First Term at Malory Towers

  It was unfortunate for Alicia that she sat at the back of the room, in the last row but one. Anyone with normal hearing could hear perfectly well, even in the back row, but Alicia with both ears 'blocked,' as she called it, found it extremely difficult to catch every word that was said.

  To make matters worse, it was not Mam'zelle Dupont who took French that day, but Mam'zelle Rougier, thin, tall and bony. She was rarely in a good humour, as her thin lips, always tightly pressed together, showed. It was funny, Alicia thought, how bad-tempered people nearly always had thin lips.

  Mam'zelle Rougier had a soft voice, which, however could become extremely loud when she was angry. Then it became raucous, like a rook's, and the girls hated it.

  Today she was taking the beginnings of a French play with the girls. They nearly always had to learn one each term, taking different parts. Sometimes they performed it at school concerts, but often they didn't perform it at all, merely taking it in class,

  'Now.' said Mam'zelle Rougier, 'today we will discuss the play, and perhaps give out the parts. Maybe one or two of the new girls are good at French, and can take the leading parts. That would be so nice! I cannot think any of the old girls would mind that!'

  They wouldn't! The less learning they had to do, the better! The new girls smiled in a sickly fashion. They thought Mam'zelle Rougier's little jokes were feeble.

  'Now, first we will see who took the chief parts in last term's play,' said Mam'zelle. 'You, Alicia, what part did you play?'

  Alicia didn't hear, so she didn't answer. Betty nudged her. 'What part did you take in last term's play?' she said, loudly.

  'Oh! Sorry, Mam'zelle, I didn't catch what you said,' said Alicia. 'I took the part of the shep herd.'

  '1 thought that was in the term before," said Mam'zelle. Alicia again couldn't catch what she said. Betty repeated it loudly. 'MAM'ZELLE SAID SHE THOUGHT THAT WAS IN THE TERM BEFORE,'said Betty.

  Mam'zelle was astonished. Why should Betty repeat everything she said like that? Then suddenly she remembered something Mam'zelle Dupont had told her about Alicia— ah, yes, the bad naughty girl! She had pretended to be deaf, hadn't she—and here she was again, playing the same trick on Mam'zelle Rougier.

  "Ah non, non!' said Mam'zelle Rougier to herself angrily. 'It is too much! I will not have it.'

  'Alicia,' she said, patting the little bun at the back of her head, 'you are a funny girl and you do funny things, nestce pas? But 1 also, I am funny and I do funny things. I would like you to w rite out for me in French, fifty times in your best handwriting, "1 must not be deaf in Mam'zelle Rougier's class.'"

  'What did you say, Mam'zelle?' asked Alicia, having caught her own name at the beginning, but very little else. 'I

  couldn't quite hear.'

  'Ah, cette mechante filleV cried Mam'zelle, losing her temper as suddenly as she always did. 'Alicia ecoutez bienl Listen well! You shall write me out "I must not be deaf in Mam'zelle Rougier's class" ONE HUNDRED TIMES!'

  'But you said fifty just now,' said Betty, indignantly.

  'And you too, you shall write out "I must not interrupt," one hundred times!' stormed Mam'zelle. The class was silent. They knew Mam'zelle Rougier in this mood. She would be handing out a thousand lines soon to somebody. She was the most irritable teacher in the whole school.

  Betty whispered to Alicia as soon as Mam'zelle was writing something on the board, but, seeing that poor Alicia couldn't hear her whisper, she scribbled a message on a bit of paper.

  'You've got to write out a hundred lines for M. For goodness' sake don't say you can't hear anything else, or you'll get a thousand! She's in a real paddy!'

  Alicia nodded. And whenever Mam'zelle asked her if she had heard what was said, she answered politely, 'Yes, thank you, Mam'zelle,' hoping she would be forgiven for the story!

  Miss Potts came for the next lesson. Mam'zelle stopped and spoke to her, with a gleam in her eye. 'Alas, Miss Potts, one of your girls, Alicia, has again got a deafness in her ear. It is sad, is it not? Such a young and healthy girl!'

  With this parting shot Mam'zelle Rougier disappeared. Miss Potts looked at Alicia coldly.

  'I shouldn't have thought that even you were foolish enough to try the same trick twice, Alicia,' she said. Poor Alicia! She didn't hear what Miss Potts said, but gazed at her enquiringly.

