Читать книгу The Abbey Girls Win Through - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 7

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Mary turned to Rosamund. “Ros, comfort Maidie somehow. I’ll come presently. I’m not well; you must do without me,” and, on the verge of a breakdown, she fled to her own room.

Rosamund looked frightened. “I say, Maidie, do buck up, old girl! Did you see Mary’s face? She looked ghastly. This has knocked her all to bits. She’s awfully keen on Jen, you know.”

“We all are,” Maidlin steadied herself with an effort. “It’s cruel that Jen should have such things happen to her. She’s good to everybody, always, and yet things always go wrong with her. It was bad enough about her father, but she did have time to think about that. But this is cruel, Ros!”

“I don’t believe Nancy would let you say that.” Rosamund slipped an arm round her waist, and they wandered down the bank of the terrace and across the lawn together. “She’d have some good reason why it isn’t. But I don’t know what it would be. But I’m bothered about Mary-Dorothy, Maidie. It would be horrid if she were ill; and she looked ill.”

“But why should she be ill? We’re all sorry for Jen, but it doesn’t make us ill,” Maidlin argued.

“No, but Mary cares such a thumping lot about Jen, and she takes things so badly. Biddy told me that. Before she went to France, a year ago, she said to me that something had once gone wrong between Mary and Joy; I don’t know the story. But she said Mary had cried till she was almost ill, because she cared so much about Joy. And then she said, ‘And she cares even more about Jen. If ever she should have trouble with her—but I can’t imagine it.’ Neither could I, so I didn’t bother. But it looks as if it had happened.”

“What kind of trouble?” Maidlin asked doubtfully. “You don’t mean that she could quarrel with either of them? Nobody could, Ros.”

“There are other things besides quarrelling,” Rosamund said, with the wisdom of seventeen instructing sixteen. “I don’t know what it was with Joy; Biddy wouldn’t say a word. It wasn’t quarrelling, for you know how much Joy thinks of Mary, and how fond Mary is of Joy. I can’t imagine what happened. But now——” she sat on the edge of a garden seat and reviewed the situation, with her own experience to help her—“don’t you think perhaps Mary wanted to go to Wycombe with Jen? I did. If she knew Jen would rather have Nancy, that might upset Mary quite a lot, don’t you think so? That’s how I felt. I see now it was better for Nancy to go. She’s older, and she could say things that would help, and that’s what Jen needed. But for a minute or two I felt awfully bad, to know Jen didn’t want me. Perhaps it’s the same with Mary, only worse. For Mary does worry so over things. You know how we’ve ragged her and said it was her artistic temperament coming out!”

“She needs it to help her write her lovely books. That’s what Jen always says,” said Maidlin.

“I know. But it makes things extra bad for her when any trouble happens,” Rosamund said wisely.

She sat swinging her legs and pondering, while Maidlin, with a wistful, “I do wish Joy would come!” lapsed into a dream of a happy future, when Joy was living at home, and Jen had come back and was happy again, and every one had everything and was content.

“There’s Mrs. Pennell from the village!” Rosamund said suddenly, as a young woman came through the Abbey gate and towards the house. “I wonder what’s up?” and she went flying across the lawn.

Maidlin woke from her dream with a sigh, and followed.

Rosamund met her, dismay in her face. “The Institute class! It’s at seven. You know, Jen meant to have tea and then hurry back; she wouldn’t put it off. They’re all waiting for her down there.”

“They’ll have to go home. They’ll understand,” Maidlin faltered. “Or shall we tell Mary-Dorothy?”

Rosamund was the type who could rise to an occasion. “We can’t worry her. She’s ill. But Jen wouldn’t like the class put off. We’ll take them, Maidie. It will be something to do for Mary and Jen.”

“We couldn’t, Ros!” Maidlin shrank back, aghast at the thought.

“Of course we can. Haven’t we been to Chelsea? We know reams more than they do. Come on, old chap, and back me up! Don’t funk!”

Mrs. Pennell’s face lit up. “If you would, Miss! Everybody’ll be pleased.”

“I’m game,” Rosamund said briefly. “Maidie, run to the house and say we’ve gone to the village. Then come after me; you don’t want to be left out, do you?”

Not to be left out was one of Maidlin’s ruling passions in life. Her power of initiative was quite unawakened, but she could follow, and her desire to follow Rosamund carried her on many a time when she would have stood still if left to herself.

She went to give the message, then took the path through the Abbey ruins to the village. Shyness overtook her as she reached the Institute, but she went in bravely, and a group of women in the doorway smiled and made way for her to pass.

Rosamund, with heightened colour and very bright eyes, stood on a chair addressing the class of girls, and young men, and older women. She was telling of Jen’s trouble and sudden departure; and a sympathetic murmur arose.

“It wasn’t possible for Miss Devine to get away,” Rosamund explained. “So if you’ll put up with me, and if you don’t mind too much, I’ll do my best to help you through, just for to-night. I hear you’re learning ‘Oaken Leaves.’ I know it, so that’s all right. Make up sets of eight, and we’ll see how much you remember.”

