applause when the orchestra, made up of pupils of all the school, filed in and took their places. Nina had been requested to take over the piano from Miss Lawrence so was among them to her great delight.

When Mr. Denny arrived to take possession of the conductor’s rostrum, there was a second outburst. It died away as his baton was raised, bows came to the ready and Nina, with her eyes fixed on him, touched the keys lovingly. Then the baton came down and they swung into Nicolai’s Merry Wives of Windsor overture which they had calmly pitched on for the purpose.

The final chords crashed out and after the applause which the conductor acknowledged with three jerky bows, he turned back, the opening chorus sounded and the curtains swept up, showing “The hall in the house of Master Geltibran, a rich merchant”. The servants were scuttling about, getting into each other’s way, and the Boatman appeared with a couple of stuffed fish to announce solemnly that he had brought “two hied drerring” for his master’s refreshment on his journey—which brought the first laugh. The Merchant appeared, gorgeous in crimson and green, together with his three daughters, Adeliza, Mariella and Beauty, the first two in elaborate dresses and the last in a gym tunic with her hair tied back. Her sisters kept crowding her out and calling her “child”, despite her complaints that she was nineteen and surely might be considered grown-up now. Master Geltibran promised the gifts and the elder sisters sneered at Beauty’s modest request for a rose. Then there was a cry of, “Way! Make way there!” and the Coachman arrived, leading the Merchant’s horse in.

The animal proceeded to display antics that would have caused any ordinary steed to be sold to the nearest circus. It had movable eyelids of enormous size and it winked solemnly at its master before it administered a side kick at the Coachman who got out of the way in such a hurry that he fell over a page and the pair went down. While the crowd were still rocking, the beast sidled up to a chair which the Merchant mounted, but when he tried to get on its back, it turned, cocked its head on one side and winked at him, pawing valiantly while the audience rocked again.

At long last he managed to get there and the Horse moved off. The audience were not to know that as Ruth’s weight descended, the hindquarters gasped, “Gosh! What a ton-weight! Thank goodness it’s only into the wings!” As a result, the gentleman nearly forgot to wave to his family as they clattered off, the Merchant grinning broadly. Beauty wept gracefully into her handkerchief, but Adeliza yelled, “Whatever you do, don’t forget my diamond tiara and necklace!” which had been her modest request! Mariella, not to be outdone, bawled a reminder of the dozen dresses from Paris she had ordered. The scene ended with a sung farewell during which the servants poured on to the stage in such numbers that Joey Maynard, sitting next to Miss Wilson and Miss Annersley, was moved to murmur, “Labour must have been cheap then!”

The next scene took place before a front-cloth and was the Merchant’s house. The Cook was busy with the dinner and in reply to every question asked merely replied, “Pepper it!” The climax came when a kitchen-maid plaintively asked how she should deal with the rice pudding ordered by Adeliza for Beauty and was told, “Pepper it!” which drew shouts of laughter from the audience. Worse was to come, however, for the Boatman arrived to ask if he could take any people to parket. He complained that he could do with a tup of kea and asked if Cook had any cruffins or mumpets. At this point, Miss Annersley moaned gently and Joey mopped her streaming eyes with her programme as her handkerchief seemed to have gone missing!

By way of contrast, the next scene was the Court of the Fairy Queen which opened with a chorus which was a very old song indeed, The Fairies, produced by Joey who had begged, borrowed or stolen all she could find for the purpose. This was followed by a charming dance given by the ballet. Then the Fairy Queen sang the story of the spell laid on Prince Charming by the Wicked Fairy, Nettlesting, and which could only be broken by a maiden as good as she was beautiful who loved the Beast with all her heart.

Verity had a beautiful voice, with a lark’s lilt in it, and fully deserved the applause she received. However, no encores could be allowed, so the orchestra swung into a merry round dance and the little fairyfolk skipped and pranced gaily.

Into this happy scene irrupted Nettlesting. Clem looked really dreadful. She had “back-combed” her whole red-brown mop until it stood on end above her face and over her shoulders. She had given herself a ferocious scowl and, someone having fatally introduced her to nose-paste, had adorned her own pretty nose with a hump in the middle.

Joey sat up and surveyed her with interest. “Heavens! How could Clem manage to make herself so ghastly?” she queried in tones that carried up to the stage and nearly gave Nettlesting a fit of the giggles.

However, she controlled herself, raised the crooked stick she was carrying and bellowed that the Queen would never lift the spell for no such girl existed. So defiant were her words and gestures that Verity, usually no actress, was roused to make her reply with real dramatic fervour, much to the relief of the producer, Miss Wilson, who had frequently moaned over the flat gentleness of her words during rehearsal. Nettlesting defied her and the Queen told her rebellious subject that when the spell was broken, the Wicked Fairy would be banished to the Land of the Green Goblins forever, whereupon, the Green Goblins, whose faces looked simply awful, done with green greasepaint, suddenly came tumbling in and hailed Nettlesting as their future queen in a song whose chorus ran,

All the time, they were tumbling about, turning somersaults and cartwheels until one visitor muttered to her next door neighbour that those children must be made of indiarubber! With a final shriek of rage, Nettlesting strode off, her future subjects tumbling after her. The ballet took the stage with a graceful dance to a Chopin valse and the curtains came down to rise a minute or two later on a front-cloth scene between the Merchant, the Coachman and the Horse.

Once more the audience were reduced to helpless laughter as the Merchant bemoaned his ill-luck in the matter of the rose and berated the Coachman for not finding him any. The Coachman, speaking in words of three or four syllables, pointed out that you couldn’t expect to find roses growing in the Muscovy plains in the middle of winter. The Horse suddenly kicked out at him with a playful hind hoof, and then proceeded to chase him round the stage to the tune of a wild rondo from the orchestra while the Merchant, hurriedly mounting a log handily at one side, encouraged his steed, ejaculating, “Good old Dobbin! Keep it up, old boy! Move a bit faster, Consequential, or he’ll dot you one! Got him!” as the Horse contacted the Coachman’s hindquarters, rather harder than was meant and the yell that gentleman let out was genuine! Finally, the three careered off and the curtains fell once more.

They rose again on the Garden of the Beast’s Palace. The girls had spent a good deal of effort and ingenuity on this. Paper roses trailed over the painted canvas walls and about a trellised archway. Rosebushes had been contrived out of them and branches of fir with quite good if somewhat unusual effect. In the middle of the stage rose a cardboard fountain, the water being effected by means of strands of fine silver wire curved over gracefully into the bowl. A garden seat from St. Mildred’s stood at one side and hither came the Merchant who seemed to have mislaid his Horse for the time being. He dropped on to the seat and gave way to a long soliloquy during which he proclaimed that though he had sought everywhere, he could not find the rose Beauty wanted. Towards the end of his speech, the orchestra began playing a lullaby pianissimo. He yawned and then stretched himself out on the seat with one of the parcels for a pillow and the ballet drifted in in a dreamy dance performed mainly down front so that very few people could see the small fairies carefully wheeling in a table already laid and drawing it up beside the sleeping gentleman. The music modulated into the lovely old English lullaby, Golden Slumbers, while the ballet melted into the wings with the fairies and as it ended, the Merchant roused up, rubbed his eyes, saw the table with many ejaculations and rubbed them again.

He finally sat up and after lifting the covers and remarking on each dish, helped himself and fell to. When he had eaten, he looked round and woke up to the fact that he was in a rose garden. He wandered round it, rhapsodizing all the time and finally plucked a rose. There was a terrific “Crash!” and the Beast stood beside him, growling most alarmingly. The Merchant fell on his knees and begged for mercy. The Beast growled again and a band of soldiers, gorgeous in red and gold, marched in and surrounded the trespasser. The Merchant shrieked—and little wonder. The Beast was an awesome-looking creature, clad in a teddy-bear suit that covered him from chin to toes and with a head on him that no animal in the Zoo had ever produced. He advanced on the stricken man and at this point, an entirely unrehearsed effect occurred.

Joey had been obliged to bring her twins to the show as she wanted everyone in the house to share the fun. Felix and Felicity, the two-and-a-half-year-old twins, had watched everything with wide blue eyes, gurgling when the grown-ups laughed and otherwise behaving beautifully. But this was where Felix, staring at the queer creature on the stage, suddenly exclaimed in bell-like tones, “Oh! Funny doggy! Wants to stwoke ve funny doggy, Mamma!”

“You can’t! Sit still!” Joey hissed, leaning over to hold him down, while the Merchant uttered a remark that sounded like “Pup-chick!” and the Beast made a most peculiar sound.

The girls were well-drilled, however, and the Beast recovered himself at once and proceeded to demand why his hospitality had been so abused. The Merchant, in very wobbly tones, explained and the well-known condition for his release was uttered. The Merchant promised and was led off into the palace while the ballet danced in and the scene ended.

There was a brief interval, during which Joey impressed on her youngest pair that they must sit quietly. Then the curtain rose on the Merchant’s front hall again and he arrived and told his story. The elder sisters complained when they heard that Beauty was to marry the Beast and own the beautiful palace. Their father told them it was their own fault for being so greedy and a very funny scene took place which ended with the Horse arriving to bear Beauty away and gallumphing off in a highly upsetting manner for its rider who nearly fell from it before it reached the wings.

A drop scene of a river when the Boatman, the Cook, the Coachman and the ubiquitous Horse fooled excellently, gave the perspiring scene-shifters a chance to set the Throne Room of the palace. They were just ready when an entirely unexpected event happened.

The Horse had tried to kiss the Cook. Every time he stretched out his neck in her direction, she shrieked and ran. The audience were mopping their eyes and screaming with laughter, when the hindquarters tripped, bunted into the back of the forequarters which was not expecting it and staggered forward, tripped over the Coachman and the latter went down, fell flat, the back legs subsiding on top of him and the forelegs sitting on top of the backlegs.

The audience merely wept—it was about all they could do by this time. As for the orchestra which was supposed to keep up an undercurrent of music here, the members were doubled up over their instruments and it was reported later that Nina simply laid her head on the piano keys and shook with laughter. Even Mr. Denny—Plato to his pupils—dropped his baton and leaned on the desk and writhed with mirth.

Luckily for the pantomime, Adeliza and Mariella kept their heads. They had been in the wings, waiting for their next entrance and they rushed on to the stage, Adeliza hissing at all within hearing, “Gag till we can straighten up!” before she and Mariella hauled the horse off the unfortunate Coachman who was nearly purple under his greasepaint by the time they got him on his legs again. Indeed, Adeliza deserved a medal for presence of mind for she raved at everyone in an impromptu speech which fitted in so well, that quite half the visitors thought it was all part of the act.

The next scene showed the arrival of the wedding party in the Throne Room. For no known reason, Adeliza swept in on the arm of Little John and Mariella arrived with Robin Hood. The outlaw band sang a chorus extolling the glories of a free forest life and followed this up with the old Morris dance, How D’Ye Do, Sir?

The music then modulated into Haste to the Wedding and Beauty arrived, all in white and complete with veil and bouquet, what time the Beast entered from the other side, supported by the Captain of the Guard and the entire Guard. A quartette followed between Beauty, the Beast, the Merchant and the Captain, after which the entire party danced a charming minuet before going out to supper.

As the last of the party vanished, the stage darkened and Nettlesting and her retinue appeared. Standing well down centre, Nettlesting, lighted by a green lime which made her look even more awful if that were possible, solemnly cursed the happy pair with a most comprehensive curse.

Having shrieked out this verse in a falsetto voice that made Jack Maynard mutter to his friend Dr. Graves, “If Clem doesn’t want a gargle after all this, I miss my guess!” Nettlesting broke into a series of shrill cackles which were nearly ruined by a small voice from the audience proclaiming, “Ooh! Isn’t Clem funny!” Joey’s third son, Michael, was giving tongue for the benefit of the twins in case they were frightened.

If thoughts could have killed, Mike would have been slain. Clem glared out across the auditorium, but in any case, the audience were shaking at the funny mixture of horrors and the next moment, amber limes brought on the Fairy Queen who dared Nettlesting to carry out any of her curses.

The bad fairy cried that though the pair were wedded, Beauty had no love of her husband and never would and the spell would remain.

“Not so, for she is good as she is beautiful and one day your wicked spell will end, for love will have vanquished it,” the Queen retorted.

The orchestra struck up and she sang a charming lyric in praise of love while Nettlesting shrank away and the Queen was left, standing in the limelight as the curtains slowly whispered down.

The second interval occurred here and trays of coffee and cakes were passed along the rows of seats. In fact, so great was the demand, that Matron at the Sanatorium had to send one of the nurses to bring all the staff’s spare cups.

“I need this!” Joey said as she sipped hers. “What a show! I wonder who was responsible for the Curse? I call it most comprehensive!”

“So do I,” Miss Wilson agreed. “I believe Bride Bettany wrote it—with some help from the rest. I know there’s a lot more of it, but they cut it down because of the time. What a relish that bad Clem used on it!”

“What awful doggerel!” retorted Miss Annersley. “I must set them all to sonnet-writing next time I take them for English. Finished, Joey? Then pass your cup along. Emerence is waiting for it.”

Joey handed over the empty cup and then leaned forward to address her young who sat just in front. “Once more and for the last time,” she said severely, “you are not to talk! If you do that again, I’ll take you all home! Then you’ll miss all the end of it. You two boys are awful! Felicity’s the only one who’s behaved herself properly so far. All right, Felicity? Have you finished your sweets?”

“No, sank you,” Felicity said with a beaming smile at her mother.

“Well but, Mamma, I was only afraid the kids might be frightened,” Mike objected.

“Not they! They’ve seen too many of the shows you folk get up in the holidays,” his mother said. “Anyhow, if you do it again, you know what will happen—-all of you!”

As Joey always did as she said, she had secured silence from them for the rest of the pantomime and as the orchestra struck up again at that moment and the footlights suddenly blazed up, she sat back and the pantomime continued.

Scene followed scene. Beauty was summoned home and she and the Beast had quite a pathetic duet before she finally went off on the back of the Horse which had recovered from the shock of its last mishap.

The next scene was the welcome given Beauty who arrived loaded with gifts for all and sundry. The Boatman had the audience laughing again as he thanked “Princess Beauty” for the “tound of pobacco and the priar bipe” she had brought him, and Adeliza and Mariella who were now wedded to the Captain of the Guard and Robin Hood compared notes on their gifts and quarrelled as to who had the best.

Next came the scene where Beauty tells of her dream that the Beast wants her. She sang very prettily of his love for her and how fond of him she had grown, while her sisters did their best to dissuade her from going, turning aside to apply stage onions to their eyes, drawing her attention to their tears after each application. Nettlesting appeared from the wings, watching the scene with gloating asides. The Fairy Queen came opposite and a chorus, sung pianissimo by the fairies, reminded Beauty of her promise. She nearly yielded. Then she suddenly broke away from the exulting and envious sisters.

“He wants me—he needs me! And I love him!” she cried.

Exit Nettlesting, shaking clenched fists above her head, while the fairy chorus swelled out triumphantly!

This scene had been acted before the kitchen frontcloth, so there was no pause and the curtains rose on the final scene of all—the Beast’s garden where he lay at the foot of the fountain, evidently in a parlous state. Beauty came rushing in, calling him. She found him and flung herself down beside him, spreading her arms about him to hide the fact that he was pulling down the zip fastening of his teddy-bear garment. Nettlesting appeared behind the fountain in one last effort to save her spell, but as Beauty cried, “Oh, Beast! My own dear Beast! Don’t die! Stay with me, for I love you so much and I can’t live without you!” the blue limes which had flooded the stage changed to amber and rose; the orchestra broke into triumphal music; the fairies and their Queen flocked on to the stage and the Prince in all the glory of a golden suit rose and helped Beauty to her feet before taking her into his arms. The fairies sang a joyful song and Nettlesting with a noise that sounded like “G—r—r—r!” turned and fled.

This was almost the end. The various characters came crowding on as Prince Charming led his bride up the steps to the palace entrance and they stood there under a rose-arch which had been rushed into position during the earlier scene. The orchestra swung into the Bridal March from Lohengrin and the entire band sang:

The music changed to Tchaikovsky’s Valse des Fleurs and the Sylphs whirled into a mazy dance on which the curtains fell, only to be raised a minute later to show the Merchant joining the hands of Beauty and Prince Charming while the Fairy Queen, mounted just above them on a step-ladder in front of which the tall Guards stood to hide what it was, balanced with hands outspread in blessing on the happy pair. The rest of the company were grouped in charming tableaux and as the curtain rose, they sang their final chorus again before it fell and the music changed to God Save The Queen and the pantomime was over!

The school might have felt very flat after all the excitement of the pantomime if it had not had the prospect of the Sale before it. In addition, there was the journey somewhere at the end of March. Of course, besides that, everyone who had to face public exams next term, had plenty to think about with her work; but a good many of the Middles and all the Juniors regarded work as something that had to be got through somehow.

The Sale was to take place the day before they broke up. All the packing would be done on the Tuesday and on Wednesday, the Sale itself would be held. They left the Görnetz Platz on the Thursday, the majority of them going to Paris, though some who had parents living on the Continent, would be carried off by them. There were a number of girls from Germany and the Benelux countries and the escort mistresses would finish with them at Basle. And about half-a-dozen, whose people were living in Switzerland, would go by themselves, as all of them were old enough and had sufficient French and German to be trusted. Among these were Mary-Lou and Verity, whose people were living at Unter die Kiefern, once the home of St. Mildred’s branch and now a combined hostel and convalescent home—the latter strictly for members of the school only.

Mrs. Carey had always had a weak chest and a violent attack of ’flu last November had left her very frail. The doctors all said that she must not risk the winter months in England, so she and her husband had shut up Carn Beg, their home at Howells village, and come out the first week in the New Year. They were still at Welsen, for though she was undoubtedly better, the doctors at the Sanatorium advised her remaining in the Alps for at least another year. That, they hoped, would see the end of her troubles. However, for the summer months, she ought to go higher. Welsen was not very far up the mountain and was heavily wooded with firs and pines which made it a very hot abode in the summer. Commander Carey had managed to rent a chalet on the Rösleinalp which was on a shelf even higher than the Görnetz Platz, and Mary-Lou and her “sister-by-marriage” were going there when the school broke up.

^[6]Jo Scott, who was Joey Maynard’s “unofficial” goddaughter, was going down to Lucerne. Both her parents had suffered during the Mau-Mau troubles in Kenya and Mrs. Scott had been left with a weak heart which made it impossible for her to live up in the mountains. Down on the shores of the lake, however, it was hoped that the peace of their chalet in a small village and the sense of security, as well as the nursing she was having, would bring her back to normal health and though they had had some bad frights about her, for the past two months she had made steady progress. So Jo, likewise, would be spending the Easter holidays in Switzerland.

She had expected nothing else, but Mary-Lou and Verity only heard of the plans for the next year after the pantomime at which both their parents had been present. As a result, they were nearly bursting with excitement and Mary-Lou so far forgot herself as to talk in Hall after Second Bell. It was well for her that no one in authority was near. Her own crowd told her what they thought of her in clear and pithy phrases to make up for that.

“Honestly, Mary-Lou, you could have knocked me down with a feather!” Vi Lucy exclaimed when they were safely back in their formroom. “You, of all people!”

Mary-Lou looked ashamed of herself. “It was mad, I know. But I do feel so revved up about the Rösleinalp plan!”

“Then let’s hope Bill will make excuses for you in botany, or I can see you being turfed out of the room in short order,” Hilary retorted.

“If Bill makes excuses for playing the giddy goat in lessons, it’ll be the first time in her life,” declared Lesley Malcolm. “You keep on your feet, Mary-Lou, and don’t go flying skyhigh. That’ll be the best thing for you!”

And the bossy Mary-Lou for once in a way said meekly, “I’ll do my best. I should hate to be turfed out like a tiresome kid. Hilary, you give me a dig if you see any signs of it coming on.”

“O.K.,” Hilary agreed.

Nina, who had this hour for practice, laughed as she went to collect her music. “It looks as if you’d be kept busy, Hilary. I’ll be interested to hear what happens when we meet again!” And she fled before Mary-Lou could think of any reprisal.

As it turned out, when they were able to talk together again, all thought of the botany lesson and Mary-Lou’s behaviour had left her memory.

Nina had listened to the chatter of the others none too happily. She had not been looking forward to the holidays. Her one experience of Brettingham Park had been of bitter cold and chilly damp. She had been miserable most of the time, being too near her own personal tragedy to enjoy the Christmas fun, and she had made up her mind that the north of England was a cold uncomfortable place. She had shied away from any talk of the Easter holidays, rather to the surprise of the others, who couldn’t understand a girl who wasn’t looking forward to going home.

Letters at the Chalet School usually arrived by the eight-thirty train up from Interlaken. They went straight to the office where Miss Dene opened the post bag and sorted them out, spreading them out on a table in Hall after she had abstracted those for the staff, the kitchen staff and herself. This meant that no one got any before Break. Quite a number of friends and parents wrote so that their epistles reached the school on Monday morning and the girls were always extra eager for Break that day.

Botany for Va lasted from nine till ten. It was followed by history which ended at ten-forty when Break came. Nina took history, so she was with the rest when Miss o’Ryan dismissed them and they streamed out to the Speisesaal for milk or cocoa and biscuits. Va were lucky in being nearest and they had all finished their “elevenses” before the last member of Lower IVa arrived and had all made off to Hall to collect their correspondence.

Bess Appleton, as form prefect, picked up the bundle marked Va and began to deal them out. “Mary-Lou Trelawney—Vi Lucy—me—Hilda Jukes—Nina Rutherford.” She handed the fat envelope to Nina who stuck it into her blazer pocket. Her Cousin Yvonne wrote every week to her, but she was very little interested in the letters. She knew very few of the Rutherfords’ friends and there had not been much chance of walks during the Christmas holidays. Lady Rutherford was often put to it to fill the four sides of notepaper which she felt to be a duty.

After Break, Va had a lesson on English and it pleased Miss Derwent to discuss poetic rhythms and beats with them. They had done some work on iambic pentameters already in connection with their Shakespeare. Now she took them a step further and introduced them to sonnet form. She made them read out various sonnets, explaining the rhyming rules, and bidding them note how the poem fell into two parts—the first of eight lines and the second of six.

“The octave and the sestet,” she explained.

When she thought they had got this firmly fixed in their minds, she went on with rhymes and before the bell rang she threw them into wild dismay by demanding an original sonnet on any subject they liked for next week’s lesson.

“What does she think I am?” Rosemary Lambe wailed. “It was bad enough when she made us write couplets. A sonnet’s the utter edge!”

“You wait till she gets us on to trochaic and spondaic measures,” Bess Appleton said gloomily. “I can just manage iambic pentameters, but how you can write verse in anything like trochees or spondees is beyond me.”

“Don’t be such a Mother’s Little Comfort!” Jill Ormsby begged her. “You would think of ghastly things like that! Personally, I consider that ‘sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof’. Ordinary sonnets will do for me.”

That was the attitude of most of them. Nina, who had grasped the question of rhythm easily enough, was shaky on rhyme. When they had been set to writing couplets, she had been reduced to going through the alphabet to get words that rhymed and then composed her lines; and of the result, the less said the better!

Miss Derwent came back. “Just a moment, girls. On the whole, I think I’ll set your first line. Take this down—quickly! Mdlle is coming!” Then she dictated, “ ‘When loveliness lies open to my sight.’ There you are! I’ve given you an easy rhyming word to start with.” After which she turned to apologize to Mdlle who was coming to harrow up their souls with French idioms.

The last lesson of the morning was algebra and when Miss Wilmot arrived, Nina had slipped away to solace herself with forty minutes’ Bach on the piano in Hall. Unfortunately, it should have been games for the Third, but the rain was streaming down and as Miss Burnett had Lower IVb in the gym, Miss Andrews, who took her own form’s games, was in Hall with them, playing a popular version of beanbags, except that instead of throwing bags, they were rolling a netball backwards between their feet. Mdlle had kept Va a few minutes beyond the time and the game was well begun by the time Nina arrived.

