5th Grade Freak-out

Chapter 3 – The Anonymous Letters

  The girls rushed to the school towers, discussing what had happened. They went up to the old common room, and lounged around in comfy armchairs, waiting for the three head girls to come so that they could enlighten them about the happenings.

  The door creaked open slowly, and the three head girls came in, surprised to see all the others looking grim and serious.

  “Golly – what’s the matter?” asked Harriet, gazing at the grave faces.

  Alice told the head girls what had happened. Felecia went white with shock, and Harriet exclaimed, “What a thing to happen in the Fifth Grade! Lizboa is shocking. She really is.” Bianca, however, was cool and calm, even when the sky turned purple or the sun suddenly stopped shining. She nodded quietly, and said, “Right. I’ll address Lizboa, and make sure this won’t happen again. I don’t think that we should bother the mistresses with quarrels and fights. Evelyn, find Lizboa, and bring her to my study.”

  “Yes,” replied Evelyn, and buzzed off.

  Bianca waved to Felecia and Harriet, signaling them to go with her out of the room. The three of them went up to Bianca’s study, and waited for Lizboa to come. They wondered whether Evelyn had found her.

  Evelyn had. She had found Lizboa practicing her serves on the tennis court, hitting them hard to relieve her anger.

  “Lizboa!” cried Evelyn. “You’re to go and see Bianca at once. Don’t keep her waiting!”

  Lizboa’s hand trembled a bit when she thought of having to speak with the serious head girl, but she still looked defiant and jaunty.

  “Well! I wonder who snitched on me this time. I suppose Bianca will go and tell Mrs Sullivan, once she’s finished with me! You all dearly want me to be sat on, to get into an awful row, don’t you?” shouted Lizboa, flinging down her racket and darting up the path, Evelyn running behind her.

  Lizboa approached the head girl’s study. Without knocking, she angrily flung open the door, and rudely stepped in, leaving the door to slam loudly right in front of the surprised Evelyn!

  Bianca frowned. “It’s rude to come in like that. Go out, and try again. Let Evelyn come in first. She’s my messenger, and should have the chance to do her duties and report your coming.”

  Lizboa murmured something under her breath, and sulkily went out of the room. When she came back in, Evelyn was in front of her, saying, “Bianca, I’ve brought you Lizboa.”

  Bianca nodded, and replied, “Thanks. You may go now, Evelyn. Sit down in that armchair, please, Lizboa.”

  Evelyn fled. Lizboa sat down, scowling and grumbling, looking most displeased.

  Bianca did not waste words. “It has been brought to my notice that you not only were rude to other students this lunchtime, but that you also used violence to try to solve the problem. You must acknowledge that this kind of behavior, which is considered to be mischief and genuine mistakes in the lower school, is a totally different issue in the Fifth grade. We cannot stand behavior of that sort, and I – plus the other head girls – demand that you apologize to Gabriel and Frances, and promise you will never do anything of the sort again.”

  “Why should I apologize? I must not be insincere. I did not and do not feel any guilt about my behavior this afternoon,” said Lizboa, with a most exasperating look on her face.

  Harriet burst out in anger. “Oh! You are horrible! You…you…” she was too enraged to continue.

  “I…I…what?” imitated Lizboa.

  “Very well. You will not apologize to Gabriel and Frances, so instead you must go and face the teacher. Tell her yourself every detail, every word you said in the incident, and accept any punishment she gives you,” said Felecia.

  “Oh, no – don’t do that! I’ll apologize, I will! Please don’t send me to the teacher. I haven’t been in their good books lately,” begged Lizboa.

  “Too late,” said Harriet.

  But Bianca saw true guilt in the girl. Give her a chance, she thought. She hushed Harriet and nodded to Lizboa, “All right, I’ll give you a chance. Apologize to Gabriel and Frances. Also, please copy out the math rules we learnt this week, and hand them in to me by Tuesday.”

  Lizboa sighed. “Thank you for giving me a chance. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

  “You may go,” said Bianca. Harriet and Felecia were both indignant that the girl should be let off so easily. They glared at Bianca.

  “She deserves a chance,” said Bianca, and swept out of the room, leaving the others staring at each other in surprise.

  In bed that night, Lizboa thought hard. She had apologized to the Ceqae siblings, and they had accepted it gracefully. Lizboa understood that if she did not improve her behavior soon, she would be heartily despised and loathed. But I can’t! thought Lizboa. I can’t humble myself to those girls. They’d laugh at me like anything. Then The Idea hit her. Yes! That’s what I’ll do! Lizboa decided, and fell fast asleep, thinking of the wonderful miracles that The Idea would perform.

