Part 17 (1/2)
”No more I have, goosey.”
”Then why did you say you'd been at a French school? You're telling fibs.”
”No, I'm not, because Brussels doesn't happen to be in France--it's in Belgium.”
”I thought you were supposed to learn geography in the third cla.s.s,”
laughed Irene Spencer.
”She said a French school, not a Belgian one,” objected Lindsay.
”Well, everybody speaks French in Brussels.”
”Don't they speak Flemish?”
”Only the poor people, and even they can generally talk French as well.”
”How long were you there, Mary?” put in Mildred Roper.
”Only one term. I got ill, and had to come home.”
”Was it nice?”
”Oh, just tolerable!”
”Had you to talk French all the time?”
”I had to try, because none of the girls knew anything else. They used to laugh at me if I spoke English.”
”How nasty! I shouldn't have cared to be you,” said Cicely.
”Yes, it was horrid, when I was sure they were saying things about me and I couldn't understand them. I used to get quite cross, and that made my head ache.”
”Was the school in the country?” asked Lindsay.
”No, I've told you already it was in Brussels, and that's a big city. It was a large building, with a great high wall all round it, with spikes on the top, as if it were a prison. Inside there was a courtyard where we used to play games. It had orange trees and oleanders in big green tubs, but no gra.s.s nor flowers. You couldn't possibly have called it a garden. We hardly ever went out for proper walks. Sometimes we were taken to the park, but even there we had to go very primly, two and two, with the teachers looking after us most sharply.”
”Were the teachers nice?”
”Yes, pretty well. I liked them better than the girls, at any rate.
There were two sisters in my cla.s.s, called Marie and Sophie Beauvais, who were always making fun of me because I was English. I had a horrid time until a German girl came to the school, and then they teased her instead of me. The best thing of all was the coffee. It was perfectly delicious--nicer than any I've ever tasted in England.”
”Why didn't you stay in Brussels?”
”I was ill, and my mother had to come and fetch me. She declared she would never let me go so far away from home again; so she sent me to Winterburn Lodge instead. Miss Russell is very kind if one's not well, and Mother said she would rather have me properly looked after, even if I didn't learn French.”
”Yes, Miss Russell does take care of us,” said Irene. ”I used to be at another school, and the teachers never noticed if we had headaches, or couldn't eat our meals. We had to work most fearfully hard for exams, too. The headmistress made a point of getting a certain number of pa.s.ses each year, and one was obliged to prepare and go in whether one was clever or not. Give me good old Winterburn Lodge!--especially when one's at the Manor instead. By the by, there's Monica. She's surely not come to play tennis? It's too hot.”
”Fifteen degrees too hot,” agreed Monica, throwing herself down on the gra.s.s beside the others and fanning herself with her hat. ”Out on the road the heat's at simmering-point. I came to bring a message to Miss Russell, and I hear she's gone to Linforth and won't be back until half-past four. I think I shall wait for her.”