Miss Andrews gave a guilty start when the girl arrived. “Oh, Nina! I thought you couldn’t be coming as you weren’t here. Is there any other piano you could possibly use for just this period?”

She looked anxiously at the girl. She was a very young mistress—this was her first post—and she was nervous of the school’s genius.

“I’ll try to find one,” Nina said gloomily. “Sorry I’m late, Miss Andrews, but French finished late.”

She left Hall and went on her search. Miss Lawrence met her wandering round, looking for a piano. “What are you doing here, Nina?” she demanded.

Nina explained and the music mistress sighed. “I do wish we could manage these things otherwise!” Then her face suddenly brightened. “But of course! Mrs. Maynard said you could use her piano any time in the mornings. Run along and put on your raincoat and goloshes and hurry off. You’ll get half-an-hour, anyhow, if you’re quick. I’ll explain to Miss Annersley.”

Nina needed no second telling. She fled at top speed and the result was that when Joey, tired of typing, gave up work on her new book for the morning and really listened, she heard a Bach fugue coming from her Saal, played as she knew only one girl in the school could play it. Joey was musical, though her piano-playing was nothing to boast about. But she owned a lovely, golden voice and had had good singing lessons. Now she opened the door of the study and then sat down in an armchair and listened with delight. She had heard Nina when school first opened and now she recognized the fact that the girl was making strides. She had a beautiful touch and her technique was amazing for a fifteen-year-old. The two airs sang clearly through the intricate counterpoint of the accompaniment, and there was a depth of feeling that Nina had not shown when she first came.

The grandfather clock in the hall chiming half past twelve warned the mistress of Freudesheim that it was time Nina went back to school. She had clearly lost count of time, for she had stopped and was wrestling with a mordant that was not as smooth as it might be. Joey got up and went to the Saal.

“Well done, Nina!” she said. Then, as the startled girl looked round, “I’m sorry, my lamb, but it’s half past so I’m afraid you must fly back. But come again any time you like. I don’t give the piano proper use just now and I love to hear you.”

Nina had frowned at the interruption. Now she stood up, gathered her music together, and came to Joey. “May I really? It’s a lovely piano—such a beautiful rich tone! I think I like it even better than the one in Hall. Thank you awfully, Mrs. Maynard—and for warning me, too. I left my things outside as they were so wet.”

“Get into them and run, then. But come back any morning you like. We never use the Saal in the morning and it’s at your service.”

Nina beamed as she repeated her thanks. She wriggled into her raincoat and goloshes, pulled up the hood over her head, picked up her music and ran. In her hurry, she never noticed that she had pulled her cousin’s letter out of her pocket and it lay on the floor behind the front door. Joey found it when she came back from a visit to the nursery and laughed.

“Never opened yet! They must have had a hectic morning, poor lambs! I hope she won’t miss it before I get it across to her. Oh, Beth!” as her nursery governess appeared at that moment. “Are you doing anything? I mean can you fly over to school for me?”

“Rather! Mike’s finished his lessons at last! We’ve had a morning of it! Honestly, Joey, I think it would be best to let him go to school with the other two when September comes. He misses Charles badly and he’ll be six by that time.”

Joey frowned. “It’s too young to go away, Beth. He must have one more year at home. But I’ll think it over and see what we can do about it. I quite see that he’s lonely, for the twins are still babies—only two and a bit, and not much company for him.” She handed over the letter. “Nina Rutherford dropped this when she went—she’s been practising in the Saal. Did you hear her?”

“Did I not! How that child can play! Yes; I’ll run over with it. I wish,” went on Beth, pulling on her red raincoat and settling the hood over her head, “that the school could have its Kindergarten out here. That would solve the problem.”

“It would; but I doubt of its happening—unless we could get children living up here and there aren’t more than one or two at present. Mike’s a problem in more ways than one!”

“He certainly is,” Beth agreed.

“Besides, if he went away, I should have to lose you. The twins won’t be ready for lessons for a couple of years yet.”

“Oh, but—” Beth began. Then she stopped and her lovely face matched her raincoat in colour. She murmured something, wrenched open the front door and fled, leaving Joey speechless.

“Is that the milk in the coconut?” demanded the lady of the house to the air when she had recovered from her shock. “Now who on earth is it? I must inquire into this as soon as possible.”

The girls were streaming out of lessons when Beth arrived, her cheeks cooler for her run through the lane. She wanted to meet no one at that moment, so she handed the letter to the first person she saw and went back to take refuge in her own room until the gong summoned her to Mittagessen when Joey talked airily of anything and everything but themselves.

Meanwhile, after the school’s Mittagessen, Emerence Hope came up to Nina while they were getting their deckchairs for the half-hour’s rest that followed the meal every day. “Oh, Nina, Miss Chester from Freudesheim asked me to give you this. She said that Mrs. Maynard says you dropped it when you were there.”

Nina took the letter. “I never missed it. Thank you, Emerence.”

“You’ve had a letter all this time and never opened it?” Emerence exclaimed. She herself could hardly wait to rip open her own letters.’

“It’s only from my cousin and there’s never anything important,” Nina said.

“Oh, I see.” Emerence turned away to join Margot Maynard, her bosom friend, and Nina once more tucked the letter into her blazer, meaning to read it when she was seated, and took her chair and cushion and went to her usual corner.

Talking during the rest period was strictly forbidden. The girls might read if they liked. Otherwise, they had to rest in their chairs. Nina settled down, took out her letter with a regretful look at Shirley which was her current book just now, and opened it. For once, Lady Rutherford had filled four sheets without difficulty, for she had a great deal of news for her young cousin. Nina read slowly to their end, her eyes widening. Then she read it again and the distress in her face caught Mary-Lou’s quick eyes.

Rules were rules, so nothing could be done about it just now, but the moment the bell rang for afternoon school, Mary-Lou asked Vi Lucy in a quick aside to see to her chair and Nina’s and sped across to that young lady.

“Nina! What’s wrong?” she demanded. “Bad news from home?”

“How did you know?” Nina exclaimed. “Yes; it’s simply dreadful! I’m so sorry for them all—and especially Alix. She was quite decent to me when I was there at Christmas. I didn’t think there was anything wrong, though.”

“It’s your cousin Alix, then? Is she ill?”

“Very ill, I’m afraid, from what Cousin Yvonne says.”

Mary-Lou looked round in a hunted way. “We can’t wait now. It’s singing and then prep. Look here, I’ll see if we can be excused prep. and you can tell me then—if you will? That O.K.?”

Nina nodded. “I’d like to tell—someone,” she murmured unevenly. “I—I don’t know what to do. And I ought to reply to this at once.”

“That’ll be O.K. The Head will give leave when she knows,” Mary-Lou said instantly. “Don’t worry about that, Nina. Now we must fly. Plato can be a dear, but you never know when he’ll blow up over something. Come on! The rest have gone.” And she tucked a hand through Nina’s arm and steered her off to the song-room.

At the end of singing, she marched off to seek the Head and found her in the study, in conference with Miss Wilson—“Bill”, to the girls—and Miss Dene. She made her request and Miss Annersley nodded.

“Can you fit in all your prep. otherwise, Mary-Lou?”

“Yes; I think so. I’ve done my essay already and I’ve only botany and French idioms. Miss o’Ryan told us to revise our history and I know it fairly well so I can let it go if I haven’t time for it,” Mary-Lou returned calmly.

“Very well, then. Send Nina to me when you’ve finished if she wants to reply at once. I may be able to help her.”

“Yes, Miss Annersley.” Mary-Lou made her curtsy and departed to call Nina out of preparation and pilot her to the St. Clare commonroom.

“Is it all right?” Nina asked anxiously.

“Yes; the Head said we might. You’re to go to her later and she’ll give you leave to write. Now tell me.”

Nina pulled out her letter. “You’d better see for yourself what Cousin Yvonne says.”

Mary-Lou took the letter and opened it.

“My dear Nina,” Lady Rutherford had written, “Thank you for your last letter. I hope the pantomime was a great success. It sounds very funny from what you have said about it. I am glad you are well and enjoying your school and getting on with your music.

“You will be surprised to hear that when the term ends you will not be coming back for the holidays. We have a very sad reason for this and I know you will be sorry when you hear that Alix is ill. It is so bad that the doctors have ordered her to Switzerland at once and we—your Cousin Guy, Alix and myself—are all coming out next week. We must go by slow stages, for Alix is not strong enough to make the whole journey at once. We shall break it at Paris and Basle and come on to Interlaken where we shall have two or three days before going on to Grindelwald.

“Do you remember that nasty cold Alix caught towards the end of the holidays? She has never thrown it off and a month ago, she got wet during a walk and didn’t change at once. She has been in bed ever since with pleurisy and pneumonia and was so ill, that Reverend Mother rang up for us to go at once. When she began to recover, the doctor told your Cousin Guy and me that one of her lungs was badly affected and she must not stay any longer than we could help in England. He advised the high Alps and so we have all been rushing round making arrangements.

“I’m afraid you will get a shock when you see her, she has gone so thin and she has a nasty little hard cough that gives her no peace. She is very good about it all, poor darling, but she is really ill. The only comfort we have is that the doctors can do such marvellous things nowadays.

“The twins will come out to us for the holidays, but, unless Alix seems no better, they must go back to St. Cecilia’s for next term, at any rate. We can’t plan for them at present. If we have to stay in Switzerland for any length of time it may be as well to take them away and send them to your school.

“Now, dear, I can’t tell you when you are likely to see us. It will all depend on how Alix stands the journey. She certainly can’t stay in England. We have had a dreadful winter with sleet, rain and fog and very high winds. At the present moment everything is blotted out with a thick fog and that is the worst kind of weather for a chesty invalid.

“So when it comes to the end of term, remember that you will come to Grindelwald. The school will be able to see to an escort for you, I expect.”

There was another paragraph, but this was the important part of the letter. Mary-Lou read it carefully. Then she folded it up and returned it to its envelope.

“Nina,” she said, “haven’t you told your cousins anything about the Sanatorium up here? Don’t they know about it?”

“I don’t know,” Nina owned. “I don’t think I’ve ever said anything in my letters.”

“You haven’t? How on earth did you manage that? Didn’t you tell them why we have the panto and the Sale—both in aid of the free wards?”

Nina shook her head. Her letters to Brettingham were very stiff and stilted affairs. She had had very few correspondents in her life and she did not find it easy to write to people she had never even known three months ago. One letter would serve as a sample for all that term’s.

“Dear Cousin Yvonne, Thank you for your letter. I am quite well and my wrist is all right now though it still aches a little if I practise too long. I hope you are well and Cousin Guy, and that Alix and the twins are having a good term. Herr von Eberhardt says he is quite pleased with me, but I need to sing my legato more. The bell is about to ring for Break so I must finish. Please give my love to Cousin Guy and the girls.”

“No; I’ve said nothing about all that,” she confessed.

Mary-Lou gasped. “What on earth do you say in your letters, then?”

“Oh, I just mention my music and ask how they all are and tell them I’m all right.” Nina stopped. Then she burst out: “You don’t understand! Until just before Christmas I just knew they existed! I’d never seen one of them! You can’t write much to people you hardly know—or I can’t!”

“Well, if you ask me, you’d better get hold of some paper, fill your fountain pen and write to your cousin and tell her. Ask her if Alix can’t come up here instead of going to Grindelwald. We might be able to see something of her and it wouldn’t be so bad for her. For,” continued the experienced Mary-Lou, “I don’t suppose if Mrs.—oh, Lady is it?—Lady Rutherford, then, can stay, her husband can. And Lady Rutherford may have to go back for a few days sometimes. But if that happened and Alix was at our San, we could visit her and so on and she wouldn’t be so lonely.”

“Yes; I could do that,” Nina agreed. “I must ask the Head. Where can I find her?”

“Study, probably. She doesn’t usually teach in the afternoons. And Nina, when you write, tell her—Lady Rutherford, I mean—about Unter die Kiefern. They could stay there until something more permanent was arranged. My people are going to the Rösleinalp on Friday, so their rooms would be vacant, anyhow. Ask the Head about it, and she’ll write herself, I expect. Now you hop off to the study and get leave to write. You can let your practice go for once, can’t you?”

“Of course I can.” Nina went off and presently appeared in Va with her writing case and leave to write to her cousin. Miss Annersley had listened with deep sympathy and promised to write to Lady Rutherford herself.

The result was a change in the plans for Alix. Cousin Yvonne wrote to tell Nina that they were coming to the Görnetz Platz with Alix and that their doctor thought it a very wise move.

“So we shall hope to see a lot of you,” she wrote. “And I may be able to be at your Sale”—Nina had told all about the Sale in a second letter she had enclosed for Alix on Mary-Lou’s advice—“Alix was delighted to receive your letter, but she can’t write at present. She sends her love and hopes to see you when she is better.”

“So I shall have people of my own at the Sale too,” Nina said to Mary-Lou when she showed her the letter.

Mary-Lou looked at her thoughtfully. This was something fresh. So far, Nina had seemed to care very little that she was almost alone in the world. All she said, however, was, “Oh, jolly good! Especially as you are playing in the concert! I’m awfully glad of that, Nina!”

“I am myself,” Nina said, surprise in her face. “Oh, I do hope the doctors can cure Alix! It’s such awfully hard lines on her and she really is an awfully decent sort!”

A letter next week from Brettingham Park told Nina that the Rutherfords had started on their long journey to Switzerland. They were going by road, Sir Guy having chartered a motor ambulance for Alix. Cousin Yvonne said the patient was very cheery and hopeful, but she tired quickly so that getting to the Görnetz Platz was likely to be a lengthy affair. She had written from Dover which they had taken four days to reach. If the sea was calm, they hoped to cross next day and then would travel through France by stages. All being well, she thought Nina might hope to see them in about a fortnight.

“I say! Your cousin must be pretty bad,” Mary-Lou said gravely when she heard this. “Or else they want to get her to San in as good shape as they can.”

“I’m afraid it’s the first,” Nina replied. “I wonder they don’t fly with her. That would be much quicker and, I should think, much easier.”

“Yes; but I rather think I’ve heard that people like her can’t always stand flying. And B.E.A. mayn’t agree to taking a T.B. patient, either.”

“Yes; that’s true, I suppose. Oh, and Mary-Lou, Cousin Yvonne says that Mrs. Maynard has invited her and Cousin Guy to Freudesheim for the first fortnight. Alix must go straight to the Sanatorium, of course, and Mrs. Maynard wrote to say that she would be sure to settle more easily if she knew her people were close at hand. Isn’t it marvellous of her?”

“It’s just Aunt Joey,” Mary-Lou told her. “It’s exactly the sort of thing she would do. Or if she couldn’t have managed it herself, she’d have fixed them up with Mrs. Graves or Mrs. Peters or someone like that.”

All the same, she wondered to herself. April was just round the corner now.

“Cousin Yvonne seems overcome at the kindness,” Nina said pensively. “It’ll make all the difference to her and Cousin Guy that if Alix should want them in a hurry for any reason they can be with her in ten minutes or so. Even at Welsen, it would take them quite half-an-hour to get there, even if there was a train due at the time. Cousin Yvonne will go to Unter die Kiefern after that, but Cousin Guy will probably have to get back to England. He’ll have to go back and forwards for the summer, I’m afraid. The Park won’t run itself, she says, and he’s busy with improvements on some of the cottages and wants to be on the spot to look after them.”

“He certainly will,” Mary-Lou agreed. “Still, at a pinch he can always fly—yes; I’m coming, Rosemary!” And she gave Nina a grin and sped off to find out why Rosemary was howling for her like a lost dog.

A card came from Calais to say that the party were safely across but Nina must not try to write for the next week or two as they had no idea where they might stay or what breaks they might make so could give her no address. Her cousin would ring up the school as soon as they reached Interlaken, where they expected to stay for a day or two before making the last lap of the journey.

“Well, that’s that,” Mary-Lou said when she heard. “It’s just a jolly good thing that we’re keeping half-term this week-end. You won’t have any time to worry yourself sick about them. Not that it would be much use to anyone if you did. Just make a complete pest of you to Matey and the Abbess and a misery to yourself. Don’t you do it, Nina. I must fly! It’s just on seventeen o’clock. The bell will be going for prep. in a sec and I haven’t got a thing ready!”

“And I must get my music,” Nina responded. “The Head said she would excuse my prep. for the week-end so that I could put in extra time on the piano. I shan’t have any chance of it till we get back again. That’s the only part I don’t like.”

“It won’t hurt you,” Mary-Lou retorted unsympathetically as she bounced off to get her books and left Nina to seek her music, thinking sadly that, understanding though she was, music was more or less of a sealed book to her.

The next day saw the entire school scattered. The Seniors were booked for Vevey on Lac Léman, as the Swiss prefer to call Lake Geneva; St. Mildred’s grandees were off to winter sports at Davos Platz; the Senior Middles to Lake Constance and the Junior Middles and Juniors to Basle where a treat awaited them in the shape of little Gretchen von Ahlen’s birthday party.^[7] Gretchen was seven at the beginning of March, but when her mother, Joey Maynard’s old chum and a former Chalet School girl herself, had heard about the week-end plans, she had instantly said the party would take place during the week-end the school was off and the entire Basle party must come to it.

“We’ve got the pick of the staff with us, anyhow,” Hilary Bennet announced as she took her seat in the motor-coach next morning. “The Head—Miss o’Ryan—Miss Wilmot—Miss Dene!”

“And Mdlle,” Vi added. “She told me just now that she was coming with us.”

“It’s a good thing we’ve got two coaches for our crowd,” Lesley put in. “There must be over sixty of us altogether—counting the staff I mean.”

“I wish Matey was coming with us,” Bess observed. She meant to follow in that redoubtable lady’s footsteps and was very fond of her.

“Oh, she says she’s bound to go with the Junior Middles crowd because it’ll need her as well as the other folk to keep some of those kids in order,” Mary-Lou remarked cheerfully. “Room for a little one between you and Verity, Jessica? Thanks a lot! Sure I’m not squashing you both too much?” as she squeezed in between them.

“You’re still a skinnigallee, as Daddy says,” Verity returned in her silvery voice. “Why don’t you try to fatten up a little? You’re like the definition of a line, length without breadth!”

“You talk as if I were a prize pig!” Mary-Lou said indignantly. “ ‘Fatten up’ indeed! I don’t mind telling you I hope I don’t get much fatter than I am now. I’m not skinny, but elegantly slender, I’d have you all know!”

The people already in the coach shrieked at this and Mdlle, who entered it at that moment, had some reason for her look of surprise.

“It’s all right, Mdlle,” Hilary hastened to reassure her. “It’s just Mary-Lou saying that she’s elegantly slender!”

Mdlle’s bright eyes glanced at Mary-Lou and she laughed. “I fear your bones are too much in evidence for elegance,” she said in her own tongue. “We should all be pleased to see a little more flesh on them.”

Mary-Lou subsided with very pink cheeks and Mdlle took her seat. The Head appeared in the doorway to ask if all the girls were there.

“Yes; I think so,” said Katharine Gordon looking round. “Are you coming with us, Miss Annersley? Oh, do!”

Miss Annersley laughed. “I’m going with nobody but Miss Dene. We’re going in the car. And where would you put me, I’d like to know?” she added as she stood aside to make way for Miss o’Ryan and Miss Dene who came up at that moment. “Every seat is filled. No one is going to stand, let me tell you. All the roads aren’t like billiard tables. You’ll get quite a lot of joggling before you reach Vevey.”

Mdlle laughed up at her. “Then we will say au revoir to you and Miss Dene for the moment. We shall meet in Vevey. Is all well?” she asked of the latter lady who had been counting heads and making sure that no one was left behind.

“Everyone present,” the secretary answered as she went to the door. “Girls! Are you sure you have all you want? Remember, if you’ve forgotten anything, you’ll either have to go without it till we return or use some of your spending money to replace it whatever it is.”

They assured her that they had everything and she nodded and followed the Head out of the coach and into the drive. The school was to be closed until the Monday, even the domestic staff going off for a day or two and they two had to see to the locking up before they left. The door was pulled shut and the coach rumbled off down the drive and out into the road where the first one was already well ahead.

The girls knew the first part of the way quite well after two years or so of coming and going each term. But when they came to the fork that led down to the plain, instead of taking the right-hand way, they swung off to the left, much to their delight. The snow-covered mountain peaks towered above them as the coach took the road that led through the Bernese Alps. At first, there was little to be heard but the noise of the coach as it rolled along, its heavily-chained wheels biting the frozen snow. Then they began to descend and presently the girls were pointing out to each other patches of bare rock or hints of green here and there. These became more and more frequent as they went on. Then someone realized that the silence of the snow was over and the air was full of the sound of water—falling water, rushing water, water babbling to itself, water thundering down over rocks and crags. Now they were running through forest where the pine needles were shedding their burden of snow every now and then. This ended and they were among fields that lay bare and brown where the snow had gone, though white streaks and patches were there in plenty. They had reached the plain and were heading for Reidenbach where they paused long enough at the Gasthaus to have coffee and bread twists. Frühstück had been at seven and by the time they reached the large village, it was after ten and they were glad of the snack. Not that they were given much chance to loiter. They were supposed to be at Vevey somewhere around noon and they still had some distance to go. However, now they were on the highroad and would stick to it, so once they were back in the coaches, they made better time and midday saw them rolling down the Route de St. Denis into Vevey itself.

It was a lovely day at the end of March and March itself was at its most lamblike. The girls found the air of Vevey so warm after the bracing atmosphere of the Görnetz Platz, that there was a cry to know if they might cast their big coats.

“Wait till we arrive at our pension,” Mdlle replied. “We are almost there and le déjeuner awaits us, I have no doubt.”

“Is that what we call Mittagessen here?” Lesley asked with interest.

“Mais oui, vraiment, ma petite. Ici, on est dans le pays de la Suisse française,” Mdlle replied in her own tongue, her black eyes sparkling. “I shall expect to hear very good French here, mes filles. However,” she added as Hilda and one or two of the others looked distinctly alarmed at this, “Vevey was one of the first of the Swiss cities to become well known to English tourists and you will find that English is spoken in most places.”

“What a mercy!” Hilda Jukes murmured to her great friend, Meg Whyte.

“Isn’t it just!” Meg replied in the same low tone. Neither girl was gifted in languages and it really was a relief to know that if their French failed them, their English would carry them through!

The coach swung into the Avénue de Mont Pélérin and a few minutes later, they had turned again and were running westwards along the lake shore till they stopped at a tall house, four storeys high, with balconies at the ground and first floors. The school car was standing in the little courtyard and the Head and Miss Dene were waiting for them outside the pension.

“Come along!” the former exclaimed. “I’ve just welcomed the first coachload and Mme Joevet, our hostess, assures me that déjeuner is ready when we are. Tumble out, all of you and Miss Dene will show you your rooms and where to wash. Don’t take time to do anything more—except that I should like to see tidy heads at the table,” she added with a meaning glance at some notably untidy ones. “I’m sure you are all ravenous by this time!”

They came tumbling out, stretching their legs thankfully, even the elfin Verity. It had been a delightful run but, as Mary-Lou pointed out to someone later on, sitting still for hours at a time has a stiffening effect on the legs!

Déjeuner was indeed waiting, as they found when they came down to the big salle-à-manger, very spick and span. Piping hot consommé came first, served with great chunks of delicious holey French bread. This was followed by fried lake perch in a delectable butter sauce, accompanied by bottled mushrooms and sauté potatoes. As a finish, cheesecakes arrived for the last course—melting pastry cases, filled with a savoury cheese mixture. The girls revelled in them and when they got back to school, one of the first things proclaimed to the others was that Hilda and Mary-Lou had each made away with five! Hilda shrieked and hid her face, but Mary-Lou merely grinned round and said she was trying to pick up a little extra weight as everyone said she was still too bony for grace and elegance! But then, you had to get up very early in the morning if you hoped to catch Mary-Lou out!

