Chapter 4 No.4

Dorothy makes a Friend

Dorothy set off for school on the morning after the election in a very sober frame of mind. Aunt Barbara had made her acquainted with most of the facts mentioned in our last chapter, and she now thoroughly understood her own position. To a girl of her proud temperament the news had indeed come as a great humiliation. Instead of bringing a copy of her pedigree to convince Agnes Lowe that she was one of the Sherbournes of Devonshire, she would now be obliged to ignore the subject. She did not expect it would be mentioned openly again, but there might be hints or allusions, and the mere fact that the girls at school should know was sufficiently mortifying.

"Agnes was perfectly right," she thought bitterly. "I am a waif, a nobody, with no relations, and no place of my own in the world. I suppose I am exactly what she called me-a charity child! I wonder how she heard the story? But it really does not matter who told her; the secret has leaked out somehow, and no doubt it will soon be bruited all over the College. It was time I knew about it myself; but oh dear, how different I feel since yesterday!"

Thus Dorothy mused, all unconscious that the shuttle of Fate was already busy casting fresh threads into the web of her life, and that the next few minutes would bring her a meeting with one whose fortunes were closely interwoven with her own, and whose future friendship would lead to strange and most unexpected issues. The train had reached Latchworth, where a number of passengers were waiting on the platform. The door of Dorothy's compartment was flung open, and a girl of about her own age entered, wearing the well-known Avondale ribbon and badge on her straw hat. Dorothy remembered noticing her among the new members who had been placed yesterday in the Upper Fourth, though she had had no opportunity of speaking to her, and had not even learnt her name. A pretty, fair-haired lady was seeing her off, and turned to Dorothy with an air of relief.

"You are going to the College?" she asked pleasantly. "Oh, I am so glad! Then Alison will have somebody to travel with. Will you be good-natured, and look after her a little at school? She knows nobody yet."

"I'll do my best," murmured Dorothy.

THE NEW GIRL

"It will be a real kindness. It is rather an ordeal to be a complete stranger among so many new schoolfellows. Birdie, you must be sure to come back with this girl, then I shall feel quite happy about you. You have your books and your umbrella? Well, good-bye, darling, until five o'clock."

The girl stood waving her hand through the window until the train was out of the station, then she came and sat down in the seat next to Dorothy. She had a plump, rosy, smiling face, very blue eyes, and straight, fair hair. Her expression was decidedly friendly.

Dorothy was hardly in a genial frame of mind, but she felt bound to enter into conversation.

"You're in the Upper Fourth, aren't you?" she began, by way of breaking the ice.

"Yes, and so are you. Aren't you Dorothy Greenfield, who was put up for the Lower School election?"

"And lost it!" exclaimed Dorothy ruefully. "I don't believe I'll ever canvass again, whatever office is vacant. The thing wasn't managed fairly. You haven't told me your name yet."

"Alison Clarke, though I'm called Birdie at home."

"Do you live at Latchworth?"

"Yes, at Lindenlea."

"That pretty house on the hill? I always notice it from the train. Then you must have just come. It has been to let for two years."

"We removed a month ago. We used to live at Leamstead."

"How do you like the Coll.?"

"I can't tell yet. I expect I shall like it better when I know the girls. I'm glad you go in by this train, because it's much jollier to have somebody to travel backwards and forwards with. Mother took me yesterday and brought me home, but of course she can't do that every day."

Dorothy marched into school that morning feeling rather self-conscious. She could not be sure whether her story had been circulated or not, but she did not wish it to be referred to, nor did she want to enter into any explanations. She imagined that her classmates looked at her in rather a pitying manner. The bare idea put her on the defensive. Her pride could not endure pity, even for losing the Wardenship, so she kept aloof and spoke to nobody. It was easy enough to do this, since Hope Lawson was the heroine of the hour, and the girls, finding Dorothy rather cross and unsociable, left her to her own devices. At the mid-morning interval she took a solitary walk round the playground, and at one o'clock, instead of joining the rest of the day boarders in the gymnasium, she lingered behind in the classroom.

"What's wrong with Dorothy Greenfield?" asked Ruth Harmon. "She's so grumpy, one can't get a word out of her."

"Sulking because she missed the election, I suppose," said Val Barnett.

"That's not like Dorothy. She flares up and gets into tantrums, but she doesn't sulk."

"And she doesn't generally bear a grudge about things," added Grace Russell.

