Tom and Some Other Girls Part 18

"Bertha is right! What I have written gives no idea of Tom herself.

It's a pity, but I don't see how it can be helped. What words could describe Tom to anyone who had not seen her? Now, here's another idea!

Why not make a rule that every girl who has had her name inscribed on the Record Wall must present a framed portrait to the school? All the frames would be alike, and they would be hung in rows in the Great Hall, so that future generations of pupils might be able to see what the girls were like, and feel more friendly towards them!"

"Rhoda! What a h-eavenly idea!" cried Irene rapturously. "How s-imply lovely! Why in the world have we never thought of that before?"

"I never heard of anything so splendid!" cried the girls in chorus, while Rhoda sat beaming with gratified smiles. Well, if her own name would never be printed in that roll of honour, at least she had composed the inscription of one of the most important tablets, and had suggested a new idea which bade fair to be as much appreciated as the Wall itself!

Already the girls were debating eagerly together as to its inauguration, and deciding that the different "Heads" should be deputed to write to those old members of each house who had been honoured with tablets, to ask for portraits taken as nearly as possible about the date of leaving school. Irene, of course, would communicate with Tom to inform her of the step about to be taken by her companions, and to direct her to be photographed at the first possible moment.

"And--er--you might just drop a hint about her attire!" said Rhoda, anxiously, as a remembrance of the dress and coiffure of Erley Chase rose before her. Nothing more likely than that Tom would elect to do honour to her companions by putting on her very best clothes for their benefit, and imagine the horror of the Blues at seeing their old Head decked out in such fashion! "We should like best to see her as she used to look here."

"She must wear the old blue dress, and stand with her back to the fireplace, with her hands in her pockets," cried Kathleen firmly. "We don't want to see Tom lying in a hammock against a background of palms, or smirking over a fan--not much! It's the genuine article we want, and no make-up. What will she say, I wonder, when she hears she is going to have a tablet? Will she be pleased or vexed?"

"She must be pleased--who could help it?--but she will pretend she is not. Mark my words, she'll write back and say it's a piece of ridiculous nonsense."

So prophesied Irene; but the result proved that she was wrong, for Tom, as usual, refused to be antic.i.p.ated. Instead of protesting that she had done nothing worthy of such an honour, and beseeching her companions not to make themselves ridiculous, she dismissed the subject in a couple of lines, in which she declared the proposed scheme to be "most laudable,"

and calmly volunteered to contribute half-a-crown!

The Blues agreed among themselves that such behaviour came perilously near "callousness," but Rhoda recalled that last peep through the bars of the station gate, and could not join in the decision. She believed that Tom would be profoundly touched by the honour, so touched and so proud that she dared not trust herself to approach the subject from a serious view. And she was right, for if imagination could have carried her old companions to the study where Tom was then domiciled, they would have seen her chalking an immense red cross on her calendar against the date when Irene's letter had arrived, and mentally recording it as the proudest day of her life.

No mention was made of the photograph, but in due time it arrived, so life-like and speaking in its well-known att.i.tude, that the more sentimental of the girls shed tears of joy at beholding it. Closely following it came other contributions to the gallery, which the new- comers examined with keenest interest, feeling more able to understand the enthusiasm of their seniors, now that the well-known names were attached to definite personalities.

About this time, too, arrived a full report of the examination, and, as had been expected, Rhoda was found to have failed in arithmetic. In other subjects she had done well, gaining the longed-for distinction in German and French, so that if only-- Oh! that little "If!" How much it meant! That terrible mountainous "If," which made all the difference between failure and success! _If_ it had been a dark morning and she had slept on! _If_ she had given way to temptation, and dozed off in the middle of her work! _If_ she had listened to Evie's words of warning!--If but one of those possible Ifs had been accomplished, she would have been among the happy crowd to-day, and not standing miserably apart, the only girl in the house who had failed to pa.s.s. The wild grief of the first few days swept back like a wave and threatened to overwhelm her, but she clung to the remembrance of Tom's words, and told herself pa.s.sionately that she would _not_ "whine"! She would not pose as a martyr! Even on that great occasion when the certificates were presented in Great Hall, and the school burst into ecstatic repet.i.tions of "See the Conquering Hero Comes!" as each fresh girl walked up to the platform, even through that dread ordeal did Rhoda retain her self- possession, attempting--poor child--to add a trembling note to the chorus.

