Читать книгу The O'Sullivan Twins - Enid blyton - Страница 4

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The first day or two of a new term is always an exciting time. There are no proper time-tables, rules are not kept strictly, there is a lot of unpacking to be done—and best of all there are tuck-boxes to empty!

The twins missed their home and their mother at first, as did most girls—but there was so much to do that there was no time to fret or worry. In any case every one soon settled down into the school routine. It was fun to greet all the teachers again, fun to sit in the same old classroom, and fun to see if the ink-spot that looked like a cat with two tails was still on Janet’s desk.

There were new books to be given out, and new pencils, rubbers, rulers and pens.

“Ah, the nice new books!” said Mam’zelle, her large eyes gleaming with pleasure as she looked round the class. “The nice new books—to be filled with beautiful French compositions. Did you groan, Doris? Surely you are not going to make my hair grey this term as you did last term? Ah-h-h! See this grey lock, ma chère Doris—it was you who caused that last term!”

Mam’zelle pulled out a bit of grey hair from her thick thatch, and looked comically at Doris.

“I’ll do my best, Mam’zelle,” promised Doris. “But I shall never, never be able to say the French r’s in the right way. Never!”

“R-r-r-r!” said Mam’zelle, rolling the r in her throat in a most marvellous manner. The class giggled. Mam’zelle sounded remarkably like a dog growling, but nobody dared to say so.

The other teachers welcomed the girls in their own manner. Miss Roberts had already seen most of her girls in the train. Alison couldn’t help liking her very much, though she was a little afraid of Miss Roberts’s sharp tongue. Miss Roberts had a way of making an offender feel very small indeed.

The form-mistress had a special word for the twins. “Well, Pat and Isabel, I can see by your faces that you’ve made up your minds to do well this term. You’ve got determination written all over you, Pat—and I know that Isabel always follows your example! What about being top in a few things this term?”

“I’d like to be,” said Pat, eagerly. “We always were at Redroofs—the school we went to before, you know. Now that we’ve got used to St. Clare’s we’ll be able to work more quickly.”

Matron was in her room, giving out towels, sheets and pillow-cases, and warning everyone that any buttons would have to be sewn on by the girls themselves, and any tears would have to be neatly mended in sewing-class.

“But I can’t mend sheets and things,” said Alison, in dismay.

“Maybe that’s one of the things your mother sent you here to learn?” suggested Matron with her wide smile. “You hope to be happily married one day, don’t you—and run your own home? Well, you must learn to take care of your own linen and mend it, then. But it doesn’t seem to me that you need worry much—your mother has sent you all new things. So unless you try to kick holes in your sheets, and tear the buttons off there won’t be much for you to do in the way of mending this term!”

All the girls had to go and see Miss Theobald in turn. Alison went with Pat and Isabel. She felt very nervous as she stood outside the drawing-room with them, waiting to go in.

“What do I say?” she whispered. “Is she very solemn?”

The door opened and Janet and Hilary came out. “You next,” said Hilary, and the waiting three went in. Alison liked Miss Theobald, the Head Mistress, at once. She had a very serious face that could break into a really lovely smile. She smiled now as she saw the three cousins.

“Well, Pat and Isabel, I am glad to see you back again, looking so happy,” she said. “I remember last term, when I first saw you, you scowled and said hardly a word! But this term I know you better. You will do your very best for your form, and for the school too.”

“Yes, of course, Miss Theobald,” said the twins, beaming.

Miss Theobald turned to Alison. “And this is another O’Sullivan, a cousin!” she said. “Well, with three O’Sullivans all working hard in the same form, Miss Roberts ought to be pleased! You are lucky to have two sensible cousins to help you along in this first term, Alison.”

“Yes, Miss Theobald,” gasped Alison, still very nervous.

“You may go now,” said Miss Theobald. “And remember, Pat and Isabel, that I am here to help in any difficulty, so don’t be afraid to come, will you?”

The three went out, all a little awed, but all liking the Head Mistress immensely. They rushed to the common room, which Alison had not yet seen.

“Don’t we have studies to ourselves here?” said Alison, in disappointment, looking round the big room that was shared by the first- and second-formers together. “What an awful row!”