  'You can leave your desk and come to one of the front ones,' said Miss Potts. 'Jean, change places with Alicia,

  please. You can change over the contents of your desk later.'

  Jean stood up, very pleased to think that she would leave the front row, which was always under Miss Pott's eye, and go to one of the much-sought-after back rows. It was easy to whisper in the back rowl, and easy to play tricks or pass notes there. Alicia didn't move because she really hadn't heard. There was suddenly a curious buzzing noise in her ears.

  'You've got to move, idiot!' said Betty in a loud whisper. 'Go on—go to Jean's place.'

  Alicia realised what was happening. She was full of dismay! What, leave the back seat she liked so much, leave her seat beside Betty—and go to the front row, under every teacher's eagle eye. Everyone knew that the front row had no fun at all!

  'Oh, Miss Potts,' she began, in dismay. 'Honestly. I am deaf! It's all that under-water swimming!'

  'You thought—or pretended you were deaf the other day,' said Miss Potts, unfeelingly. 'How in the world am I supposed to know when you are and when you aren't, Alicia?'

  'Well, I really am this time,' said Alicia, wishing her ears wouldn't buzz so. 'Please, Miss Potts, let me stay here!'

  'Now, Alica,' said Miss Potts, speaking in loud, clear tones so that, deaf or not, Alicia would be sure to hear, 'listen to me, and tell me if you agree with me or not. If you are not deaf, but playing a trick, it would be best to have you out here under my eye. If you are deaf and can't hear in the back row, then it is only common sense that you should be placed out here where you can. What do you think about it?'

  Alicia, of course, could not do anything but agree. She sat rather sulkily down in Jean's place. She could, of course, hear much better there. Then a funny thing happened. First one of her ears went 'pop' and then the other. She shook her head. Goody, goody! Her ears had gone pop and were all right again. She could hear as well as ever.

  She was so pleased that she whispered to Mary-Lou, next to her. 'My ears have gone pop. I can hear!'

  Miss Potts had extremely sharp hearing. She caught the whisper and turned round from the board. 'Will you kindly repeat what you said, Alicia?' she said.

  '1 said "My ears have gone pop. I can hear!'" said Alicia.

  'Good,' said Miss Potts. 'I thought you would probably find you could hear all right in the front there.'

  'But Miss Potts, I...' began Alicia.

  'That's enough,' said Miss Potts. 'Let us begin this lesson please without wasting any more time on your ears, deaf or not.'

  Alicia was cross because Jean and she had to change over the contents of their desks in Break. She hated being out in the front. Jean was very cheerful about the change.

  'I wished hard enough I could be at the back,' she said. 'And now I am.'

  'It's not fair,' grumbled Alicia. 'I really was deaf this morning—and then my ears suddenly got right. Miss Potts ought to have believed me.'

  Darrell, who was helping, couldn't help laughing. Alicia was not in a mood to be teased, and she scowled.

  'Oh, Alicia, I know it's unkind of me to laugh,' said Darrell, 'but honestly it's funny! First you pretend to be deaf, and pull Mam'zelle's leg well. Then you really do get deaf, and nobody believes it! It's just like that fable of the shepherd boy who called "wolf wolf!" when there wasn't a wolf, and then when there really was, and he called for help, nobody came because nobody believed him!'

  'I thought you were my friend,' said Alicia, stiffly. 'I don't like being preached at.'

  'Oh, I'm not preaching, really I'm not!' said Darrell.

  "Listen, Alicia, I'll write out half your lines for
you, I will really! It would take you ages to write out a hundred, and I know you hate writing. 1 love it.'

  'AH right. Thanks very much,' said Alicia, cheering up. So Mam'zelle Rougier was presented with one hundred lines that evening, half of them rather badly written and the other half quite nicely written. 'Strange that a child should write so badly on one side of the paper and so well on the other!' said Mam'zelle wonderingly. But fortunately for Alicia Mam'zelle got no further than wondering about it!

  10 A QUEER FRIENDSHIP

  IT was very hot. The girls simply lived for their time in the swimming-pool. They groaned when the tide was out and they couldn't bathe. Fortunately the pool was an enormous one, and would take practically the whole school when the tide was in.