She never knew, nor guessed, that the girls honoured her more in that moment than if she had won a dozen distinctions. She did not see the kindly glances bent upon her by the teachers, for they were careful to turn aside when she looked in their direction; and if she had seen, she would never have believed it was admiration, and not pity, which those looks expressed. In her estimation the occasion was one of pure, unalloyed humiliation, and when she reached the shelter of her cubicle she seized the hand-gla.s.s and examined her ruddy head anxiously beneath the electric globe.

"It isn't true!" she exclaimed. "The ghost stories tell lies. I don't believe now that anyone's head ever turned white in a night. I can't see a single grey hair."

CHAPTER TWENTY.

AN ACCIDENT.

After a storm comes a calm. Compared with the struggle and anxiety of the summer term, the one which followed seemed stagnation itself. The arrival of the report had been an excitement, it is true; but when that was over the days pa.s.sed by in uneventful fashion, until autumn waned and winter came back, with the attendant discomforts of dark mornings, draughty corridors, and coatings of ice on the water in the ewers; for this was a good, old-fashioned winter, when Jack Frost made his appearance in the beginning of December, and settled down with a solidity which meant that he had come to stay. The hardy girls declared that it was "ripping," and laughed at the shivery subjects who hobbled about on chilblained feet, and showed faces mottled blue and red, like the imitation marble in lodging-house-parlours; the shivery girls huddled in corners, and wished they could go to bed and hug hot bottles until May came back and it was fit for human creatures to go about again! People who possess brisk circulations can never understand the sufferings of those whom no amount of clothing will keep warm, and who perform their duties for four months in the year feeling as though icy water were streaming down their backs. Human sympathy is an elastic virtue, but it seems powerless to reach so far as that!

Poor Miss Everett belonged to this latter unhappy cla.s.s, and perhaps the hardest duty which she had to perform at Hurst Manor was the spending of two hours daily in the grounds with her pupils, be the weather warm or cold. To be sure, they always moved about briskly, playing hockey and lacrosse so long as the weather allowed, and then turning to skating and tobogganing, but there were moments of waiting and hanging about, when the wind cut through her like a knife, and made her pretty face look pinched to half its size. Rhoda, brisk and glowing, would look at her with affectionate superiority, call her a "poor, dear, little frog," and insist upon running races to restore circulation. Evie would declare that she felt warmer after these exertions, but when at the expiration of ten minutes she was found to be shivering and chattering as much as ever, Rhoda would grow anxious, and consequently more flattering in her similes.

"You are a hot-house flower, and not fit to rough it like this! It makes me cold to look at you. I have a great mind to tell Miss Bruce how you suffer, and ask her to forbid you to come out to games in this weather!"

But at this Miss Everett protested in genuine alarm.

"Rhoda, you must do nothing of the kind! Don't you see that it would be as much as saying that I am unfit for my work? Miss Bruce thinks it quite as important that I should be with you for games as for work; perhaps more so, for there is more likelihood of your getting into mischief. I don't like feeling cold, but after all it is only for a few weeks in the year, and as I thoroughly enjoy being out of doors for the rest of the time there is not much to grumble about. It won't kill me to shiver a little bit."

"Cold, cough, consumption, coffin!" quoted Rhoda cheerfully. "I hate to see you with a blue nose, when I am tingling all over with heat, and feeling so fit and jolly. It's unsociable--and unbecoming! Now just skate once more round the field with me, and I won't worry you any more!"