"I believe I can guess," said Mavie Morris. "I heard yesterday that she isn't really Miss Sherbourne's niece at all; she was adopted when she was a baby, and she doesn't even know who her parents were."

"Well, she can't help that."

"Of course she can't; but you know Dorothy! She's as proud as Lucifer, and Agnes Lowe called her a waif and a nobody."

"Agnes Lowe wants shaking."

"Well, she didn't mean Dorothy to overhear her. She's very sorry about it."

"I'm more sorry for Dorothy. So that's the reason she's looking so glum! Isn't she coming to the meeting?"

"I don't know. She's up in the classroom."

"Someone fetch her."

"I'll go," said Mavie. "It's a shame to let her stay out of everything. She's as prickly as a hedgehog to-day, and will probably snap my head off, but I don't mind. She may have a temper, but she's one of the jolliest girls in the Form, all the same."

"So she is. It's fearfully hard on her if what Agnes Lowe says is really true. I vote we try to be nice to her, to make up."

"Any girl who refers to it would be a cad."

"Well, look here! Let us try to get her made secretary of our 'Dramatic'."

"Right you are! I'll propose her myself."

Mavie ran quickly upstairs to the classroom.

"Aren't you coming, Dorothy? It's the committee meeting of the 'Dramatic', you know. The others are all waiting; they sent me to fetch you."

"You'll get on just as well without me," growled Dorothy, with her head inside her desk.

"Nonsense! Don't be such a goose. I tell you, everybody's waiting."

"Dorothy's jealous of Hope," piped Annie Gray, who, as monitress, was performing her duty of cleaning the blackboard.

"I'm not! How can you say such a thing? I don't care in the least about the Wardenship."

"Then come and show up at the meeting, just to let them see you're not sulking, at any rate," whispered Mavie. "Do be quick! I can't wait any longer."

Dorothy slammed her desk lid, but complied. Though she would rather have preferred her own society that day, she did not wish her conduct to be misconstrued into jealousy or sulks.

"Go on, Mavie, and I'll follow," she replied abruptly, but not ungraciously.

As she strolled downstairs she noticed Alison Clarke standing rather aimlessly on the landing, as if she did not quite know where to go or what to do. Dorothy's conscience gave her a prick. She had quite forgotten Alison, who, as a new girl, must be feeling decidedly out of things at the College. She certainly might have employed the eleven-o'clock interval much more profitably in befriending the new-comer than in mooning round the playground by herself, brooding over her own troubles. However, it was not too late to make up for the omission.

"Hallo!" she exclaimed. "Not a very breezy occupation to stand reading the Sixth Form timetable, is it?"

"I've nothing better to do," replied Alison, whose rosy face looked a trifle forlorn. "I don't know a soul here yet, or the ways of the place."

"You know me! Come along to the gym.; we're going to have a committee meeting."

Alison brightened visibly.

"What's the meeting about?" she asked, as she stepped briskly with Dorothy along the passage.

"It's our 'Dramatic'. You see, we who stay for dinner get up little plays among ourselves. Each Form acts one or two every term. They're nothing grand-not like the swell things they have at the College Dramatic Union-and we only do them before the other girls in the gym., but they're great fun, all the same."

"I love acting!" declared Alison, with unction.

"Ever done any?"

"Rather! We were keen on it at the school I went to in Leamstead. I was 'Nerissa' once, and 'Miss Matty' in Scenes from Cranford, and 'The March Hare' in Alice in Wonderland. I have the mask still, and the fur costume, and Miss Matty's cap and curls."

"Any other properties?"

"Heaps-in a box at home. There are Miss Matty's mittens and cross-over, and her silk dress."

"Good! I must tell the girls that. We requisition everything we can. Where are they having the meeting, I wonder? Oh, there's Mavie beckoning to us near the horizontal bar!"

The day boarders belonging to the Upper Fourth were collected in a corner of the gymnasium, waiting impatiently for a few last arrivals. They made room for Dorothy and Alison, and as Annie Gray followed in a moment or two, the meeting began almost immediately. Hope Lawson, by virtue of her Wardenship, took the chair. The first business of the society was to choose a secretary.

"I beg to propose Dorothy Greenfield," said Grace Russell, putting in her word before anyone else had an opportunity, and looking at Ruth Harmon.

"And I beg to second the proposal," said Ruth, rising to the occasion.

Nobody offered the slightest opposition, and Dorothy was elected unanimously. Very much surprised, but extremely pleased, she accepted the notebook and stump of pencil that were handed her as signs of office.