  Darrell loved to have a game of tennis and then sprint down to the pool to bathe. Oh, the delicious coolness of the water then! She couldn't understand how Gwendoline or Mary-Lou could possibly shrink from getting in. But they insisted that the hotter the day, the colder the water felt, and they didn't like it.

  'But that's what's so lovely about the water," said Darrell. "Feeling so cold on such a blazing hot day as this! If you could only make up your minds to plunge in instead of going in inch by inch, you'd love it. You're awful cowards, both of you.'

  Neither Mary-Lou nor Gwendoline liked being called cowards. Mary-Lou always felt very hurt when Darrell so carelessly lined her up with Gwendoline, and scorned her, too, for her timidity. She tried her hardest to make Darrell pleased with her by running after her more than ever, even to tidying her locker in the common room, which exasperated Darrell because Mary-Lou always altered her arrangement of things.

  ' What s happened to my sweets? I know I put them in the front here. And where's my writing-pad? Blow, and I'm in such a hurry, too!'

  And out would come every single thing in the locker, higgledy-piggledy on the floor! Mary-Lou would look on mournfully.

  'Oh—I tidied them all so nicely for you,' she would say.

  'Well, don'tV Darrell would order. 'Why don't you go and bother with somebody else's things? You always seem to make a bee-line for mine. You seem to have got a craze for tidying things and putting them away. You go and do Alicia's—they're much untidier than mine! Just leave mine alone!'

  i only do it to help you,' Mary-Lou would murmur. It was awful to have such an admiration for somebody and for them to find it a nuisance. Perhaps Darrell would like her to tidy Alicia's things. She knew Darrell liked Alicia very much. Very well, then, she would help Alicia too.

  But Alicia could not bear it any more than Darrell, and when poor Mary-Lou succeeded in breaking the glass of her mother's photograph, Alicia forbade her ever to touch any of her things again.

  'Can't you see when you're a nuisance?' she said. 'Can't you see we don't want a little ninny like you always flapping round us? Look at that photograph! Smashed to bits just because you started messing around.'

  Mary-Lou wept. She was always scared when anyone ticked her off. She went out of the room and bumped into

  Gwendoline in the passage.

  'Hallo! Crying again! Whatever's up now?' asked Gwendoline, who was always interested in other people's rows, though never sympathetic.

  'Nothing. It's only that Alicia and Darrell are always so hard on me when I want to help them,' wept poor Mary- Lou, feeling very sorry for herself.

  'Oh, what do you expect from people like Alicia and Darrell—yes and Betty too?' asked Gwendoline, delighted to get in a few hard words about her enemies. 'Always so cocksure of themselves, and so ready with their tongues. I can't imagine why you want to make friends with them.'

  'I've just broken the photograph of Alicia's mother,'said Mary-Lou, wiping her eyes. 'That's what the trouble was really about."

  'Well, you may be sure Alicia won't forgive you for that,' said Gwendoline. 'She'll have her knife into you now. She just adores her mother, and nobody is ever allowed to handle that photograph. You've done it now, Mary-Lou!'

  As she spoke, a perfectly wonderful idea came into Gwendoline's head. She stopped and thought a moment, her eyes shining. In one moment she saw how she could get even with Alicia and Darrell, yes, and give that stupid little Mary-Lou a few bad moments too. Mary-Lou looked at her curiously.

  'What's the matter, Gwendoline?' she asked.

  'Nothing. Just an idea,' said Gwendoline. To Mary-Lou's intense surprise she suddenly slipped her arm through the younger girl's.

  'You be friends with me,' she said, in a honeyed voice. 7 shan't treat you like Darrell does, and Alicia. I haven't a w icked tongue like Alicia, or scornful eyes like Darrell. Why don't you make friends with me? 1 shouldn't jeer at you for any little kindnesses, I can tell you.'

  Mary-Lou looked at Gwendoline doubtfully. She really didn't like her, but Gwendoline smiled at her so sweetly that she felt grateful. And Alicia and Darrell really had been horrid to her when she had tried to do things for them. Then she remembered how Gwendoline had held her under the water.

  She took her arm away from Gwendoline's. 'No,' she said, 'I can't be friends with you, Gwendoline. You were very cruel to me that day in the pool. I've had dreams about it ever since.'

  Gwendoline was angry to think that the stupid, feeble little Mary-Lou should refuse to be friends with her. But she still w ent on smiling sweetly. She took Mary-Lou's arm again.

