He waded with Aldred to his own boat, returning to fetch Mabel, and the boys scrambled after him as best they could.

"It's Pritchard's boat, isn't it?" he said. "I'm pa.s.sing the ferry, so if you like I'll tell him what's happened. If you cross through the wood there, and turn to the right of the iron gate, you'll find your way straight to the village."

The boys went home in rather subdued spirits.

"We shall have to go down to the ferry this evening and explain things to Pritchard," said Piers. "I hope he won't cut up rough about the boat."

"I'm afraid he'll want compensation," said Francis, "I split that spliced oar with trying to shove her off."

"What an abominable swindle! It'll take half our next term's cash. I don't believe the pater will stand it for us."

"I'm sure he won't, after that little affair of the rifle and old Carter's dog!" put in G.o.dfrey.

"Well, never mind if we have to pay up. We shall survive it, I suppose,"

said Francis. "We're making Mabel and Aldred look quite uncomfortable.

It seems a stingy trick to take them out rowing, land them on a sandbank, and then spend all the rest of the time growling over the damage. But I know one thing: if ever we have that boat again, I'm going to make a chart of the river first, and mark down all the shoals!"

CHAPTER XVI

An Opportunity

Mabel and Aldred returned to Birkwood on terms of even closer intimacy than before. There is always a difference between a companion who is only an acquaintance at school and one who shares the many little home a.s.sociations and interests that make a bond of union apart from the other girls, and give innumerable subjects for those confidential talks which are the chief joy of friendship. The bedroom that had once seemed entirely Mabel's was now taken up with joint possessions. Aldred had helped to buy the new gipsy table that stood in the window, and had embroidered half of the table-cloth that covered it. The cushion for the wicker chair was a present from Lady Muriel to both the girls; and the knick-knacks that they had brought back with them were so entirely mixed that it was difficult to tell which belonged to either. "All things in common" was Mabel's motto, and Aldred, who certainly got the better of the bargain, was only too ready to agree.

It was high summer now at the Grange--glorious, golden days, when the sea breeze, or the wind from the downs, tempered the warm sunshine, and established Birkwood's reputation for a bracing climate. As many lessons as possible were held in the garden. Each form had its own special open-air cla.s.sroom, and the girls easily accommodated themselves to working out-of-doors.

"When you're accustomed to it, it's no harder than working in the house," said Ursula. "Of course, just the first day we can't help staring about a little, to look at birds and things, but we soon get over that. We're none of us babies, to need four walls round us to keep our attention, and it is so very much nicer."

The Fourth Form "room" was at the corner of the big lawn, under the shade of a large oak, almost exactly in the place where Aldred had made her statue of Venus in the snow. How different the garden looked now in its summer dress! It was difficult to believe that the asphalt court had ever been frozen and turned into a skating rink.

"I shall never forget our ice carnival," said Miss Bardsley. "My ankle is hardly strong yet, and I'm afraid it will always be thicker than the other."

"You had a long holiday, though," urged Phbe: "six whole weeks!"

"An enforced holiday is no pleasure; I would far rather have been at my work. I don't feel that you've made up yet for all you lost while I was absent."

"Is that why we have a double allowance of Roman history now?" queried Ursula.

"Certainly it is. You must finish the book this term, if we have to take extra lessons on it. You naughty girls, don't pull such faces! You ought to be interested in the Emperors."

"Father says some day he'll take me to Rome, and I shall see all their marble statues," observed Mabel.

"Lucky girl!" said Miss Bardsley. "I was fortunate enough to spend one Easter holiday in Rome, and saw the busts of the Emperors at the Capitoline Museum. They're the most beautiful likenesses in the world.

You'll appreciate Roman history when you've been to the Forum, and the Colosseum, and all the other famous places."

"Why can't we study history that way?" suggested Ursula. "Suppose you were to take us all to Rome for a month, and we learnt about Romulus and Remus when we were sitting on the Capitoline Hill, and about Trajan in Trajan's Forum, and Diocletian in Diocletian's Bath, and Nero at the Colosseum: it would be so interesting, and we should really remember it!"

"No doubt that is the ideal method; but think of the expense! I am afraid most parents would grumble at the school bills, if teaching history involved a visit to the scene of each occurrence. No! You're supposed to study all this beforehand, and then, when you have a clear idea of ancient and mediaeval times, you can go abroad with an understanding of what you'll see."

"But why shouldn't there be a mutual exchange of schools?" continued Ursula, who liked to discuss questions with Miss Bardsley. "Suppose a cla.s.s from an Italian school were to come to the Grange for a month, and we were to go and take their place: they'd learn English games, and we should see the old temples and amphitheatres, so we should each have something we couldn't get in our own country."

"It would certainly be a splendid means of learning languages, especially if such an exchange could be effected with a French or a German school. But I fear we are not ripe for that yet; there are too many difficulties in the way of such international visiting. In years to come perhaps the State will organize it, and we shall see little bands of children starting with their teachers to study foreign life and get rid of insular prejudices. It would have to be a special department of the Board of Education."