“What do we do after this, Miss Annersley?” Betsy Lucy asked as the meal ended.

“Go and sit on the balcony and have our coffee. After that, you may unpack your cases and settle in. At half past two we are all going for a walk along the lake-side promenade. That will help you to recover from the effects of your meal. Really, girls, I’d no idea we had such a lot of Gargantuas in the school! However, a six miles walk will do away with any ill effects. It will also give you a chance to see the lake and the mountains since it’s such a clear day. We’ll go in parties and you can have your Kaffee und Kuchen in any café that takes your fancy. The only thing I ask is that you will remember that we are here as a school. I don’t expect monkey tricks from girls of your age, but I do beg you not to shriek too much. Also remember that le dîner here is at seven and you must change for it, so don’t be too late.” Then she turned to those of the staff who were with her. “I think that covers it?”

“Oh, please, Miss Annersley, may we cast our big coats and just wear our blazers?” Mary-Lou asked eagerly. “It’s boiling hot down here after the Platz and we’ll be melted if we have to wear winter coats for a walk!”

“Yes; you may. But take scarves with you. Remember that this is just the end of March and though it’s warm enough in the sunshine, it’ll grow cold after dark. However, you all ought to be back by six o’clock—or quarter past at latest. I don’t think it will hurt any of you.”

A chorus of “thank-yous” rose at this.

“Then is that all? Anyone got anything more to ask?”

Nina rose. “May we do any shopping, please?”

“I don’t mind; but I think you’ll be wiser to wait for that till the last day.”

Nina said no more, though when they were upstairs, the three people with whom she shared a bedroom were anxious to know what she hoped to buy.

“Nothing in particular,” she said. “I only thought it would be a good idea to have permission in case we saw anything we wanted specially.”

“I’d like to know why it’s so warm here when we’ve still got snow feet deep at the Platz,” Vi said as she settled her beret on her bronzy curls.

“I’ve heard that Vevey and Montreux are always warm,” Nina replied. “I know at one time lots of people used to come who couldn’t stand the bitter cold of England in winter. I expect it’s sheltered at this end of the lake. I do know that when Dad and I were in Geneva there was a most ghastly biting wind and we came here for a day and were both sweltered because we had on winter coats and things. There! I’m ready! Shall I go down or should we go all together?”

“All together,” Mary-Lou said firmly. “Buck up, Barbara! We’re all waiting!”

Barbara hastily pulled her beret to a rakish angle and the four left the room and went down to find that most of their crowd were surrounding Miss o’Ryan and the Head had already set off with the prefects. Mdlle was taking VIb and a few from Va and Miss Dene and Miss Wilmot had divided up the remnants.

“Hurry up, girls!” the history mistress called. “Now are you four the last?”

“Wait for us!” Christine Vincent and Catriona Watson came plunging down to join them; Miss o’Ryan counted her girls and then marched them out on to the Quai de Plan.

“Must we croc?” Lesley asked.

“Not if you don’t either lag behind or go racing ahead—and not more than four in a bunch. Keep near me. I know you’ll be full of questions and you can’t be racing backwards and forwards or you’ll be tired out long before we reach the end. And we’ve got to come back, you know,” Miss o’Ryan ended with a chuckle. She was only twenty-seven and, in her smart knitted suit of a blue that matched her glorious eyes and chic little hat that she wore pulled sidewise over her black hair, she looked little older than the girls themselves.

“Which way—which way?” Vi asked eagerly.

“You remind me of Alice,” Miss o’Ryan said, laughing. “Turn left, me dear, and keep on till we come to the Quai Arabie. There, we’ve got to go up the Veveyse to reach the bridge. It’s straight on down the river then, and after that, we keep along the lake shore. Lead on, Prunella and Clare, and don’t be racing ahead too far.”

“What a gorgeous lake!” Mary-Lou remarked as she, Verity, Nina, Barbara and Vi escorted the mistress to the bridge. “It’s not blue like our own Thun—that’s a rich blue. This is silvery.”

“Isn’t it huge?” Verity said as they left the Veveyse and turned left to go along the Quai Maria Belgia with its chestnut trees, at present leafless, but with something about them that spoke of spring near at hand.

“Well, ’tis the largest of the Swiss lakes. You’d expect that,” Miss o’Ryan said calmly.

“D’you think we can go for a trip on it?” Vi wanted to know.

“Oh, yes; we’re going to Geneva by lake steamer on Monday—if the weather holds. If you mean, can we go sailing, certainly not. Sure, ’tis none so safe with all the mountains round, and at this time of the year.”

Lesley Malcolm had turned back. “Miss o’Ryan, what’s that big building over there? Can we go and see it?”

“Ye can not. Sure, none of you are old enough.”

They stared at her. “Not old enough?” Mary-Lou exclaimed. “Why, what do you mean, Biddy?” During the holidays, she was allowed to use the Christian name as Biddy o’Ryan made her home with the Maynards, being an orphan. The Maynard girls called her aunt, but Biddy had objected to being addressed by that title when it was a girl as big as Mary-Lou who used it. The shock of her remark and the sense of freedom they all felt had made Mary-Lou forget her manners.

However, Biddy made no objection. Instead, she answered the question. “Well now, would the Head be letting girls of your age visit the Casino, even if there was no law against it until ye come of age?”

Lesley’s jaw dropped. “Goodness! Is that what it is? I thought it was a concert hall.”

“They may hold concerts there for all I know. But it’s mainly for gambling ’tis. Never mind it. Look at this.” She stopped half-way across a big square and waved her hand round it.

“It looks like a market square to me,” Mary-Lou said.

“So it is—Place du Marché, no less. But here the Fêtes des Vignerons takes place once every twenty-five years—has done for centuries.”

“Is Vevey very old then?” Lesley asked as the rest came crowding round to know why they had stopped.

“Goes back to the times of the Romans who called it Viviscum and were very fond of its warm baths which maybe you’ll be seeing later.”

“Vignerons—that means vine-growers, doesn’t it?” Nina said.

“Are there vineyards here?” Vi asked amazedly.

“There are, of course. Vevey is the second largest town in the Canton of Vaud which is the real vine-growing part of Switzerland.”

“Goodness! What a lot of things the Swiss do!” Vi cried. “They are famous woodcarvers and they make clocks and watches and silk ribbons and lace and chocolate and condensed milk——”

“Put a sock in it!” Hilary recommended. “We’re not anxious to have a lesson in geography. All the same,” she turned to the mistress, “when I told Mummy we were coming here for the half-term, she said in her letter back that she hoped we’d have a chance to see over the Nestlé factory. She and Daddy did it two years ago and were thrilled with it. Do you think Miss Annersley will take us, Miss o’Ryan?”

“Well, now, I couldn’t be telling you,” Miss o’Ryan said non-committally. “In the meantime, time is flying. Come along, girls! On you go! We’ve got to get as far as the Tour du Peilz before we turn. And you’ll be wanting your coffee and cakes, won’t ye?”

“Where do we go for them?” Catriona asked.

“We’ll try the Rue du Lac. They have some good cafés there. But you reach that tower—or the château built to commemorate it—before we turn back and you get neither coffee nor cakes until we’re coming back. I know ye! ’Tis sitting there talking half the time ye’d be and then the rest would be crowing over us! Go on, Catriona!” But she ended with a gay laugh and Catriona raced back to join her bosom friend, quite unperturbed by this scarifying.

“I’d like to see that factory,” Verity said as they strolled on.

“Well, there’s not much time to see everything,” the mistress said, laughing again. “Won’t it do you to buy a slab of chocolate in one of the shops?”

“It wouldn’t be the same thing,” Verity returned with unusual decision.

“You pipe down!” Mary-Lou said firmly. “Biddy, go on and tell us some more about Vevey, won’t you? Has it any famous people?”

The rest had gone on, even Nina, called off by Lesley to admire a view down the lake and Mary-Lou, Verity and Vi were the only ones there. Biddy o’Ryan looked very straight at Mary-Lou.

“I thought we said you shouldn’t use that name during school,” she said quietly.

Mary-Lou went crimson. “Oh, I’m so awfully sorry! I quite forgot! Please do forgive me. Only we were all so jolly and—and free and I didn’t remember that it was school. I won’t do it again.”

“That’s all right then. Now we’d best be joining the others.”

No more was said, but Mary-Lou was particular to call the mistress “Miss o’Ryan” for the rest of the week-end and the others had been too excited by all they saw even to notice the slips. They went on with fair briskness now, for Miss o’Ryan was anxious not to be late for dinner. They walked along the Quai d’entre Deux-Villes and then turned up a side-street to get into the Rue d’Italie where the shops were. Not that they had much chance of window-gazing, for the mistress was looking for a café and hurried them on until they found one she remembered from a visit the summer before. They went down the Rue d’Italie and came into the Rue du Lac and there found what she was seeking. Of the meal, Barbara Chester spoke the final word when she said as they walked along the Quai du Plan towards their pension, “I’ve had gorgeous coffee before and gorgeous cakes, too; but of all the melt-in-your-mouth, luscious coffee and cakes I ever had, those were the best!”

And every last girl of the group agreed with her.

“What do we do to-day?” It was Carola Johnstone who asked the question as they sat down to breakfast—or petit déjeuner—on the Monday morning.

So far, it had been a glorious week-end, even the weather being friendly. The girls had “done” the district as thoroughly as was possible in the short time. They had visited Montreux, Territets and the Castle of Chillon; they had climbed up to Blonay and seen the vineyards, at present very bare-looking; they had taken a motor-coach trip round the lake. This was the last full day of the holiday and to-morrow they would return to the Görnetz Platz.

“What would you like to do?” Miss Annersley asked. “We could see Geneva, if you liked. It would be all right if you wrapped up well. Or we might take the postal-coach to Neuchatel and spend the day there. Which would you like?”

They had the salle-à-manger to themselves this morning. A large party of visitors had left on Saturday and besides themselves there had been since then only three ladies, two of whom were artists while the third, a cousin of the elder, acted as lady-courier and general caretaker. They had all gone off to Les Avants, having their rolls and coffee earlier than the school, so the Chaletians felt free to talk as they liked. They discussed the two ideas and finally it was decided to take the morning steamer going westwards round the lake, spend the day in Geneva, and come back in the early evening by postal coach.

This settled, the girls finished their meal and raced upstairs to get into winter coats and berets. They were quickly ready and, on this occasion, the Head told them that when they reached Geneva, they might break up into small groups of eight or nine as all the escort mistresses would be going with them. Hitherto, she had arranged matters so that each mistress had one day off. After all, as she remarked, it was their half-term as well! The eldest girls might go by themselves if they would promise to keep together and not go off down any side-streets or alleys. They fervently promised and as most of them were either eighteen or verging on it and all could speak French and German with a good deal of fluency by this time, she felt that they would be safe enough. The rest—some forty-eight—would be duly escorted.

“Then that’s understood,” she said briskly. “We keep together on the boat and when we reach Geneva, we split up. Don’t be too late for the postal coach, whatever you do. I’m sure you won’t want that lengthy walk back to Vevey. Neither do you want to have to spend your money on chartering transport or trying to find rooms in Geneva itself. Have you all plenty with you, by the way? I suppose you all want to shop?”

A chorus of assent greeted this. She laughed. “Very well. But I warn you that prices are higher in Geneva than almost anywhere else except Zurich. You see, the Palace of Nations is there and so many organizations are continually visiting the city that prices have gone skyhigh.”

“How sickening!” Betsy Lucy said. “Oh, well, I suppose we can buy chocolate to take home if the worst comes to the worst. Here comes the steamer!”

The little lake steamer swung in to the landing-stage and when the three or four visitors to Vevey were off, the girls marched smartly on board. Very trig and trim they looked in their coats and berets of gentian blue, the Chalet School badge in silver and dull crimson worked on the beret. The prefects gathered together at one side of the deck while the rest scattered about and the mistresses, having seen their lambs safely there, settled down in a sunny corner.

There were not many other passengers aboard, but among them was a large lady who looked at them with interest. She must have been very pretty as a girl, and even now contrived to be attractive although, as Hilary murmured to Mary-Lou and Co., she must turn the scales at every ounce of fourteen stone! She had two small boys of about five and seven with her and they all three chattered continually. Presently, the boys became interested in something on shore and raced across to the rail.

Their mother scuttled after them, calling them back imperatively, and the staff, who happened to be near the spot, turned to look. The elder boy was climbing up and hanging over precariously and Miss Wilmot, who chanced to be nearest, leapt forward and grabbed him by the back of his coat just as the lady reached them.

“Oh, merci beaucoup!” she panted as she lifted him firmly down. “Robin, you are a very naughty boy! I’ve told you you’re never to climb about on the steamer. If you do it again, I won’t let you go on the lake for a whole month!” Then she turned to thank his rescuer.

What happened next, nearly stunned the interested staff, though the girls, at the other end of the boat, had just seen the happening and then turned to their own affairs again. But the stranger stared at Miss Wilmot as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. She let go of the small shoulder she had been grasping and flung out her hand exclaiming, “Nancy Wilmot! It must be Nancy!” She glanced at the group from which Miss Wilmot had come and her eyes widened till they looked as if they would drop out of her head. “Why, Miss Annersley—and Mdlle de Lachennais!” she cried. “Is it really you? But what are you doing here? What’s happened to the Chalet School? And—why, Rosalie Dene! Are you here, too? I simply must know the meaning of this!”

Miss Annersley pulled herself together. “An Old Girl of ours, I’m sure,” she said. “But so much has happened during the years, I’m afraid I must own that I can’t remember you at the moment.”

“Neither can I,” Nancy Wilmot put in. “And yet,” she added, “her face does ring a bell somewhere. Tell us your name—do! Then we can go on from there.”

The stranger sighed. “My too, too solid flesh!” she mourned. “And to think I used to be as slim as anyone! I suppose I ought to diet and get rid of it, but though I’ve tried, I never stick to it somehow. As for who I am, I’m Winifred Embury, these days. ^[8]When I was at St. Scholastika’s—not the Chalet School; I left before you joined forces—I was Winnie Silksworth!”

“Winnie Silksworth!” Nancy Wilmot exclaimed. “Of course I remember you! You were a prefect when I was a pest of a Junior! But what fun to meet you like this! Are you here for a holiday? These are your boys, of course?” She waved towards the pair who were standing gazing amazedly at them.

“Two of them,” Mrs. Embury said briskly. “Robin—and Paul. I have three older who are away in England at school and two younger who are at home with Nannie. But never mind about me! We can talk of me later. What I want to know is what’s happened to the Chalet School? Why are you all here? Oh, let’s find seats and then we can talk. You two—” she looked at her sons, but Miss Annersley intervened.

“The girls will look after them.” She raised her voice. “Betsy—Carola! Some of you people come and take charge of these two, will you? They aren’t shy, are they?” she added, turning to their mother.

“Don’t know the meaning of the word,” Mrs. Embury said. “Thank you, girls! If you will! We’re getting off at Nyon and before that I simply must get up-to-date a little! Off you go, you two, and mind you behave yourselves!”

The prefects took charge of the small boys, and the mistresses, with the new addition, returned to their corner and sat down. Mrs. Embury opened fire at once.

“Now tell me!” she demanded. “What is all this in aid of?”

Nancy Wilmot chuckled. “First, let me recall to you Biddy o’Ryan. She was at the Chalet School the summer before you left. I don’t know if you remember how a bunch of the Middles adopted her? Now she belongs to the school and is history mistress.”^[9]

“I remember the yarn,” Mrs. Embury said cautiously. “It’s lovely to meet you all again. I’ve often wondered what happened, but I married the spring after I left school and then Rupert, our eldest, was born and after him came Lionel and Maurice and those two. If any of them had been girls, I’d have hunted up the school, but as they’re all boys, I left it alone. Is it still in existence? I hope so!”

“Very much in existence,” Miss Annersley said crisply. “We have an English branch still, but the main part of the school is in the Oberland, up at the Görnetz Platz.”

“Where they have that new Sanatorium?” Winifred Embury asked. “I knew about that, of course. Do you mean that it’s a branch of our San? What fun! Who’s in charge of it?—Dr. Russell?”

“No; Sir James is still at the English San,” Rosalie Dene said. “Yes; he really is that, Winnie. Madame is Lady Russell now. We have three Russell girls with us—Sybil, Josette and Ailie. The Russells have a lovely house in the Welsh hills where the San is; but Sir James is always in demand for big International conferences. It’s Jack Maynard who’s Head out here. He and Joey have a house next door to the school.”

“Joey—do you mean Joey Bettany? Did she marry him? Oh, my dears! I’m all behind and Nyon is getting nearer and nearer! Tell me all you can now and you’ve all got to come and stay with us by turn at the week-ends. We live outside Montreux. My husband is in business in Geneva, but we prefer to live away from the city and with a car it’s an easy matter for him to go back and forwards.”

Mdlle took a hand in the matter. “But yes; Joey married Dr. Jack when she was twenty and the following year, she had—” she paused, and her black eyes danced.

“Well, what did she have?” Winifred asked. “Twins? It would be like her!”

“No; but triplet daughters!”

Winifred Embury gasped. “Triplets! Oh, no! But how like Joey! She always was wholesale! Not that I can say anything with seven sons,” she added laughing. “I’ve beaten everyone else I know.”

“Then prepare to hide your diminished head in a bucket!” Nancy Wilmot retorted. “Joey has you beat! After the Trips, she had three sons—singletons. Then she went to Canada with Jack and had twins while she was there. She has eight.”

Miss Annersley positively smirked. “You’re behind the times, Nancy. Jack rang up the pension before petit déjeuner to inform us that their fifth daughter arrived at six this morning and everyone is very well.”

With one accord the staff glared at her. Mdlle was the first to speak. “But Hilda,” she said plaintively, “do you mean you have known it all this time and never said anything about it till now?”

“Oh, I meant to tell you people when I got you alone; but the girls can wait till we’re safely back at school. I can just imagine the excitement if they knew!”

“A singleton daughter at last!” Rosalie Dene said. She turned to Mrs. Embury. “Her twins were a boy and girl—Felix and Felicity. Hilda,” she looked at the Head, “you’re sure it was six this morning?”

“Well, that’s what Jack said. I suppose he knows. But why?”

“Have you forgotten yesterday’s date?”

“April 1st? Oh, I see?” And the Head’s laughter pealed out. “No; It’s all right. She’s escaped April Fool’s day by six hours.”

“Thank goodness for that! No; it’s just as well the girls shouldn’t know until we have them in our own bounds. Well, we can discuss this later. Meanwhile, what about giving Winnie what news we can in the time? As she says, Nyon is getting near.”

“Oh, do! But give Joey my love and tell her I’m delighted to hear about her. She must come and stay with me and bring the baby when she is able. I’m sure a week or two at Montreux would do her good. How old are the twins?”

“Three in September.” Miss Annersley said no more. Beth Chester had confided a secret to her and Joey the Sunday before this week-end, but it was to remain a secret for the present. Even Barbara Chester did not know yet.

“But we must tell her our other news,” Mdlle interrupted. “Winnie, you must come to the Görnetz Platz and see us there. At the moment, we are smaller than you knew us as part of our school in England remains there. However, we grow.”

“You’ve changed the uniform. You used to have brown and flame.”

“We did that when we came out here. The English branch keeps it, but we decided that with a fresh beginning we would have a fresh uniform.”

“Oh, I see. If I’d seen the brown and flame, I’d have known you at once, of course. It’s a lovely blue. What are the other colours?”

“Crimson and silver. But Winnie—oh, Winifred, then,” as Mrs. Embury gave her a look, “well, Winifred, tell us some more about yourself. And what about your sister—Irene, I remember?” Rosalie Dene said. “Is she married, too?”

Mrs. Embury shook her head. “Irene has gone in hot and strong for nursing. She has no use for men except as patients or doctors. She’s matron now of a big hospital in the north, not far from Newcastle. Which reminds me. One of their ambulances is due some time this week with a patient from their area. At least it may not be until next week. She’s going to the San at the Görnetz Platz. That’s how I knew about it.”

“Alix Rutherford,” Biddy o’Ryan murmured. “A young cousin of hers is with us and she’s a musical genius, the creature.”

Mrs. Embury had one eye on the shore. “We’re almost there. I must collect the boys. Well, what I was going to say is that this cousin is a cousin of my husband’s. Her mother was Dorothy Embury before she married Alan Rutherford. She died when the baby was still a baby and he disappeared with her. Now he’s dead, as I expect you know, and Irene’s Rutherfords have taken charge of the girl. What’s she like? Irene guessed more from what they didn’t say than from what they did that she’s a difficult girl. Martin would like to give a hand with her, he says. He was very fond of Dorothy when they were children and he’d like to help her girl.”

“It’s a pity we didn’t know sooner,” Nancy Wilmot said. “She’s with us—over there.” She stood up and scanned the groups. “Yes; with that tall, fair girl up in the bows.”

“Oh! And Nyon’s here and I can’t go on. We’re going to spend the day with the wife of my husband’s partner and she’s expecting us by this boat.” She had stood up. “Yes; there she is, waiting.” She whirled round on the Head. “Where are you staying? When do you go back? To-morrow after déjeuner? I’ll tell Martin and he can ring you up. What a blessing we all met like this! For from what Irene said in her letter, the Rutherfords won’t have much time or attention to spare for anyone but their own girl. She seems to be pretty bad, poor child!”

By this time, the steamer had reached the landing-stage and Mrs. Embury had to go. She thrust a card into Miss Annersley’s hand as she said good-bye. “There’s our address and I know yours. Write and we’ll fix up something about meeting—properly meeting, I mean. Come along, you two! Paul, take my hand. Good-bye, everyone! I’ll write and so must you! On you go, Robin!”

She hustled the boys off the boat and on to the little pier where the watching staff saw a much older lady come to greet them. Winifred waved and then the gangway came up and they were off again, heading round the lake towards Geneva.

Nancy summed up the general feeling of the staff when she said pensively just before they called the girls to be ready to leave the steamer, “You never know who or what you may meet in the course of the day’s doings! I’d forgotten all about the Silksworths, though we all liked Winnie at school—and Irene, too, for that matter. Of course, she had left school when I got there—she’s about four years older than Winnie who must be about thirty-five or six——”

“No,” Mdlle said with decision. “She will be no more than thirty-one or two.”

“Then her husband did a bit of cradle-snatching at that rate,” Biddy o’Ryan laughed. “Fancy her being around Joey’s age. She looks a good ten years older.”

“That’s the size of her.” Nancy was still pensive, “I’m plumpish myself. I think I’d better keep an eye on my weight. Someone remind me to ask Dr. Jack for a dietary when we get back. And what’s more,” she added as they neared the great lake-port, “I’ll stick to it! I don’t mind being chubby, but seeing Winnie makes me realize what sort of a house-end I might become if I don’t take steps to check it!”

Mary-Lou and Co. had seen to it that Miss o’Ryan was their escort mistress. She found them waiting for her when she came off the steamer while the remnants of the Sixth thronged round Miss Annersley, begging for her company. What was left of Va made a beeline for Mdlle and Miss Dene and Nancy Wilmot laughed and divided Vb between them. The prefects had already gone off after a final reminder from the Head about keeping together and avoiding alleyways and side-streets. The rest parted after Miss Annersley warned them once more about meeting at the postal coach station in time.

“Where are we going first?” Vi Lucy demanded as they walked along the Quai.

“Where do you want to go?” Miss o’Ryan asked amiably.

