CHAPTER XIV
Nicky Nan Night
Immediately after the lesson, on the next French day, Gwen Williamssauntered in the direction of the Ramsays.
"Do you go out for walks with that Penruddock boy from Grimbal's Farm?"she asked rather insolently.
"Do you mean Bevis Hunter?" Mavis's voice was iced politeness.
"Yes. I told Mother, and she _was_ surprised! Does your uncle know?"
Merle was on the point of bursting out, "It's not your business!" buther more discreet sister gave her a hasty poke.
"It was Uncle David who sent us out with Bevis," answered Mavis withstately dignity. "He thinks very highly of him, and so do we. I've nevermet anybody who knows so much about natural history, or who can tell usmore about excavations and prehistoric mounds and things. He was curatorof the school museum when he was at Shelton College."
Gwen gazed at Mavis as if she were speaking an unknown language.
"It's a matter of taste of course," she replied. "_I_ shouldn't care togo about with the boy from the Penruddocks' Farm."
She walked away, leaving sad heart-burnings behind her. The Ramsays hadbeen very simply brought up at home, and were accustomed to judge peoplemerely by whether they liked them or not, and knew little of worldlystandards. Bevis, with his jolly, merry ways, and his intense love ofnature, seemed a far pleasanter companion than Gwen or her brotherTudor. Intellectually he was more than the equal of those who despisedhim, and his romantic story suggested many possibilities.
"Bevis might be _anybody_," ventured Mavis.
"I don't care who he is, he's our friend," fumed Merle stoutly.
"Rather, and we'll stick to him in spite of all the Glyn Williamses inthe world. It really doesn't matter to us what Gwen thinks."
Fortunately for the Ramsays, Gwen only came to school twice a week, butto their sorrow Opal was there every day. Lately she had been growingmore and more out of hand. She had begun to adopt a patronizing attitudetowards Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny, called them "poor old dears",quizzed their clothes, their manners, and their methods of teaching, andvoted them hopelessly slow and out of date. There is a certain phase ingirls who are growing up at which they are fiercely critical of theirelders. As a child Opal had immensely admired her two godmothers, andhad been proud of their many accomplishments. Now, because she too hadacquired a certain skill in music and painting, she rather looked downupon their talents. She thought her own superior, forgetting that thougha well-taught girl may seem clever at sixteen, there is no guaranteethat she will go on developing in the same ratio, and will therefore bea genius at the age of thirty-seven.
The fact was that Opal ought long ago to have been sent away to aboarding-school, where she would have found her level among other girlsof her own age, and have been thoroughly sat upon by elder ones. Herposition of prime favourite at The Moorings was bad both for herself andfor everybody else. The juniors, encouraged by her example, began toevade rules, and to do many things they had never dreamt of before. MissFanny, finding them unusually troublesome, puzzled over the reason. Shedecided there must be bad influence somewhere, but it never struck herto fix the blame upon Opal. She was always ready with an excuse whereher god-daughter was concerned.
Among other subjects which Miss Fanny taught at The Moorings was thepiano. She was a very good and correct musician, and had studied underan eminent master of her day. Perhaps her fault as a teacher was thatshe concentrated too much on the technique to the exclusion of theartistic element. She would stop a pupil every few bars to correcterrors in touch or the position of the hands, and was such a martinetover these details that the spirit of the piece was often entirely lost.Merle, who liked to dash away and get a general impression of acomposition, oblivious of a few wrong notes, chafed terribly under thissevere regime.
"It knocks all the poetry out of the music," she complained. "Ihardly know what tune I'm playing when Miss Fanny is watching myhands like a cat watching a mouse, and that abominable metronome istick-tack-tick-tacking on the top of the piano! How I hate the beastlything. I'd as soon recite Shakespeare to a metronome as play Chaminade.It would be just as sensible. Music, to my mind, is like reciting, youwant to hurry up some phrases and to linger on others, not go poundingon like a pianola or a piece of clockwork! Tick-tack-tick-tack--Ugh! Ihate it!"
Opal, who also suffered from the metronome, chimed in with her side ofthe grievance.
"My cousin learns from Mr. Jardine, the best teacher in Burchester, andshe never uses one!"
"I don't see why we need. I wish somebody would break the wretched oldthing, or lose it, or otherwise dispose of it. They'd have my blessingI'm sure."
The juniors, who had gathered round to listen, giggled at Merle'sheroics. It was rather nice to hear elder girls grumbling.
"Why don't you do it yourself," piped Betty Marshall.