"If Father gets into Parliament again I'll ask him to bring in a Bill for it," said Mabel. "He's very keen on Secondary Education."

There was so much to be done at Birkwood during the summer term that the days did not seem nearly long enough, though the school rose half an hour earlier than in winter. The girls played cricket as well as tennis, worked in their gardens, and were taken for walks on the downs or on the sh.o.r.e. These expeditions generally had a scientific object in view, wild flowers being brought home to be pressed and added to the school collection, or the pools left by the tide investigated for specimens to enlarge the already flourishing aquarium. There is an old saying: "If you are good, you are happy"; but Miss Drummond believed in the reversing of that moral process, on the theory that "if you are happy, you are good", considering that young girls, at any rate, would be more likely to grow up with nice minds and true instincts if all their environment was beautiful, and their days were filled with pleasures calculated to elevate and refine. There were few of her pupils on whom her system had not the desired effect, and the one or two failures had been gently eliminated, so as not to contaminate the rest.

With Aldred especially Miss Drummond's method had worked well. She was very different from the ill-disciplined girl who had arrived at the Grange last September. The pleasant but carefully ordered regime seemed quite to have counteracted her aunt's injudicious management, and she would have been utterly ashamed now of behaviour in which a year ago she had gloried. This improvement was largely due to Mabel's influence. The latter's implicit faith in her began to rouse a desire to become actually what her friend believed her to be. She conquered many little weaknesses, lest Mabel should notice them. She had soon found that a cross word or an unkind speech, the evasion of a rule, or the shirking of some small duty, would bring a look of puzzled surprise to the latter's face; and rather than that Mabel should be disappointed in her, she kept a tight hand on herself, and would repress anything of which her friend did not approve. It was not the loftiest of motives, but it was the first time in her life that Aldred had ever really tried to join the ranks of those who are striving upwards, and even a faint-hearted effort is better than none at all.

There are occasionally people in this world who seem to have the faculty of drawing the very best out of those with whom they come in contact.

They create their own atmosphere, and by the strength of their winning personalities rouse all the sleeping good in others. Such a friend was Mabel, and Aldred, despite her false position, could not fail to be influenced by daily living with a character so much sweeter and more self-controlled than her own. Though she was still content to take credit that was not her due, she was gradually altering her standard, and beginning slowly but surely to realize that life consists of far more than the gratification of the moment, and that righteousness is a higher goal than pleasure.

One morning, when the girls were sitting chatting round the sundial at eleven o'clock recreation, they noticed the telegraph boy from Chetbourne ride up on his bicycle and deliver a message at the door.

"No alarm for any of us, I hope!" said Phbe. "It's rather silly, but I always feel a little scared when I see one of those yellow envelopes, and wonder if anything has happened at home."

"And yet people send telegrams about everything," said Myfanwy.

"Probably this is only to offer Miss Drummond seats at a concert, or to tell her somebody's coming to visit the school."

"Oh, I dare say! But I get nervous, all the same; telegrams so often mean bad news."

Phbe's apprehensions were justified in this case, though not on her own account. When morning school was over, the prefects reported that Miss Drummond had been suddenly called away.

"She has a mother living somewhere in the North, who is most seriously ill, and is scarcely expected to recover," explained Freda Martin. "She sent for a carriage at once, and started off to catch the 1.13 train at Chetbourne. I hope she'll arrive in time. She was most fearfully upset and distressed, and couldn't make any arrangements; she only said Miss Forster was to take her cla.s.ses, and she would come back as soon as she could."

This unexpected event naturally caused great commotion at the Grange.

Miss Drummond had never before been absent during term time, and, though the other mistresses did their best in the circ.u.mstances, all seemed rather helpless without her. The princ.i.p.al taught the Sixth Form herself, and also took science cla.s.ses throughout the school, so it was difficult to arrange to supply her place, it being impossible to engage another teacher, as had been done during Miss Bardsley's absence. By combining some of the cla.s.ses, and omitting the science, Miss Forster managed to arrange fairly well; but as she had not been definitely placed in command over the entire establishment, she did not like to usurp too much authority on her own account. No one, therefore, seemed actually at the head of affairs, or really responsible; and there was a general feeling of disorganization and slackness.

"It's horrid without Miss Drummond!" said Mabel. "n.o.body seems to know anything, or to be able to do anything while she's away. Even the medicine cupboard is locked up."

"That's no loss, I'm sure!" returned Aldred.

"Well, as it happens, it is. I've such a splitting headache, I was going to beg for sal volatile."

"Perhaps Miss Forster may have some."

"I asked her, but she hadn't; and then Mademoiselle came fussing along, wanting to know what was the matter. When I told her I had a headache, she declared it might be the beginning of something infectious, and said that I must sleep in the hospital to-night, and she would examine me to-morrow morning, to see whether a rash had come out. 'Ve cannot be too careful vile Mees Drummond is avay!' she said."

"But you're not really going?"

"I shall have to. I'd have asked Miss Forster to interfere, but she'd hurried away by that time. I've come to collect my night things now."

"What a ridiculous swindle! Can't I go too?"

"No; remember, it's a case of isolation!" said Mabel, smiling.