No one was very sure. Finally, Mary-Lou suggested that it might be a good idea if they did their shopping, so she agreed and they went on, for the Grand Quai is one of the main shopping centres of Geneva. Indeed, all around there are streets of wonderful shops, including the Rue du Rhône, Rue du Marché and Rue de la Croix d’Or.

“What marvellous brooches!” Verity sighed as they gazed into the windows of one of the great jewellery stores. “Look at that turquoise and filigree one, Mary-Lou!”

Mary-Lou looked. “It’s lovely—just what Mother would love. What do you say, Verity? Should we fix on that? Miss o’Ryan, do you think it would cost too much for us to buy between us?”

“That all depends on what you have to spend. Your mother wouldn’t want you two to spend all your earthly wealth on one brooch for her. And don’t forget the Sale comes off next week. How much have you?”

“We—ell,” Mary-Lou replied, “we both drew out practically all we had in Bank. You see, it’s Mother’s birthday the week after next and we thought we might be able to get her something decent between us while we were here.”

“Oh, I see. In that case, how much have you? And do answer my question directly.”

“We’ve been saving all the term,” Verity explained in her tiny voice. “We did so want to give Mother something really nice, especially when she’s been so ill. With what we had in Bank and what we’ve saved from our pocket-money, we have 103 frs. between us—oh, and fifty-three centimes,” she added with conscientious accuracy. “Could we manage the brooch, do you think?”

Miss o’Ryan considered. The brooch was very dainty and she knew that both girls really wanted to give Mrs. Carey something good. Verity’s own mother had died when she was a baby and to have a second mother—and one as sweet and dear as her step-mother—was a joy to the girl that none of the others could realize; not even Mary-Lou. “We’ll go in and ask the price, anyhow,” she said. “No harm in doing that. Only don’t be too disappointed if it’s beyond you. Remember what we’ve all told you all along; that prices in Geneva are higher than anywhere else in Switzerland except possibly Zurich. Girls, you’d better come in, too. Anyone else want to buy anything?”

Nina did. The party followed the mistress into the shop and, in her fluent French, Biddy o’Ryan proceeded to deal with the very polite gentleman who served them. The brooch cost 30 frs., so Mary-Lou and Verity bought it. Nina invested in a pretty, slender bangle, studded with rhinestones. She had what Miss Annersley had privately considered a ridiculous sum for a schoolgirl in the school Bank. However, Sir Guy had explained that he wanted the girl to learn to handle her own finances as soon as possible since it would be almost impossible for him to tackle them in the roving kind of career she had chosen for herself. In justice to her, it must be said that she showed very little sign of being extravagant.

“It’s lovely,” Vi said when they were outside once more. “I do love sparklies so much! But when on earth will you wear it?”

“Not at all,” Nina replied brusquely. Then, feeling that she had been rather too short, she added, “I want it for my cousin Alix—a kind of welcoming present when she reaches the Platz.”

“That’s a jolly decent idea,” Mary-Lou commented. “I should think a thing like that would buck her up no end. Good for you, Nina! As our one and only Emerence would say, it’s a bonza idea!”

Nina flushed, even while she laughed. She had liked Mary-Lou immensely and her praise was worth having to the girl who had never had a girl-friend before in her life. She expanded a little as a result. “Cousin Guy gave Alix a gold bangle for Christmas and she was thrilled with it. He and Cousin Yvonne don’t let the girls have much jewellery, you know, so it was the first bangle she had ever had. I thought she’d like another to wear on the other wrist.” She paused before she added, “I’d loathe it myself! I can’t bear things messing on my hands. Still, Alix didn’t seem to mind.”

“Alix isn’t going to be a professional pianist,” Miss o’Ryan pointed out. “All very well for her to have jingles on her wrists, but you’d find them an awful nuisance at the piano. What’s that, Lesley? Collars and cuffs? We’ll turn in here, then. You’ll find plenty of choice, I think.”

They did their shopping, buying mainly trifles, for they had the Sale to consider and they found what they had been told about Geneva prices was all too true. However, they got presents of collars and cuffs of Swiss embroidery, little knickknacks, tiny flagons of perfume and sweets and chocolates. Nina bought some music for herself when she saw something she had long wanted, and a huge three-pound box of chocolates when they were all in one of the big confectionery shops. This last, she brought to Miss o’Ryan who was standing back, leaving the girls to manage for themselves.

“Would you ask Miss Annersley and the rest to share these with you, please?” she said half-shyly. “You’ve been so very good to us all and so kind, this week-end.”

Biddy looked at it with dismay. “Oh, Nina! You simply mustn’t do things like that!” she exclaimed. “It’s very sweet of you, but after all, it’s part of our job and we enjoy doing it.”

Nina flushed, but she stood her ground. “I know all that, but I’d like you all to know how grateful we all are to you for it, just the same—we all would. Do please take it—this once, anyhow. I won’t do it again if you’d rather not.”

“And will the lot of ye be telling me what else I was to do?” Biddy o’Ryan demanded of her colleagues that evening when she had produced the box and handed it round. “Sure the child was doing it with the best meaning in the world! But she’s promised me ’twill be the last time. We can’t have the girls making us presents in that style!”

“No; you couldn’t do anything else,” Miss Annersley agreed. “But I’m glad you made her give you that promise. From all you say, Nina is a generous soul; but she has really too much money to allow her to scatter it like this. I must talk to her, for in her future life, she will have to rely on herself and she must learn to be just before she is generous or she may land herself into trouble.”

At the moment, Miss o’Ryan took the box and dropped it into the shopping-bag she had had the foresight to bring, in company with all the other parcels. The packets of chocolate and boxes of sweets were added and then the mistress proclaimed that shopping was over for the day. She pulled the zip fastener tight, handed the bag—by request—to Lesley who was a careful creature, and informed them that the rest of the time must be devoted to sight-seeing.

“Come along!” she said. “We’ll turn up here to the Promenade des Bastiens and you shall see Geneva’s monument to international Protestantism. It’s world famous and everyone goes to see it—and the great sculptured figures of the four Reformers, Farel, Beza, Calvin and John Knox. I can’t say I admire any one of them and I should hate to have got across any of them if those sculptures are true to life. All the same, you ought to be able to say you’ve seen it.”

They went from the Rue du Rhône to the Place Neuve where she pointed out the Opéra, the Rath Art Gallery and the Conservatoire, at which last Nina gazed eagerly.

“And now,” Miss o’Ryan said, “look ahead of you. You see that high wall? That is part of the ancient ramparts. Those houses up there used to belong to the quality. We go into this park which belongs to the University and keep left and—there! That’s the Monument!”

The girls gazed at the great wall with its four huge figures turning their backs on Rome, flanked at either side by other great names from the Protestant Reformation, in silence which was broken, as might be expected, by Mary-Lou.

“So that’s old Knox!” she said. “Well, the Swiss may think he was the cat’s pyjamas, but in my opinion, he was one of the rudest, most unchristian old men who ever lived! It makes my blood boil when I think how he treated Mary Queen of Scots! I call him disloyal, as well as ill-bred! It’s a pity no one ever taught him better!” With which scathing indictment, she turned her back on the four and turned to examine the other carvings.

“You couldn’t call any of them handsome,” was Barbara’s contribution. “Still they’re a part of history, so I suppose we ought to see this.”

Lesley, who was as great an admirer of the “Bonnie Queen” as Mary-Lou, laughed. “And the funny part of it all is that Mary’s own son, though he was a firm Protestant, seems to have been no greater an admirer of John Knox than his mother was.”

“My dear girl, Knox died when James I was a tiny boy of six or so—of a stroke of apoplexy, I believe. I don’t suppose the king worried very much about him.”

“Really? I’d no idea of that. Well, they’re all dead, so why worry?” was Hilary’s remark. “Is the University famous, Miss o’Ryan?”

“Very famous. It was established somewhere around 1559, though it did not take the title of University until 1873. It includes three museums, but I don’t think we’ve time to visit them to-day. But a great many famous men were there, including Rousseau and Frédéric Amiel whose Journal has been translated into a number of languages. Now we’ll go back and have a look at the Rhône. Across the Place Neuve, Lesley, and turn down the Rue de Racite. We’ll take a look at the dam.”

They were thrilled with the great dam which has been flung across the Rhône near the place where it flows into the lake. Miss o’Ryan told them that by its means the level of the lake is properly controlled, and they stood for some minutes watching the foaming water pouring tumultuously over it into the lake.

“It’s—rather marvellous,” Hilary said at last. “Not to be compared with the Falls of Rhine, of course; but still, quite good.”

“You couldn’t expect it,” Lesley remarked. “Look at the difference in the drop. And then the Rhine Falls are natural and this is artificial—if that’s the right word. What do you say, Nina? D’you know the Rhine Falls, by the way?”

Nina had been standing with a rapt expression on her face. She started as Lesley addressed her. “Oh, sorry!” she said in some confusion. “I’m afraid I wasn’t listening. What did you say?”

“I asked you if you knew the Falls of Rhine. And what were you listening to if not to us? For you certainly were listening.”

“Oh, nothing!” But Nina’s crimson cheeks belied her reply.

Lesley gave her a keen look, but let the matter drop and Miss o’Ryan decided that it was time to move on.

“Déjeuner!” she announced. “We’ll find a restaurant where we can have fondue—and luckily that’s easy enough. This way; we turn down here. Go straight on down, Barbara and Vi, if you mean to lead. Turn right when you come to the end and half-way along the street there’s a little restaurant your sister Beth and I patronized last Easter hols, Barbara, when she was out here the week before you folk came back. The fondue there is delicious!”

Delicious it was, although, as Mary-Lou complained, you soon had enough at one time.

“It’s so filling!” she sighed, as she speared her last square of bread coated with the luscious mixture. “If I lived here, I’d want it every day.”

“I should think you’d soon put on all the weight you want at that rate,” Vi giggled. “What a tub you’d be!”

“Tub—with her length?” Hilary added. “You mean a vat, don’t you?”

Mary-Lou grinned at them and refused to rise. “Whatever it was, it ’ud be worth it!” was all she had to say.

At this point, Prunella Davidson, who was with them but, being a silent person, had left most of the talking to the others, was moved to observe, “Did you two really think she’d come up for that? You ought to know Mary-Lou better!”

“Squashed!” Vi exclaimed. “Hilary, I hope you feel a mere blackbeetle!”

Hilary grinned. “Not I! It’s something to have got a speech out of Prunella.”

Prunella laughed. “I can talk when I’ve got something to say. If not, I prefer to keep silence and not go nattering on about nothing.”

“Squashed all round,” Lesley said mournfully. “Still, it’s nice to be sure you’re here, Prunella! Sometimes you make me jump when you barge in on our chat.”

“Have you all had enough fondue?” Miss o’Ryan interrupted them. “Then we’ll have it removed and see about a sweet. What would you all like?”

“May we choose, or must we all have the same?” Verity asked cautiously.

“Oh, choose, by all means. There’s plenty of choice; only don’t be too long over it. We want to see the cathedral and one or two other places as well.”

They chose in turn, some of them voting for the huge, airy buns filled with whipped cream; some, méringue Chantilly—méringues with mounds of stiffly whipped cream hiding them—Miss o’Ryan herself was satisfied with millefeuille which are layers of very thin pastry, also hidden beneath whipped cream. They wound up with cups of coffee as a treat, though it added substantially to the cost of the meal, since it costs round about a franc a cup in Geneva and a franc is worth about 1s. 8d. at the present time.

“I suppose I can walk,” Mary-Lou said as they finally left the restaurant. “I hope we haven’t very far to go though for the next half-hour or so!”

“We’re going to the cathedral,” Miss o’Ryan said briskly. “That’s not very far, and a walk after the sort of meal you’ve eaten, Mary-Lou, is the best thing in the world. We’ll go up one of the towers so that you can see the view. It really is wonderful on a clear day like this. You can see the entire city and the lake spread before you. Only make sure your berets are pulled right down. It’s calm enough down here, but at the top of the tower there may be quite a breeze blowing. Come along and we’ll try it.”

“Is it very far to the top?” Hilary asked.

“Not too far for you, anyhow!” Miss o’Ryan retorted. “I’m taking no excuses from you, Hilary.”

She marched them off to the hill which is crested by the great building and by the time they had arrived there, most of them were ready for the trip up the tower.

“Is it very old?” Verity asked as they stood outside, looking up at the façade which replaced the original one.

“It was begun about 1150,” the mistress returned. “Unfortunately, as you can see for yourselves, they’ve done a lot of restoration. I believe the façade had to be seen to as the earlier one was perishing rapidly; but to impose a Greek form on a medieval building isn’t my idea of what’s fitting. That was done in the eighteenth century, though, and they were all mad over classical architecture at that time. Let’s go in and we’ll tackle the towers first. After that, you’ll be wanting to see the stained glass which is very fine. By the way, they have a carillon between the two towers, but whether we’ll hear it or not, I couldn’t be telling you.”

She led the way in and the first thing they heard was the organ. Nina stopped dead as the music rolled down the aisles and her face lit up. The organist was playing great Bach B major fugue and she dropped down on the nearest seat, gazing up the length of the edifice with absorbed face. She was enjoying the sight-seeing and everything else, but with her, music would always come first.

Verity shot a quick glance at her. “I’ll stay with her if you don’t mind, Miss o’Ryan,” she said softly. “I’m getting rather tired and I love music, too.”

“Very well; but mind you wait here till we come back,” Biddy o’Ryan said after a glance at her. Verity was rather a frail little mortal and no one wanted her to go back to school tired out.

So they were left to enjoy their Bach while the rest made for the entrance to one of the towers. It seemed a tremendous way up, but when they had finally reached the top they were well rewarded for their efforts. Below them lay the city, and beyond gleamed the lake, still and beautiful, clear as glass without almost a ripple to disturb its mirror-like surface.

It was calm enough below but up here, as Miss o’Ryan had warned them, there was a fairly stiff breeze blowing. The girls had pulled their berets well on to their heads, but Biddy had merely made sure that her hatpins were in and as they stood gazing down on the scene, an extra fierce puff tugged at it, lifted it and whirled it away while the loosened hairpins gave up their job and masses of black hair blew and swirled all round her to her hips.

“My hat—my hat!” she cried, catching at her lengthy locks to keep them from blinding her. “It’s gone!”

“Here—have my beret!” Hilary exclaimed, pulling it off her short curls and holding it out. “Yes; it’s all right. You can tuck your hair into it—I expect,” she added doubtfully as she surveyed the tremendous mop which Miss o’Ryan was rapidly twisting up.

“More than half my pins are gone!” she said in dismay. “See if you can find any of them on the ground, girls, or I’ll never do anything with it.”

They obligingly scrabbled about and managed to find half-a-dozen and with these she had to be satisfied until she could go to the nearest shop and buy some. As for the hat, Prunella pointed it out, perched on a roof far below. Then another little puff lifted it and away it went again while the wind, which was evidently taking matters into its own hands, whipped the lake with long flaws which became waves with amazing rapidity so that by the time they had left the tower with the mistress ruefully making up her mind that she must buy some sort of head-covering if she wanted to look any way decent, the whole lake was tossing madly and Hilary was moved to being loudly thankful that they were not going back to Vevey by steamer.

“I should be deadly seasick!” she proclaimed.

“On an inland lake!” Prunella protested.

“More likely there than on the sea,” Miss o’Ryan said as she tried to repin a heavy strand so that it would stay up. “You get a nasty groundswell on a lake like this. Oh, bother my hair! I’ve a good mind to go and have it bobbed to-morrow morning!”

Shrieks of protest greeted this. The girls had been greatly impressed by their mistress’s mane. It was Mary-Lou who, with her usual devastating common sense, put a stopper on it, however.

“Oh, Miss o’Ryan, you simply can’t! Just think what a sensation it would make! Everyone would be simply stunned and ‘stare’ wouldn’t describe it when you came to take your lessons! No one would think of any history!”

Biddy o’Ryan knew that this was quite true. She shrugged her shoulders. “Well, I must do something about it. I certainly can’t go through the streets like this. Hilary’s beret isn’t much help, I’m afraid.”

“Buy a head handkerchief,” Vi suggested. “You have another hat at Vevey, haven’t you?”

“Yes—at Vevey. I want something now. Well, it’s the best thing I can do. I don’t propose to buy a hat here. Now come along and collect Nina and Verity. The organ is stopping, so I expect they’ll be ready to come.”

They found the pair where they had left them. Nina was just waking up and Verity had realized that a cathedral was a cold place and was swinging her arms to warm herself. She stopped as the party approached them and stared at Miss o’Ryan who, it must be confessed, was an untidy sight. Hilary’s beret would not cover the great bun at the back of her neck, and that was twisted up so precariously, that one tail was already slipping loose from its moorings and falling over her shoulder.

“Yes,” that lady said, getting in first. “I’ve lost my hat and most of my hairpins. I shall have to do something about it when we reach the shops. Meanwhile, you two have sat here quite long enough. Come along, all of you, and when I’ve managed to do something about it, we’ll go to the Jardin d’Anglais and have English tea.”

She spoke with a certain crispness that warned the girls to say no more about the accident. To tell the truth, she felt extremely foolish and if it had not been for Mary-Lou’s warning, the chances are that she would have dived into the first hairdresser’s and had her mop cropped. As it was, she stopped short at that, but she was a thankful creature when they were able to stop at a shop and buy hairpins. The obliging girl at the counter, grasping what had happened, offered the use of a cubicle and Miss o’Ryan vanished for a few minutes to return with her hair clamped to her head by every pin in the two packets she had bought and looking unnaturally tidy. Another shop provided a gay handkerchief and when that had been securely fastened Biddy was able to take her party to the Jardin d’Anglais for English tea feeling fairly comfortable again.

Repercussions came when they met the rest of the crowd in time for the postal coach, when Miss Wilmot gave her colleague a startled look and exclaimed, “But I thought you were wearing a hat! Why are you got up in a head handkerchief?”

“And where, then, is your hat?” Mdlle added, her black eyes widening.

“Anywhere, so far as I know!” Miss o’Ryan told her. “Probably in the lake by this time. The wind blew it off when we were up one of the cathedral towers. And I may as well tell you,” she added, “that if I hear one more word about it, ’tis having me hair cut to the bone, I’ll be and sorra one of ye can stop me!”

When Biddy o’Ryan became richly Irish like this, they all knew that it was serious. The comments stopped there—for the time being. The postal coach came up then and the girls were hustled in and they were whirled away to Vevey for their last evening there and even Nancy Wilmot said no more. As for the girls, they had to wait for the story until they were back at school next evening, when it lost nothing in the accounts given by Hilary, Vi and Lesley and one more legend was added to the many that the Chalet School had already accumulated.

“Do you mean to tell me that Aunt Joey’s new baby has arrived already?” Sybil Russell, very brown and fit after the week-end the prefects had spent at Davos, “winter-sporting”, to quote Katharine Gordon, stared incredulously at her young sister Josette who had just come to her, primed with all the news.

Josette nodded. “That’s what comes of staying till the last minute as you people did. We were back almost the first—only the kids were before us—and we met Uncle Jack at the turn above Freudesheim. He said he’d been on the look-out for us as he wanted to tell us himself. I suppose he couldn’t wait around for you folk. You were most awfully late, Sybs!”

“We were having such a gorgeous time and Miss Burnett said we’d stay till the afternoon. We weren’t sorry, I can tell you! But never mind all that. We can talk it all over later on. In the meantime, tell me all about Aunt Joey.”

“Don’t know an awful lot more. The Head knew all about it, by the way. Uncle Jack rang her up early on Monday morning, but he told her to say nothing to us as he wanted to tell us himself. Talk of yells! We just about roused the echoes at the Auberge when we heard!”

Mary-Lou, who was with them, heaved a sigh. “I’m glad it’s all over, but it definitely spoils her for our Sale.” She stopped and made a grab at a twelve-year-old who was passing. “Hi, Con! Just a minute! You three will know all about it, of course. Tell us how Aunt Joey is and the baby. Have you seen them yet?”

“Rather!” Con beamed. “We came back earlyish from Basle and Papa was waiting for us three and took us straight off to San to see them. We were thrilled!” And Con, the second of Joey’s triplet daughters, heaved a deep sigh of satisfaction.

“Who’s she like?” Sybil asked eagerly. “Oh, but I don’t suppose you’ll know.”

“Don’t I just! Everyone says she’s the image of ME!” Con literally swelled with pride.

“If you go on like that, you’ll end by bursting if you’re not careful,” Sybil warned her young cousin with a chuckle.

“Think we ought to take her to Matey for a hat five sizes larger?” Mary-Lou asked wickedly. “It’ll take all that, won’t it?”

Nothing could upset Con to-day, however. “I’m not swelled-headed,” she said calmly, “how could I be? I didn’t make the baby. It was God Who made her like me, so what is there to get swollen head about?”

“Well, tell us just what she is like,” Sybil ordered, giving it up.

“Oh, sweet! She’s wee—not so wee as Felix and Felicity were when they first came, though; but there were two of them. She has black hair in curls all over her head, just like Auntie Robin’s was. Her eyes are blue, but navy-blue. Mamma thinks they’ll be black when she’s a little older, so that’s really darker than me.”

“ ‘Than I’,” Sybil said automatically. “You mean, ‘darker than I am’, Con.”

“Oh, well! She’s got a tiny nose—Mamma says it’s a shadow of a nose at present. But her mouth’s a good size to make up. And she has black eyelashes—long ones—and you can just see black eyebrows.”

“Gosh!” Josette exclaimed. “She sounds as if she was going to be a little nigger!”

Con laughed. “That’s where you miss the bus! She’s pinky and I never heard of a pinky nigger. It’s her little hands that I like. They’re all dimpled and she has lovely little fingers.”

Nina, who had been standing with Mary-Lou’s arm thrust through hers, laughed. “Well, she sounds like you, Con, but not a bit like either Len or Margot.”

“That’s where Aunt Joey scores,” Mary-Lou said pensively. “No one could say her family were monotonous! Len’s chestnut red and Margot’s golden red; Steve and Mike are fair and the twins are milky fair; Charles is between colours and Con’s dark and now there’s this new baby who’s going to be even darker! I call it very satisfactory.”

“What are you going to call her?” Nina asked curiously.

“We’re not quite sure. She’ll have Cecilia after Auntie Rob for one of her names. Auntie Rob’s her godmother, you know. But none of us like it very much for every day so we’ve got to think up something else to go with it and we all want something different. Len wants Juliet, and Margot’s all for Francesca. I think I’d like Monica. We can’t wait for the boys, and Mike says he doesn’t care.”

“You could call her Cecily—or Cecil, if you liked,” Sybil said.

“I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll tell Mamma when I see her again,” Con said, rather impressed by this idea! “She’ll be Mary, too, of course. All of us girls are except Felicity, and that’s ’cos she’s Felicity Josephine.”

“I rather like it,” Mary-Lou put in. “What do you think, Nina?”

“I think it would be very pretty,” Nina said promptly. “Mary Cecilia Maynard—it runs like a brook. And Cecily Maynard is just as pretty.”

“I’ll tell Mamma,” Con repeated, moving off. “It’s a jolly good idea, Sybs.”

And, to anticipate a little, that was what they did in the end. The baby was baptized Cecilia Marya—the two names of her godmother—and known as “Cecily” thereafter.

“Thank goodness,” Joey said when they laid her new little Christian in her arms two days later, “she hasn’t got a name that’ll date her! I’m always so sorry for the various Joans and Pamelas and Susans and Annes. People will always be able to guess their ages from their names. I call it most unfair!”

The school at large learnt of the decision next day when the Head came back from her visit to the Sanatorium.

“I like it,” Mary-Lou said in fairly fluent German and with great decision. “When is she to be baptized?”

“Saturday morning at ten o’clock and we’re all to be there if we like,” Hilary said. “I met Len in the corridor and she told me. The Head’s putting up a notice in Hall.”

