Girls of the Forest Part 10

"Again I shall have to correct you. 'What are they?' is the sentence you ought to use. But now, my dear, I don't approve of little girls learning much when they are only seven years old; but if you wish to be a schoolroom girl you will have to take your place in the schoolroom, and you will have to learn to submit. You will have to be under more discipline than you are now with nurse."

"All the same, I'll be with my own aunt," said Penelope, raising her bold black eyes and fixing them on Miss Sophia's face.

But Miss Tredgold was not the sort of person to be influenced by soft words. "Deeds, not words," was her motto.

"You have said enough, Penelope," she said. "Take your choice; you may be a schoolroom child for a month if you like."

"I wouldn't if I were you, Pen," said Josephine.

"But I will," said Penelope.

In her heart of hearts she was terrified at the thought of the schoolroom, but even more did she fear the knowledge that nurse would laugh at her if she returned to the nursery.

"I will stay," she said. "I am a schoolroom child;" and she pirouetted round and round Aunt Sophia.

"But, please, Aunt Sophia," said Verena, "who is going to teach us?"

"I intend to have that honor," said Miss Tredgold.

If there were no outward groans among her a.s.sembled nieces at these words, there were certainly spirit groans, for the girls did not look forward to lessons with Aunt Sophia.

"You are all displeased," she said; "and I am scarcely surprised. The fact is, I have not got any efficient teacher to come here just yet. The person I should wish for is not easy to find. I myself know a great deal more than you do, and I have my own ideas with regard to instruction. I may as well tell you at once that I am a very severe teacher, and somewhat cranky, too. A girl who does not know her lessons is apt to find herself seated at my left side. Now, my right side is suns.h.i.+ny and pleasant; but my left side faces due northeast. I think that will explain everything to you. We will meet in the schoolroom to-morrow at nine o'clock sharp. Now I must go."

When Miss Tredgold had vanished the girls looked at each other.

"Her northeast side!" said Pauline. "It makes me shudder even to think of it."

But notwithstanding these remarks the girls did feel a certain amount of interest at the thought of the new life that lay before them. Everything had changed from that sunny, languorous, _dolce far niente_ time a fortnight back. Now the girls felt keen and brisk, and they knew well that each moment in the future would be spent in active employment.

The next day, sharp at nine o'clock, the young people who were to form Miss Tredgold's school entered the new schoolroom. It was suitably and prettily furnished, and had a charming appearance. Large maps were hung on the walls; there was a long line of bookshelves filled partly with story books, partly with history books, and partly with ordinary lesson books. The windows were draped with white muslin, and stood wide open. As the girls took their seats at the baize-covered table they could see out into the garden. A moment after they had arrived in the schoolroom Miss Tredgold made her appearance.

"We will begin with prayers," she said.

She read a portion from the Bible, made a few remarks, and then they all knelt as she repeated the Lord's prayer.

"Now, my dears," said their new governess as they rose from their knees, "lessons will begin. I hope we shall proceed happily and quietly. It will be uphill work at first; but if we each help the other, uphill work will prove to have its own pleasures. It's a long pull, and a strong pull, and a pull all together that masters difficulties. If we are all united we can accomplish anything; but if there is mutiny in the camp, then things may be difficult. I warn you all, however, that under any circ.u.mstances I mean to win the victory. It will be much easier, therefore, to submit at first. There will be no use in sulkiness, in laziness, in inattention.

Make a brave effort now, all of you, and you will never regret this day.

Now, Verena, you and I will have some conversation together. The rest of you children will read this page in the History of England, and tell me afterwards what you can remember about it."

Here Miss Tredgold placed a primer before each child, and she and Verena retired into the bay-window. They came out again at the end of ten minutes. Verena's cheeks were crimson, and Miss Tredgold decidedly wore a little of her northeast air. Pauline, on the whole, had a more successful interview with her new governess than her sister. She was smarter and brighter than Verena in many ways. But before the morning was over Miss Tredgold announced that all her pupils were shamefully ignorant.

"I know more about you now than I did," she said. "You will all have to work hard. Verena, you cannot even read properly. As to your writing, it is straggling, uneven, and faulty in spelling."

CHAPTER VII.

NANCY KING.

The rest of the day pa.s.sed in a subdued state. The girls hardly knew themselves. They felt as though tiny and invisible chains were surrounding them. These chains pulled them whenever they moved. They made their presence felt when they spoke, when they sat down, and when they rose up. They were with them at dinner; they were with them whenever Miss Tredgold put in an appearance. Perhaps they were silken chains, but, all the same, they were intensely annoying. Verena was the most patient of the nine. She said to her sisters:

"We have never had any discipline. I was reading the other day in one of mother's books that discipline is good. It is the same thing as when you prune the fruit trees. Don't you remember the time when John got a very good gardener from Southampton to come and look over our trees? The gardener said, 'These trees have all run to wood; you must prune them.'

And he showed John how, and we watched him. Don't you remember, girls?"

"Oh, don't I!" said Pauline. "And he cut away a lot of the little apples, and hundreds of tiny pears, and a lot of lovely branches; and I began to cry, and I told him he was a horrid, horrid man, and that I hated him."

"And what did he answer?"

"Oh, he got ruder than ever! He said, 'If I was your pa I'd do a little pruning on you.' Oh, wasn't I angry!"

Verena laughed.

"But think a little more," she said. "Don't you remember the following year how splendid the pears were? And we had such heaps of apples; and the gooseberries and raspberries were equally fine. We didn't hate the man when we were eating our delicious fruit."

Pauline made a slight grimace.

"Look here, Renny," she said suddenly; "for goodness' sake don't begin to point morals. It's bad enough to have an old aunt here without your turning into a mentor. We all know what you want to say, but please don't say it. Haven't we been scolded and directed and ordered about all day long? We don't want you to do it, too."

"Very well, I won't," said Verena.

"Hullo!" suddenly cried Briar; "if this isn't Nancy King! Oh, welcome, Nancy--welcome! We are glad to see you."

Nancy King was a spirited and bright-looking girl who lived about a mile away. Her father had a large farm which was known as The Hollies. He had held this land for many years, and was supposed to be in flouris.h.i.+ng circ.u.mstances. Nancy was his only child. She had been sent to a fas.h.i.+onable school at Brighton, and considered herself quite a young lady. She came whenever she liked to The Dales, and the girls often met her in the Forest, and enjoyed her society vastly. Now in the most fas.h.i.+onable London attire, Nancy sailed across the lawn, calling out as she did so:

"Hullo, you nine! You look like the Muses. What's up now? I have heard most wonderful, astounding whispers."

"Oh, Nancy, we're all so glad to see you!" said Briar. She left her seat, ran up to the girl, and took her hand. "Come and sit here--here in the midst of our circle. We have such a lot to say to you!"

"And I have a lot to say to you. But, dear me! how grand we are!"

Nancy's twinkling black eyes looked with mock approval at Verena's plain but very neat gray dress, and at the equally neat costumes of the other girls. Then finally she gazed long and pensively at Penelope, who, in an ugly dress of brown holland, was looking back at her with eyes as black and defiant as her own.

"May I ask," said Nancy slowly, "what has this nursery baby to do in the midst of the grown-ups?"

"I'm not nursery," said Penelope, her face growing crimson; "I'm schoolroom. Don't tell me I'm nursery, because I'm not. We're all schoolroom, and we're having a right good time."

"Indeed! Then I may as well remark that you don't look like it. You look, the whole nine of you, awfully changed, and as prim as prim can be.

'Prunes and prisms' wouldn't melt in your mouths. You're not half, nor quarter, as nice as you were when I saw you last. I've just come home for good, you know. I mean to have a jolly time at Margate by-and-by. And oh!

my boy cousins and my two greatest chums at school are staying with me now at The Hollies. The girls' names are Amelia and Rebecca Perkins. Oh, they're fine! Do give me room to squat between you girls. You are frightfully stand-off and prim."

"Sit close to me, Nancy," said Verena. "We're not a bit changed to you,"

she added.

"Well, that's all right, honey, for I'm not changed to you. Even if I am a very rich girl, I'm the sort to always cling to my old friends; and although you are as poor as church mice, you are quite a good sort. I have always said so--always. I've been talking a lot about you to Amelia and Rebecca, and they'd give their eyes to see you. I thought you might ask us all over."

"Oh! I daren't, Nancy," said Verena. "We are not our own mistresses now."