Merle, just for fun, seized the object of her invective from the top ofthe piano, and opening the window placed it outside upon the sill.
"It may stay there and tick-tack to the birds if it likes," shedeclared. "If I had my way it would never come back again. Yes, I meanit."
The juniors laughed again as they ran from the room, and Merle, alsolaughing, lifted the unfortunate metronome inside and placed it back onthe piano. She and Opal chased the smaller ones along the passage, andcaught them, squealing with delight, in the cloakroom.
"You little pussies, I'll tickle you!" cried Merle, swinging PosieAndrews off her feet and tucking her under one arm, while she made agrab at Florrie Leach.
The children, wild with fun, danced about like so many imps.
"It's Nicky Nan Night to-night," twittered Betty as she jumped andpranced. "We're all Nicky Nans. Look at us!"
"Hooray! It's Nicky Nan Night," shouted the others.
"Heavens, so it is. I'd completely forgotten!" said Opal.
She stood for a moment as if thinking, then she suddenly ran back to theschoolroom. She was only gone a moment or two, but she returned to thecloakroom with a curious look of amusement on her face.
"What have you been up to?" asked Merle, eyeing her suspiciously.
"Ah! Wouldn't you just like to know?"
"You've been doing something!"
"Indeed! How clever we are all of a sudden. Are you clairvoyante mayI ask?"
"Not at all, but I know Opal Earnshaw. You're pluming yourself no end."
Opal broke into a fit of delighted giggling, but refused allexplanations, and slamming on her hat rushed away home, leaving thejuniors still dancing about the cloakroom like pixies and loudlyproclaiming: "It's Nicky Nan Night. We're all Nicky Nans!"
"What on earth is Nicky Nan Night?" asked Merle rather crossly, butnobody troubled to answer, so she struggled into her coat and joinedMavis, who was waiting at the door, and forgot all about the matterdirectly.
Later on in the evening, however, she began to understand. Durracombewas a little old-world place, and had preserved many quaint and curiouscustoms from ancient times. One of the most extraordinary of these was akind of carnival held by the boys of the town at the beginning of theseason of Lent. As soon as it was dusk they commenced to prowl about thestreets wearing black paper masks and carrying turnip lanterns. Theywere supposed to represent imps of darkness, or perhaps will o' thewisps, and their chief sport was to ring door bells, or rat-tap withknockers, and then run away. Mavis and Merle, hearing repeated pealsfrom the surgery bell, were amazed that Jessop did not answer it, tillshe explained it was merely a ruse of the Nicky Nans, and that nobody inDurracombe who knew their tricks would respond to such a summons. Sheoffered however to take the girls out for ten minutes to look at thefun; so they donned coats and scarves and issued into the dim HighStreet. It was a moonless night, which made things all the better forsuch a saturnalia. In the distance a cluster of lights began to danceabout, and presently up ran half a dozen little urchins, disguised inmasks and waving turnip lanterns pierced with holes for eyes and mouths,so that the candles shining through them gave them
the appearance ofgruesome goblins. The children had indeed vied with one another as towhich could produce the most horrible looking turnip head, and part ofthe sport was to hide in dark alleys and suddenly to exhibit thelanterns to unwary passers-by, to try to raise a scream. The small impscareered round and round, prancing and giving an occasional yell of"Nicky Nan". The girls laughed in much amusement, and Jessop, who hadwitnessed the custom from her youth up, felt in her pocket for somepennies, and threw them into the road to be scrambled for.
Presently came the noise of a tin-kettle band, and down the High Streetmarched a procession carrying "Jack o' Lent", a grotesque figure on thelines of a Guy Fawkes, stuffed with straw and wearing a mask and an oldtop hat. The Nicky Nans flew to join their fellows, showing theirlanterns like the wise virgins in the parable, and the Guy was escortedby quite a crowd of leaping dancing will-o'-the-wisps, who added squealsand whistling to the din made on the old tea-trays and pans. Theycrossed the bridge to a field on the farther side of the river, where abonfire had been built. Upon this Jack o' Lent was carefully hoisted,and a match was put to the straw. The Ramsays, hurried indoors by Jessoplest Mavis should catch cold, watched the scene from Aunt Nellie'sbedroom window, and had a fine view of the flames blazing up, and theNicky Nans prancing round in a circle, waving their weird turnip lights.