“She’s come awfully near being an April Fool!” Rosemary Lamb giggled.

“Still, she did escape it,” Vi said cheerfully. Then, with great urgency, “Be quiet, everyone! Here comes Miss Derwent!”

The talking ceased promptly. Miss Derwent was usually a pleasant creature, but one thing did madden her and that was to find her form all chatting gaily and nothing ready when she came for a lesson. But Vi had another reason besides that for hushing them. Miss Derwent seemed to have started the day in a bad mood. She had snapped at one or two people earlier on and when Emerence Hope, calmly forgetting rules, went tearing wildly along the corridors and bumped into the mistress, she had received a tongue-lashing that amazed her, coming from that source. She had passed it on to Vi when they were changing after the early walk and Vi remembered now. Accordingly, Miss Derwent entered to find a very proper Va awaiting her and tried to forget the tooth which had ached at intervals all night.

Va were feeling rather nervous, in any case. Last lesson, it had pleased Miss Derwent to set them an exercise in writing Alexandrine couplets which she had taken very thoroughly with them. They had mastered iambic pentameters fairly well, but most of them still felt shaky over Alexandrines. They had been told to choose their own subjects and most of them had played safe. Miss Derwent was confronted with set after set on Spring—Flowers—March—April—June—Christmas—and so on. When Bess Appleton laid before her ten lines on the subject of May, she exclaimed, “Is there any month you girls have left alone?”

However, she let it go at that. Bess was a conscientious girl with little poetry in her and her effort was neither better nor worse than was to be expected from her. Miss Derwent pointed out three or four mistakes in scansion and a terrible false rhyme and awarded her a B—before she sent her back to her seat and the passage from Browning’s Andrea Del Sarto which they were paraphrasing.

Nina came next and she had actually found a fresh subject—Bach. Her musical training enabled her to feel the correct beat of words as a rule, but her rhyming was none too brilliant and over the last two lines, Miss Derwent suddenly developed a violent coughing fit. Apostrophizing the great composer and organist, Nina had produced:

“How on earth can you make ‘deepening’ and ‘creeping’ rhyme?” Miss Derwent demanded as she slashed her red pencil through this remarkable effort.

“I—I——” was all Nina could find to say.

“And I don’t like your simile at all! I know of nothing more irritating than having a fly crawling across one’s hand or arm, for instance.”

Nina was silent. She knew very well that those last two lines were sheer nonsense, but she had been hard put to it to find anything to wind up.

“And in any case, how could insects creep over your spirits?” wound up the mistress scathingly.

Vi, sitting in the front row, the direct result of whispering during Miss Wilmot’s previous lesson, might have been expected to behave herself; but this proved too much for her. With her eyes still on her paraphrasing, she muttered just aloud enough for her nextdoor neighbour to hear, “They could all right if it was meths, or spirits of wine—or whisky, say!”

It was very unlucky that the neighbour was that inveterate giggler, Hilda Jukes. She had been going on blamelessly with her work when Vi spoke, and the unexpected comment set her off. She spluttered, only just smothering it a little with her hand. It was fortunate at the moment for the pair that Josette Russell had been called on to bring her attempt up and elected to stumble over the textbooks piled up at the side of her desk. The books came down with a crash, flying in all directions and the sudden noise set every nerve in Miss Derwent’s mouth jumping.

“Do be careful, Josette!” she said with unwonted asperity. “There can be no need for a girl of your age to be so clumsy. Pick up those books and put them somewhere safe and hurry up about it! I can’t wait all day for you!”

Josette did as she was told with a meekness belied by her blazing eyes, and in the general scrimmage, Hilda’s explosion went unnoticed.

Vi, rather alarmed at the result of her silly speech, nudged her, hissing, “Shut up, you ass!”

But it was easier to say that than to get Hilda to comply. All the time she was struggling with her paraphrasing, she was sniggering to herself. She was still at it when Miss Derwent, somewhat mollified by Josette’s lines which were quite good for a schoolgirl, summoned her in her turn, and Vi made things worse by grimacing a warning at her to pull herself together. Normally, Vi was one of the prettiest girls in the school, but when she took to making faces anyone would have awarded her the palm for being one of the ugliest. On this occasion, she pulled down the corners of her mouth, drew her brows together in a portentous frown and added a violent squint to crown the effort. Hilda, glancing back, got the full beauty of it and a loud titter fell across the comparative silence of the formroom.

“Hilda! What is there to laugh at?” Miss Derwent demanded. She was patient enough as a rule, but between her aching tooth, those Alexandrines and Josette’s carelessness, her stock had run out and the sight of Hilda Jukes literally writhing in an attack of the giggles ended it.

^[10]Once Hilda was fairly started, it was no easy matter to stop her as Herr Laubach, the irritable art master, had once discovered! The sight of her shaking there, her face turning crimson as she tried in vain to control herself, set the others off, even Vi, who had sat rigid with horror for a moment. The room rang with their peals of laughter and when Hilda, horrified at what was happening, tried to stop her own giggles by thrusting her handkerchief in her mouth, it made them worse.

The noise attracted Miss Dene who was bringing round a notice to the forms. Under the impression that Va were left alone and for once taking advantage of it, she swept into the room, exclaiming in thunderous tones, “Girls! What are you thinking of? Can’t we trust Seniors like you to behave yourselves alone for a few minutes?” Then she saw Miss Derwent who had been hidden by the big standing blackboard and blushed.

“I beg your pardon, Miss Derwent,” she began rather nervously, for Miss Derwent’s face was very black. She went no further, for she also saw Hilda and at once guessed partly what had happened. Dropping her slips on the table, she seized that unfortunate young woman by the shoulders and gave her a shake which made Hilda start and bite her tongue smartly. This certainly did put an end to her giggles. With tears of pain streaming down her cheeks, she stopped dead and Va suddenly woke up to the enormity of their behaviour and also stopped laughing.

In the deadly silence which succeeded to the wild shrieks of the girls, Miss Dene once more apologized to the irate Miss Derwent whose mouth was compressed into a thin line and whose stormy eyes were quite enough to alarm the hardiest girl in the school.

“I am so very sorry, Miss Derwent,” she said earnestly. “If I had taken time to think I would have known that as this is Va it was only Hilda Jukes making an exhibition of herself.”

“My only wonder is that the entire staff hasn’t been in to inquire what was wrong!” Miss Derwent snapped.

Vi gulped and got herself to her feet. “Please, it was my fault—I mean it was my fault that Hilda giggled,” she faltered.

“What do you mean?” Miss Derwent demanded while Miss Dene hurriedly laid the Va notice on the table and fled with a murmur that might have been anything.

“I—I said something to make her laugh,” Vi owned, wondering what awful fate would overtake her if Miss Derwent should be moved to find out exactly what she had said.

However, the mistress had had time to recover herself a little. She made no attempt to find out the sum total of Vi’s sins. But she proceeded to rend that young person to such good purpose that by the time she had finished, Vi was thankful to sit down and hide her face over her exercise-paper, feeling as if she had been reduced to a status rather less than one of Nina’s insects. As for the rest of Va, they promptly buried themselves in their work with a concentration that said as plainly as any words, “Please don’t notice me—I’m not here!”

Miss Derwent paid no attention to them. She held out her hand for Hilda’s verses, saying coldly, “I will comment on these and then you had better go and make yourself fit to be seen. You are a disgrace to the form at the present moment.”

Her final comment, “Quite undistinguished, but as good as you usually do!” meant nothing to Hilda who took them back to her desk and then escaped thankfully to wash her tear-smeared face and tidy her hair. By the time she had finished, the bell had rung for Break and when she returned to the formroom, it was empty. Miss Derwent had had more than enough of Va that morning and dismissed them on the first stroke of the bell.

Hilda hurriedly tidied her desk and then went to get her milk and biscuits from the Speisesaal where she found a repentant Vi waiting for her.

“Oh, Hilda,” she said humbly, “I’m most awfully sorry I made such an ass of myself and got you into trouble. Please forgive me. I never meant to do it.”

Poor Hilda sighed. “It wasn’t your fault so awfully much. I do wish I could get over giggling at next to nothing! Two years ago, Herr Laubach flung me out of his art class for the same thing and wouldn’t have me back for the rest of the term. And Peggy Bettany who was Head Girl that year caught me out and gave me a frightful rowing. She nearly took the skin off me! I did think that had cured me, but it hadn’t.”

“But you’ve been a lot better since then,” Vi said consolingly. “And anyway, it was my fault this time. I really am sorry, Hilda. I never meant to start you off like that!” She added ruefully, “I got all that was coming to me from Miss Derwent, anyhow. Thank goodness we don’t have her for anything else to-day!”

“Vi! Do you know where Nina Rutherford is?” demanded her sister Betsy coming in at that moment. “Go and find her and tell her she’s wanted in the study, pronto! Hurry up with your elevenses, Hilda,” she added as Vi fled. “You won’t get any exercise outside if you don’t; and Karen will be hopping mad, anyhow.”

Hilda choked down the last of her milk, wiped the creamy moustache off her upper lip and went out to join the others, wondering to herself what Nina, of all people, had been doing to be summoned to the study in that peremptory way. No one could tell her, however, and the form went over to the laboratories for a chemistry lesson for the rest of the morning, those not taking science having extra French with Mdlle and German Dictat with Frau Mieders. Nina came to none of these, but had the time for practice, so there was no hope of questioning her before Mittagessen. And when they took their seats in the Speisesaal, hers remained empty.

No one could understand it, for they all knew that the Rutherfords were not expected at Interlaken before Saturday, if then. They had to possess their souls in patience until Nina herself turned up for Abendessen, looking very excited and bright-eyed. And even then they had no chance to ask her about it, for it pleased Carola Johnstone, the prefect on their table that week, to initiate a conversation about next term’s tennis!

Once they were in their own commonroom, however, and free from all prefects and mistresses, Mary-Lou and Co. brought their work for the Sale and surrounded her, demanding to be told what had happened.

Nina looked at them happily. “Oh, you’ll never guess! Do you remember the fat lady on the steamer going to Geneva? She got off at Nyon and she had two small boys with her.”

“Robin and Paul,” Mary-Lou nodded, “I remember. But what on earth has she to do with you?”

“Everything!” Nina replied dramatically. “Her husband was my mother’s cousin—they were brought up together. Only after she died, Dad took me and we wandered around the world and so we lost touch with him. Well, he, Mother’s cousin, I mean, married this lady who was an Old Girl or something of the school, only then, she says, she was as slim as I am!”

“She’s altered!” Hilary said. “What’s her name, Nina?”

“Cousin Winifred. That’s what she’s told me to call her. Mrs. Embury, really. He is my cousin Martin. Well, she has a sister who’s Matron of a big hospital near Newcastle-on-Tyne, and Alix was there for a few weeks. When she—Alix, I mean—had to come out here, the Matron wrote to Cousin Winifred to ask her if the Rutherfords could break the journey for a night or two at her house at Montreux. She said of course they could. Then she met the staff on the steamer as we all saw, and knew them though they didn’t recognize her!” Nina stopped to laugh.

“I don’t blame them,” Barbara remarked. “If she really was as thin as you when she was at school, I don’t see how they could be expected to!”

“They didn’t; but she reminded them and she told them about Cousin Guy and Cousin Yvonne and Alix and Miss Annersley or someone said I was here. She would have come to speak to me at once, but we’d reached Nyon then and you know what a short time the steamer waits anywhere. She had to go, but she said she’d get in touch again. Well, she and Cousin Martin came to-day to get in touch. That’s why the Head sent for me. They wanted to take me back to Montreux with them for the rest of the term. Of course, the Head wouldn’t allow it; but she let me go with them to Interlaken. I’ve had a gorgeous time. Cousin Martin loves music himself and he plays the ’cello. I’m to go to them for the whole of the Easter Holidays and meet all their boys—they have seven!—and as long as I’m here, I’m to look on their house as home. Cousin Martin says he’ll talk it all over with Cousin Guy and come to some arrangement. Oh, and she’s coming up for the Sale on Monday and she’s sending us some things for our stall. Isn’t it marvellous? I thought I didn’t have a soul in the world but the people at Brettingham Park and though they’re very kind, they don’t understand about my music. Cousin Martin does and it’s such a help!”

“I think it’s wonderful!” Mary-Lou said quickly. “We’re all awfully glad for you, Nina.”

“I’m awfully glad for myself,” Nina said, laughing happily. “I’m not alone any more!”

“Now just listen to me, you three! This is Friday and Fridays are French days as you know as well as I do! But you’ve been reported to me by your form prefect for continually speaking English.” Betsy Lucy looked severely at her auditors and they wriggled uncomfortably. It was bad enough to know that they were due to be fined—and the Sale only three days ahead!—without the Head Girl lecturing them into the bargain.

Emerence Hope spoke up—it would be Emerence! to quote Betsy later on—and her manner was pert, to say the least of it. “We know it all right. The trouble is we so often forget.”

Heartened by this, Connie Winter and Francie Wilford added their mite towards the Head Girl’s stupefaction at Middles daring to speak like that to a prefect.

“I’ve had eleven fines this term for forgetting that sort of thing,” Connie said with colossal calm. “It doesn’t seem to have been much help, does it?”

“And I’ve had sixteen,” Francie chimed in. “So what?”

Betsy had recovered her self-possession by this time. With a glare that reminded Emerence and Connie, at any rate, that they were there for execution, she said with an awful dignity, “I didn’t ask for any impertinent comments, thank you. If that’s all you have to say, I think you’d better be silent.”

But if Emerence and Connie were brought up short, it was more than Francie was. For some reason best known to herself, she had got up in a very bad mood and Betsy’s scathing tones did nothing to improve it. Tossing the loose wisps of brown hair out of her eyes, she said cheekily, “I only asked because I wanted to know.”

The look she got in reply suddenly took the starch out of her. Betsy Lucy was small and slight and usually her face was alight with humour; but there was nothing humorous about it just now, and Francie wilted visibly.

Betsy said no more for a moment or two. She took what was known as The Black Book out of the nearby shelf and glanced through the term’s records of the three. At last she looked up, by which time the culprits were tired of standing first on one leg and then on the other.

“Well,” she said awfully, “no other girl in the school has had to pay so many fines or lose so many marks as you three—not even the new girls. You say that fines don’t help you to remember. Very well! I’m going to try something else and see if that’s any good.”

The three looked at each other out of the corners of their eyes. What appalling idea was Betsy evolving? A horrid thought struck Connie.

“Please, Betsy,” she said in the meekest of meek tones, “you—you don’t mean to give us Head’s Reports, do you?”

It had not dawned on any of them up to then that this might happen and Emerence’s face fell. Head’s Reports were not, as a rule, given for such breaches of rules; but they had all been in trouble over and over again that term for this sort of thing. Every single prefect had had to pull them up at least once; and the mistresses had been equally busy over it. Emerence began to regret that she had spoken so pertly. She had contrived to keep out of anything really hair-raising that term. The results of a deliberate disobedience on her part last term had been the cause of Mary-Lou’s accident, and there had been a whole terrible week when no one could say if the girl would be restored to them. Emerence had endured real anguish during that week, but not even that could reform her altogether in the course of a few months. If she had managed to keep out of the worst sins, she had certainly been heedless enough about minor crimes.

“I—I’m sorry I was so rude,” she muttered at this point.

“Very well,” Betsy said, still with that icy dignity. “That will wipe that part of it out. But do remember, Emerence, that if you’re rude to prefects, you’ll probably go on to be rude to mistresses and ultimately to the Heads.” She paused and looked expectantly at the other two.

Connie, who generally followed the last speaker, murmured, “I’m awfully sorry! I didn’t mean to be rude.”

But Francie dug her toes in. She shuffled her feet and said nothing. Neither did she look at the stately Betsy. That young woman gave her a full two minutes. Then she said, “Very well. You two have apologized, so we’ll leave it at that. As for talking in English on a French day, instead of talking English to-morrow when we’re busy in Hall with the stalls, you will speak French. Also, you won’t be trusted alone. Emerence will be with me, Connie will be with Katharine and Francie will be with Carola.” She had already discussed this idea with her two friends and they had agreed, though they had complained that having those little pests hanging round all the time would be a perfect nuisance. Having pronounced sentence, Betsy dismissed the first two, bidding Francie stay behind. She knew that to pass over such rudeness to a prefect would never do. Francie Wilford was a firebrand. Emerence seemed to be toning down at long last and Connie Winter could generally be handled; but there was a streak of obstinacy in Francie combined with a stubborn pride that hated to apologize for anything. If she were allowed to get away with the latest, she would be worse another time.

“You two may go,” Betsy said to Emerence and Connie, who got themselves out of the room as fast as they could.

They loathed their punishment. To have to be with prefects all the morning when the others would be enjoying complete freedom; to have to speak French when it was Saturday, anyhow, when English was the set language; it was beyond everything! However, it had produced an effect on them and so had Betsy’s immense dignity which they had never encountered before. They scuttled off downstairs, wishing fervently that they had not talked English and kept on doing it after three warnings from their form prefect. Len Maynard had honestly tried to keep them out of trouble, but the three were excited about the end of term and Francie was in a bad mood and had openly defied Len when she had finally informed them that if they wouldn’t keep to rules she was jolly well going to report them to the Head Girl! They had gone on and Len had kept her word as she invariably did. And this was the result! It was two very sorry girls that finally reached the commonroom of Ste. Thérèse’s.

“Well,” Emerence said gloomily as they went to find seats near a window, “there’s one thing we may be thankful for and that is that Betsy didn’t cut us out of the Sale altogether.”

Connie turned a horrified face on her boon companion. “Oh, Emmie! What a ghastly idea! I never thought of that! But could she?” she added doubtfully.

“I don’t know. If she’d given us Head’s Reports, the Head ’ud have done it, anyhow.”

“What’s a ghastly idea?” demanded Margot Maynard, the youngest of Joey’s triplets who usually made up a quartette with the others. “Where have you been anyhow? I’ve been looking for you all over the place.”

Margot was not in the same form as her sisters and her friends. In some ways she was the cleverest of all Joey’s children, but she had a bad habit of working in fits and starts while Len went at things steadily and Con, the middle of the trio, was also a reliable worker unless she was in the throes of some ballad or epic when, as Joey herself had once said, she was no use to anyone. Luckily, these fits came at long intervals and did not make much difference to her general work. But the result of Margot’s methods was that her groundwork was less reliable than her sisters’ and while they, at twelve and a half, were in Upper IVb with girls who were anything from ten months to two years older than themselves, Margot was still only in Lower IVa with the rest of the twelves and thirteens. Consequently, she knew nothing of what had occurred during the morning’s lessons.

Emerence explained lugubriously and Margot exclaimed, “Oh, Emmy! What an utter ass you can be! Yes; I know we’re in different Houses so we shouldn’t be at the same stalls anyhow; but you can always manage to meet and have some fun together if you don’t make a how d’ye do about it! If you three each have a pree doing sheepdog to you, though, there isn’t a hope of that sort of thing!”

“I know that,” Emerence said, still in mournful tones. “Oh, well, I suppose it serves us right. Goodness knows Len warned us good and plenty!”

“But where’s young Francie if the three of you were in it?” Margot demanded, sublimely ignoring the fact that Francie was a good two years older then herself.

“Oh, she’s made a bigger ass of herself than even we did,” Connie said. “Emmy told Betsy she was sorry she’d been rude, so I did, too, but Francie wouldn’t say a thing. You know what she’s like when she gets going. Betsy washed it out with us two, but she wasn’t going to let Francie get away with cheek like that, so she told her to stay when she turfed us out.”

“Silly goop—Francie, I mean,” Margot said dispassionately. “Betsy’s a sport all right, but no one’s going to pass over cheek—for you seem to have been most ghastly cheeky, all three of you!”

“All right! No need to rub it in. We know that as well as you,” Emerence told her flatly. “But we did apologize afterwards.”

“And Francie didn’t—wouldn’t!” Connie added.

“Is that Francie Wilford?” demanded Mary-Lou who had come into the room in search of Len Maynard just then. “I sometimes think that kid’s crackers! What’s she been doing now?”

Had it been anyone else who spoke like that, it would have brought a suggestion that she should mind her own business. Emerence and Co. were at the stage when Middles all too frequently resent interference from Seniors, especially Seniors who are fairly near to them in age. But Mary-Lou had been Head of the Middle School last year and the rest had found that she was always ready to give a helping hand where needful and often managed to improve matters. Margot explained, therefore, and Mary-Lou frowned.

“What a little goat Francie can be!”

“Can’t you do something?” Emerence suggested. “I mean she’s been queer and edgy all day. She won’t be any sweeter after Betsy’s finished with her and you know, Mary-Lou, if she got into a real row with the Head, it might mean she was done out of the Sale.”

“I wonder Francie hadn’t the sense to think of that for herself,” Mary-Lou responded. “I don’t see what I can do about it. Francie must stand her own consequences.”

Emerence’s face fell. “You generally manage to butt in on things,” she murmured. “You can get away with a lot more than most of us even dream of trying on, Mary-Lou.”

“That’s a nice character you’re giving me!” that young woman retorted. “And as for talking in English, we’re all doing that now. Sorry, you folk! I should have remembered.” She went on in her French that was fluent if not always Parisian in accent, “I don’t say I won’t do anything, but that I don’t quite see how I can. If I do get a chance, I will, though. That’s a promise. And you three just see if you can keep out of any more trouble for what’s left of the term,” she added as she left them to catch Len, who had suddenly appeared, and give her the message with which Miss Dene had entrusted her.

Francie appeared at Mittagessen, still looking defiant, and when the others tried to get out of her what had happened, she flatly refused to tell them anything.

“Never you mind! It’s my business! But Betsy Lucy’s a complete beast!”

As she added to her sin of forbidden slang by speaking in English again, she deserved Retribution to fall on her once more. But Retribution held her hand for once and she got away with it. Meanwhile, she sat through the meal with an outsize in black dogs on her back and would speak civilly to no one.

Mary-Lou naturally said nothing to anyone about what she had been told. She was full of work at the moment and Francie kept away from everyone—even her faithful friends. However, someone else was to come to the rescue—and a most unexpected someone.

This being the last Friday of term, there was no preparation to worry about that night. The next day was Saturday. On Monday the whole day would be taken up by the Sale and on Tuesday they broke up. Lessons had ended at midday and the rest of the day was spent in finishing up any oddments for the stalls. They had a short walk in the afternoon, as it was gloriously fine and no one would hear of their missing the chance of some outdoor exercise. They were back again by half past fifteen, however, and from then onwards, except for meals, they were all hard at it. This made it easy for Francie to go off by herself, even if Betsy had not forbidden her to have anything to do with the fun and awarded her a long poem to be learned by heart and repeated before she might be free.

Francie flounced off after the walk to get her poetry book and then marched up to the prefects’ room whither she had been bidden that Betsy might keep an eye on her and her doings. As she had not entirely lost her senses, she set to work on the poem, but it was with a very bad grace.

The other prefects were none too pleased about the whole affair, though they fully agreed with the Head Girl that Francie Wilford must be brought up with a sharp turn or goodness knew what she would be like next term! But to have her in with them was a nuisance. It meant that they had to watch their chatter and by degrees they departed to other sanctuaries and Betsy was left alone with the impenitent Francie who, nevertheless, was beginning to regret that she had not guarded her tongue more carefully. Not that she was prepared to tell the Head Girl so as yet. Her pride was too deeply touched for that. But it was very boring up here, with that poem to learn and only a very chilly Betsy for company.

Half-way through the time, Betsy received a summons to the study. She stood up.

“Stay here till I come back,” she said severely to the sinner. “I’ll hear you when I return.” Something in the sulky face made her add more gently, “If you can say a fair amount of it correctly, we’ll call it quits and I’ll cancel the rest.”

She departed after that and Francie was left alone. Her first reaction as the sound of Betsy’s footsteps died away down the corridor was to fling her book on the floor in a fit of childish temper.

