Читать книгу The Girls of the Abbey School - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 6

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‘Come on, Jenny-Wren! I want you to see my abbey!’ Joan held out her hand.

Jen laughed as she caught it, and they ran together across the lawn. ‘Why am I Jenny-Wren?’

‘Didn’t you say your name was Jen Robins? Well, then!’

Jen laughed again, but accepted the explanation as sufficient. ‘Oh, isn’t this fine? And isn’t it surprising?’

A narrow shrubbery path had led them to an ancient gate, studded with great nails, in a high wall. Joan unlocked this and showed a tiny garden, full of early flowers—pansies, wallflowers, late daffodils, lilac—with narrow paved paths among the flower beds. Beyond stood buildings, which had been hidden by the garden wall, and even to Jen’s ignorant eyes the long, narrow windows and finely-moulded arches were obviously ancient.

‘Twelfth century,’ said Joan, noting her look. ‘It was built by the old monks eight hundred years ago, and all the rooms they lived in are still here. I can show you where they slept and worked and had their meals, though the church has gone. This way!’ and she led Jen down a stone passage through the first building. ‘That’s a seat for the porter. Here’s a recess where they kept books. That was the abbot’s little garden we came through.’

‘Oh! Is this where Sir Antony saw you dancing?’ cried Jen, as the passage led them to a smooth, sunny lawn, with old gray walls and broken arches and ancient doors and windows closing it in.

‘Yes. Do you wonder we were tempted? This is the cloister garth. Come and speak to Ann Watson, and then I’ll show you just how the monks lived. She’s the caretaker,’ Joan explained, leading the way to an old pointed doorway. ‘She’s been here for seven months now, and we all like her very much. When I gave up the job to go to school, I offered it to her, as she was living in the village with her old father and mother. She’s a widow with no children, and I thought that was just as well. If there had been kiddies they might have got messing about with the buildings and have done some damage.’

A pleasant-faced, middle-aged woman came out to greet them, and Joan explained Jen’s presence. ‘So that you’ll understand if you see her about!’ she laughed.

‘Ann Watson lives in some old rooms right inside the outer wall,’ she explained to Jen, as she led her along the cloisters. ‘We lived there ourselves for a while, so we know they’re comfortable! Don’t you like her? She’s pleasant to speak to, and she learned all about the abbey very quickly. I think she must have been a servant in some London family before she married; nurse, or lady’s maid, perhaps; she says she lived in London. This is my room!—my absolutely private place, where I can get away from everybody,’ and she opened a door leading from the cloisters into the thickness of the wall.

It was a quaint little nook, furnished with rugs from the Hall, two basket chairs, a low table, and a few favourite books and pictures. Joan had gathered a handful of daffodils in the abbot’s garden, and she began to arrange these in a bowl, while Jen, delighted to help, carried away a bunch of faded wood hyacinths and fetched a jug of water from Mrs Watson.

‘Those bluebells were given me at the Coronation,’ Joan laughed. ‘But their day is over!’

‘Did you say you had lived here?’ Jen ventured, sitting on the arm of a chair and watching her. ‘And—and what did you mean about the caretaker? You said you——?’

‘Had to give up the job to go to school. I thought perhaps you didn’t quite understand. We were the caretakers, mother and I, for nearly two years. Yes, it’s queer, isn’t it?’ as Jen stared blankly. ‘Perhaps you’ll understand how odd it feels to be living at the Hall now! All the girls at school know all about it, of course. We lived here, and I showed people over the abbey; that’s how I know it so well. We didn’t know then that Sir Antony was Joy’s grandfather; mother knew, of course, but he wouldn’t let us be told till he was dead. He let mother bring us here on condition she kept it secret, and she had nowhere else to go. Father had died, and Joy needed country air; so we came here. Then when Sir Antony died he left money for us both to go to school, and so we found Ann Watson to come here. Now you understand!’

‘What a queer story!’ Jen marvelled. ‘But how ripping for it all to be yours and Joy’s now!’