On this one night in the year the town's children were veritableDevonshire pixies. By immemorial custom they were licensed to carry awaybrooms, pails, or any objects which people were so foolish as to leaveunguarded outside their houses. These they pounced upon and bore off asbooty, exhibiting them the next morning in the pound, whence they mightbe redeemed by their owners for a fee varying from a penny to sixpence,according to their value. As the proceeds went to their football club,the Nicky Nans were naturally anxious to pick up every trifle which theycould possibly find lying about, and every house and garden in the townwas visited for that purpose. The matron, who missed her scrubbing-brushor her bucket, knew what Pucks and Robin Goodfellows had been flittinground in the darkness, and made a visit to the pound to recover her lostproperty, paying the price with a good-natured remembrance of the fun ofher own young days.
Mavis and Merle, on their way to school on the morning following thesaturnalia, peeped into the pound, a walled enclosure intended for thedetention of lost cows or strayed sheep, and saw half a dozen of theboys, still wearing masks, guarding quite a collection of treasures andchaffing some of the owners over the gate. Evidently they had had a mostsuccessful evening, and the funds of their football club would bereplenished.
"Little wretches. They're as light-fingered as elves," remarked Merle."They've even taken the pots of geraniums off people's window-sills."
"I shall never forget them dancing in a mad circle round the bonfire,"laughed Mavis, as the pair passed on.
When the pupils at The Moorings assembled that morning for call-over,Miss Fanny entered with a look upon her face which everybody at oncementally registered at stormy. Her "Good morning, girls!" was cold. Shenever noticed the vase full of flowers which the boarders had arrangedupon her desk, and she took the names, as if she were reading a list ofcriminals, in a deep sad voice without an atom of her usual geniality.When this first preliminary was finished she turned to what wasevidently the pressing business on her mind.
"Girls!" she began. "A very unpleasant thing has happened in the school.The metronome is missing from the piano. None of the boarders hasinterfered with it. Can any of you day girls tell what has become ofit?"
A look of much astonishment passed round the assembled faces. Onseveral it was even mingled with relief. To get rid of the metronome didnot seem an unmixed evil. Perhaps Miss Fanny noted the expression. Shepaused for a whole solemn minute, then spoke again in a yet sternervoice.
"I put every girl in this room on her honour to tell what she knows."
There was a stir among some of the younger children, a bending togetherof heads, and a faint whispering like the buzzing of bees, then BettyMarshall held up her hand.
"Please, Miss Fanny, there's a metronome just like ours in the pound.Posie and Florrie and I saw it as we came to school."
"In the pound!" Miss Fanny's voice quivered with amazed indignation.
"Yes, the Nicky Nans had taken it."
"But surely no boy would dare to venture into our schoolroom. It'soutrageous! I shall have to complain to the schoolmaster if they gobeyond bounds like this. To take it off the piano!"
Posie and Betty glanced doubtfully at one another as if uncertainwhether to explain further. Then Posie held up a chubby hand.
"Please, Miss Fanny, it wasn't on the piano; it was outside on thewindow-sill."
"On the window-sill! Who put it there?" The teacher's voice had reachedcrescendo.
Posie wriggled and looked uncomfortably at Betty and then at Florrie,finally in a rather tremulous whisper she murmured:
"Merle Ramsay."
Merle stood up at once with flaming cheeks.
"I put the metronome outside the window for a minute, Miss Fanny, but Ididn't leave it there. I put it back upon the piano."
Miss Fanny glared hard, first at Merle, and then with a kind ofcomprehensive sweeping glance over the whole school.
"Can any other girl volunteer any information?"
There was dead silence. Opal was rather ostentatiously sharpening thepoint of her pencil. The teacher's gaze came back to a focus on Merle.
"You had no business to interfere with the metronome at all. I certainlyconsider it your fault that it has been taken. In future I can't haveyou day girls staying in the schoolroom after four o'clock. You mustleave directly you've put your books away. Go to your forms now, girls!We've wasted too much time already."
Merle stumped off, feeling extremely cross. She was absolutely certainthat Opal, who had run back last thing into the schoolroom, must haveput the metronome outside on the window-sill, knowing that the NickyNans would be sure to carry it off. At 'break' she taxed her with it.But Opal simply laughed, and went on eating biscuits.
"Don't set all the work of the Nicky Nans down to me," she declared."It's a pity they didn't keep the metronome. Miss Fanny will trot downto the pound and pay her sixpence and get it back, and it will betick-tacking again on the piano as gaily as ever, unless some of thosepriceless kids have chanced to break it."
"But you put it outside for them?" persisted Merle.
"I? I never do naughty things!"
"Don't you? It strikes me you tell the biggest fibs of any girl I'veever yet come across. I call you the absolute limit," said indignantMerle as she flounced away.