CHAPTER XIV
Concerns Cynthia
"Look here!" said Hermie to Raymonde two days later, when the latterwas helping the monitress to put away the wood-carving tools; "what'sthe matter with Cynthia Greene? She's behaving in the most idioticfashion--goes mincing about the school, and sighing, and even moppingher eyes when she thinks anybody's looking at her. What's she posingabout now?"
"She says she feels lonely--and fair-haired and blue-eyed--at leastthat's what she wrote inside her strawberry basket," volunteeredRaymonde.
"What in the name of the Muses do you mean?"
Raymonde explained. The monitress listened aghast.
"Well, I call that the limit!" she exploded. "The little monkey! Why,Gibbie would slay her if she knew! Such an atrociously cheeky,unladylike thing to do, and putting her address here at the Grange!Bringing discredit on the school! I don't suppose whoever finds itwill take any notice."
"She's hoping for an answer," said Raymonde. "I believe she's justyearning to be mixed up in a love affair."
"At thirteen!" scoffed Hermie. "The silly young blighter! I'd like toshake her!"
"If you do, she'll be rather pleased than otherwise," returnedRaymonde. "She'll pose as a martyr then, and say the world isunsympathetic. I'm beginning to know Cynthia Greene."
"I believe you're right!" said the monitress thoughtfully.
Sentiment was not encouraged at the Grange. Miss Beasley very rightlythought that girls should keep their childhood as long as possible,and that premature love affairs wiped the bloom off genuine laterexperiences. The school in general assumed the attitude of scoffing atromance, except in the pages of the library books. It was notconsidered good form to allude to it. Tennis or hockey was a morepopular topic.
"So Cynthia's trying to run the sentimental business," mused Hermie."It'll spread if we don't take care. It's as infectious as measles.I'm not going to have all those juniors wandering about the garden,reading poetry instead of practising their cricket--it's not goodenough. Yet it's difficult for a monitress to interfere. As you say,Cynthia would take a melancholy pride in being persecuted. Look here,Raymonde, you're a young blighter yourself sometimes, but you don't goin for this kind of rubbish. Can't you think of some plan to nip thething in the bud before it goes further? You're generally inventiveenough!"
"If I might have a free hand for a day or two, I might managesomething," admitted Raymonde with caution.
"I'd tell the other monitresses to let you alone. I don't mind howyou contrive it, as long as you knock the nonsense out of the juniors.Cynthia Greene of all people, too! The former ornament of The Poplars,who used to keep up the tone (so she says) and set an example to therest. What is she coming to? I should think they'd want that braceletback, if they knew!"
The Mystic Seven had a special Committee Meeting before tea, andpledged one another to utmost secrecy. The result of theirconfabulations seemed satisfactory to themselves, for they partedchuckling.
The next morning, when Cynthia Greene went to her desk to take out alesson book, she found inside a letter addressed to herself. Sheopened it in a whirl of excitement. It was written in a slanting,backward kind of hand, with a very thick pen. Its contents ran thus:
"Dear Miss Cynthia,
"Being the fortunate recipient of the card placed in a strawberry basket, and bearing your name, I am venturing to answer it. I, too, am lonely, and long for friendship. I admire blue eyes and fair hair; I myself am dark. I should like immensely to meet you. Could you possibly be at the side gate of your garden shortly after seven this evening? I shall arrive by motor, and walk past on the chance of seeing you.
"Yours respectfully but devotedly, "Algernon Augustus Fitzmaurice."
The conduct of Cynthia during the course of the day was extraordinary.She exhibited a mixture of self-importance and flutteringanticipation that was highly puzzling to her companions. She refusedto explain, but dropped sufficient hints to arouse interest. It waspresently whispered among the juniors that Cynthia had received alove-letter from somebody highly distinguished and aristocratic.
"Did it come by post?" asked Joan Butler.
"No, of course not. Gibbie would never have given it to her if it had.Cynthia found it inside her desk. She doesn't know who put it there.It's most mysterious."
For the day, Cynthia was a heroine of romance among her Form. Sheplayed the part admirably, wearing an abstracted expression in herblue eyes, and starting when spoken to, as if aroused from daydreams.She mentioned casually that she believed the family of Fitzmaurice tobe an extremely ancient one, and that its members were mentioned inthe _Peerage_. As there was no copy of that volume in the schoollibrary, nobody could contradict her, and her audience murmuredinterested acquiescence. When asked whether they preferred the name ofAlgernon or Augustus, their opinions were divided.
At first the juniors were sympathetic, but by the end of the afternoonthe goddess of envy began to rear her head in their midst. Cynthia'smanner had progressed during the day to a point of patronage that wasdistinctly aggravating. She openly pitied girls who did not receiveprivate letters, and spoke of early engagements as highly desirable.She missed two catches when fielding at cricket, being employed instaring sentimentally at the sky instead of watching for the ball.
"Buck up, you silly idiot, can't you? You're a disgrace to theschool!" snarled Nora Fawcitt furiously.