“Pig!” she exclaimed aloud. “How I loathe that girl!”

Her next one was rather saner. She picked up the book and looked at the next verse. So far, she had managed to learn five verses of Alfred Noyes’s Sherwood. It was a pity that Betsy’s choice had fallen on this, for normally it was just the poem to appeal to Francie. As it was, she felt she never wanted to see it again. She found her place again and, urged thereto by Betsy’s final remark, set to work again.

Five minutes later, the door opened and Nina looked in.

“Oh, Katharine——” she began. Then she saw that the room was empty save for the sulky Francie, so she altered her words. “Oh, Francie, do you know where Katharine Gordon is? Miss Burnett wants her and I’ve looked pretty well everywhere and I can’t find her.”

“Haven’t the least idea,” Francie said without lifting her eyes from her book.

“Oh, dear! I thought she might just be here, though most of the other prees are scattered about, helping. I wonder if she’s gone to her dormy for anything?”

“I wouldn’t know so it’s no use asking me,” Francie mumbled. Then she intoned, “ ‘Oberon, Oberon, rake away the gold. Rake the—the gold——’ No that’s not it! Oh, bother! I’ll never learn the beastly thing!”

“What is it?” Nina asked, her curiosity aroused. What on earth was Francie Wilford doing in the prefects’ room, learning poetry when everyone else was hard at work for the Sale? “What is the poem? It sounds rather nice.”

“Well it isn’t, then!” Francie snapped. “Any poem’s beastly when it’s a punishment lesson!”

“That’s rot! Let me see it! I rather liked that line you repeated.” Nina stretched out her hand and took the book and began to read it aloud. She read well, for her father had been very particular in training her and she had a real feeling for poetry. Despite herself, Francie began to take an interest. Nina read it through to the end. Then she turned to the culprit with glowing face. “It’s a marvellous poem! It sings as it goes! It’s just asking to be set to music! Oh, I must have a shot at it some time!” She handed the book back. “There you are; buck up and learn it! It should be easy. Who wrote it? Alfred Noyes? Well, he can write most musicful poetry. I love that!”

She turned to the door and vanished in search of Katharine who eventually turned up in the handcrafts room where she had been helping two desperate people finish their raffia baskets. Meanwhile, Francie, roused quite out of her sullen mood by Nina’s enthusiasm about the poem, applied herself to the Oberon verse and by the time Betsy returned, jubilant over a big box of contributions to the Sale from Winifred Embury, she had mastered that and the next verse and was well away with the one that followed.

Betsy set down her big box and held out her hand for the book. “How far have you got?” she inquired as she took it.

“I’ve just begun the verse beginning, ‘Softly over Sherwood the south wind blows,’ ” Francie said, and the Head Girl gave her a quick look. The sullenness had left her voice and when she began to repeat the poem, she did it surprisingly well. The memory of Nina’s rendering helped her, though she still did not see what the elder girl had meant by saying that it was “musicful”.

“That’s quite good,” Betsy said as Francie reached the first two lines of the last verse and then stumbled over the third. “Very well; we’ll let that do.”

She handed back the book and Francie took it. But she seemed in no hurry to go.

“You may go now,” the Head Girl told her. “I said it would do.”

Francie wriggled violently and Betsy wondered what was coming. Then, with a very red face, the younger girl got out, “I’m—sorry!”

Betsy’s face lit up. All the severity left it and she was her puckish self again. “Good for you, Francie! That took some doing, I know. O.K. It’s done with! After to-morrow morning we’ll let it go. But do, for goodness’ sake, hold on to yourself and don’t cheek people or you may end with a bad row. Now you’d better run along. The bell will be ringing Kaffee und Kuchen in a minute and your hair’s positively wild!”

Francie left the room and went down to the splashery to tidy up. When she had finished, she glanced through the poem again. Finally, as the bell rang, she shook her head in bewildered fashion. “I don’t see what Nina was getting at. But she was right about one thing—it isn’t rot; it’s a jolly decent poem and I like it. I believe I’ll finish learning it, anyhow. May as well, now I’ve done so much.”

She shoved the book into her locker in complete defiance of rules and scudded off down the passage, hungry for her Kaffee und Kuchen.

Nina slipped out by the side entrance of the school and ran down the path which led across the school’s lawn, through the gate in the hedge and into the garden of Freudesheim. It was Saturday morning and most of the school was hard at work, preparing Hall for the Sale on Monday.

The men had been busy the night before, setting up the stalls and the section of merry-go-round which was to form the needlework stall. St. Mildred’s had undertaken this and they had laid claim to the affair from the start. As they had made it themselves, the rest had agreed that it was their right to have it, though members of more than one House sighed after it.

By the time Nina had decided to call it a day, Hall was rapidly becoming a very charming miniature Fair. The stage cottages had been set up at one side and decorated with sprays and streamers of the artificial roses used in Beauty and the Beast. Here, St. Clare’s were holding the toy stall, having “bagged” it with loud shrieks. Ste. Thérèse, who were responsible for produce, had demanded the school’s swingboats which had been brought out of their winter retirement in a shed and made beautiful with strips of crepe paper twisted round the rather shabby supports, while the roses from the “bushes” adorned the boats.

In the centre of the floor, they had set up the maypole which had its own stand. The long streamers of pink, blue, mauve and yellow ribbons had been spread out and tied to the tops of standing fences and here Nina had been in much demand, for she had a quick eye and, thanks to her, the colours alternated the whole way round in their correct order. Here, St. Agnes’s were having a cakes and sweets stall, with bags of sweets attached to the ribbons and shelves clipped on to the bars of the fences to hold the cakes.

^[11]Above the maypole stood the Wishing Well which had been made for the Fairy Tale Sale in Tirol and still went on, a hardy evergreen, to quote Miss Wilmot. There were no roses left to decorate it, but the Juniors were pacified by long trails of evergreens and clumps of stiff white paper lilies set round it at intervals.

St. Hilda were running a competitions’ booth in the opposite corner to the merry-go-round and everyone with any artistic capability had been set to painting pictures of wild animals to represent a menagerie. These had been pasted on to canvas and made a long, narrow room in which two trestle tables had been set up, while a large bucket adorned one end.

All in all, the girls had shown real ingenuity and when they were dressed in the costumes they had decided on, it would make a very gay show.

“I’ve slogged all the morning at it,” Nina said to herself as she crossed the garden at Freudesheim, making for the french windows of the Saal which opened on to the flower garden Joey had established at the side of the house. “I’m playing in the concert and I simply must put in some practice! I can’t play Chopin’s Tarantella just out of the blue, so to speak.”

She walked into the Saal and there found Joey’s friend and help, Beth Chester. All the Chester girls were good-looking, but Beth bore away the palm. Nina, with her passionate love of beauty in every form, always felt a certain satisfaction in gazing at Beth’s fresh loveliness of chestnut hair, violet eyes, perfect features and complexion and a certain grace and dignity of movement that added to her attractions. This morning, she heaved a sigh of pleasure, for Beth seemed lovelier than usual.

“She has a sort of—of shining look,” Nina said to herself.

“Hello!” Beth exclaimed. “Come to practise? I thought you’d all be up to the eyes in the Old English Fair. We’re expecting something marvellous, you know. This is something quite fresh and I take my hat off to the genius who thought it up.”

“The rest are, but I’ve got to practise,” Nina explained. “I have been helping all the morning up to Break and I’m helping again to-night when we fill the stalls, but I do want to polish up the Tarantella a little more.” Then she added anxiously, “It’s all right, isn’t it? Mrs. Maynard did say I might use her piano when I couldn’t have the one in Hall.”

“Oh, quite all right now,” Beth replied. “We’re expecting her home to-day, but I don’t suppose she’ll be coming till this afternoon. They want the room, you see, and she and Cecily are amazingly fit and she’ll go to bed when she comes, so they’re bringing her.”

“But whatever will she do with the hols next week?” Nina cried, forgetting her music for once. “All the kids will be home and you go back with Barbara and Nancy for Easter, so how will she manage?”

“I’m not going back for Easter this time,” Beth said shortly. “Is it likely? I’m staying for another three weeks, so you needn’t worry about Joey.”

“Jolly decent of you,” Nina said. “And when you do have your hols, everyone will be back at school. I hope they’ll be awfully good ones,” she added. Then she stared with a complete lack of manners, for Beth’s face went pinker and pinker till even her neck and pretty ears were glowing.

“Oh, bother you, Nina Rutherford!” she exclaimed at this point. “Go and get on with your practice and leave me and my affairs alone!” And she dashed out of the room. “Well!” Nina gasped, staring at the door which had slammed behind her. “What on earth’s wrong with her?”

She failed to solve the problem, so she took Beth’s advice and sat down at the piano. A few scales and arpeggii to loosen her fingers; then she started on the Tarantella and was lost to the world.

Meantime, Beth went up to her own room where she cooled off her cheeks at the open window before turning to her work basket and the bag of mending. She sat down with a frock of Felicity’s and began to mend a three-cornered rent with meticulous care though her mind was far away.

As for Nina, having settled in to her work, she thought of nothing else. She would, of course, play from memory on the Monday, but there were two or three cadenzas that were not clear enough for her liking and she set to work on them, reading the music first to fix them more securely in her memory, then playing them, at first, slowly, then faster, until they were right up to time and rippling from her fingers with perfect evenness, every note receiving its proper value.

This took half an hour. Then she closed the music and proceeded to play the whole thing right through, listening to herself as she had been taught, with an ear alert for any slips. Twice more she played it. Then she decided that she had done enough work on it for the moment and might enjoy it. She played it through once more with a look of relaxation and Beth, recovered from her blushes, heard her and dropped her work to listen with delight.

“How marvellously Nina plays!” she thought. “She ought to do something jolly good when her training’s finished. Those runs are just like running water.”

Nina finished and then drifted into Débussy’s Reflets Dans L’Eau which she played with a sensitiveness which spoke well for her understanding of the music. When it ended, there was a pause. Then she broke unto a simple little air. She played jerkily, pausing now and then, making slight alterations and then going on. The air itself remained the same, but the harmonies were changed again and again.

“What on earth is she playing at?” Beth wondered as she finished her darn and broke off the thread. “There, Felicity Josephine! That’s your frock mended and I hope you’ll manage to keep from ripping it like that again!”

She ran her needle into her needlebook, shook out the frock and folded it and then went to the night nursery to put it away. That done, she ran up to the playroom where Mike was enjoying himself with an elementary Meccano set, made sure that he was all right, and went down again to her own room. The twins were out with the young girl known to the family as “The Coadjutor”, but Mike had cut his knee in a fall the day before and his father had advised a day or two’s rest from walks.

Beth sat down by the window again and began to write a letter home. She was aware that Nina was still wrestling with whatever it was she was busy with.

“Queer, she seems to be making such a mull of it!” she muttered to herself. “I’d have said it was easy enough.”

Meanwhile, Nina was hard at work. It was a gay little thing, written in six-eight time, with something of the gentle swing of a cradle in the rhythm. It showed very definitely the influence of Débussy and Ravel in the harmonization, but the air owed nothing to anyone later than Mozart. It had a good deal of his tunefulness and gaiety. In fact, it was neither more nor less than a full-blown composition of her own, intended as a welcome to Joey’s youngest daughter. Nina had often composed before for her own amusement and she was fond of improvising. This was by far the most ambitious thing she had ever attempted. She had scribbled it out in the rough and now she was engaged on polishing it. Presently, she decided that the first phrase was more or less right, seized her fountain pen, tore out the rough and began to jot it down in its new form.

She was so absorbed in what she was doing, that she never heard the sudden stir and bustle outside, nor Beth’s light steps flying down the stairs. She finished what she was doing and then set the manuscript book on the desk and played the passage with eager affection. Yes; she had more or less got what she wanted, though it still needed more polishing.

Then the door of the Saal opened and there entered first, Beth with a beshawled bundle in her arms; then Dr. Maynard with an arm round his wife whose face was alight with laughter; lastly a nurse from the Sanatorium who had come to establish Joey in her home once more.

Nina was still considering her composition. She knew that it was immature and that no publisher would have looked at it for a moment. But she did feel that it was a foreshadowing of what she might do later on when she had worked hard at her theory of music and learned the lessons life teaches. She could see that, though she had no idea that it was all there, however childishly set down. And it is no wonder that when she heard the noise behind her, she turned with a dazed face. It was fully a minute before she took in what was happening. Then she sprang to her feet.

“Mrs. Maynard!” she cried. “Miss Chester said you weren’t coming till this afternoon!”

“I know,” Joey said as Jack carefully lowered her on to the big settee and the nurse hurried forward to arrange cushions. “Do let me alone, Nurse! I really am quite all right for the moment. Come here and kiss me, Nina, and then you shall see the treasure I’ve brought back with me. Beth, give me my baby, please.”

Beth came forward and laid the pink bundle in her arms while Nurse, with a word to the doctor, stood back for the moment. Joey tossed aside the shawl in which the baby was wrapped and then turned to eager Nina, the tiny black-curled head nestled against her, her hand and arm supporting the wee body with accustomed deftness.

“There! What do you think of my latest effort?” she asked proudly as Nina stooped to give her the requested kiss before kneeling down beside her.

“Oh, how tiny! And oh! what a perfect pet! Mrs. Maynard, she’s simply lovely!”

“Isn’t she just? Nurse, do stop hovering about me like that! I really am quite all right. I’m not tired in the least and I’m not an invalid any more and haven’t the least intention of being treated like one. I mean to have my lunch here and after that, I’ll go to bed if nothing else will serve you; but that’s all. Cecily is six and a half days old and I’ve been aching to show her to someone who isn’t family and here’s Nina all ready and to hand. Here; you can hold her for a minute, Nina, while they finish settling me. I can see in Nurse’s eye she’ll give me no peace till that’s done. Here you are! Don’t be afraid. She won’t break and she won’t wake for a while yet. She had her feed just before I left San.”

Nina took the small thing cautiously while Jack and the nurse between them got Joey properly settled on the settee.

“You may stay there till you’ve had a meal and a rest,” he said severely. “Then you go to bed and there you stay until Frank Peters gives you leave to get up. Can’t have Cecily upset just because you choose to be pig-headed!”

Joey made a face at him. “We’ll see about that! I can manage Frank Peters any day in the week. Give her back, Nina. I’m safe now.”

Nina put the baby carefully into her mother’s arms. “Thank you most awfully, Mrs. Maynard. I never held a baby before. I’m just thrilled to know I’m the first in the school to do it!”

“Except her sisters,” Joey said laughing. “They have each nursed her, of course. But they’re accustomed to it by this time. You’re the first girl apart from them, though.”

Nurse and Beth had left the room now and Nina sat down on the floor by the settee.

“The girls will be thrilled to know you’re home again,” she said. “Some of them have been planning to pay you lots of visits when you came back to Freudesheim. We couldn’t do it with San three miles away. Here, we can see you and Cecily as often as we’re let.”

“And that won’t be at all for a day or two,” Jack said with an eye on his wife. “What were you playing when we came, Nina? Something new isn’t it?”

Nina reddened. “It—it’s just—something I was composing for—Cecily,” she said shyly. “A little welcome to her—at least, that’s what it’s called.”

“Not really?” Joey’s eyes left the baby’s face to rest delightedly on Nina’s. “Oh, my dear, how decent of you! Go and play it again so that we can hear it. And then—well then, I rather think they’ll make me rest, whether I want to or not, and you’ll have to go.”

“It’s still only in the rough,” Nina said, getting up and going to the piano again. “There’s lots to do to it yet. It won’t disturb her, will it?”

“Most unlikely at this stage. And anyway, all our babies learn very soon to sleep through anything,” Joey answered, laughing. “As for telling the others I’ve come home, don’t give me away just yet, Nina. I’d have been at San for another four or five days if they hadn’t needed my room so badly. But it was wanted—for your cousin, actually—and we’ve both got on so well, they said I might come home to-day. But just for the next few days we’re going to be very quiet, Cecily and I, to give her a good start in life. In fact,” she added with a sudden grin, “you’re having the start of everyone unless any of the people staying on in Switzerland come along to see us in the hols. You break up on Tuesday and I shan’t be having any ordinary visitors by then.”

“Oh, I won’t say a word,” Nina promised earnestly as she went to the piano and sat down.

She played the little composition through and the Maynards listened in silence. When she had finished, Joey called her. “Come here, Nina! My dear girl, that’s a lovely little thing and when Cecil’s old enough, she’ll thank you herself for such a jolly welcome. In the meantime, go ahead with your composing. You have the root of the matter in you. It’ll be hard work. Often enough you’ll feel as if you’d never get what you want. I know! It’s often that way with my books. But it’ll come some day and some day the school is going to be very proud of you.”

It was the first encouragement Nina had had from any outsider and she flushed and tears pricked the backs of her eyes. “Do you really think so? Oh, how glad I’d be! But I’m not the first Chalet girl to compose. There’s Jacynth Hardy—and hasn’t Margia Stevens composed some lovely songs?”

“She has. I sing some of them. But I rather think you’re going to go much farther than either of them,” Joey said quietly. “You won’t stop short at songs and short pieces. I think you have it in you to go much, much farther than that. Now you must go back to school. You’re having Mittagessen, aren’t you? Or will the sight of our fifth girl do you for to-day?” She had suddenly become her usual teasing self.

Nina gasped. “Heavens! I forgot all about it! I’ll be frightfully late if I don’t fly at once!”

She grabbed up her music, thrust it into its case, snatched up her coat and beret and made for the french windows. “Good-bye, and thank you more than I can say for being so awfully kind and understanding!”

“Thank you for a lovely welcome home!” Joey said promptly. “Come and see Cecily later on during the holidays, Auntie Nina. I know you’re staying at Montreux and you’ll be coming up to see Alix, so don’t pass us by!”

Nina flushed again but a lump was in her throat so she merely waved and fled, so happy over Joey’s comments and the title awarded to her so unexpectedly, that she was afraid of crying just then.

Nurse arrived a minute later, bearing a tray and Beth came with her to move up a small table and take the baby with a kiss on the feathery curls that smelt so fragrantly of violet powder, and Joey sat up with a look of interest.

“I hope you’ve given me something solid! I’m ravenous after all this! Roast chicken, no less, and very nice, too! Beth, when I’ve had my meal, I’ll go to bed and when you’ve had yours, you can bring Mike and the twins to my room to see me. I shan’t be asleep till I’ve seen them. Run along, all of you, and have your meal. You’ll be seeing plenty of me now you’ve got me back and a meal is a meal, any day!”

But that evening, when Nurse had finished her duties and returned to the Sanatorium and Beth, with shining eyes and happy smile, was writing a long letter to a certain young man, Joey looked up at her husband, who had just come in from his job and was having a peaceful last-minute chat with her before going to bed himself, and said, “You know, Jack, it’s all rather marvellous. When I first saw Nina, I thought I’d never seen such a poor little misery in my life. Now she’s happy, even though the grief for her father is still there in the background. She feels that she isn’t standing alone any longer. She’s met with sympathy and understanding over her music which the Rutherfords, with all their goodness, couldn’t quite give her. It’s set her back on her balance and believe me, balance was what she needed when she first came.”

“You’ve said it!” he replied from the far side of the crib where he had been inspecting his new daughter critically. “Yes; you’re right. Nina should go ahead now. But she has a heavy load to carry, poor girl! Genius is a gift I shouldn’t like to think had been wished on this youngster of ours, for instance. Nina Rutherford is going to need all the help she can get from everyone.”

“Oh, well, she’ll get it from the Emburys from what I can hear. He is very musical and from what I remember of her, Winnie is a kind creature who will do her best. As for the Rutherfords, it’s just a jolly good thing the Emburys have turned up. With poor Alix in her present condition, the Rutherfords won’t have much time to spare for a cousin they’ve practically only just met. Yes; I know the same thing applies, only more so, to Winnie and her Martin; but they haven’t the awful anxiety Sir Guy and Lady Rutherford are enduring just now. I only hope Alix begins to pull up, once she’s here.”

“I can’t tell you that till we’ve seen her. However, that should be any day now. Meantime, as you say, they don’t have to worry about Nina. She’s provided for.”

“Thank goodness!” Joey rejoined.

“As you say. And now, it’s after twenty-two o’clock and this girl seems disposed to sleep, so suppose you follow her example. I know you’re very well but if you overtire yourself, she’s going to make a nice fuss about it to-morrow. Good-night, sweetheart. Yell for me if you want me during the night.”

“Not very likely,” Joey returned as they kissed. “I’m half asleep as it is and most of what I might say will be in my sleep.” She released him and sighed deeply. “Oh, how nice it is to get back to my own room and my own bed again! And with the duckiest baby I’ve had yet to show for everything! God bless you, my Jack!”

Her long lashes fell and she was asleep by the time he had finished tucking her up. He chuckled as he went to his dressing-room. “Nice to be back again, bless her! It’s even nicer to me to have her back. Heigh-ho! How I do miss the woman when she’s out of the house! Even Freudesheim doesn’t seem quite the happy home it is when she’s in it with all her alarms and excursions!”

“Nan, Miss Annersley wants to see you in the study In before Frühstück—now, if you’re ready, she says.”

Nan Herbert looked up from the handkerchiefs she was sorting to see if she could find one that was fitting for Sunday morning, and stared blankly at Nina who had been sent with the message. “She wants to see me?” she said blankly.

“That’s what she said.”

“Oh! Well, thank you, Nina.” But when Nina had left the room to go down to the commonroom at Ste. Thérèse’s whither she had been bound when the Head, emerging from her own private quarters, had caught her, she turned to the other three prefects who shared Wisteria dormitory with her to demand, “What on earth can the Head want with me at this hour? I’ve done nothing that I’m aware of to be sent for with such a ‘Dilly-Dilly-Duck, come-and-be-killed!’ message! What’s it all in aid of?”

“You sound as if you had a blackly guilty conscience,” Blossom Willoughby grinned.

“I can assure you I haven’t. I’ve been leading the most blameless life possible lately—not that I ever did get into many wild scrapes, anyhow.”

“Perhaps you’ve murdered someone in your sleep and left the corpse in the study together with your name-taped hanky and the Head wants to know what you mean by it!” Hilary Wilson suggested with a deep chuckle.

“Not so far as I know. This’ll do, I think!—and——Oh!” A sudden idea had come to Nan. “I wonder! It just might be!”

“What do you wonder?” Sybil Russell, the fourth member of the dormitory demanded. “Do stop being cryptic, Nan, and tell us what you think.”

“Never you mind! If I’m right, you’ll hear all about it before long.” Nan put the three or four handkerchiefs left out from packing back into her drawer, glanced round her little domain to make sure that everything was in order and then made for the door, saying sweetly, “Curiosity killed the cat, you know. You can possess your little souls in patience. Just think what pretty faces you’ll have as a result!”

Then she fled before the other three could think of any fitting reprisals.

Down the main staircase she went as was her prefect’s privilege, across the entrance hall and along the passage to the door of the study where she paused before the old oak-framed mirror hung on the opposite wall to make sure that neither hair nor attire had suffered in her headlong flight. The Head had an unpleasant trick of raising her eyebrows at you if you appeared before her looking untidy. While she was twisting and turning, the door opened and Miss Annersley herself appeared, looking very trim and fresh in her charming gown of coral-pink woollen material. Every hair of the gleaming waves that framed her well-cut face was in place and she smiled broadly as she surveyed Nan’s antics before the mirror.

“There you are, Nan! You’re quite tidy, my dear, so come along in. I’ve something here for you. You’ve just time to inspect it before the bell rings for Frühstück.”

She led the way into the study and pointed to the ottoman couch standing across one of the windows. On it were set out piles of slim magazines with the school badge printed in crimson and silver on its bright blue cover, the words, The Chaletian, crowning the badge.

