Just Gerry Part 20

Gerry hated this particular form of merry-go-round. It made her feel sick and giddy, and she was unable to work her body backwards and forwards rhythmically enough to keep her place in the magic circle.

She gasped for breath and held on tightly while Muriel ran her two or three times round the ring, and endeavoured to work her body as the other girls were doing. But the result was a hopeless failure, and when the head girl, having given her pupil what she thought was a super-excellent start, left go her hold, Gerry swung helplessly at the end of her rope, getting into the way of the girl who was swinging behind her, and finally bringing them both to an ignominious finish in the middle of the ring.

"What a donkey you are!" said Margaret Taylor angrily. She stooped down to rub her ankle, which Gerry had kicked rather hard in her efforts to keep herself going. "I was having a perfectly lovely swing, and now you've made me lose my turn." And she continued to glare angrily at the unfortunate new girl until the other striders dropped out one by one and the ring finally stopped.

Muriel made Gerry have one more try, but with no better results than before. After that, the new girl was handed on to Monica Deane, who was superintending the vaulting-horse. Gerry fared no better at this, and although each prefect in turn tried their hand upon her, none of them could find anything in the nature of apparatus upon which the new girl could perform with any measure of success.

Muriel Paget had been keeping her eye upon Gerry, and saw the hopeless exhibition the Lower Fifth girl was making of herself. But the prefect was determined to conquer the nervousness which was such a handicap to her protegee; and acting upon the plan which had succeeded so well with Gerry at hockey, she cast about in her mind for something to set her to do which would help her to make a start.

Finally she thought of the rope ladders.

"n.o.body, not even the most hopeless duffer at gym, could make an utter mess of them, surely," she thought to herself, and ordered the ladders to be let down. But even here she had reckoned without Gerry's nerves!

The girl was in a desperately overwrought state by this time. The troubles of the last few days culminating in her disgrace in cla.s.s that morning, added to the hopeless exhibition she had been making of herself all through the afternoon, had rendered her unfit for even the simplest thing. When ordered to climb the rope ladder she obeyed dumbly, much in the way a condemned man might obey the order to walk to the scaffold; and, spurred on by Muriel's urging from below, she did succeed in mounting to a fair height. But rope ladders are not such easy things to climb as a novice might suppose. They have a nasty knack of doubling up and slipping away from you when you least expect them to, and when she was some thirty feet up this was what happened to the one Gerry was endeavouring to mount. And instead of trying to regain her balance, the girl gave way to the panic that had possessed her more or less all the afternoon.

She clutched desperately to the rope with her hands, and pushed hard with her feet, which, of course, only had the effect of turning her still more upside down.

"Let your body hang limp until you are in a proper position again,"

called Muriel. But Gerry was far too terrified and unnerved to act upon her directions, even if she had been able to take in exactly what they meant.

"Muriel! I--I can't get right way up," she gasped, struggling to keep her self-control. But Muriel did not realise quite how frightened Gerry really was. She spoke impatiently as she answered her, while a gale of laughter at the unsightly figure poor Gerry made as she clung to the rope like a drowning man, went through the gymnasium.

"Don't be such a little goat, Gerry!" cried the head girl. "Come down again if you can't go any farther, but for goodness' sake make an effort of some sort!"

Making an effort of any sort was quite beyond poor Gerry's power at the moment. It seemed to her that she would soon be hanging quite upside down, and when that happened she was sure that she would have to release her hold. Already everything was swimming around her; black specks danced before her eyes, and at last she gave vent to her terror in an anguished cry for help.

"Oh, Muriel! Muriel! I'm going to fall!" she cried, with a piteous note in her voice. And seeing that she really was in extremities, the head girl was obliged to run up the ladder herself and bring her down.

"Well, you _are_ a little funk!" she said in some disgust, as she set Gerry on her feet again, and stood surveying her white face and trembling figure; while the Middle School, amused and interested spectators of the scene, pressed about the two at a respectful distance. She might have said more, but at that moment someone in the background exclaimed audibly:

"Why, of course! Isn't it German Gerry? What else do you expect her to do but funk!"

The head girl swung round sharply, but she could not identify the speaker.