Certainly there was a noise. Girls were talking and laughing. Some one had put the gramophone on, and some one else, at the other end of the big room, was tinkering with the wireless, which kept making most extraordinary noises.

“You’ll soon get used to the noise,” said Pat happily. “It’s nice and friendly, really. Look—you can have this part of the shelf here for your belongings, Alison—your cake-tins and biscuit-tins—and your sewing or knitting and the library book you’re reading. The next part belongs to me and Isabel. Keep your part tidy or you’ll take up too much room.”

The twins showed their cousin over the school—the big classrooms with the lovely view from the windows—the enormous gym—the fine art room, high-up under the roof, with a good north light—the laboratory—even the cloakrooms, where each girl had a locker for her shoes, and a peg for her out-door things and her overall.

“Am I in the same dormitory as you, Pat?” asked Alison, timidly, as she peeped in at the big bedrooms, where eight girls slept in eight little cubicles each night.

“I’ll ask Hilary,” said Pat. “She’s head-girl of our form, and she’ll know. Hie, Hilary—do you know if our Cousin Alison is in with us, or not?”

Hilary took out a list of names. “Dormitory 8,” she read out. “Hilary Wentworth, Pat and Isabel O’Sullivan, Doris Elward, Kathleen Gregory, Shelia Naylor, Janet Robins and Alison O’Sullivan. There you are—that’s our dormitory list—same as last term, except that Vera Johns has gone into number 9—to make room for Alison, I suppose.”

“Oh, good,” said Pat. “You’re with us, Alison. That’s a bit of luck for you.”

The three new girls were in the first form with Miss Roberts. The tall bad-tempered-looking girl was called Margery Fenworthy. She looked old enough to be in the second form, but the girls soon saw that her work was poor—not even up to the standard of the first form, really.

“Isn’t she a funny creature?” said Pat to Isabel, after a morning in class with Margery. “She simply doesn’t seem to care a bit what she does or says. I’ve an idea she can be awfully rude. Goodness—there’ll be a row if she gets across Mam’zelle!”

Margery Fenworthy kept herself to herself. She was always reading, and if anyone spoke to her she answered so shortly that nobody said any more. She would have been very good looking if she had smiled—but, as Pat said, she always looked as if she wanted to bite somebody’s head off!

Lucy Oriell, the other new girl, was the complete opposite of Margery. She was brilliantly clever, but as she was only fourteen and a half, she was put into the first form for that term at any rate. Nothing was difficult to her. She had a wonderful memory, and was always merry and gay.

“The way she gabbles French with Mam’zelle!” groaned Doris. “The way she draws in the art class! The way she recites yards and yards of Shakespeare, and it takes me all my time to learn two lines properly.”

Every one laughed. Doris was a duffer—with one great talent. She could make people laugh! She could dance well and comically, and she could mimic others perfectly, which made it all the more strange that she could not imitate Mam’zelle’s French accent. Every one liked Doris.

“An absolute idiot—but such a nice one!” as Janet said.

“What do you think of the three new girls, Janet?” asked Hilary, biting the end of her pencil as she tried to think out a problem in arithmetic set by Miss Roberts.

Pat and Isabel were nearby, listening. Janet shook back her dark hair, and gave her judgment.

“Lucy Oriell—top-hole! Clever, responsible, kind and gay. Margery Fenworthy—a bad-tempered, don’t-care creature with some sort of past.”

“Whatever do you mean?” said Pat, astonished.

“Well, mark my words, there’s something behind that funny way Margery has of keeping herself to herself, and of not caring tuppence for anything or anybody,” said Janet, who could be very far-seeing when she wanted to. “And what does a girl of fifteen want to be so bad-tempered for? I’d just like to know how she got on at her last school. I bet she didn’t make any friends!”

The twins stared across at Margery, who, as usual, had her nose buried in a book. Janet went on to the third new girl, Alison.

“I suppose I mustn’t say much about Alison, as she’s your cousin—but if you want my real opinion it’s this—she’s a conceited, stuck-up little monkey without a single idea in her pretty little head!”

“Thanks for your opinions, Janet,” said Hilary, with a laugh. “You have a wonderful way of putting into words just exactly what every one else is thinking—and doesn’t say!”