Penelope and the Others Part 15

"I wonder if the Merridews are nice?" remarked Ambrose; "fancy five girls!"

"Only four are going to learn," said Pennie; "Miss Unity told me their names. There's Joyce, and Ethel, and Katharine, and Sabine."

"What rum names!" said Ambrose; "all except Katharine; almost as queer as Ethelwyn."

"They're not a bit like Ethelwyn to look at, though," said Pennie; "they're very neat and quiet, and I think not pretty."

"I suppose Ethelwyn was pretty, but she wasn't nice," said Ambrose thoughtfully; "and what a sneak she was about the mandarin!"

Pennie sighed; Ethelwyn and the mandarin were both painful subjects to her, and she felt just now as though the world were full of trials.

There was this dreadful dancing-cla.s.s looming in the distance--something awful and unknown, to which she was daily getting nearer and nearer.

Ambrose understood much better than Nancy what she felt about it, and was a much more sympathetic listener, for he knew very well what it was to be afraid, and to dread what was strange and new. Nancy was quite sure that she should hate to learn dancing; but as to being afraid of the dean or any other dignitary, or minding the presence of any number of Merridews, that was impossible to imagine. So as the days went on Pennie confided her troubles chiefly to Ambrose; but she was soon seized with another anxiety in which he could be of no help.

"Those shoes are awfully shabby, mother," she said one morning; "don't you think I might have new ones?"

Mrs Hawthorne examined the shoes which Pennie had brought to her.

"Are those your best?" she asked, "it seems quite a short time since you and Nancy had new ones."

"Nancy's are quite nice still," said Pennie sorrowfully; "but just look how brown these toes are, and how they bulge out at the side."

"They were just the same as Nancy's when they were bought," said Mrs Hawthorne; "but if you will stand on one side of your foot, Pennie, of course you wear them out more quickly."

"I never mean to," said poor Pennie, gazing mournfully at the shabby shoe, "but it seems natural somehow."

"Well, you must try harder to remember in future," said her mother. "I should like to give you new shoes very much, but you know I have often told you I can't spend much on your clothes, and I'm afraid we must make the old ones do a little longer."

So this was another drop of bitterness added to Pennie's little cup of troubles. It was not only that the shoes were shabby, but they fastened with a b.u.t.ton and a strap. She felt quite sure that the Merridews and all the other children at the cla.s.s would wear shoes with sandals, and this was a most tormenting thought. She saw a vision of rows of elegantly shod feet, and one shabby misshapen pair amongst them.

"I think I want new shoes quite as much as Kettles does," she said one day to Nancy.

"You might have mine if you like," said Nancy, who was always ready to lend or give her things, "but I suppose they'd be too small."

"I can just squeeze into them," said Pennie, "and while I stand-still I can bear it--but I couldn't walk without screaming."

The dreaded day came, as all days must whether we want them or not, and Pennie found herself walking across the Close to the deanery with Betty, who carried a little parcel with the old shoes and a pair of black mittens in it. The grey Cathedral looked gravely down upon them as they pa.s.sed, and Pennie looked up to where her own special monster perched grinning on his water-spout. The children had each chosen one of these grotesque figures to be their very own, and had given them names; Pennie called hers the Griffin. He had wings and claws, a long neck, and a half-human face, and seemed to be just poised for flight--as though at any moment he might spring away from his resting-place, and alight on the smooth green turf just outside the dean's door. Pennie often wondered what Dr Merridew would say if he found him there, but just now she had no room for such fancies; she only felt sure of the Griffin's sympathy, and said to herself as she nodded to him:

"When I see you again I shall be glad, because it will be over, and I shall be going home to tea." Another moment and they had arrived at the deanery.

"Miss Unity wishes to know, please, what time Miss Hawthorne is to be fetched," asked Betty.

It seemed odd to Pennie that she could not run across the Close to Miss Unity's house alone, but this by no means suited her G.o.dmother's ideas of propriety.

Having taken off her hat, changed her shoes, and put on the black mittens, Pennie was conducted to the dining-room, which was already prepared for the dancing-cla.s.s, with the large table pushed into the window and the chairs placed solemnly round close to the wall. Some girls, who were chatting and laughing near the fire, all stopped short as she entered, and for one awful moment stared at the new-comer in silence.

Pennie felt that no one knew who she was; she stood pulling nervously at her mittens, a forlorn little being in a strange land. At last one of the girls came forward and shook hands with her.

"Won't you sit down?" she said; and Pennie having edged herself on to one of the high leather-covered chairs against the wall, she left her and returned to the group by the fire.