Miss Everett sighed, and consented. Her feet were so numbed that she had believed them incapable of any feeling, but now the straps of her skates were beginning to cut into her like so many sharp-edged knives.

She longed to take them off, but did not like to refuse the girl's kindly invitation, while, unselfishly speaking, it was a pleasure to see the graceful figure skimming along by her side, with such healthful enjoyment in the exercise.

The pupils at Hurst Manor were seldom, if ever, allowed to skate on the lake, for it was deep, and the Princ.i.p.al preferred to have one of the fields flooded in its stead, where the girls could disport themselves with that sense of security which comes from seeing little tufts of gra.s.s showing beneath the surface of the ice. Even nervous subjects grew bold under such conditions, and while the more advanced skaters cut figures, or even essayed a game of hockey, the spectators circled round and round, looking admiringly at their exploits. At one end of the field was a slight ditch, or rather undulation in the ground, which when frozen over afforded a source of unending amus.e.m.e.nt, being as good as a switchback itself. Daring skaters went at it with a dash which brought them safely up the incline on the further side, but by far the greater number collapsed helplessly at the bottom, or, rising half-way up the ascent, staggered back with waving arms and gasping cries, vastly entertaining to the spectators. Evie would never be induced to make this experiment, having, as she said, "too much respect for her ankles"

to subject them to so severe a trial, and having also pa.s.sed that age when to tumble down in an icy ditch twenty times over in the course of an afternoon seems the height of mortal bliss.

The hardihood of the vast majority of the girls, the imperturbable good nature with which they picked themselves up from their rec.u.mbent position and hobbled up the banks on the edge of their skates, spoke volumes for the success of the system on which they were educated. They returned to the house glowing and panting, and surged up the staircase-- a stream of buoyant young life which seemed to warm the draughty corridors and bring sunshine into the colourless rooms. The piles of "bread and sc.r.a.pe" which disappeared at tea after such an afternoon as this would have amazed the parents of the daughters whose appet.i.tes at home had been so captious as to excite anxiety in the maternal heart!

"Of course," as the croakers had it, as soon as a week's consecutive skating had made everyone proficient enough to enjoy the pastime, the snow descended, and fell in a persistent shower which made the ice impossibly rough. The girls looked out from their windows on a wonderful white world, whose beauty was for the time hidden from them by disappointment, but, in the end, even snow seemed to bring with it its own peculiar excitements. Relief gangs of pupils were organised to sweep the princ.i.p.al paths in the grounds, while those not so employed set to work to manufacture "snow men." Not the ordinary common, or garden snow man, be it understood--that disreputable, shapeless individual with his pipe in his mouth, and his hat perched on the back of his head, with whom we are all familiar--the Hurst Manor girls would have none of him; but, superintended by the "Modelling Mistress," set to work with no smaller ambition than to erect a gallery of cla.s.sic figures. Some wise virgins chose to manufacture rec.u.mbent figures, which, if a somewhat back-breaking process, was at least free from the perils which attended the labours of their companions. What could be more annoying than to have two outstretched arms drop suddenly, at the very moment when the bystanders were exclaiming with admiration, and to be obliged to convert a flying G.o.d into a Venus de Milo as the only escape from the difficulty? Or, again, how was it possible to achieve a cla.s.sic outline when a nose absolutely refused to adhere to a face for more than two minutes together? The rec.u.mbent figures lay meekly on their beds and allowed themselves to be rolled, and patted, and pinched into shape, until at a distance, they presented quite a life, or rather deathlike, effect. The girls declared that the sight gave them the "creeps," whatever that mysterious malady might be, and s...o...b..lled the effigies vigorously before returning to the house, so that no straggler through the grounds might be scared by their appearance.

All this time an eager outlook was kept on a sloping bank at the end of the cricket ground, where the snow lay first in patches and then by degrees in an unbroken ma.s.s. When it grew deep enough tobogganing would begin, and that was a sport held in dearest estimation. The course was dubbed "Klosters," after the famous run at Davos, for the school-girl of to-day is not happy unless she can give a nickname to her haunts, and it was sufficiently steep to be exciting, though not dangerous.