  "You know I didn't mean anything that time in the pool,' she said. It was just a joke. You've often seen the others being ducked. I'm sorry 1 ducked you so hard. I didn't realize you were so frightened.'

  There was something very determined about Gwendoline, when she had made up her mind about anything. Mary-Lou didn't know how to get away. So, as usual, she surrendered.

  'Well,' she said, hesitatingly, 'well—if you really didn't mean to hurt me, that time in the pool, Gwendoline, I'll be friends. But I'm not going to talk against Darrell or Alicia.'

  Gwendoline gave her arm a squeeze, bestowed another honeyed smile on the perplexed Mary-Lou and walked off to think out her suddenly conceived plan in peace.

  'It's marvellous!' she thought. 'Everyone knows how fed- up Darrell is with Mary-Lou, because she's always tagging after her, and soon everyone will know how cross Alicia is because she has broken her mother's photograph. So, if/ start playing a few tricks on Mary-Lou, everyone will think it is Darrell or Alicia getting back at her! And oh. goody, goody. Alicia has to sit by Mary-Lou now! That makes it easier still.'

  She sat down in the Court and thought out her plan. She meant to revenge herself on the three people she disliked. She would scare Mary-Lou to death—but she would make everyone think it was Alicia and Darrell! Then they would be blamed, and punished.

  'And if 1 make close friends with Mary-Lou nobody would ever think I had anything to do with things,' thought Gwendoline, in delight. 'Really, I'm very clever. I bet no one else in the whole of the first form could think of a plan like this.'

  She was right. They couldn't—but not because they weren't clever enough—but just because they weren't mean enough. Gwendoline couldn't see that. She couldn't even see that she was doing a mean thing. She called it 'giving them all a lesson!'

  She laid her plans very carefully. She would wait her time, till Alicia or Darrell were carrying out the duty of tidying the classroom and filling the vases with water. Then everyone would know they and they only had been in the classroom and so had the opportunity of slipping anything into anyone's desk, or taking something out.

  She would pop a blackbeetle into Mary-Lou's desk—or a few worms—or even a mouse if she could get hold of it. But no—Gwendoline quickly ruled out mice because she was so scared of them herself. She didn't much like black-beetles or worms either, but she could manage to scoop those up into a match-box or something.

  She could do that. And she could remove Mary-Lou's favourite pencils and hide them in Alicia's locker. That would be a cunning thing to do! She might put one or two of Mary- Lou's books in Darrell's locker too. And how sympathetic she would be with
Mary-Lou when she found out these tricks!

  Gwendoline began poking round the garden to see what insects she could find. Jean, who was a good gardener, and liked to give a hand with the school garden at times, was most amazed to see Gwendoline poking about in the beds with a trowel.

  'What are you doing?' she asked. 'Looking for a bone you've buried?'

  'Don't be silly,' said Gwendoline, angry that Jean should have come across her. 'Can't I do a little gardening? Are you to be the only one?'

  'Well, what gardening are you doing?' demanded Jean, who always liked to know the ins and outs of everything that aroused her curiosity.

  'Just digging,' said Gwendoline. 'Making the earth a bit loose. It's so dry.'

  Jean gave a snort. She had a wonderful variety of snorts, which she kept mainly for Gwendoline, Sally and Mary-Lou. Gwendoline dug viciously with her trowel, wishing she could put a worm down Jean's neck. But probably Jean wouldn't mind, anyway.

  Gwendoline didn't like to look for worms after that. She decided to look for spiders. But when she saw a large one in the wood-shed she almost ran out helter-skelter herself. Still, it was such a large one, it would be just the thing for Mary- Lou's desk. It would come running out marvellously!

  Somehow Gwendoline caught it, though she shivered as she clapped a flower-pot over it. She managed to get it into a little cardboard box. Then, feeling very clever, she slipped away to the common room, meaning to hide the spider in its box away in her locker until the right moment came.

  She led the conversation round to spiders that evening. 'I got my head caught in a web in the shed today,' she said. 'Oooh, it did feel horrid. I don't like spiders.'

  'My brother Sam once had a tame spider,' began Alicia, who could always be relied on to produce a bit of family history of any moment. 'It lived under a fern in our green¬house, and it came out every evening for a drink of water, when Mother watered the ferns.'