Pennie examined them.

"That must be Ethel," she thought, "and the tallest is Joyce, and the two with frocks alike must be Katharine and Sabine. It isn't nice of them not to take any notice of a visitor. We shouldn't do it at home."

Presently other children arrived, and then Miss Lacy, the governess, joined them. She went up to Pennie and asked her name.

"Why, of course," she said, "I ought to have remembered you. Ethel, come here and talk to Penelope. You two are just the same age, I think," she added as Ethel turned reluctantly from the group near the fire.

Pennie was very tired of hearing that she and Ethel were just the same age, and it did not seem to her any reason at all that they should want to know each other. Ethel, too, looked unwilling to be forced into a friendship, as she came listlessly forward and sat down by Pennie's side.

"Are you fond of dancing?" she inquired in a cold voice.

"I don't know," said Pennie, "I never tried. I don't think I shall be,"

she added.

Ethel was silent, employing the interval in a searching examination of her companion, from the tucker in her frock, to the strapped shoes on her feet. She had a way of half-closing her eyes while she did this, that Pennie felt to be extremely offensive. "I don't like her at all,"

she said to herself, "and if she doesn't want to talk to me, I'm sure I don't want to talk to her."

"We've always been taught by Miss Lacy," said Ethel at last, "but of course it's much better to have a master."

"I should like Miss Lacy best," said Pennie; and while Ethel was receiving this answer with another long stare, Monsieur Deville was announced.

The dancing-master was tall and slim, with a springing step and a very graceful bow; his sleek hair was brushed across a rather bald head, and he had a long reddish nose. He carried a small fiddle, on which he was able to play while he was executing the most agile and difficult steps for the benefit of his pupils. On that day, and always, it was marvellous to Pennie to see how he could go sliding and capering about the room, never making one false note, nor losing his balance, and generally talking and explaining as he went. He spoke English as though it had been his native tongue, and indeed there did not seem to be anything French about him except his name.

The cla.s.s opened with various exercises, which Pennie was able to do pretty well by dint of paying earnest attention to the child immediately in front of her, but soon some steps followed which she knew nothing about. She stood in perplexity, trying to gather some idea from the hopping springing figures around her. They had all learnt dancing before, and found no difficulty in what looked to her a hopeless puzzle.

"Bend the knees, young ladies!" shouted Monsieur Deville above the squeaking of his fiddle. "Slide gently. Keep the head erect. _Very_ good, Miss Smithers. The wrong foot, Miss Hawthorne. Draw in the chin; dear, dear, that won't do at all,"--stopping suddenly.

Miss Lacy now advanced to inform Monsieur that Miss Hawthorne was quite a beginner, at which every member of the cla.s.s turned her head and looked at Pennie. What a hateful thing a dancing lesson was!

"Ah! we shall soon improve, no doubt," said Monsieur cheerfully; "the great thing is to practise the exercises thoroughly--to make the form supple and elastic. Without that as a foundation we can do nothing.

With it we can do wonders. Miss Hawthorne had better try that step alone. The rest stand-still."

Pennie would have given the world to run out of the room, but she grasped her dress courageously, and fixing a desperate eye on Monsieur's movements, copied them as well as she could.

"That will do for the present. All return to your seats. The Miss Smiths will now dance '_Les Deux Armes_.'"

Two sisters, old pupils of Monsieur Deville, advanced with complacency into the middle of the room.

"A little fancy dance composed by myself," said the dancing-master, turning to Miss Lacy as he played a preliminary air, "supposed to represent the quarrel and reconciliation of two friends, introducing steps from the minuet and gavotte. It has been considered a graceful trifle."

Pennie gazed in awe-struck wonder at the Miss Smiths as they moved with conscious grace and certainty through the various figures of the dance, now curtsying haughtily to each other, now with sudden abruptness turning their backs and pirouetting down the room on the very tips of their toes; now advancing, now retreating, now on the very point of reconciliation, and now bounding apart as though nothing were further from their thoughts. Finally, after the spectators for some time in doubt as to their intentions, they came down the length of the room with what Monsieur called a _cha.s.se_ step, and curtsied gracefully hand in hand.

"Well, at any rate," thought Pennie with a sigh of relief, "_I_ shall never be able to dance well enough to do that; that's one comfort."

The cla.s.s lasted two long hours and finished by a march round the room, the tallest pupil at the head and the shortest bringing up the rear.

"Why," asked Monsieur, "do we begin with the left foot?"

And the old pupil immediately answered: