Part 8

Sally tried to move as she spoke, and fainted. When she was able to realise her surroundings again, she was lying on two chairs in the lodge kitchen; and "Ma Jakes," a fat woman with her hair in curlers, was trying to blow the embers into a blaze. Miss Castle was writing a note at the table.

"Take this to the sanatorium at once," she said as she finished to a man in the doorway, who, Sally knew, must be Jakes, the gardener--only he looked so odd in a shabby dressing-gown, with the legs of his pyjamas falling over his boots, and his matted hair standing wildly on end.

"Where is the puppy?" asked Sally, as Miss Castle came towards her, and at this minute he made his presence known by a yelp, as he retreated under the table before a large angry cat.

"Eating the poor thing's supper, 'e was," said Mrs. Jakes resentfully; "'e ought to be drowned, 'e ought."

She was angry at being dragged out of her bed, "because," so she put it to herself, "of the mischieviousness of one of them dratted noosances of girls."

"It's just--he's so terribly hungry," said Sally. And her voice trembled because her foot hurt her so much, and her swollen eye nearly as badly.

"I ... fought a boy to save him from being hurt, and I don't want him scolded or drowned."

She looked entreatingly at Miss Castle, who seemed to understand, for she drew the dog over and patted him gently.

"All right, Sally--he shan't be hurt, and I will get him some food myself. Don't try to talk any more, child."

She slipped her arm behind the cushion on which the girl's head was resting and raised her a little. Sally lay quite still, and gazed at the tin canister on the mantel-piece in which Mrs. Jakes kept her tea. She found herself concentrating on its shininess, and wondering how it had got its two dents, because she knew she must think of something, or the pain would become unendurable, and she would cry like a baby. It was no use at all to consider explanations or what it was best to say to Miss Cockran, for her head was altogether too stupid to form a connected story.

When at last she did see the Headmistress, it was only for a minute, in what afterwards seemed a kind of dream, with a white-capped nurse standing in the background.

Sally found herself saying, "I'm sorry," as she met the searching grey eyes, and though they did not smile they were quite kind as they gazed down at her.

"That's right. I am glad you are sorry," Miss Cockran said. "But I don't want you to talk now, just to try to sleep. Later on you shall tell me everything."

She was turning away when Sally clutched at her arm.

"Miss Cockran," she said; "Please ... the puppy ... he is such a darling, and it's not his fault--you will be kind to him?"

This time the Headmistress smiled.

"He has just had a large bowl of bread and milk, and Miss Castle and Nurse Baker are putting some ointment on his ear. He is quite happy; so lie quiet, child, and don't worry any more about him."

Sally tried to lie quiet, but her foot was very painful, and her whole body ached. Even when she fell asleep she did not seem able to forget the pain; but woke up in a panic, dreaming that boys were pelting her with stones.

"You have had a slight touch of fever, but you will be all right now, if you are good," the white-capped nurse told her some days later, but when Sally demanded leave to get up she shook her head.

"Why, you will have to keep that sprained ankle of yours up for some time--there's a nasty swelling."

Sally had very rarely been "laid up." On the few occasions when it did occur, the whole of her family had combined to amuse her and keep her quiet; because her mother said it would be bad to allow her to become over-excited. Even so, she had been peevish and not particularly grateful.

Now, convalescence took on a very different note. For some days Sally saw no one but the Matron of the sanatorium, her nurse, and the old doctor who came to look at her ankle. Occasionally she could hear the voices of those recovering from measles; but they were in another passage, and all communication with them was forbidden. Sally did not even know if they were aware of her presence in the building.

It was obvious that she was in disgrace--"a leper"--as she told herself bitterly, turning the pages of some magazines, which, with some Patience cards, were almost her sole means of passing the time. Occasionally Matron read to her; but her choice of books bored the girl, and she refused to be drawn on to school topics.

"Miss Cockran will tell you anything she wishes, when she has time to see you," was her final answer to Sally's frequent entreaties, and the girl's heart sank.

Left to herself, she lay and brooded over Trina Morrison's remark that, were they to run away and be caught, they would not be allowed to provide the school with even a few minutes' peep-show.

"I suppose it means expulsion," she told herself--and longed to know if Peter had escaped detection. It was maddening to think that when she did see Miss Cockran she could not inquire after her for fear of arousing suspicion.

It was a very sulky girl, outwardly calm, but really a good deal shaken, who faced her interview with the Headmistress. The account she gave of her adventures was of the barest.

"I heard there was a Fair--and I wanted to go. So I got out of the house and went: and as I was coming away, some boys were illtreating the puppy--and afterwards he followed me."

"Haven't you missed out that you fought the boys?" asked Miss Cockran quietly.

Sally flushed. Something had kept her from her usual boasting: indeed, when she remembered the fight, her feeling was rather of shame than pride.

"I put up a simply rotten show," she muttered.

"You fought pluckily, at any rate--and in a good cause. I am proud of that."

The girl found the tears rising to her eyes at this praise, and her sullenness began to vanish.

"I ... I'm sorry about the rest now--I wasn't before ... but ... it's been horrible at school, and I didn't care----"

"You wanted to be expelled, you mean?"

Sally crumpled the edge of the counterpane between her hot hands.

"I did at one time. I'm not doing any good here that I can see."

"You have a good form record--top every week, I think. On the other hand, I hear you are untidy in the dormitory, and often rude to Matron, and Decima Pillditch."

There was no answer for some minutes, and then the girl said:

"I like the class work--it's interesting--I could do stiffer stuff."

"I know. You would have been moved up next term."

Sally's heart sank at that "would have been."

"Are you going to expel me?" she demanded suddenly.

Miss Cockran had been sitting very still on her chair beside the bed; but now she rose, and after looking down at the girl with her clear grey eyes for a few seconds, turned and paced the room.

"I don't know, Sally," she said, stopping at last. "Frankly, I can't decide. I hate expelling girls. It means such a stain on their career for always, and you are so young to start with that. Yet what you have done is quite impossible, and fully deserves the worst punishment school life knows."

Sally had begun to grow sulky again, and almost involuntarily her usual formula of disdain sprang to her lips:

"I don't care----"

The Headmistress had walked to the window, and was looking out, but she wheeled sharply as she caught the words.

"Do you mean it, child? If so, there is, of course, nothing more to be said--you will leave directly your foot is well enough, and not come back here. But have you thought what expulsion stands for?"

"I've only been here one term, and..."

"Yes--one term--and that will be the end of your school life, at any rate, in England, I fear. Other schools will not be anxious to take you. Is it because you preferred home work so much, and living with your family, that you have done this reckless thing?"

There was so much real anxiety in Miss Cockran's voice as she asked the question, and her eyes, though grave, were so kind, that Sally felt the last of her outposts of defiance break down. At the same moment, she caught a vision of the schoolroom at home, and the boredom of lessons alone there, for all the years, until she grew up.

"It wasn't true, what I said just now," she burst out suddenly. "I do care--the other girls are hateful to me, and I'm very unpopular; but I like the work and the games, when I'm given a chance at them. I'd like to get a scholarship, and go on to College--Oxford--I know I could do it."

Miss Cockran nodded as if she understood.

"Then why ... why this mad escapade?" she said at last; "I don't understand."

Sally flushed a deep red. It seemed as if Trina Morrison's share in the adventure was not known, and she, at least, had come back all right, undetected. Her spirits rose at the thought.

"It was just ... just silliness----" she said at last. "I do mad things sometimes."

"Ah," said the Headmistress, "just silliness, ... and it might have wrecked your life. If I had thought it deliberate naughtiness, and not, well--just silliness--I would have had no hesitation in thinking it my duty to expel you. A school cannot be run without discipline, any more than a ship."

Sally shifted her bad foot uncomfortably. She hated apologies, and usually skimmed over them as airily as possible; but something told her that nothing but complete submission would be of any use on this occasion. With a great effort, she forced herself to look Miss Cockran in the face as she spoke.

"I ... I'm really sorry, and would like to stay, if you'll have me--and I'll try to keep straight--keep the rules, I mean--in future. And ... and I don't think it will do the discipline any harm if I stop, because everyone hates me so much that I couldn't have persuaded them to go to the Fair with me, even if I had wanted to--I mean, I'm not a bad influence--I'm just no influence at all."

In spite of herself, the Headmistress smiled at the last part of this confession.

"Poor Sally," she said. "There's a lot to learn at school besides lessons, isn't there?"

"No one gives me a chance ... they all hate me ... and----"

Miss Cockran put up her hand.

"Hush, Sally--think very carefully before you speak when you begin to say anything like that. Just remember this--that I am going to give you a chance now--suppose you give the others a chance next term."

She bent, kissed the girl and went quickly from the room.

CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH

AUTOLYCUS

Sally Brendan saw no one belonging to the school during the remainder of her convalescence except Miss Cockran occasionally, and once Miss Castle, who came to tea with her. It was a red-letter afternoon, for Sally had been allowed up for the first time, with a crutch under her arm, to take the weight off her injured foot, and was able to establish herself in a cosy armchair in the window, from which she could command a view of the distant lodge and drive.

Down below, she could see some of the convalescents from measles walking arm in arm, or playing crazy croquet, on a lawn that was all bumps and slopes. The sound of good-natured squabbling, interspersed with many giggles and shouts, rose continuously; but though bored by her own society, the girl made no attempt to follow what was happening, or to attract attention. Rather, she pulled the curtain slightly forward so as to leave herself in the shadow.