"Who said that?" she demanded angrily. But n.o.body would give the culprit away. However, the remark had the effect of cutting short her reproof to Gerry, and with a dry: "Well, you'd better ask Miss Caton to let you have extra gym practice until you get into it a bit, I should think," she let the matter drop.

"That's enough for this afternoon. Fall in, please, order of forms,"

she said, addressing the a.s.sembled girls. Monica Deane went to the piano and struck up a lively march. And to the tune of "The Coster's Wedding" the Middle School marched out of the gymnasium and repaired to its various dormitories to get ready for tea.

CHAPTER XXI

HECTOR OR PARIS?

That evening the lists for the dormitory hockey finals were posted up on the notice-board. Muriel Paget and Monica Deane pinned them up on their way out from supper, and after the two prefects had departed a curious crowd quickly gathered round to see who had been selected.

Much to everybody's astonishment, Geraldine Wilmott's name figured again in the Pink Dormitory list.

"_Surely_ Muriel isn't to let _her_ play again?" exclaimed Elsie Lips...o...b.., the Green Dormitory's centre forward. "Why, it was only through her that the Pink Dorm didn't win last time! It must be a mistake!"

"Play who?" asked Dorothy Pemberton, who came up just then arm in arm with Phyllis Tressider.

"Gerry Wilmott. She's down for left outside!"

"Not German Gerry?" cried Phyllis.

"Muriel must be cracked!" said Dorothy in disgusted amazement, as her eyes verified the truth of Elsie's statement. "What on earth Muriel can see in that little donkey I can't think! I don't think the head girl ought to show such favouritism. It was all very well putting her in last time when there was n.o.body else to play. But now there's Pam Henderson, and Dora Wainscott, and Bee Tyrell, and heaps of others. It isn't fair to go putting in a rotten little German coward who can't play hockey for nuts, and who even funks climbing a rope ladder!"

"Oh, well, I suppose Muriel knows what she's about," said Gwen Carter, an Upper Fifth girl, in rather a languid tone. "After all, neither Pam nor Bee are exactly geniuses at hockey, you know. I shouldn't think that even Gerry Wilmott was much worse. And Dora Wainscott's hand is still awfully bad. She was wearing it in a sling in form to-day."

"All the same, I think it's too bad that German Gerry should be playing," declared Phyllis loudly. She had caught sight of Gerry coming along the corridor, and had raised her voice purposely in order that she might hear. "I think it's a shame that we should be asked to play in the same team with her again, when everybody knows that the Pink Dorm would have won last time if she hadn't funked."

Gerry heard, as it was intended that she should. But she took no notice, only hurried by the group around the notice-board with flushed cheeks and averted eyes. The girls stopped talking for the moment and watched her curiously. Just as she pa.s.sed somebody gave a slight hiss, which was immediately taken up by three parts of the girls present.

"German Gerry!" called out someone, and the hissing grew louder as the girl fled by. Gerry's steps quickened into a run until she had turned a corner of the corridor and was out of sight of her tormentors. She had been on her way to the Lower Fifth sitting-room, but her reception in the pa.s.sage made her change her mind, and she hurried on to the cla.s.sroom instead, which was empty and deserted at this hour. It was against the rules to be there except in lesson hours, as Gerry knew well. But she had no other place of refuge, and once or twice lately this had served her in good stead. It was less risky than going to the dormitory, which was also out of bounds at this time, and there was no other place in the school where she could hope to find privacy.

She slipped into her desk and buried her burning face in her hands, grateful for the darkness and the silence. Although she did not realise it, Gerry was certainly getting braver. When she first came to school she would not have ventured alone into a dark room for anything in the world, in spite of her fifteen years. But now she was so absorbed in her greater trouble that she forgot to be afraid.

"Why do they hate me so?" she asked herself, and puzzled, as she had puzzled so many times before, over her unpopularity. It was not really so puzzling as she imagined. She was too quiet and shy to have won popularity easily in any case, even without her nerves, in such a big school as Wakehurst Priory; and, unfortunately for her, she had made two very bad enemies on the first day of term in Dorothy Pemberton and Phyllis Tressider.