‘Yes, ripping’s the only word for it!’ Joan laughed. ‘Now come out on the garth and have a dancing lesson! It won’t hurt you to know the movements, whether you join us or not. You’ll understand the dances better next time you watch them.’ And out on the garth she initiated Jen into the mysteries of siding and arming, set-and-turn-single, casting-off, and gave a demonstration of the morris step for her benefit.

During the week that followed, when all three girls waited anxiously for Miss Macey’s reply to Mrs Shirley’s invitation, Jen had many such lessons, on garth or lawn, or in the great hall at night. Joy was called upon to help, so that Jen might learn the ‘heys’ of morris and country dancing, and even Mrs Shirley consented to join in and make a fourth.

‘Good business! Then we can have “Rufty” and “Hey, Boys!” ’ Joy said exuberantly. ‘You’re a sport, aunty dear!’

‘So long as it’s not “Goddesses,” I don’t mind helping you,’ Mrs Shirley laughed. ‘But I do draw the line at that.’

‘Why?’ asked Jen, as the elder girls laughed.

‘Because it’s all skipping. We’ll find some others one of these days, and then you’ll know!’ they assured her.

A week later, Joan and Jen, practising the ‘Bacca Pipes’ jig on the garth early one afternoon, with crossed sticks laid down to represent the long clay pipes, were interrupted by Joy, who came flying through the abbot’s garden and tresaunt passage waving a letter.

‘It’s all right! They’re coming as soon as we’ll have them! Aunty says to-morrow will do. There haven’t been any more cases, so they’re out of quarantine, but the school’s got to have all the drains up, so we can’t go there all term, and Miss Macey’s just awfully thankful to get the chance of bringing the girls here. They haven’t been living in the school while the drains were being tested, of course; they were all moved away to rooms in a hotel. So they won’t go bringing germs here. And Cissie’s much better, so we needn’t worry about her!’

‘You have been worrying a lot, haven’t you?’ Joan mocked.

‘Oh, and, Joan, Miss Macey says, may she bring twenty-one boarders! Isn’t she weird? Do you suppose she’s—well, forgetting things a little, with all this worry? There are only twenty of them.’

‘And me!’ Jen added. ‘But I’m here already!’

‘You are, Jenny-Wren, and that’s a fact! We shan’t forget it, either!’ Joy teased.

‘I shouldn’t have thought Miss Macey would count you in, when you’re here already,’ Joan observed. ‘Let’s see the letter, Joy!—“Twenty-one boarders, three mistresses, four maids”—and then she goes on to say she’ll bring Jen’s clothes and books, and she hopes she hasn’t given us too much trouble!’—all three laughed at the characteristic touch.

‘But she hasn’t forgotten me, then!’ Jen pondered. ‘It is queer!’

‘Queer about the twenty-first boarder!’ Joan and Joy looked at one another. ‘What can she mean? She can’t have taken in any new girl just now!’

‘Not likely, when the whole town must know we’ve got an infectious disease!’ Joy mocked. ‘We’ll see who the mysterious Number Twenty-One is when they turn up! Come and help get ready for them, you two! What were you dancing? Oh, “Bacca Pipes”!’

‘Jen’s smashed her pipes to atoms, or she would have done if they’d been there,’ Joan laughed. ‘She will jump on her sticks. Show Joy, Jenny-Wren! Toe in the right, heel in the left! Now round your pipes! Remember it’s morris step!’

‘I can’t!’ Jen sighed. ‘My morris step goes west as soon as I think about anything else. What’s that?’ at the hoot of a motor-horn near by.

‘Visitors to see the abbey! Americans, probably; they come in crowds. Come on, take cover!’ and Joy made a dash for the arched door of the chapter-house.

Joan caught her just in time. ‘Don’t be a silly goat! That’s the first place they’ll go. Come home—no, it’s too late! In here, then!’ as the sound of Mrs Watson’s voice warned them that the guests were entering the garth.

Joan threw open the door of her retreat, and they all slipped in and closed the door. ‘Sanctuary!’ she laughed. ‘It’s not the first time I’ve been nearly caught. Oh, there are our bacca-pipes—sticks, I mean!—left out on the garth! How horrid they look!’