Rhoda had been accustomed from childhood to practise this sport at home, and had brought to school her beautiful American toboggan, with the stars and stripes emblazoned on polished wood, ready for use if opportunity should occur. She knew that her experience would stand her in good stead, and was now, as ever, on the outlook for a chance of distinguishing herself in the eyes of her companions. One may be naturally clever and athletic, but it is astonishing how many others, equal, and even superior to oneself, can be found in an a.s.sembly of over two hundred girls. Do what you would, a dozen others appeared to compete with you, and it was ten to one that you came off second best.

"But wait till we can toboggan!" said Rhoda to herself. "They will see _then_ who has the most nerve! I'll astonish them before I have done!"

And she did.

Following a fall of snow came a frost, which pressed down and hardened the soft surface until it was in perfect condition for the desired sport. The games captains surveyed the course, and p.r.o.nounced it ready, and directly after lunch a procession of girls might have been seen wending their way from the house, dragging toboggans in their wake, and chattering merrily together. The wind blew sharp and keen, and many of the number looked quite Arctic, waddling along in snow shoes, reefer coats, and furry caps with warm straps tied over the ears. It was _de rigueur_ to address such personages as "Nansen"; but Rhoda gained for herself the more picturesque t.i.tle of "Hail Columbia" as she strode along, straight and alert, her tawny curls peeping from beneath a sealskin cap, her stars and stripes toboggan making a spot of colour in the midst of the universal whiteness. No one thought of addressing her except in a more or less successful imitation of an American tw.a.n.g, or without including the words "I guess" in every sentence, and she smiled in response, well satisfied to represent so honoured a nation.

The progress of dragging toboggans to the top of an incline is always uninteresting, and never takes place without an accompaniment of grumbling, in which, we may be sure, the Hurst Manor girls were in no way behind. They groaned, and sighed, and lamented, as in duty bound, while Dorothy went a step further and improved the occasion by moral reflections.

"If I were a man I could preach a splendid sermon on tobogganing. All about sliding down hill, you know, and how easy it is, and how quickly done, and how jolly and lively it feels, and then the long, long drag back when you want to get to the top again. It is a splendid ill.u.s.tration; for, of course, sliding down would mean doing wrong things that are nice and easy, and the climb back the bad time you would have pulling yourself together again and starting afresh... It's really a splendid idea. I wonder no--" But at this moment it occurred to Dorothy to wonder at something else, namely, how it was that her toboggan had grown suddenly so light, and turning round to discover the reason, she found it rapidly sliding downhill. The girl immediately behind had nipped out her knife and deftly cut the leading string, as a practical demonstration of the favour in which "sermonising" was held at Hurst, and the whole band stood and screamed with laughter as the would-be preacher retraced her steps to the bottom of the hill, and started afresh on her symbolic climb!

Five minutes later, with a rush and a whoop the first toboggans came flying down the slope. Their course was, perhaps, a trifle erratic, and apt to be followed by a spill at the bottom, but these were unimportant details only to be expected in the first run of the season, and the style improved with every fresh start. One girl after another came flying down, drew her toboggan up a little slope facing the run, and sat down upon it to recover breath and watch the exploits of her companions.