“I thought that was a good way to start,” she murmured to Maidlin, as the class clapped, and laughed, and began to arrange itself in sets. “It sounds kind; I’m sure it’s tactful! Of course, they won’t remember any, but we’ll pretend not to notice that.”

Maidlin watched with admiration and deep envy as Rosamund, who had never taught in her life before, took command, watched critically, made pointed yet kindly comments at the end, and demanded the dance over again. But Rosamund had watched Jen teaching many a time, and she had not a trace of shyness. She had not been twice a May Queen in a big school for nothing, and her slight diffidence vanished as she gained confidence.

The hour that followed was enjoyable to all. Maidlin forgot herself enough to join in and make up a set for “Hey, Boys,” so that three girls should not have to sit out; and Rosamund watched her dancing with much satisfaction. Maidie was always less dreamy after dancing; in dancing, in her singing lessons and practice, or in dreams of Joy’s return, she forgot herself entirely; but while the first two were healthy for her, the last was not so good, and Rosamund had private orders from Jen to “keep Maidie from mooning about and going inside herself.” Just what that meant Rosamund did not know; she was not in the habit of “going inside herself.” But she did know the signs of it in Maidlin, and she understood it was not to be allowed.

“You’re a sport, Maidie!” she said warmly, as they walked home through the Abbey together. “It helped tremendously to have you joining in. Your dancing’s jolly good; you’re so light, and so full of music; and they all try to play up to you. You bucked up that whole set.”

“How can dancing be full of music?” Maidlin asked doubtfully, always distrustful of herself.

“Yours is,” Rosamund said briefly.

“It’s just by chance, then. I love the way you teach, Ros. You should take them again for Mary.”

“It was rather fun,” Rosamund admitted. “I say, Maidie! You know what all the girls want! Won’t you rise to the occasion?”

Maidlin flushed and shrank. The suggestion that she should be the new May Queen, to follow Jen, had startled and dismayed her. She did not know that the proposal had been made to the Club by Rosamund at Jen’s suggestion, and had been accepted by the girls only on Rosamund’s promise to prompt in the background and to keep Maidie up to her duties; for the girls quite frankly felt it would be undesirable to have a dreamy Queen. But Jen had felt that here might be a cure for Maidlin’s growing tendency to withdrawal into an inner world of her own, and had urged her election on Rosamund and on the Club with energy. The invitation had been given at the Club’s last meeting, a few days before, and Maidlin was supposed to be considering it, and to be about to make her gracious acceptance of the honour known very shortly. Actually she was trying, nervously and desperately, to find some way of escape which would not disappoint Jen and Rosamund too deeply.

“I’m not good enough, Ros,” she pleaded. “You know I couldn’t do it. It’s awful for anybody to have to come after you and Jen; you’ve been such ripping Queens. It’s simply silly to think of me.”

Rosamund looked at her with amusement. “Maidie, you are funny! I was in the seventh heaven when they asked me.”

“I’m not,” Maidlin said unhappily. “We’re different.”

“Well, I should say we are,” Rosamund chuckled. Then she said more earnestly, “Think how pleased Joy would be, Maidie!”

“Oh, shut up!” blazed Maidlin, and fled to hide herself in a corner of the garden.

Rosamund started in pursuit, then checked herself, and laughed. “Poor Maidie! That’s the one thing that upsets her. She knows Joy would like it. I don’t understand her a scrap. If it comes to that, I don’t understand Mary-Dorothy either. I don’t know why she’s so fearfully upset. It’s awfully jolly for me, with Mary on one side and Maidie on the other! I’m glad I don’t have feelings; at least ... well, I do! But I do think I’ve got them in better order! Maidie can’t manage hers at all; and it seems as if Mary-Dorothy sits on hers, but now and then they get on top of her. I suppose she and Maidie have ‘temperaments.’ Thanks be, I’m just plain and ordinary!—All the same, ordinary people are useful. What would happen if we were all like Maidie and Mary? Mary’s books would happen, of course, and Maidie’s singing; but things like those wouldn’t run the house or keep Joy’s clubs going! I guess both kinds of people are needed—I and Maidie! I won’t tease her now; she’ll come along presently, and it will be all right. I won’t plague Mary-Dorothy either. She’ll come down when she wants to.”

Rosamund stood in the hall, hesitating. “I’ll begin a letter to Jen, telling her I took the club for her. But I’ll go and talk to Mrs. Shirley first; she’ll be feeling left out of everything. Perhaps Mary has been with her.”

She went hopefully upstairs, but found the old lady alone and waiting anxiously for some one to talk to. The maids had told her the girls had gone to the village, but had not been able to give the reason, and she had wondered, and fidgeted, and had grown anxious at last.

Rosamund put aside the thought of her letter and sat down on a stool at Mrs. Shirley’s feet, to tell the story of the evening’s class.