‘Oh? Then…?’
‘General Schools, my love, by the skin of my teeth, with the result that, goaded thereto by my family, I have written to every training college in the country, without result until now. These places are choosy. I shouldn’t wonder if it isn’t easier to get to Oxford or Cambridge than into one of these professional deathtraps.’
Deborah sat and digested a new point of view, but not for long.
‘Miss Boorman?’ said the student, emerging once more, list in hand, and smiling kindly upon the hitherto silent member of the community.
‘I say,’ observed Kitty confidentially to the student, jerking her head in the direction of the door, a bourne from which, it seemed to her, no traveller returned. ‘What have they done with the corpses?’
‘The corpses?’ said the student, who appeared to have a literal mind.
‘Yes. The girl friends. They come, they go into that room, and that appears to be the writing on the wall, so far as they’re concerned.’
The student smiled, as though at the naïve question of a small boy, and when Kitty had gone in, turned to Deborah.
‘My name is Cloud,’ said Deborah. ‘I suppose you are the senior student. Do you mind telling the Warden?’
The senior student’s pose of good-natured efficiency vanished with ludicrous effect.
‘Oh, I say! Oh, I am sorry, Miss Cloud! I ought to have known! Mary might have said! Lulu’s usually on the door, so I suppose Mary didn’t ask your name.’
‘Oh, no, it’s all right,’ said Deborah. ‘I’ll go in when they’ve done with Miss Boorman.‘
‘A bit under the weather, that specimen,’ had said Kitty, who had a very kind heart. The senior student begged Deborah to accompany her. Deborah regarded the Warden’s door with mixed feelings. The senior student tapped, listened, opened the door and announced:
‘Miss Cloud, the Sub-Warden, Warden.’
Deborah entered, to be confronted, to her immense surprise and confusion, by Mrs Bradley, who was seated in a swivel chair behind a handsome, imposing desk, blandly established in office.
‘So we do meet at Philippi,’ she observed, getting up and giving Deborah her hand. ‘Those poor children,’ she continued, withdrawing her skinny claw from Deborah’s grasp, and waving it towards the three students, who, looking scared and uncomfortable, were occupying chairs about the room, ‘have come up today instead of tomorrow, to see whether the College has room for them. What they’re to do with themselves for twenty-four hours I can’t think, and neither can they. At least…’
With what seemed devilish omniscience she intercepted a wink which passed between Miss Trevelyan and Miss Menzies… ‘At least, that was our first impression. Have you met them?’
‘Yes,’said Deborah, smiling shyly at the students. ’Yes, we — we met under false pretences. I hope they won’t hold it against me.‘
‘We thought Miss Cloud was a student, Warden,’ observed Miss Menzies. ‘Instead of the Second Grave-Digger,’ she added, sotto voce.
‘Of course you did, child,’ agreed Mrs Bradley, grinning at the subject of this remark. ‘And now, what about tea?’
Deborah, who had had nothing but the couple of biscuits dispensed under the hospitality of the College secretary, assented with pleasure to this suggestion. She could not have told how she knew it, but the realization came to her, with the inevitability of prophecy, that Mrs Bradley’s idea of tea would be something substantial on north-country lines. She was right, for the little party sat down to toast, ham, boiled eggs, sardines, new bread, butter, honey and jam with zest, goodwill and (apart from a spasm of hiccups on the part of the unfortunate Miss Boorman for whom Deborah, herself a prey to nervousness, felt overwhelming sympathy) unalloyed pleasure.
The meal over, Mrs Bradley took Deborah off for what she called (leering hideously at Kitty, who had developed a fit of giggling) a review of the situation, and the three students went over to College, under the escort of the senior student, who had had tea with the rest of the party, and who continued to show herself, to Deborah’s relief, to be a sensible homely girl, likely to prove helpful and non-critical. Deborah already felt that the more help and the less criticism her initial efforts evoked, the better everything would be.
At the entrance to College the senior student left the others pleading that she had a list of their study-bedrooms and bath-times to make out.
‘But you don’t know whether any of us will want a study-bedroom or a bath-time until we’ve seen the Principal,’ objected Laura Menzies. ‘I say, what price the Old Trout?’ she added to her comrades.
Chapter 2
THE THREE MUSKETEERS
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In Athelstan the Old Trout aforesaid closed the sitting-room door.
‘And now,’ she said, giving Deborah a cigarette, ‘you and I, dear child, must come to an understanding. You expected to come here as assistant to Miss Murchan. You find me. Have you been notified of the change?’
‘Oh, but I didn’t know Miss Murchan,’ protested Deborah. ‘I mean, it’s all the same to me, whoever it is. That’s to say…’ she floundered, watched by the keen black eyes and appraised by the beaky little mouth, pursed now in kindly but, she sensed, unerring judgement upon her.
‘Never mind. The point is that I’ve been told I must report upon your courage.’
‘My courage? But…’ A desire came upon Deborah to retort that she had not any courage; that she had obtained her present post because she possessed good testimonials and a ladylike style of handwriting. She yielded to it. Mrs Bradley cackled. Then, taking from a capacious skirt pocket a notebook and a fountain-pen, she turned over a few pages, scribbled some hieroglyphics in tiny script, and, putting the impedimenta away, said briskly: ‘I am here to make mountains out of molehills, child… or, possibly, molehills out of mountains.’
Deborah searched the witch-like countenance. The black eyes looked into hers. It appeared that the opinion had not been facetiously rendered. She straightened up in her chair and said: ‘What do you mean, Mrs Bradley?’
‘Exactly what I say, child. I’ve come here, at Miss du Mugne’s request, to trace Miss Murchan, who, it seems, disappeared last June at the College End of Term Dance, and has not been heard of since. The students were told that she had been taken ill — peritonitis — and the Principal herself officiated here in Athelstan Hall for the last two days of the term. That was ten weeks ago. Not the slightest trace of Miss Murchan has come to light. Interesting, is it not? And in the hands of the police, of course, although, so far, at the earnest request of the Principal, not in the newspapers.’
‘I see,’ said Deborah.
‘Well, now, if I’m to have your help I must at least let you know as much about the background of the case as I know myself. That is only fair. It appears that before she came here just two years ago, Miss Murchan had been Biology mistress at the County Secondary School for Girls at a place called Cuddy Bay, and, unfortunately, just before she left, they had a very nasty accident. A child was killed in the school gymnasium.’
‘How?’
‘She seems to have been lowering the boom, and a rope parted, and the thing came down on her head. It happened after school hours and as it could not be proved that anybody had given the child permission to stay and practise, the verdict was accidental death, with the school authorities completely exonerated from blame.’
‘Oh, what a good thing. Children can be disobedient little beasts; don’t I know it!’
‘Yes. The grandfather of the child, however, wanted further action taken. He persisted in saying that the child had had permission to stay; that she had stayed on other occasions, and that one of the mistresses stayed too. He argued that a great deal more was known about the accident than the evidence given in court served to show. He had to be taken to a mental hospital in the end, completely off his head, poor fellow.’