Experience had proved that, however rapid the descent, a toboggan invariably stopped short before this edge was reached, so that it was accepted as a retreat of absolute safety, and, as a rule, there were as many girls resting there as starting from the brow of the hill. All went on merrily, then, until in the very height of the fun Dorothy was seized with an attack of her usual sickness. It was not a very deadly complaint--nothing more serious than haemorrhage from the nose, but it was astonishing how much trouble it seemed able to give her! To the gaze of the world that nose was both a pretty and innocent-looking feature, but it must surely have been possessed with an evil spirit, since there was no end to the plights in which it landed the unhappy owner! It disdained to bleed in a cubicle, or any such convenient place, but delighted in taking advantage of the most awkward and humiliating opportunities. It bled regularly at Frolics, when she wore her best clothes, and wished to be merry; it bled in the ante-room of the Examination Hall, so that she went in to tackle the mathematical paper with three pennies and two separate keys poked down her back; it bled at the critical part of a game or when she went out to tea, or forgot to put a handkerchief in her pocket. "It is my cross!" she would sigh sadly, and to-day she was inclined to say so more than ever, since the attack was so severe, that she must needs go indoors, and leave her favourite sport on the very first day when it had been possible to enjoy it.

Miss Everett walked with her across the field, cheering and encouraging, and directing her to go straight to Nurse when she reached the house, then retraced her own steps and hurried back to her charges. She had been away only five minutes, barely five minutes, but in that short time something had happened which was destined to bring about life-long consequences to more than one member of the party, for it chanced that just as she turned away Rhoda Chester reached the top of the run, on the lookout for fresh opportunities. It was absurd to go over the same course, with no change, no excitement--to do what thirty other girls could do as well as herself! She must try to discover some variety this time, and so she gazed about with critical eyes, and suddenly had an inspiration, for why not drag the toboggan a yard or two further up the steep bank beyond the path which made the present start? It was a tree- crowned bank, forming the very crest of the hill, so short that it measured at the most six or seven yards, but of a steepness far eclipsing any other portion of the run. If she could start from this higher point she would accomplish a feat unattempted by any of her companions, and descend at a velocity hitherto unknown!

No sooner thought than done, and she began to climb the bank, dragging the toboggan behind her, while the onlookers stared aghast.

"In the name of everything that is crazy, Rhoda Chester, what are you doing up there?"

"Rhoda, come _down_! Don't be absurd! You can't possibly start from there!"

"Why not, pray? I can, if I choose. I'm tired of ambling down that baby-run. I want a little variety!"

"You will have it with a vengeance, if you start from there. It's far too steep. Don't be obstinate now, and get into trouble. Evie will be furious with you."

"Why should she be? There's no rule against it. I'm not doing anything wrong... Get out of the way, please. I'm coming!"

"No, no; wait, wait! Wait until Evie comes back, and says you may. She will be here in a moment. _Do_ wait, Rhoda, just one minute!"

But Rhoda would not wait. Although, as she had argued, there was no rule forbidding what she was about to do, she had an instinctive feeling that Evie was too anxious about the safety of her charges to give consent to anything that involved unnecessary risk. Evie's absence was her opportunity, and she must act now or never; so, seating herself firmly on her toboggan, she called out the last word of warning; "I'm coming, I tell you! Stand back!"

"You will break your neck! You will kill yourself, if you are so mad!"

"Oh, bother my neck! I'll risk it! I'll not blame you if it _is_ broken!" cried Rhoda, recklessly; and even as she spoke the last word the toboggan shot forward and bounded over the edge. _Bounded_ is the right word to use, for it did not seem to glide, but to leap from top to bottom with a lightning-like speed which took away breath, sight, and hearing. That first moment was a terrible blank and then she shot over the path itself, and was flying down, down the slope, drawing her breath in painful gasps, and staring before her with distended eyes.

The girls on the bank were craning forward to watch her approach. She saw the blur of their whitened faces, and behind them a little figure running wildly forward, waving its arms and crying aloud:

"Girls, girls! Jump! _Run_! Get away, get away!"

The words rang meaningless in her ears, for she was dazed beyond the power of thought. The running figure drew nearer and nearer, still waving its hands, still calling out that agonised cry. The girls disappeared to right and left, but the figure itself was close at hand-- closer--closer--at her very side. Then came a shock, a jar. Evie's tottering figure fell forward over her own; Evie's shriek of anguish rang in her ears, and then came blackness--a blackness as of death!