"The next thing is to choose a play," said Hope, "and I think we can't do better than take one of these Scenes from Thackeray. Miss Pinkerton's Establishment for Young Ladies is lovely."

"Who'd be Miss Pinkerton?"

"It depends on the costume. She ought to have curls, and a cap and mittens, and a silk dress."

"Can we fish them up from anywhere?"

"Didn't you say you'd had them for Miss Matty?" whispered Dorothy to Alison; adding aloud: "This new girl, Alison Clarke, has the complete costume at home, and she's accustomed to acting. I say she'd better take Miss Pinkerton."

"One can't give the best part to a new girl," objected Annie Gray.

"It's not the best part; it's nothing to Becky Sharp."

"Well, it's the second best, anyhow."

"Oh, never mind that! Let her try. If you find she can't manage it, you can put in somebody else instead. Give her a chance to show what she can do, at any rate," pleaded Dorothy.

"We'd destined Miss Pinkerton for you," murmured Grace Russell.

"Then I'll resign in favour of Alison. Let me take Miss Swartz, or one of the servants-I don't mind which."

It was characteristic of Dorothy that, having reproached herself for neglecting Alison, she was at once ready to renounce anything and everything for her benefit. She never did things by halves, and, considering that she had made a promise in the train, she meant to keep it; moreover, she had really taken a fancy to the new-comer's beaming face.

"So be it!" said Hope. "Put it down provisionally-Miss Pinkerton, Alison Clarke. Now the great business is to choose Becky. Oh, bother! There's the dinner bell! It always rings at the wrong minute. No, we can't meet again at two, because I have my music lesson. We must wait till to-morrow."

Dorothy escorted her protégée to the dining-room, and, when dinner was over, spent the remaining time before school in showing her the library, the museum, and the other sights of the College.

"You don't feel so absolutely at sea now?" she enquired.

"No, I'm getting quite at home, thanks to you. It's such a comfort to have somebody to talk to. Yesterday was detestable."

At three o'clock the Upper Fourth had a literature lesson with Miss Tempest. It was held in the lecture hall instead of their own classroom, and just as the girls were filing in at the door, Dorothy made the horrible discovery that in place of her Longfellow she had brought an English history book. It was impossible to go back, for Miss Pitman was standing on the stairs.

"What am I to do?" she gasped. "How could I have been so idiotically stupid?"

"Can't you look on with somebody?" suggested Alison, who was walking with her.

"Miss Tempest will notice, and ask the reason. She's fearfully down on us if we forget anything. I'm in the front row, too, worse luck!"

"Then take my Longfellow and give me your History. Perhaps I shan't be asked to read. We'll chance it, anyhow," said Alison, changing the two books before Dorothy had time to object.

"No, no; it's too bad!" began Dorothy; but at that moment Miss Pitman called out: "What are you two girls waiting for? Move on at once!" and they were obliged to pass into the lecture hall and go to their seats.

Fortune favoured them that afternoon. Miss Tempest, in the course of the lesson, twice asked Dorothy to read passages, and completely missed out Alison, who sat rejoicing tremulously in the back row.

"You don't know from what you've saved me," said the former, as she returned the book when the class was over. "I should have been utterly undone without your Longfellow."

"It's like the fable of the mouse and the lion," laughed Alison. "I must say I felt a little nervous when Miss Tempest looked in my direction. I thought once she was just going to fix on me. All's well that ends well, though."

"And I won't be such a duffer again," declared Dorothy.

* * *

"Mother, dearest," said Alison Clarke that evening, "I didn't think the College half so horrid to-day as I did yesterday. I like Dorothy Greenfield, she's such a jolly girl. She took me all round the place and showed me everything, and told me what I might do, and what I mustn't. We went to the Dramatic meeting-at least, it wasn't the real College Dramatic, but one in our own Form-and I got chosen for Miss Pinkerton. Dorothy's going to be Miss Swartz, I expect. We've arranged to travel together always. She's going to wave her handkerchief out of the window the second the train gets to Latchworth, so that I can go into her carriage; and we shall wait for each other in the dressing-room after school."

"I thought she looked a nice girl," said Mrs. Clarke. "She has such a bright, intelligent face, and she answered so readily and pleasantly when I spoke to her. I'm glad to hear she took you under her wing, and showed you the Avondale ways. You'll soon feel at home there now, Birdie."

"Oh, I shall get along all right! Miss Tempest is rather tempestuous, and Miss Pitman's only tolerable, but the acting is going to be fun. As for Dorothy, she's ripping!"

* * *