Cynthia sighed gently, with the air of "Ah-if-you-only-knew-my-feelings!"and twisted the ends of her hair into ringlets. After tea, in defiance ofall school traditions, she changed her dress and put on her bestslippers. She appeared in the schoolroom with a bunch of pansies pinnedinto her belt.
Preparation was from six to seven, and was supposed to be a period ofstrenuous mental application. That evening, however, Cynthia madelittle progress with her Latin exercise or the Wars of the Roses. HerForm mates, looking up in the intervals of conning their textbooks,noted her sitting with idle pen, gazing raptly into space or glancinganxiously at the clock. Though she had not confided the details of hersecret, her companions felt that something was going to happen.Romance was in the atmosphere. Several of the juniors found themselveswishing that clandestine letters had appeared in their desks also.When the signal for dismissal was given, and the girls trooped fromthe schoolroom, Cynthia mysteriously melted away somewhere. Ardiune,walking round the quad. five minutes later, accosted Joan Butler,Janet Macpherson, Nancie Page, and Isobel Parker, who were sitting onthe steps of the sundial reading Ella Wheeler Wilcox's _Poems ofLove_.
"If you'd like a little sport," she observed, "come along with me. Youmay bring Elsie and Nora if you can find them. I promise you a jinkytime!"
The juniors rose readily. None of them were really very fond ofreading, but Cynthia had lent them the book earlier in the day, with afew pages turned down for reference. They flung it on to the stonestep, with scant regard for its white cover. Ardiune led her recruitshastily to the back drive, and bade them hide behind the thick laureland clipped holly bushes that backed the border.
"Somebody you know is coming to keep an appointment, and will get asurprise," she volunteered.
They had hardly taken cover when Cynthia Greene appeared, strollingalong the drive. She advanced to the gate, leaned her elbow on it,and, posing picturesquely, glanced with would-be carelessness up anddown the back lane, and coughed.
At this very evident signal a figure emerged from the shelter of theopposite bushes and strode to the gate. The juniors gasped. They hadall taken part in last Christmas's term-end performance, and theyeasily recognized the hat, long coat, and military moustache of theschool theatrical wardrobe, the only masculine garments permitted atthe Grange. Cynthia, being a new-comer, was not acquainted with them.Her agitated eyes merely took in a manly vision who was accosting herpolitely, though without removing his hat.
"Have I the pleasure of addressing Miss Cynthia Greene?" asked adeep-toned voice.
Cynthia,
utterly overcome, giggled a faint assent.
"I am Algernon Augustus. Delighted to make your acquaintance! You'rethe very girl I've always longed to meet. I can't describe myloneliness, and how I'm yearning for sympathy. Fairest, loveliest one,will you smile upon me?"
What Cynthia might have answered it is impossible to guess, but atthat critical moment the hat, which was several sizes too large,tilted to one side, and allowed Raymonde's hair to escape down herback. Cynthia's agitated shriek brought a crowd of witnesses from outthe laurel bushes. They did not spare their victim, and a perfectstorm of chaff descended upon her.
"Did it go to meet its ownest own?"
"Did you call him Algernon, or Augustus?"
"Did he tell you his family pedigree?"
"Where's his motor-car, please?"
"Is the engagement announced yet?"
"I think you're a set of beasts!" whimpered Cynthia, leaning her headagainst the gate and sobbing.
"If you hadn't been such a silly idiot you wouldn't have been taken inby such a transparent business," returned Raymonde, pulling off hermoustache. "Look here, we don't care about this sickly sort of stuff,so the sooner you drop it the better. Gracious, girl! Turn off thewaterworks! Be thankful Gibbie didn't scent out your romance, that'sall! If the Bumble knew you'd put that card inside that strawberrybasket, she'd pack up your boxes and send you home by the next train.Crystal clear, she would!"
For at least a week after this, Cynthia Greene suffered a chastenedlife, and shed enough tears to make her pocket-handkerchiefs aconspicuous item in her laundry bag. She began to wish that the namesof Augustus and Algernon could be expunged from the English language.Her Form mates hinted that she might receive a present of Debrett's_Peerage_ on her next birthday. If she missed a ball at tennis, orslacked a little at cricket, somebody was sure to enquire: "Thinkingof him?" She found a picture of two turtle-doves attached to thepin-cushion on her dressing-table, and drawings of hearts and dartswere scrawled by unknown hands inside her textbooks. Moreover, shelived in constant dread lest somebody should have really found thecard inside the strawberry basket, and should send an answer by post,which would fall into the hands of Miss Beasley. The prospect ofexpulsion from the school haunted her.
Fortunately for her, nobody troubled to notice her request forcorrespondence, the basket of strawberries having probably found itsway to some snuffy individual at a greengrocer's stall, who took nointerest in the loneliness of blue-eyed, fair-haired damsels. As forher volume of _Poems of Love_, Hermie confiscated it until the end ofthe term, and recommended a _Manual of Cricket_ instead.