“The magazine!” Nan cried as she ran across the room to pick up a copy and look at it. “My very first effort! When did they come, Miss Annersley?”

“By the last train yesterday. You were all busy on the stalls, so I decided to unpack them and leave them here, ready for this morning. I knew you all had as much as you could do to get the stalls ready before bedtime. As I told you yesterday, we can’t have our own special service this morning as Mr. Lord has had to go to England on business, so that means attending the ordinary one at eleven o’clock. We needn’t leave school till half past ten and the Catholics have Mass at the same time as our service to-day, so we can all go together. That will give you people plenty of time to have a ‘first skim’ between bed-making and Church. And there will be no service at all this evening, so you will have that time, too. I’m glad they’ve come in time for the Sale after all! We generally make quite a good sum out of them.”

Nan was paying no heed to this. She was eagerly looking at her first attempt at editing. Miss Annersley smiled to herself. She knew all about it and she could sympathize with the girl. She remembered how another girl, more than thirty years ago, had been equally thrilled by the sight of her first magazine.

The sound of the first bell for Frühstück roused Nan from her absorption. “Oh, I’m so glad it’s come at last!” she said fervently. “Doesn’t it look nice, Miss Annersley?”

“Very nice,” the Head replied warmly. “And you’ve given us a pleasant surprise, Nan. Oh, yes; I read it from cover to cover before I went to bed last night. You didn’t expect me to resist that temptation, did you?”

Nan laughed happily. “I’m certain I couldn’t have done it myself,” she acknowledged. “It’s just as well you held them back, Miss Annersley.”

“That’s rather what I thought,” Miss Annersley said pensively. “Well, the first bell has gone, so you must put that down now and go on duty. Bring some of the others along here after you’ve finished your cubicle work and then you can collect them and distribute the House copies at once. We’ll put the rest on the book stall in the morning. If I’m not here, just come in and take them.”

Nan laid down the copy reluctantly and went to take her duty in the Speisesaal. But her radiant face could hardly escape notice and her peers were full of curiosity to know what had happened.

“If you wait long enough, you’ll see,” she replied primly.

“But I don’t want to wait,” Betsy Lucy said plaintively. “I want to know why you’re looking as if someone had left you half a million all at once.”

Nan laughed. “That’s so likely to happen, isn’t it?” she said derisively. “Millionaires or even half-millionaires don’t go floating around in our family. It’s no use fussing, Betsy. The Head said after we’d finished our cubeys, so you’ll have to wait till then.”

That finished it, of course. Katharine Gordon changed the subject to the prospects of next term’s tennis and the prefects talked tennis solidly for the rest of the meal. But once they had made their beds, dusted their cubicles and put everything in order, there was no holding them. The St. Hild prefects, of which House she was an ornament, swarmed round Nan, demanding to be told the secret now!

She laughed. “What excitement! It’s only that The Chaletian has come after all. They arrived last night but the Head thought we’d give the stalls the go-by if we knew, so she kept it very dark. But she let me see them and she said when we’d finished all the cubicle work, we might go and get the copies for the Houses and distribute them. Come on! We’ll call in on the others as we go along and fetch them along with us.”

No one needed to be told that twice. They crowded after her, pausing at each House as they went on to Ste. Thérèse’s, which was the school house as well, and picking up the other members of their body. When they tapped at the study door, they got no answer, so Nan, strong in the Head’s final remarks, opened the door and they went in. Everyone made a beeline for the ottoman, but the editor was there before them.

“No peeping here!” she ordered. “The Head might land at any moment, and so might Bill, and a nice set of idiots we’d look if they found us. It’s O.K. to come in and collect what we want; but it’s definitely not O.K. to stand around reading. Come on! Miss Dene has been busy sorting them out. She’s tied up the bundles for each House and labelled them. Betsy, here’s Ste. Thérèse’s. Carola, St. Clare’s for you. Here you are, Katt; these are St. Agnes’. These are ours. I don’t know what we can do about St. Mildred’s. I suppose someone will be coming along to pick them up after Church. The rest are for the stall. Now clear out, everyone! Scram—scamper—vamoose!”

They surged forth with their armfuls of Chaletians, hurrying off to distribute them among the others. No one had far to go, for all bedroom work was done by this time and the girls had gone to the House commonrooms to wait until it was time to get ready for Church. Everyone was thrilled when they saw the blue piles, for everyone had been afraid that the magazine would arrive too late for the Sale. It should have come at least a week ago, but trouble at the printers had held it up and the girls had resigned themselves to having to do without it for the Sale at any rate.

“Better late than never!” Prunella Davidson remarked as she took her copy. “It really is a blessing it’s arrived. It would have been ghastly if it hadn’t come till Tuesday, say. We’d have got ours all right, but all the extra copies we ordered for the Sale would have been a dead loss. I hope you all realize that!”

“Don’t mention it!” Mary-Lou exclaimed. “—Though I expect quite a lot of people would have left orders for it,” she added. “Still, it’s not the same thing.”

“It certainly isn’t!” Hilary Wilson who, with Betsy Lucy and Sally Winslow were the prefects at Ste. Thérèse’s, spoke severely. “Do you people understand that in that case, we should have had to find the postage extra?”

“Well, thank goodness we’re spared that,” Betsy remarked as she handed the copies out. “Here you are Mary-Lou. Verity—Nina—got yours, Jo? Will your mother want one again, or will she share yours?”

“She’ll want her own, of course,” Jo replied, “especially if the thing about Kenya that I sent is in. I wouldn’t put it past Dad to demand one on his own account, either.”

She scuttled off to seek a quiet corner and hunt through to see if the said article had been accepted or not, and Betsy gave out the few remaining and went off with the other two to the prefects’ room to read her own copy in peace.

For minutes there was silence in the commonroom except for the rustling of turning pages and occasional exclamations as the girls discovered whose contributions were in. This was always something that could not be known until the magazine arrived in all its glory. All contributions went to the editor who sorted them—generally assisted by any of the other prefects she chose to co-opt. When they had mulled over everything and made their choice, all they had picked out were put into one heap and taken to the mistress in charge of The Chaletian—Miss Derwent at present. They usually selected a good deal more than could finally be used for funds were limited and printing is costly everywhere, these days. The mistress went through that lot herself, first. She, also, was apt to call on her friends for help and it was as well that some of the aspiring authors never heard the staff’s remarks on their efforts!

When that had been done and the mistress had made her decisions, she summoned the editor, the Head Girl and the Second prefect and discussed everything with them. Finally, the sheaf that remained was handed over to Miss Dene who sent it to the printers and also saw to correcting the proofs when they arrived. The remainder was packed up and put into a closet in stockroom in case material ever ran short later on. It had happened only twice during all the years The Chaletian had been running and, warned by what had happened on the first occasion, everyone had seen to it that it never occurred again. Sundry school essays had had to be pressed into service then and even so, the result had been a very slim magazine.

Anyone who had had anything to do with the final choices was under bond not to tell anything to anyone and the girls generally awaited the arrival of their magazine with a good deal of impatience. But for the fact that the half-term trips had had to be postponed that term, owing to the weather, there would have been a good deal more fuss about its delay in arriving before this.

On this occasion, Mary-Lou opened her copy with a good deal of trepidation. Not only had she sent in an account of a visit she and Verity had paid during the Christmas holidays to St. Moritz, but she had calmly helped herself to a short composition of Nina’s—a song—without the gifted composer’s knowledge, and sent that in as well. She had had one or two twinges of conscience on the subject after she had done it. Nina was admittedly not an easy-going creature and for once in her self-assured life, Mary-Lou had had spasms of wondering if she had done the right thing. Nina might very well resent the liberty. But Mary-Lou knew well enough that nothing would have induced her to send it in herself and, as she remarked to Verity, the one person to know of her action, when they had a composer in the school, it was a pity if The Chaletian couldn’t profit by it! If nothing came of it, well and good! No one would be any the wiser—or at any rate, Nina wouldn’t, which was what mainly mattered! But if it had gone in then everyone would know, including Nina, and goodness only knew how she would take it!

“Oh, well, she can’t eat me!” Mary-Lou told her sister by marriage as they sat together, each looking through the magazine. “I only hope she’s pleased and not mad!”

“I still think you ought to have asked her,” Verity responded. “It was cheek on your part, Mary-Lou. Still, you generally do get away with all sorts of cheek,” she added as she turned a page. “Oh, here’s your article, anyhow! Doesn’t it look nobby?”

“Not so bad,” Mary-Lou agreed in carefully subdued tones, though her cheeks were flushed and her eyes had lit up. It was the first time she had ever troubled the magazine with any effort of hers and it was gratifying to know that it had passed muster.

“Mother and Dad will be awfully pleased,” Verity said, as she skimmed through it. “It reads better in print than it did in your scrawl.”

“Shut up, ass!” was Mary-Lou’s response to this. “Here’s a short story by Betsy. It’s a Guernsey legend, it says. What’s next? Oh, a sonnet by Nan Herbert. I say! I’d no idea she could write like this! It’s rather decent, isn’t it?”

An exclamation from Nina who was sitting at a nearby table made Mary-Lou and Verity both look at her. Her face was pink and her eyes were bright with excitement.

“Oh—oh! However did they get hold of this?”

At the same time, Bess Appleton called across the room, “I say, Nina, how simply gorgeous of you! I don’t believe we’ve ever had music in the mag before! Doesn’t it look lovely? How does the tune go? Play it for us, won’t you? And Verity can sing it. I say, you people, have you seen? Nina has a song in the mag—words and music! It’s on page twenty-five. Look! Do let us hear it properly, Nina!”

The room rang with their delighted exclamations.

“That’s something!” Hilary exclaimed. “One up to our House! Oh, yes, Nina! We simply must hear it! Where’s Verity?”

“But—I can’t think how it got there!” Nina cried in bewildered tones. “I never sent it in! It never dawned on me to do so.” She regarded the page with gratified eyes. “How nice it looks to see it in print!” She suddenly woke up to the fact that everyone was demanding to hear it and the flush in her face deepened. “It’s only quite a little thing, you know. I—it would never have been published by any proper music publisher.”

“Never mind that! It’s in the mag, at any rate,” Hilary said, “and we want to hear it. Play it through for us, Nina, do! There’s a gem! Verity can sing it for you all right. She can read music easily enough.”

Verity herself came forward. “Oh, Nina, I’m so glad! Shall we try it and let the rest hear it? I can read it all right. It sounds lovely to me.”

Nina got up and went over to the piano she never touched as a rule, since the girls thumped on it regardless when they wanted to dance or have community singing. She sat down and began to play the four bars that made up the prelude. Verity had gone with her and now she sang in the lark-like voice that was her great gift. The listening girls were enthralled. Most of them had not enough musical knowledge to realize that Nina had been quite right in her statement. It was pretty enough, but too slight for any publisher to bother with it. But, as with the Welcome to Cecily, everything she was to do in the future was foreshadowed in it. And however much she might publish in the future, it is hard so say if she would feel prouder over it than she did over that simple canzonette published in the school magazine.

“Are the words yours as well?” Prunella asked when it had ended and they had exhausted every laudatory adjective they could think of. “I don’t know them at all.”

Nina shook her head. “No; they’re Herrick’s. I read it when I was looking up a quotation in general literature and loved them. They sang that air in my head and I scribbled it down in a hurry and forgot it. I found it at half-term—the proper half-term, I mean, and I spent my free time polishing it. But I still don’t understand how it got there. I lost it——” Her eyes had been wandering round them as she spoke and now they lighted on Mary-Lou’s face. That young woman, however much she tried, could not help looking conscious and Nina was down on her at once. “Mary-Lou Trelawney! It was you!”

Now that the secret was out, Mary-Lou was her own woman again. “Yes, it was me,” she assented. “I found it on the floor in our formroom one morning and I was awfully struck with it—words and music——”

“Thought you didn’t learn?” Hilda Jukes interjected at this point.

“No more I do. But Verity does. I gave it to her and made her play it to me. Then I thought what a gorgeous lift up it would be all round if we could get it into The Chaletian. But I knew I hadn’t a Chinaman’s chance of coaxing you to send it. So I spent all one evening copying it out—and believe me, it took all one evening! How do you do it, Nina?—because it was filthy from kicking about the floor and I couldn’t send it in like that. Then I just shoved it into the box Nan had put for contributions at the back of the daïs in Hall. After that, I could only wait.” She paused and eyed Nina. “You—you don’t mind, do you, Nina? I know it was cheek—and I’ll apologize for that if you want me to—but you don’t really mind, do you?”

“Mind? When she can do a perfectly smashing thing like that for the House? Of course she doesn’t!” Lesley cried.

“And for the school, too,” added Hilary. “For it’s one up to the school as well as to the House. We all feel that, Nina.”

And if Nina had felt that Mary-Lou had taken rather much on herself, in the face of all that, she would have had to forget it. As a matter of fact, in the thrill of seeing her own music in print for the first time, she didn’t even think that she had anything to forgive, as she assured Mary-Lou vehemently. Indeed, her first feeling was one of deepest gratitude, for she knew that the other girl was right and she herself would never have dreamed of sending it in. It had been done for her, however, and she was a very joyful girl as she cried, “Forgive you? Oh, indeed, I can only thank you! You’ve proved yourself a true friend, Mary-Lou, and I’m as grateful to you as I can be!”

“Hello—hello!—Oh, is that you, Rosalie? Can I speak to Miss Annersley, please?—Yes; I’ll hold on!” Miss Wilson—“Bill”, to most folk at the Chalet School—chuckled to herself as she waited. Then she heard the receiver lifted and the next moment, her great friend and co-Head spoke agitatedly.

“Nell Wilson! What on earth do you want with me at this ungodly hour? Do you know that it’s only ten past seven? What have you got to say that can’t wait till nine? Don’t tell me that any of your lambs have developed measles or chicken-pox at the last moment! That would be too awful!”

Bill chuckled long and loud before she replied. “Nothing of the kind—or if they have, Gertrude Rider’s said nothing to me about it which would be most reprehensible in any decent school matron. No; it’s nothing like that. All I want is to ask you to have one of the smaller trestle tables set up somewhere or other. Never mind why! That can wait until we meet. You do as I ask and possess your soul in patience.”

“You tantalizing creature! Am I to know nothing?”

“Not a thing till the proper time!” Bill giggled like one of her own charges.

“Aggravating object! Oh, very well. Rosalie is fully-dressed and she can see to it. I’m still in my dressing-gown. Is that all you want?”

“Absolutely all—Yes, Gill? What is it? Oh! All right! I’ll tell her!—Hilda, Gill Culver says you’d better use the strongest you have left, so be careful. We don’t want any collapses and subsequent smashes.”

“What is all this in aid of? You’re being unpleasantly mysterious, my dear!”

“You wait till you see! You’ll be ready to yell with delight!”

“I hope I have more sense of propriety than that!” Miss Annersley retorted. But she was talking to the empty air, for Bill had hung up and she was left to lament to Rosalie Dene, “I do wish people wouldn’t spring surprises on me first thing in the morning!”

“Why not?” Rosalie demanded as well as she could for laughing.

“Because I don’t feel able to cope until I’m decently dressed. You heard what she said, didn’t you, Rosalie? Run along and pick out the sturdiest of the small trestles and get someone to help you to set it up, will you? You have the keys to Hall, I know. Mind you lock the door behind you when you come out. I will not have the girls wandering in until after Prayers!”

“You forbade it last night,” her secretary reminded her.

“I know I did, but some of those young monkeys of Junior Middles will certainly forget unless they find the whole place locked against them. I must fly! I don’t want anyone to catch me like this. Thank goodness I have my own private staircase at this end!”

She gathered up the folds of her dressing-gown and went off to finish dressing. Miss Dene sorted out one of the keys to Hall from the bunch in a drawer of her desk and departed to the storeroom where spare trestle-tables were kept to make selection of the stoutest she could find and then to the remedials room to beg the help of Miss Burnett, the P.T. mistress, in carrying it to Hall and setting it up.

“What’s it for?” that young woman inquired as they made sure that the legs were safe.

“Not the foggiest! Bill rang up to demand it and apparently Gill Culver insisted on having the strongest we could produce. That’s all I can tell you. Oh, well, it isn’t long till nine o’clock now. Should we find some sort of covering for it, do you think?”

“Did Bill ask for anything?” Peggy Burnett asked doubtfully.

“Not that I heard.”

“Then I should think we’d better leave it alone. Probably she’s bringing everything they want for it with her.”

“Then that’s all. Come along! The girls will be down presently and if they see us in here, we shall have them tumbling in on us and the Head said no one was to come in till after Prayers.” Rosalie marched her friend out of Hall and locked the door securely behind them. “There! That’ll hold them! I must go! See you later!” And she hurried back to the office to deal with the mailbag which had come just before the telephone rang.

Meanwhile, the girls were beginning to come downstairs. Rules were more or less in abeyance to-day and no one waited for the first bell before she left her dormitory. As soon as anyone was ready, with bed stripped and cubicle in the correct order, she shot off downstairs. By the time Frühstück came, the school was seething with excitement and Miss Annersley had to sound her bell on the staff table five separate times to ask for a little less noise!

After Frühstück, they rushed upstairs to get through the dormitory work in short order and then they had to get ready for their early morning walk. The Head had insisted on this, for it would be the only chance any of them would have of outdoor exercise that day. The official opening of the Sale was to be at eleven and from then onwards they would all be hard at it. Granted that it would probably close at seventeen o’clock; they then had to have Kaffee und Kuchen and after that would come the excitement of reckoning up the takings. By the time that was over, it would be nearly nineteen o’clock and that meant Abendessen. After Abendessen would come Prayers and then bed which was always early for everyone the last night of term. Most of them had the long journey to England next day and even when they had landed, quite a number of them had several more hours of train travel. Therefore, early bed, even for the prefects!

It was a glorious spring day with bright sunshine, fresh breezes and a blue sky, lightly flecked with little white clouds. It was true that Blossom Willoughby’s foreboding had come true and the lawns were veritable seas of mud so that “Tilting at the Ring” must be carried on in the gym; but they had all expected this to happen, so no one was unduly upset.

“It’s easy enough to manage,” Blossom said cheerfully to Sybil Russell when they talked it over. “We can clip those sticks to the ribstalls and the boom and so on, and the roller-skates will be just as much fun if not more so than the bikes.”

For the Head had declined to let them use bicycles in the gym and they had been afraid they must give up the idea until some genius suggested that if they could borrow some pairs of roller-skates, that would do just as well.

The walk lasted the usual half-hour and when they came in they had to rush to change into their dresses for the Fair. However, they were ready by nine o’clock, by which time the St. Mildred girls had arrived and there were joyful reunions between sisters and cousins and friends before the bell rang and they had to go to Prayers. What none of them knew was that as soon as the last girl was safely in either the Speisesaal or the gym, Miss Wilson who had begged off for once, Dr. Maynard and Dr. Graves from the Sanatorium who had been hovering about outside, and Beth Chester, sent by Joey, carefully unloaded a bulky article from Dr. Graves’ convertible and carried it between them into Hall where a green baize cloth was flung over the trestle-table after it had been moved out into the middle of the floor. Then the article was heaved up by the four and the dust-sheet which had enveloped it was removed. When it was finally set out, they all stood back and chuckled in unison.

“It’s a wonderful thing,” Jack Maynard said. “Tom’s outdone herself this time. I should think you’d need a new size in hats, Nell, for she really has done you all proud this time.”

“And the beauty of it is,” remarked Miss Wilson, “that no one but our noble selves knows anything about it. My girls were all bemoaning the fact that Tom left last summer so there could be no competition this year. I didn’t know she meant to do anything about it myself until the huge packing-case arrived last night and Gill Culver and I opened it between us. Gill danced a jig of delight!”

“What’s the competition?” Dr. Graves asked curiously.

“Guessing the sum it makes,” she replied.

“A really new idea,” Beth said. “I wonder we never thought of it before.”

“Thank goodness we didn’t!” Miss Wilson said thankfully. “We’ve rung most of the changes already, I think.”

“Joey will be biting her finger-ends because she can’t come when I tell her about it,” that lady’s husband observed. “But Frank Peters is keeping her in bed all next week, so she’s had it this time. I’ll tell you what, though!” as a sudden idea struck him. “You hold the fort and I’ll dash home and get my kodak and take some snaps for her. Better lock the doors after me, though. Prayers can’t go on forever and those kids will be swarming in here as soon as they’re over.”

“That’s a good idea! I’d like some snaps myself. Give five taps when you come back so that I know it’s you—and hurry up!” Miss Wilson ordered.

He fled and she locked the door after him, sending Dr. Graves to guard the bottom one. He arrived back just as a hum of voices told them that Prayers were over and the school would be on them in full force in a minute or two. She let him in and locked the door again. Then he set to work and made five exposures, by which time various people were demanding to know why Hall was still locked up! The exasperated chorus outside warned them that the school’s patience was wearing thin. Finally he said he had enough.

“That’s O.K. now. Some of those ought to be all right. Let ’em in before they begin to tear the doors down!” Then he retired to the daïs to see the fun.

Bill opened the doors and fled after him, pursued by the other two and they stood watching eagerly. They had moved the table below the swingboats where Ste. Thérèse’s had their produce. Mary-Lou was well in the van as might be expected. She raced to the spot and then stopped short with a shriek of surprise that drew everyone’s attention.

“Look!” she cried. “Look at that! We’ve got our doll’s house after all! Where did it come from? How did it get here? When did it come?”

“It’s more gorgeous than ever!” Betsy exclaimed as she rushed to inspect it. “Just look at that wizard balcony outside the first-floor windows!”

“Oh, and see the little tiles!” added her sister Julie. “Nancy—Bride! Had you any idea Tom meant to weigh in as usual?”

“None whatsoever!” Bride Bettany replied as she bent over it. “Hi! Stop pushing! You nearly had me on top of it then!”

“But Tom’s not here,” Nancy Chester cried. “Or is she?” She looked round eagerly.

The staff, as Miss Wilson did not fail to tell them later, were every bit as bad as the girls. They stood on tiptoe, trying to peer over the bobbing heads of their pupils and exclaimed as loudly as anyone. She decided to put an end to it. She rapped on the lectern with the chisel she had been carrying and the sudden sharp sound brought them all round in a hurry.

“Tom is not here,” she said with a twinkling look at Nancy, whose clear tones had carried above the rest of the noise. “She sent the house, though, and with it a letter which I’ll read to you now if you can all manage to stop this wild screaming and listen.”

There was instant silence and she produced a big sheet covered with Tom Gay’s dashing hand.

“Hello, School!” it began. “Sorry I can’t be with you this minute but it just can’t be done. However, here’s the house as usual—and I’ll bet you’re all yelling your heads off about it. Only wish I could be a fly on the wall to hear you!

“I always meant to do it, and Mother and Dad and some pals rallied round to help with the furnishings, etc. The comp is to guess exactly how much it makes. I’m leaving it to the Heads to fix the price for entering and I should say it had better include some odd centimes to make things more difficult. It’s not exactly interesting, I know, but I couldn’t think of anything else. Hope it makes a packet, anyhow!

“Tell young Con from me that she’d better give it a miss this time. She won that one just before they all went to Canada and she got last year’s. I know she handed that one over to Leila Elstob, poor kid; but the principle’s the same. Tell her she’ll give everyone else an inferiority complex if she has a shot!

“How is young Leila, by the way? You’re a rotten lot of correspondents! Some of you buck up and write and give me all the hanes. It’ll be hols after this, so you haven’t any excuse if you don’t.

“Haven’t time for more now. Good luck to the Sale and good luck to you all! Tom.”

Nancy Chester, sister of Barbara Chester and a cousin of the Lucys, jumped on to a chair. “Everyone! Three cheers for Tom!” she shouted. “She’s done us proud this time!”