Without being altogether bad-hearted, these two girls were responsible for a great deal of trouble in the school. They both possessed what so many of the girls lacked--personality; and they had a large following amongst their own set of girls who admired them for their ingenuity in mischief and the spirit of dare-deviltry which seemed at times to possess them. They had been "up against" Gerry from the very beginning, owing to the fact that Gerry had innocently usurped Dorothy's cubicle; and a series of unlucky accidents, occasioned by Gerry's newness to school ways and her rather unfortunate disposition, had simply played into their hands.

For some while Gerry was left in peace in the solitude of the cla.s.sroom. But luck was against her that night, as it had seemed to be so often during the term. As a rule n.o.body ever dreamt of going near the cla.s.srooms after supper, but to-night Miss Burton must needs require a book from her desk and come to fetch it. And suddenly poor Gerry was startled by the abrupt opening of the schoolroom door and the switching on of the light.

She rose to her feet in a panic to find Miss Burton regarding her in surprised disapproval.

"Geraldine Wilmott! What are you doing here? Of course you know that it is strictly against the rules?"

"Yes, I know," said Gerry lamely, unable to think of any excuse for her presence in the cla.s.sroom at this unauthorised hour. Dorothy or Phyllis or Jack would have thought of dozens in a moment! Indeed, it did not occur to her that there was any excuse to make. She was too fundamentally honest to try and wriggle out of the sc.r.a.pe as ninety-nine out of a hundred schoolgirls might have done. Miss Burton, however, with her lack of understanding, interpreted her reply as bald defiance, and was correspondingly severe.

"Then that means another bad mark for you. Really, you are incorrigible! I shall be obliged to report you to Miss Oakley if you don't soon make a decided improvement in your conduct. Go back to your sitting-room at once. And don't forget to give in your bad mark to-morrow morning."

Gerry wandered disconsolately back through the corridors. There seemed to be n.o.body about, and as she did not want to go to the sitting-room sooner than she could help, she went on to look at the notice-board, to see if Muriel really had put her name down for Sat.u.r.day's match. From Phyllis Tressider's speech she gathered that she had done so. Somehow, after the incident in the gymnasium that afternoon, Gerry had quite expected Muriel to change her mind about putting her into the team.

But, no! There was her name down, in black and white--Gerry Wilmott, left outside.

Gerry stood for a few moments gazing at the list, uncertain whether to be pleased that Muriel still intended to give her another chance, or to be frightened at the ordeal that lay before her. And as she stood there, doubtfully regarding the notice-board, the head girl herself came along, and stopped to speak to her.

"Well, Gerry, I'm giving you your chance, you see," she said kindly.

"Yes--I see," said Gerry, turning round to face the prefect. "But, Muriel, are you--are you sure you think it's best?

Supposing--supposing I funk again?"

"Now, look here, Gerry, I shall really get cross with you if you go on like this," said the head girl impatiently. And indeed, there was some reason for her impatience. She seemed always to be having to spur Gerry Wilmott on to the simplest acts of courage. "I keep telling you and telling you that you must have more confidence in yourself! You needn't funk if you'll only make up your mind not to. You've put up one or two quite good games since you've been playing forward, Alice says, and there's no earthly reason why you should not do the same on Sat.u.r.day. If Dora Wainscott's hand was well enough for her to play, I should put her in. But it isn't, and you're just as good as any of the other girls in the dorm who are left--rather better than most of them.

Now, are you going to buck up and do yourself and the dorm credit, or are you going to let me down?"

"I'm--I'm going to do my best," said Gerry, lifting earnest eyes to the head girl's face. "It's jolly good of you, Muriel, to give me the chance after the way I went on over gym this afternoon."

"Did you think I should cut you out because of that?" said Muriel.

"You certainly did make rather an a.s.s of yourself. But there's no earthly reason why you should do the same on Sat.u.r.day. I should like to fit you up with a new backbone, Gerry Wilmott," she added laughingly. "You'd be quite a decent kid if you'd _only_ buck up and be a bit more daring! You ought to take for your own the motto that the Red Cross Knight found written up over the door of the castle--'Be bold, be bold, be bold!'"