A glance had told her that Peter, at any rate, had not found her way to the sanatorium group, and there was no one else in the school in whom she took the faintest interest: besides, when she hobbled across the room, she had passed a looking-glass, and, though vanity formed no part of Sally's conceit, the sight had given her something of a shock.

Her head might speak to a phrenologist in bumps of brains and determination, but to the ordinary observer it was, at the present moment, frankly ugly, with the short hair, that should have crowned it in curls, cut roughly, in odd, shaggy lengths. The injured eye was no longer swollen, but still rainbow-coloured; in fact, as Sally honestly told herself, she was a figure of fun, and when Miss Castle entered the room she looked up anxiously to detect a smile.

The smile was there; but it was friendly--not malicious--and Sally quickly forgot all about her own appearance when she saw the second visitor. For the moment she scarcely recognised the dirty cowering mongrel she had rescued in the well-brushed, rather self-assertive puppy who hurled himself on her knee and began frantically to lick her face.

"Why, he's quite handsome," she said, and Miss Castle laughed.

"I've told them so in the Common Room, but they won't believe me--except Miss Cockran--and she quotes, 'handsome is as handsome does,' because he caught a rat in the cellar last night."

"Oh, did he?--the angel! He is an angel dog, isn't he, Miss Castle?"

"I haven't found his wings yet--I fear he is a thief and a rascal--but he is a very attractive rascal, and has made me take more exercise in the last few days than in all the rest of the term, Sally."

Sally looked up quickly: she was amusing the puppy with the end of her dressing-gown tassel, and as she tried to prevent him from barking she said anxiously:

"Miss Castle, what is going to happen to him? I have not been allowed to get letters, or write home, but I know I can make Mother keep him, if I take him back with me; though if I ask her through the post my sister Cecilia will tell her to say 'No.' You see we have two dogs already."

"I sympathise with Cecilia, three dogs are too many in most houses."

"Well, you see, there are the boys and I who can always exercise them."

"Perhaps--in the holidays--but what about term time?"

Sally looked a little sulky. People always saw Cecilia's point of view: she was so dreadfully reasonable.

"Still, I shall take him home, all the same," she said obstinately. "When you rescue someone like that you can't just shut him out of your life, and forget him, as if he came to you in an ordinary way."

"No--I see that."

Miss Castle was sitting in the window seat and had drawn the puppy down on her knee, with her hand over his nose to make him be quiet.

"What do you say to his stopping here?" she added.

"Oh, Miss Castle! ... What, in school?"

"No, Sally, I don't mean that. Why, if one girl started a pet we should have a menagerie--cats, rabbits, tortoises and monkeys--Oh, Heaven forbid!"

Sally laughed, in spite of her anxiety.

"Well, I don't understand, then. Matron wouldn't have him in the san.: she's much too particular. The other day she told me cats were nasty dirty things that carried infection."

"I expect Miss Cockran would keep him, if you liked to give him to her."

"Miss Cockran?"

Miss Castle threw back her head and laughed at the open-eyed astonishment with which her suggestion was received.

"Oh, Sally, you girls are funny sometimes. Do you think mistresses are a race apart with no ordinary affections and weaknesses?"

The girl got very red.

"No, of course not--at least, I suppose not. You are quite different, at any rate. But Miss Cockran looks ... oh, and Miss Cheeseman, you know ... well, not silly, like us."

As she floundered, trying to find the words she wanted, Miss Castle, bending to kiss the puppy, who lay sprawled across her knee, examined her with twinkling eyes.

"I'm glad I'm silly," she said at last; and then as the girl began to expostulate indignantly that she hadn't meant that, of course, the other stopped her:

"I know what you mean, so don't apologise or explain--just remember it's not always safe to judge people by their appearances--Autolycus, for instance...."

"Auto!--what? Do you mean the puppy?"

"Yes--I have christened him that because he was picked up at a Fair, and there's no doubt he's a rascal--Shakespeare met, or invented, a gentleman of that name who was a pedlar, habitually attending Fairs. Anyhow, we'll call him 'Tolly' for short, except at School Commemoration."

"And Miss Cockran says he may stay here?"

"Yes--she is even prepared to adopt him, if you will pass on the ownership. You see, about a year ago she had a Yorkshire terrier, 'Gyp,' whom she loved very much, and he was lost down a rabbit burrow. She says she never meant to have another dog, because she suffered so much when 'Gyp' disappeared; but 'Tolly' seems to have been sent to her, and he's very fond of her already."

"How splendid!"