The cheers were given with a will. Then Miss Annersley, who had made her way to the daïs to join her co-Head, clapped her hands for silence—and got it at once.

“I know you all want a chance to see the house properly,” she said. “Get into line and you shall all march past for an inspection. Quickly, please! Time’s flying and our first visitors will be here before long now. Juniors first; then the rest in proper order. St. Mildred’s last. Make haste!”

Hustled by the rest of the staff, they lined up quickly and the Juniors led the way.

“Who’s Tom?” Nina asked Mary-Lou in an undertone as they waited for their turn.

“Tom Gay. She left last summer to go to Oxford. She always made us a house every year from the first term she was here for the Sale. The first two, we had to guess the name—they were ‘Tomadit’ and ‘Sacarlet’—the next we had to guess the different materials used and Con Maynard got most. The next year, she made a model village. Then we came out here and last year it was a chalet and you had to guess the number of things that really worked—like the doors opening and the windows, and things like that. Con got it again. That kid’s a perfect wonder!”

Hilary, who was listening, chimed in. “Tom wasn’t in the least like a girl. Her dad brought her up like a boy and she stayed like a boy, even after she came here—to the school, I mean. She was wizard. We all liked Tom! She loathed sewing and things like that, but she’d had lessons in carpentry and woodwork and she made marvellous things. She never used nails. All her things dovetail—Oh, we’re moving at last. We’ll tell you the rest later.”

They were indeed moving and now they came to rest before the house.

Tom had done them proud! The house stood four feet high, and was three feet long and three feet deep. It opened on all sides and the front not only had the little balcony Betsy had noticed, but there were four steps leading up to the front door which opened and shut. The roof was made out of tiny shingles, painted red to simulate tiles. Tom must have put in hours of work on them, for each was fixed separately. The windows were sash windows and pushed up and down in the proper way. There were three sitting-rooms and a kitchen on the ground floor; a drawing-room over the dining-room and the little hall; three bedrooms finished off that floor and in the roof were an attic bedroom, day and night nurseries and a storeroom which contained tiny trunks made out of jeweller’s boxes. The staircase went up with two half-landings and on one was a bathroom. Underneath the house was a garage with sliding doors containing a clockwork car and a coal cellar stocked with shining black beads for coal. It was fully furnished, down to carpets, pictures and even electric lights, for Tom had fixed a bell battery to one side which you could switch on and off. The one snag was that when it was on, the whole house was lighted up.

“How on earth did Tom manage that?” Bride Bettany asked, awestruck.

They learnt later that one of the boys in the Boys’ Club run by her father’s church was an electrician by trade and he had seen to it for her. Her parents had helped when they could, and various friends had done all the needlework part for her. Others had given assistance with the furniture. Tom had bought half a dozen little dolls and her mother had dressed them. When Carola gently opened one of the little wardrobes, they found that it was full of tiny frocks and coats. For a girl who was working hard at the university in term time and a busy rector and his equally busy wife, it was a marvellous piece of work.

Tom had even fixed a little tablet over the door with the name “Red Tiles” painted on it. It was a toy fit for a princess and the girls reckoned delightedly that it would bring a substantial addition to their takings.

“This,” said Julie Lucy as the school finally scattered to take up the various duties of the day, “is the house of houses! The kid who gets that is jolly lucky—that’s all I’ve got to say!”

And everyone agreed with her.

By the time the girls were at their posts, the first visitors had begun to arrive, among them three or four Old Girls who were now married and living in Switzerland. Among them were Mrs. Graves, wife of Dr. Graves and, as Hilary Burn, first pupil and then P.T. mistress at the school. With her, came one of Joey’s oldest and dearest friends, Frieda von Ahlen, once Frieda Mensch. She had her elder girl, Gretchen, with her, but had parked the two babies, Carlotta and Andreas, at Freudesheim in the nursery with the Maynard twins.

“It’s too bad,” she protested to the two Heads who came to welcome her. “Here have I been hoping for a full reunion of our quartette and Joey has to have her ninth baby a week before the Sale and Marie and Simone are both held up, too!” Still, she added more cheerfully, “I have seen Joey and her little Cecily. And it will be fun to meet Elisaveta after all these years. How fortunate that you were able to get her to come and do the opening for us!”

“I fancy we shall be seeing a good deal more of Elisaveta in the future,” Miss Wilson said cryptically. “Oh, I’m telling you nothing more at the moment, Frieda. You go and look round the stalls. And don’t forget to let Gretchen have a good look at Tom’s latest. As our one and only Mary-Lou remarks, it’s the best yet!”

She turned away to greet someone else, so Frieda laughed and went off with Gretchen to examine the show.

At five to eleven, there was a stir of excitement in the room. The ex-Crown Princess of Belsornia, Princess Elisaveta, had arrived. When it was found that she had brought her entire family to grace the scene, the excitement became terrific.

^[12]In the days when the Chalet School had been in Tirol, she had had one joyful year as a pupil. Since then, she had had many adventures, most of them unpleasant. Now that Belsornia had been annexed to the Soviet Union, she was anxious to drop her title but so far the government in exile had refused to agree. Her father, the King, was living in Australia at the moment, but the Princess and her husband, the Duke of Mirolani, had been in America. He had been killed in an air accident five years before this, leaving her with their five children to educate and bring up. Mercifully, much of the Belsornian investments, and especially those of the Royal family, had been in British Empire concerns, so she had enough to manage. Business affairs connected with her husband’s estate had brought her to Switzerland and when she found that she was likely to be detained there for at least a year, she had sent for her family and they were all living at Arolla at the moment. She and Joey had always been close friends and it had been Joey’s idea that she should be asked to open the Sale. So here she was, attended by the three boys and two girls and looking, despite everything, not so very greatly older than the Elisaveta of earlier days.

Dr. Maynard as Chairman introduced her in a few words and she rose, first to accept the bouquet of spring flowers presented by little Janice Chester, and then to open the Sale in a speech that proved to be unique in the annals of the school’s Sales.

“You know,” she said plaintively, “coming back like this makes me feel that I simply must mind my p’s and q’s! It’s almost as if I were back at school again and no older than Frédéric here!” She indicated her eldest son who gave her a broad grin. “For I was just his age when I came to the school as a pupil—twelve and a bit. As soon as my girls are old enough, they’re coming—if Miss Annersley and Miss Wilson will have them.” This time, she beamed at the two pretty little girls standing with their brothers at one side of the daïs. “Only,” she then confided to her startled audience, “I hope they’re going to be luckier than I was, for I mean them to have at least seven years at school and I only had one. Still, it was good while it lasted!” She paused again and the school began to clap loudly. Some of their best-loved legends were concerned with that year. ^[13]And they had two or three connected with a Guide camp that had been held in the lovely land of Tirol.

The Princess gave them their heads for a minute. Then she held up her hand. “I haven’t finished yet and I haven’t opened the Sale properly, either. Give me a minute or two longer, please.”

They calmed down and she spoke her conclusion. “I want to say that during that year I had standards and ideals held up to me that I’ve tried to live up to. All I learnt then has helped me during the years after we had to leave our homeland. It’s gone on helping me over hard places that I, like everyone else, have had to face.

“I learnt then to think about other people and not put Elisaveta first. This very Sale is an example of that. And it hasn’t been a flash in the pan, either, for I know that year after year the school has held a similar one in aid of the free beds for sick children and each year has tried to do more in that direction. When you know all this, you must see why, on this occasion, I’m urging everyone here to do what they can to make this Old English Fair the biggest success of them all. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m not going to keep you any longer, for I’m sure you’re all aching to pull out your purses and invest in some of the wonderful goods you can see on every hand. You want to try your luck at the competitions’ booth and make a guess at what that amazing dolls’ house will fetch and attend all the entertainments—and for me to stop talking and let you get on with it! So I’ll just declare it open and say that I hope it beats the biggest success the Chalet School has had up to date.”

She sat down amidst a hurricane of laughter and applause and Miss Wilson rose at once to propose a vote of thanks which was seconded by Dr. Graves. The final clapping died away and the Princess left the daïs with her children and the selling began.

“A most unorthodox speech!” Jack Maynard said severely when he could talk to her.

“Oh, I think it was a very good one,” she said blandly as she stopped at the merry-go-round to inspect the needlework. “Most opening speeches are too boring for words. You can’t accuse me of that! You go away and leave me to do my duty by these fascinating things. My family has gone off to try its luck at skittles and competitions but once they come back, I shan’t have any time to myself. I want to see Joey later, so you can take me over to Freudesheim and we’ll talk then. I suppose your triplets are hard at it here and I know the two elder boys are at school; but I want to see all the babies later. Freddy and Carl are going to the same place as your two after Easter, by the way. I don’t want them to become Americanized and it looks rather as though I have a long visit here before me. And José and Guita are quite definitely coming here. José will be ten in September and will begin then. Guita’s only seven, so she must wait a little longer.” She turned to inquire the price of a traycloth and he left her to tour the room and be pestered by his daughters who were in charge of the house, to make a guess at what it would bring.

It was not till the afternoon that the Princess sought him out and insisted on his taking her to Freudesheim to visit Joey and the babies.

“I’m leaving my family to enjoy itself,” she explained. “They’re a good crowd on the whole and Freddy can keep them in hand.”

“What will happen when he goes to school?” he asked, glancing down at the slim woman beside him.

“Oh, I can deal with them myself. But oh, Jack, it’s very hard to bring boys up without a father! Raoul would have been so good for them!”

“You’ll be good for them yourself, my dear,” Jack said, deep sympathy in his voice. “You’re very wise to send Freddy and Carl to school. I suppose little Raoul will follow later?”

“Oh, of course. But he’s not six yet.”

“Then here’s an idea for you. Come here and live with us. We’ve plenty of room, goodness knows. And I know Beth Chester is complaining that Mike needs companionship of his own age, but he’s not six yet, either, and we don’t want to send him off yet awhile. Or if you prefer it, there’ll be the Elstob place in September. I know Joey told you about that poor kid, Leila. She’s doing well and we all think a long sea voyage best for her now. Shall I speak to Mrs. Elstob for you? The Élisehütte will be to let for a twelvemonth at least. And,” he added with a grin, “I’ll be at hand to whack the boys if they need it. You think it over. At least you don’t have to decide at once. Talk it over with Joey. If you do decide to come here, our new governess—when we get her!—can take on the three kids along with our Mike and, in any case, Freddy and Carl won’t be going to school quite friendless!”

“Oh, I’m not worrying about that,” she said quickly. “They’re both good mixers. And luckily, there doesn’t look like there being any question of a throne for either of them. I hope not. Freddy is mad on engines and Carl has made up his mind to be a doctor. Far better for them—though if things had come back to what they were, Freddy, at any rate, would have had to change his ideas. I’ll think it over, Jack. It would be lovely to be with all of you again and my father doesn’t want us out in Australia, or I’d go to him. By the way, I hope the underground Regency Council is going to see sense at long last and let me give up. In that case, I shall take my husband’s family name of Helston and be Mrs. Helston. However, we must wait a little still. This the house? Oh, I like it! Come on and take me to Joey and then you’d better get back to duty again.”

“Right! But don’t tire her with too much talking. Cecily’s just a week old to-day and if you don’t know what Jo is by this time you ought to!”

He left her with his wife and went back to Hall where he found plenty to do.

Meanwhile, the girls were all hard at work selling. Quite a number of people had come, including all the staff who could be spared from the Sanatorium, as well as Jo Scott’s people from Lucerne and Mary-Lou and Verity’s father and mother from the Rösleinalp and various friends the school had made during its nearly two years in the Oberland.

Va were surrounded, for Matron always contributed a large supply of home-made jams and marmalade and the girls themselves had spent three days of the previous week in concocting cakes, buns and scones of all kinds, not to mention toffee, fudge and various other sweets. Lesley Bethune had spent a whole afternoon making shortbread and black bun; and Jill Ormsby, who came from Yorkshire, had a pile of real Yorkshire parkin.

Nina was hard at it, weighing out brandysnaps, which Lesley Malcolm had had sent from her Alnwick home. She looked a different girl these days, for the Alpine air had whipped the colour into her face and friends of her own age had helped to turn her thoughts from inside herself to other people. She was still slight, but the hollows in her cheeks had vanished and as she turned to answer Margot Maynard’s demand for “one of the bags of that luscious scrunchy stuff”, she looked more like a jolly schoolgirl than she had ever done before.

A big man who had just come in at the door grasped this at once, and his lips pursed in a soundless whistle. “By Jove, what a change! I swear you’d never know her for the washed-out misery I took home to Brettingham at Christmas! What have you done to her, Miss—Miss Wilson, isn’t it?”

Bill nodded. “She has every moment filled up here and she has friends of her own age to keep her occupied. And then, Sir Guy, though it’s a truism, time is a great healer. I don’t mean that she has forgotten her father nor her grief. Her sense of loss is still there. But she has no time for brooding over it now and her sorrow has become a natural, healthy sorrow. But she’ll never forget. Things go deep with Nina. Wait here a moment and I’ll send her to you.”

She left him and threaded her way through the crowd round the swingboats and cut Nina out neatly with a quick, “Take over, will you, Lesley? I want Nina a moment.”

Nina handed Margot her change and turned quickly. “Do you want me, Miss Wilson?”

“Not I, but your cousin, Sir Guy.”

“Cousin Guy here? Oh, have they come, then? Is Cousin Yvonne with him?”

“He’s over by the lower door. He’ll tell you all about it. Go and take him to have a cup of coffee. You haven’t too long, for the concert begins in less than half an hour’s time. Hurry up!”

Nina glanced at her watch and then wriggled her way through the crowd to the corner where her cousin was waiting for her.

“Oh, Cousin Guy!” she exclaimed as she reached him. “How lovely to see you again! Where’s Cousin Yvonne? And how is Alix? Has she gone to the San yet?”

“My wife and Alix are at Interlaken. We got there a short while ago and I came straight on up here. Alix has stood the journey better than we expected.”

“Oh, good! I am glad! Bill said I was to take you to have coffee. It’s in the dommy sci. rooms. This way! Then we can talk. Did you stay with my Embury cousins at Montreux? Cousin Winifred said she meant you to, to break the journey.”

“Yes; we had three days with them. I rang up the Sanatorium from there and when we reached our hotel in Interlaken, one of the doctors was waiting for us—Dr. Courvoisier, I think he said he was.”

“I know him—we all do,” Nina nodded. “Coffee and cakes, please, Clem, and as quickly as you can. The concert begins in about twenty minutes!”

Clem Barras, in charge of the refreshments, nodded in her turn and two minutes later coffee and cakes were on the table before them and Nina was tucking in with a healthy appetite while she listened to his news.

“He seemed pleased with Alix. He said she looked in better shape than they had expected. They’re bringing her up to-morrow. He wanted her to have a day’s rest before she tackled the last lap. There was a nurse there, too, and she and your Cousin Yvonne got Alix to bed while the doctor and I came on up here. We’re coming up in the middle of the morning and we’ll see her settled at the San. Then Yvonne is going to stay with a Mrs. Graves and I’m flying back to fetch the twins for the holidays. They break up on Thursday.”

“Then I’ll see something of all of you these hols. I’m going to Montreux, you know, but Mrs. Maynard is having me up for a long week-end the week after next. Cousin Guy, what, exactly, do the doctors say about Alix? I do hope it isn’t too bad!”

“Bad enough! She’s been very ill, Nina. We nearly lost her. She’s still pretty ill, I’m afraid. It’s going to mean two or three years out here, at least. That wretched cold she had at Christmas settled on her chest and she says now that she felt pretty rotten when she went back to school, but she thought it would wear off. Then she got that wetting and instead of changing when they got in as she was told to do, she waited to help with some of the youngsters. By the time she did change, she’d been in her wet things nearly two hours. Next day she came down with pleuro-pneumonia and when they’d got the better of that, they found her lungs were touched. She’s never been too strong, poor lassie—not like the twins.”

“Cousin Yvonne said so in her letter. But now she’s here, she’ll probably begin to pull round,” Nina said hopefully. “You’ve no idea what marvellous air it is! I know I felt quite different when I’d been up only a week or so. I’m awfully glad you agreed to bring Alix here. When she can have visitors, she’ll have lots, for we’re all going to see her as soon as we’re allowed. Are Alison and Anthea staying at Mrs. Graves’, too?”

“Yes; but only for a week. We can’t impose on even the kindest strangers longer. When I bring the twins, we’re going to try to hunt up some place where we can live and your Cousin Yvonne will be there most of the time. I shall have to go back and forwards. We’re sending the twins here to school after next term, too.”

“Good! Alix will like that. And it won’t be so lonely for Cousin Yvonne. Besides, I’m sure Cousin Winifred will invite them all down to Montreux sometimes.”

“She said so when we said good-bye. They’re very kind folk.” He stopped and seemed embarrassed.

Nina, sipping her coffee with one eye on her watch, waited.

“There’s one thing I’d like to say,” he said at last. “Don’t think we want to be rid of you, Nina, because we’ve agreed to let the Emburys have you. But we shan’t be a lot at Brettingham for the next few months and I don’t know what I’ll be able to scare up in the way of a house here. It may be quite a small affair. Martin Embury seems to understand how you feel about your music better than we do and they are your mother’s people. But I’m still your guardian and you can always feel you have another home with us whenever you want it. Now that’s all, but I wanted you to know.”

Nina looked at him seriously. “Thanks a lot, Cousin Guy. I’ll love to come to you sometimes as well as to Montreux. But you know, once I’m really started on my career, I probably shan’t have much time at home anywhere. It’ll mean going on tour—at least, I hope so. If I do really well, it’ll only be times off between the tours. But it’ll be nice and—and I shall feel—safe if I know I have all of you in the background as well as the Embury cousins.” She stood up. “I must fly now! The concert begins in five minutes and I ought to be with the others. Miss Lawrence will be looking for me if I’m much later.”

He nodded and beckoned to Clem who was standing at one side. Then they went back to Hall where Nina left him to fly to the Junior formroom where the concert was to be held. Presently Miss Annersley brought him in to find a seat and when the school choir had sung three part-songs and Freda Lund had given a charming violin solo, Nina went to the piano and played Weber’s Rondo Brillante with a verve and fire amazing in a schoolgirl. Later, she played again and this time delighted the audience with a delicate rendering of Débussy’s Clair De Lune. Sir Guy was amazed at her powers. She had gone far beyond anything his own girls could do and he began to realize that she was indeed touched with the spark of genius.

The Sale went with a swing from beginning to end. Fathers and brothers enjoyed the skittles and as for tilting at the ring, that was a huge success. Quite a number of people found that swinging round the room on roller-skates was one thing and trying to pass a wand through the rings at the same time was quite another. Emerence Hope created a sensation by turning a complete somersault when her turn came. She landed on top of Margot Maynard who was ahead of her and the squalls the two let out had to be heard to be believed! Miss Wilmot, who had been induced to try her hand, missed every ring but the last one and that she went at with such a vengeance, that she snapped the twine that held it and skimmed off with it dangling from her wand. The girls cheered this effort until Mary-Lou changed the cheers to shrieks of laughter by flying down the length of the room, demanding the ring back again.

At seventeen o’clock, the afternoon ended with the awarding of prizes for the different competitions. Dr. Maynard won a huge meat pie by guessing its exact weight: Mrs. Scott was awarded a knitted patchwork blanket for filling in the greatest number of book titles in what Hilary and Vi described as “the maddest rhymes you ever read!”: Matron from the hospital had a fat pink china pig for making the greatest number of single words from “The Oberland”: Ailie Russell, a ten-year old, carried off the prize for the best pig drawn with your eyes shut; Miss o’Ryan guessed the right cake mixture of a pink-iced confection of Frau Mieders’, and promised the rest of the staff a share when they had their evening coffee that night. Sundry other prizes were gained by people who don’t come into this story. Finally, only Tom Gay’s house was left.

By this time, quite a number of people had gone, but all the girls were there and so was the Princess who had given place to Frieda and come to collect her family to take them to their hotel at Interlaken.

“I’ve had to take a ticket for every one of us for this,” she explained to Jack Maynard. “The girls are dying to win it. Unlike me they love their dollies. I had never the faintest use for a doll when I was small!”

Miss Annersley came to summon the doctor to the daïs where Miss Wilson presented him with a heavily sealed envelope. “The amount of the takings and the name of the winner and her—or his—guess are both there,” she explained. “Will you please open it and read them out.”

He took the envelope and opened it in his most leisurely fashion while his audience waited breathlessly for the results. Indeed, Ailie was later accused by one of her small friends of dancing up and down with impatience!

“Well,” he said as he extracted the two slips, “here we are! Now let me see!”

A wail of, “Papa! Do hurry up!” came from Con and he stopped to twinkle at her.

“Patience—patience, my child! Now for it! The whole sum taken amounts to Francs 520 centimes 20. 197 tickets were sold and the lucky person whose guess came nearest was Mrs. von Ahlen, who guessed Francs 522.” He looked round the applauding girls. “Frieda! Where are you? Come and take your prize away!”

There was no immediate reply, for Frieda von Ahlen was sitting with Joey, sharing her coffee and cakes and talking quietly. Then there was a scuffle and the triplets came forward with her small Gretchen in their midst.

“Tant Frieda isn’t here, Father,” Len announced, “but Gretchen is. Shall she take it for her mother?”

His eyes danced as he looked down at Gretchen with her long flaxen locks flowing over her shoulders and her wide blue eyes glowing with delight. He stooped down and swung her up in his arms. “Come on, Gretchen! Way there, you people!”

The girls, all laughing and clapping vigorously, made way for them and he set the small girl down beside the new treasure. “There you are, Gretchen. Die Mutter has won it so my guess is that as she has plenty to do with her own house, she’ll hand this over to you and Carlotta to play with. Just how she proposes to get it to Basle, is her headache. Want to go and tell her yourself? Right! You three take her across to Freudesheim and you can leave her there, but mind that you come straight back.”

Gretchen, all her shyness forgotten, flung her arms round him first before she went off with the triplets. The Princess came forward.

“I’d like to say one thing,” she said. “I’ll offer Tom Gay the same amount to make another one like it for my girls, the money to go to whatever you’ve made to-day. Think she’ll do it?”

And as one girl, the entire school shouted, “Rather!”

That was the end. The remaining visitors began to depart while the school, tired, hot and dishevelled, but very triumphant, went to have Kaffee und Kuchen and finish up every cake within sight. Then they went back to Hall and the important business of counting the takings began while people not so occupied set to work and cleared away the denuded stalls. By the time they had finished and Hall was itself once more, the Head was ready for them. She sent them to their seats and when they were quiet, announced the grand total with pride.

“Girls! I congratulate you! The Sale has realized Frs. 1824 cms. 17. In English money, so Miss Wilmot tells me, that is roughly £154. Well done, School!”

The cheering that greeted this announcement might have been heard at the summit of the snow-crowned Jungfrau!

Prayers came next, followed by Abendessen and bed, after which the exhausted staff retired for coffee and Miss o’Ryan’s cake.

“Not so dusty!” Mary-Lou observed next morning as she, Nina and Jo Scott stood in the drive to watch the motor coaches rolling off to the plains with their loads of thrilled girls and luggage. “On the whole, quite a good term, I think.”

Nina caught her hand excitedly. “It’s been a marvellous term, Mary-Lou! I never wanted to come to school, but I wouldn’t leave the Chalet School now until I have to go to start my career, not if you paid me for it!”

“Glad to hear it,” quoth the imperturbable Mary-Lou. “And that’s my hand you’re treating like a wet dishcloth if it’s all the same to you!”

Nina released the hand, but as she laughed, she knew that whatever the future might bring her, she would never regret the odd chance that had brought her to the Chalet School.

It was left to Jo Scott to sum it up. “A wizard end to a marvellous term!” she cried. “Up the Chalet School!”

[The end of A Genius at the Chalet School by Elinor Mary Brent-Dyer]