‘Look silly, anyway,’ Joy laughed.

But Joan had a sense of artistic fitness and a great love for the abbey. ‘It looks horrid. I’m an idiot not to have thought of it,’ she said, frowning at the white sticks lying neatly crossed on the lawn.

‘They’ll never notice,’ Joy remarked.

‘I should! It will spoil their first impression of the garth. Instead of looking beautiful, it will just look untidy. I feel like apologising,’ Joan murmured, but did not carry out the threat.

From the narrow window-slit they watched while Mrs Watson led the party of motorists to refectory, chapter-house, and sacristy, and told the story and date of each.

‘Ann Watson knows it all right, but she’s rather a stick,’ Joy murmured. ‘Now when Joan did it, people just saw the old fogies moving about in their white robes and black head-dresses; didn’t they, old thing?’

‘I don’t know. I’m sure I hope so!’ Joan laughed.

‘Some swank!’ Joy murmured. ‘Look at that fur motor-coat—topping! D’you think she’s a duchess?’

Joan’s eyes were on the small boy and girl, who, with the lady in the handsome fur coat, made up the little party. They were evidently a lively pair, whose interest in architecture, and even romance, soon wore off. The girl was the elder, and perhaps thirteen, with a mane of thick brown hair; the boy looked a year younger, and was fairer than his sister. For the first minute or two they followed Mrs Watson’s description of the buildings with interest. Then their attention began to wander, and Joan groaned as the girl made a dash for the crossed sticks lying on the lawn, struck a warlike attitude, and challenged her brother to combat. ‘Come on, Dick!’ her voice rang out across the garth. ‘There aren’t any windows to smash here! You sent my sword flying last time. Now I’m going to do for yours, old bean!’

‘Della!’—was that the name the fur-clad lady called imperatively from the old Norman archway that led to the refectory stairs? ‘I have forbidden you to use that word to Dick!’

‘Yes, mummy, I believe you have,’ Della called back easily. ‘But I didn’t do it wilfully, dear! I only forgot. You never mind when it’s quite a forget, do you, darling?’

Jen chuckled. ‘I know just how she feels!’

‘I’m glad Dick and Della will only be here for a few minutes!’ Joan remarked. ‘I hope they don’t manage to smash anything before they go. They ought to have keepers. See that!’ as Dick’s stick, caught up hastily and carelessly, flew across the garth at a skilful blow from Della’s evidently practised hand.

He sprang after it with a howl of wrath, and snatched it up close to the arches of the chapter-house. Then he came flying back to his sister. ‘Say, D.! There’s the most topping little room in there; the very place for a smuggler’s den! It would be just It! Come and have a look!’

They disappeared into the chapter-house, and Joy, with a shout of laughter at the look on Joan’s face, flung open the door. ‘Let’s cut across the garth and get home and prepare for the girls! It won’t do any good to look tragic, Joan; and why worry, anyway? They’ll be gone in half an hour. Let them turn your precious chapter-house into a smuggler’s cave, if it pleases them; it won’t hurt it for a few minutes. Let’s clear out! Their swanky mummy’s hearing all about saints and sermons in the refectory; and they’re both too busy to see us. Come on! It will only rile you to stop here and listen to them!’

Joan saw the force of this. She locked the door, and they all raced across the garth and disappeared into the tresaunt passage. ‘All the same, I’ll be glad when that lot have gone!’ she panted, as she locked the garden gate.

Joy laughed again. ‘Every step and every stone of the abbey is holy to Joan,’ she remarked to Jen. ‘I wonder we didn’t need smelling-salts to revive her! Smuggler’s den, indeed! The chapter-house! Where the monks never spoke above a whisper, because it was so sacred—but you’ve heard her, of course, Jenny-Wren! Smuggler’s den! I must tell aunty!’ and she went off into a peal of laughter again. ‘Oh, Joan! If you could have seen your own face!’

‘I’ll be glad to see the backs of Dick and Della!’ Joan retorted.