  The girls would discuss The Idea rather than discuss Lizboa. Lizboa would be free from contempt and dislike!

  Then next day, Lizboa went to the locker room to get her tennis racket. There, in her locker, was a nasty little note:

  To Lizboa, the highest and mightiest at all games:

  I assure you that we note your performance at games – horrifying! It is so bad we can hardly bear to watch it. Oh, must I be saying this? The games queen might be so hurt. Oh no – a strong athlete does not care two pence for what others – or mistresses – think of her. Oh, then, I’ll tell you what we think of you next time, Lizboa!

  Lizboa wept over the spiteful note, and ran to Bianca.

  “Oh, Bianca! Look at this note! Which beast could have written it? It’s awful, awful! To think that someone is sending out these anonymous letters in the Fifth Grade! Oh, do, do find that little, mean, cunning pig! I shall have many things to say to her!” panted Lizboa, sobbing onto Bianca’s Latin prep.

  Bianca observed the note, and nodded. “All right. I’ll look into the matter. Go back to your tennis. Frances is almost frantic because you didn’t turn up!”

  Lizboa went. Bianca called Evelyn, Alice, Alexis, Esther, Felecia and Harriet to her study to try to make something out of this clueless mystery.

  Evelyn shook her head. “I can’t come to the conclusion that it is any of the Fifth Graders. None of them is as mean as that. And anyway, even though we all despise her for what she did last time in the pool, she made up by apologizing, and none of us really dislikes her heartily anymore. It must be someone from the younger grades.”

  “Well – this has happened before,” said Esther, gazing at Harriet awkwardly. “Someone wrote notes to Carlotta.”

  Harriet smiled and blushed. “Yes – I did. I was awfully silly.”

  “Who has the reason to dislike Lizboa much more than we do?” asked Felecia, thinking hard.

  They all thought of the same people. “Yes – Frances and Gabriel have full reason to dislike Lizboa,” cried Alexis, banging her hand on the wooden table.

  “Careful – you’ll break the table,” giggled Bianca. Then she looked serious again. “But I can’t think that they would do it. I mean – they were angry with her, but they accepted her apologies and all that. And remember, Gabriel didn’t want to seek revenge on Lizboa, because he begged Frances not to tell the mistresses about what Lizboa did! What about Frances?”

  An uncomfortable thought crept over Evelyn, who had taken a liking to the quiet, kind little Frances. Was it Frances? “Well, I hate to say it, but Frances cares for Gabriel an awful lot. Remember how enraged and anxious she was when Lizboa slapped Gabriel? She totally forgot about herself. And she did insist on Lizboa being reported, and would have if it weren’t Gabriel who stopped her. It might just be her,” said Alexis, hurting poor Evelyn a lot.

  “We shouldn’t think it was Frances before we get definite proof, should we?” whispered Evelyn, softly.

  “Of course not,” said Harriet. Then a tho
ught struck her. “Oh – there is someone else who would dislike Lizboa heartily, too.”

  “Who?” asked Esther.

  “I – I can’t tell you,” stammered Harriet. But when she saw the questioning faces of the girls, she said it. “Well – I think that Esther would dislike Lizboa heartily, too. Esther is the games captain, and Lizboa always seems not to take any notice of it, making out she is better than Esther. But I know Esther didn’t write the note. Of course she didn’t.”

  “Of course it wasn’t Esther!” burst out Alice, angrily. She was Esther’s best friend, and couldn’t bear Esther being suspected of the loathsome act. “What a notion! What an accusation!”

  “Calm down,” said Esther, and Alice calmed down.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “But I can’t stand seeing other people suspecting you of doing that.”

  “Well, we haven’t been able to come to any conclusions,” said Bianca. “The mains suspects are, of course, Gabriel and Frances, but don’t show them that we suspect them. Because I really can’t believe that any of them did it!”

  The next day, Lizboa found a note in her desk.

  Ooh, Hi Lizboa!

  How were games today! How many people did you criticize for the things that you are even more awful at? Oh, arrogance, I suppose, is one of those things? Maybe a little vanity? No, no, I’m being too serious. Or what about some chokes in your tennis backhand? Or a little problem about humongous splashes while diving? Look, you’ve wet the paper with your splashes!

  This horrible letter writer! thought Lizboa, crumpling up the yellow note. Again she showed it to Bianca, who nodded and said, “The girls and I have been trying our best to find the culprit.”

  The culprit would soon be found – yes, very soon!

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