"Yes--we are all fond of him. Even Miss Cheeseman will be converted to him in time, I hope, though she doesn't really care about animals."

"She wouldn't," muttered Sally, who disliked the thin, dark, rather precise little mistress, who was second in command at Seascape House, and took her Form in English Composition.

Miss Castle appeared not to hear this remark, unless the slight puckering of her brows showed she was displeased at it.

"I'm going to take Tolly away now," she said, "or he will begin to eat the cushions; but I will come back for some tea in about half-an-hour."

"Oh, thank you, Miss Castle--it's awfully decent of you."

They had a very jolly tea, and discussed everything except Seascape House: such topics as County Cricket, Napoleon's character, haunted houses, and even how to make stick-jaw toffee.

"I think I'll have a toffee party next term," said Miss Castle as she rose to go; "and you shall come and be kitchen-maid."

"May I be taster-in-chief as well, please?"

"Ah, I don't know about that. There will be so much competition for the office, I shall have to hold an examination, I expect, and charge an entrance fee."

She bent and kissed Sally as she spoke, and stood looking down at her for a minute, before she went.

"You will try to make friends here next term, won't you, child? It's the great thing that comes out of school life, I always think."

"But I have friends here," said the girl; "one at least and she is splendid."

After Miss Castle had gone she pulled out a pencil and block from under her pillow, and went on with the long letter she had been writing to Trina Morrison ever since her eye had been well enough to let her look continuously at the paper.

She intended to post this as soon as she had left Seascape House; not before--since she was afraid of drawing attention to any connection between herself and the elder girl which might involve the latter in her disgrace. To some nine or ten pages written earlier in the week she now added five or six more in praise of Miss Castle, and, more doubtfully, of Miss Cockran.

Peter had not admired Old Cocaine. She said she was stuffy and inhuman, like a mummy in the British Museum, that had dried up years ago, and ought to be kept on a shelf.

"But you see she is human, after all," wrote Sally, as she told about the Yorkshire terrier and the adoption of Autolycus.

In the end, the letter was so long that Sally had to ask Matron for a large envelope, pretending that she wanted it to hold part of a story that she was writing; and when she had got this, she addressed it to Trina at her uncle's house, with "Please Forward" in the corner.

It was very nearly holiday time now, and all who had had measles before, and seemed in no danger of getting it again, were sent home early, along with the convalescents.

Seascape House became quieter and quieter, save for the barking of Autolycus, who nearly wore himself out chasing sea-gulls, or hunting wildly for rabbits, amongst the furze bushes along the top of the cliff. He had to be washed twice a week by the indignant Jakes, who pretended that he would like to put a rope round his neck, attached to a big boulder, and sink him in the sea.

"He won't be allowed to do it, will he?" said Sally anxiously to Miss Cockran, when she went to say good-bye, just before starting for home.

"Certainly not! Autolycus is the school watch-dog. I am going to trust him to see no one comes in or out after dark."

Was there a twinkle in the grey eyes? Sally was not sure, and felt uncomfortable under their scrutiny.

"Good-bye," she said gruffly. "And ... and I'm sorry, you know, about it all----"

"That's all right. We start fresh next term, child-- Don't think of what's behind you, but of what's in front. And for goodness' sake, don't go and play tennis on that foot of yours, or do anything foolish for the next six weeks."

She shook hands briskly, and Sally hobbled out to the taxi in which Matron was taking her to the station. Her first term at Seascape House was over.

CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH

WILL SHE COME?

"Sally has improved in many ways--and I don't think, Cecilia, you are being quite fair to her when you complain she is so troublesome."

Mrs. Brendan spoke plaintively. Like many another mother, she wished her daughters agreed better, but did not know how to make them do so. During the term, Cecilia had been sweet-tempered and apparently happy; now, since Sally's return, she was continually ruffled and even snappy--so that the atmosphere of the house had become quite tense.

"There is nothing much to choose between Sally and the boys," went on their mother. "They all expect to do exactly what they like, in the holidays," and she sighed for the selfishness of youth.

"Oh, the boys!" broke in Cecilia impatiently; "that's quite different."

She did not explain, perhaps she did not realise, that the difference lay in her own attitude towards them. She had long ago ceased to try to control her brothers, but Sally's case was another matter. Cecilia felt she should behave at home like a junior at school in the presence of a senior, and if Seascape House could not teach her this elementary piece of manners in the course of a term it had certainly failed in its task.

"I expect the school is not what it used to be when I was there," she continued, jumping from the subject of the boys to what was chiefly occupying her mind, and heedless of the fact that schools, like newspapers, never are what they used to be.

"Why, in my time, no kid of Sally's age would think of cheeking an elder girl, or of speaking to her in the way she does to me."

"You continually find fault with her, Cecilia."