"But you are not going to tell me this happens commonly, Miss Edge."
"In the ten years we have been here, I do not know when we have had someone over at such short notice," the lady answered, then waited. When there was no retort, and she had given Baker a look to express her disagreement at the summoning of what had turned out to be a recalcitrant witness, Miss Edge continued, "We are fronted by an entire scaffolding of Reports. In certain circumstances we are obliged to render a Report of behaviour to our Superior Authority. And, if we are to do so, the most stringent Rules obtain. Access to the party concerned before she has given an explanation is rigidly excluded. I cannot see her, my colleague even cannot do so, no-one can intervene before she has given her own story."
"Then why have me over?"
"We thought it the human thing," Baker interjected, miserably.
"But what's behind this, what has she done?" Mrs Manley complained.
"There's a man in it, I'm very much afraid," Baker muttered.
"No really Miss Edge. ." the aunt began.
"Miss Baker," Edge corrected, as if to dissociate herself from the line which was being taken.
"… I can't accept that," Mrs Manley went on, with a look of venom at Edge. "Only sixteen, and not ever a hint of the kind at home."
"We sometimes notice with families. . where the parents are no longer together. ." Baker uttered in a faint voice, mixing Mary with Merode.
"Their orphans wander about the garden at night in pyjamas?" Mrs Manley asked, and actually laughed aloud.
"Miss Baker has written the standard work on this difficult subject," Edge said, thrown back on the defensive.
"Well I don't know that my husband wouldn't agree with her," the woman announced in what could only be termed a fruity voice. "But you and I realise it's hardly usual, don't we?" she had the impudence to ask Edge.
"I am afraid we shall not see eye to eye," this lady said, while Baker made a gesture of weariness.
"There's a whole history of such cases," she explained "I've no doubt," Mrs Manley agreed, conscious perhaps that she had gone too far. "And of course I'm grateful to you for the chance to put our heads together," she added with what was, to Edge, an altogether offensive familiarity. "But I have the right to see my ward at any time, I hope?"
"Of course," Miss Baker said.
"Yes," Edge put in. "The question is, how not to make it harder for her."
"In view of your rules about reports, you mean?" the aunt enquired.
"Just so."
"Oh well, Miss Edge, I hope it won't come to that, indeed not," Mrs Manley answered, in such a way that the lady felt this relative was in full command. Then the aunt tried a shot in the dark. "But I do feel I have a right to learn how it was you came to the conclusion there might be a boy in it, before I go up to see my niece," she said.
"She told Miss Marchbanks," Baker explained, quite unaware.
"Exactly," Mrs Manley said. "But did she write out an account?"
"Oh no," Baker replied, with signs of distress because she saw looming ahead the awkwardness that Merode had fainted. But Edge could see further. She was on tenterhooks.
"Then this Marchbanks person questioned her?"
"Yes, and such a distressing thing occurred," Baker hurried on, regardless. "The dear child fainted."
"Fainted?" Mrs Manley echoed, in a voice of horror. It was then that Baker saw the pit she had dug for herself.
"Oh, not what you think at all," she said pettishly. "It was what made the doctor diagnose shock."
"Third degree shock," Mrs Manley snorted. Edge had to keep herself from clicking her fingers together she was so exasperated.
"Really, madam, I cannot have this," Baker said, with great firmness, rising to the occasion. "I asked you here to have a quiet talk about what was best in the child's own interest, and you make suggestions as to our competence. Perhaps I should remind you that the State, when It delegated Responsibility to my colleague and myself, gave us a large measure of protection, or latitude if you prefer the word. I asked you over because I felt that was the human thing to do. If you insist you must see your niece before she has voluntarily made her explanation, then my Report shall go in and I'll note the fact in what I have to write, which may go hard with her. After all, I can lay claim to some experience."
"There is one of our students missing yet," Edge added, white of face.
"But what d'you get out of your girls if you won't allow anyone to go near 'em?" Mrs Manley asked, in a humble voice. Baker, at this point, was misled.
"My dear Mrs Manley," she said, back at once to her most expansive. "We are not like that with our children. There is perfect confidence."
"And if they won't talk?"
"Well then, that is very difficult, isn't it?"
"But Miss Baker, who is this Marchbanks?"
"Our deputy. We both have to go to London Wednesdays, and while we are away she takes our place. We have complete faith in her, isn't that so, Edge?"
"Of course," Miss Edge agreed, showing in her voice the disapproval she felt at the line their little talk was still taking.
"And, in spite of the rule you have about interviews with your students, she was brought before Miss Marchbanks?"
"She was found hidden," Edge interrupted, finally taking charge.
"Then who hid her?"
Miss Edge answered with a prolonged shrug of the shoulders.
"That's one point on which I'd like to see Merode, of course," Mrs Manley said. "But this woman interviewed the child?"
"Certainly not," Edge objected. "When Merode was discovered she was brought before our deputy, as she would have been before us if we had not been obliged to be elsewhere."
"She was asked no questions?"
"Miss Marchbanks has thirty years in the State Service. I am confident she would never betray her Trust."
"But excuse me, Miss Edge, you haven't answered my question."
"I have some regard for accuracy, madam. Since neither myself or my colleague were present. ."
"And yet my little girl fainted?"
"She blurted something out about a man and then she fainted," Edge agreed.
"You see, it is just this point that I find so difficult to understand," Mrs Manley appealed to Baker. "What man? Where is he? If she volunteered what she did, why don't I know about him? And in her pyjamas, too."
"But my dear lady, it is precisely why we asked you to come over. Merode has been simply splendid the whole time she has been here. We just wondered if she had given any indication in her letters?"
"There is one of our girls we cannot account for yet," Edge repeated, in a warning voice.
"But I've had not a hint from the child," the aunt protested. "She's always been so very happy with you both. Of course, I don't say she has no secrets from me. I know I never told my mother a word, and I don't expect any different from my poor sister's girl." Edge sniffed audibly, but was not noticed. "Yet I'm sure, if she'd fallen under the influence of an older child, then I'd have had at least an idea."
"And there's been no sign?" Baker asked, hoping against hope.
"Not one," Mrs Manley answered. "But I'll tell you a perfectly simple explanation of the whole affair."
"By all means," Baker encouraged, dubious to the last.
"Sleepwalking," the aunt announced, in barely concealed triumph. And Miss Baker was so flabbergasted at this forgotten echo of the dawn that, without more ado, she took the woman up to Merode at once.
Edge did not stay to argue. There was no time, she felt. As soon as Baker had led the woman out, she herself hurried off to get the decorations done because, now they had decided to hold their Ball, it must be the most successful ever. The girls simply must enjoy themselves.