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Regiment of Women

<h2>CHAPTER XXII</h2> To the schoolgirls the dress rehearsal was, if possible, more of an ordeal than the performances themselves. The head mistress attended in state with the entire staff and such of the girls as were not themselves acting. Stray relatives, unable to be present at the play proper, dotted the more distant benches, or were bestowed in the overhanging galleries, while the servants, from portly matron to jobbing gardener, clustered at the back of the hall. The platform at the upper end had been built out to form a stage, and when, late in the afternoon, the final signal had been given and the improvised curtains drew audibly apart, Clare had fair reason to plume herself on her stage-management. The long blinds of the windows had been let down and shut out the sceptical sunshine; and the candle footlights, flickering unprofessionally, mellowed the paintwork and patterned the home-made scenery with re-echoing lights, pools of unaccountable shadow, and shaftlike, wavering, prismatic gleams, flinging over the crude stage-setting a veil of fantastic charm. The play opened, however, dully enough. The scenes chosen had had inevitably to be compressed, run together, mangled, and Clare had not found it easy work. Faulconbridge, bowdlerised out of all existence, could not tickle his hearers, and King John, not yet broken in to crown and mantle, gave him feeble support. But with the entrance of Constance, Arthur and the French court, actors and audience alike bestirred themselves. Agatha, her dark eyes flashing, her lank figure softened[200] and rounded by the generous sweep of her geranium-coloured robes, looked an authentic stage queen. Her exuberant movements and theatrical intonation had been skilfully utilised by Clare, who, playing on her eager vanity, had alternately checked and goaded her into a plausible rendering of the part. She was the reverse of nervous; her voice rolled her opening speech without a tremor; her impatient, impetuous delivery (she hardly let her fellow-actors finish their lines) fitted the character and was effective enough. Yet to Clare, note-book in hand, prepared to pounce, cat-like, on deficiencies, neither she nor her foil dominated the stage, nor the row of schoolgirl princes. Her critical appreciation was for the little figure, wavering uncertainly between the shrieking queens, with scared anxious eyes, that swept the listening circle in faint appeal, quivering like a sensitive plant at each verbal assault, shrinking beneath the hail of blandishments and reproaches. The one speech of the scene, the reproof of Constance, was spoken with un-childlike, weary dignity— "Good my mother, peace! I would that I were low laid in my grave; I am not worth this coil that's made for me." Yet it was not Arthur that spoke, nor Louise—no frightened boy or overwrought, precocious girl. It was the voice of childhood itself, sexless, aloof; childhood the eternal pilgrim, wandering passive and perplexed, an elf among the giants: childhood, jostled by the uncaring crowd, swayed by gross energies and seared by alien passions. "She's got it," muttered Clare to Alwynne, reporting progress in the interval; "oh, how she's got it!" She laughed shortly. "So that's her reading. Impudent monkey! But she's got her atmosphere. Uncanny, isn't it? It reminds me—do you remember that performance of hers last autumn with Childe Roland? I told you about it. Well, this brings it back, rather. Clever imp. I wonder[201] how much of my coaching in this act she'll condescend to leave in?" "You gave her a free hand, you know," deprecated Alwynne. "I did. But it's impudence——" "Inspiration——" "Impudence all the same. When the rehearsal is over I must have a little conversation with Miss Denny." She showed her white teeth in a smile. Alwynne caught her up uneasily— "Clare—you're not going to scold? It wouldn't be fair. You know you're as pleased as Punch, really." Clare shot a look at her, but Alwynne's face was innocent and anxious. She shrugged her shoulders. "Am I? I suppose I am. I don't know. On my word, Alwynne, I don't know! But run along, my deputy. There's an agitated orb rolling in your direction from the join of the curtains." Alwynne fled. The opening scene of the second division of the play—as Clare had planned it—showed Arthur a prisoner to John and the old queen. The child's face was changed, his manner strained; his startled eyes darted restlessly from Hubert to the king and back again to Hubert; the pair seemed to fascinate him. Yet he shrank from their touch and from Elinor's embrace, only to check the instinctive movement with pitiful, propitiatory haste, and to submit, his small fists clenched, to their caresses. His eyes never left their faces; you saw the tide of fear rising in his soul. Not till the interview with Hubert, however, was the morbid drift of the conception fully apparent. He hung upon the man, smiling with white lips; he fawned; he babbled; he cajoled; marshalled his poor defences of tears and smiles, frail defiance and wooing surrender, with an awful, childish cunning. He watched the man as a frightened bird watches a cat; turned as he turned, confronting him with every muscle tense. His high whisper premised a voice too[202] weak with terror to shriek. Yet at the entrance of the attendants there came a cry that made Clare shiver where she sat. It was fear incarnate. Clare fidgeted. It was too bad of Louise.... And what had Alwynne been thinking of? A free hand, indeed! Too much of a free hand altogether! The fact that she was listening to a piece of acting, that, in a theatre, would have overwhelmed her with admiration, added to her annoyance. A school performance was not the place for brilliant improprieties. Certainly impropriety—this laborious exposure of a naked emotion was, in such a milieu, essentially improper—Louise must be crazy! And in what unholy school had she learned it all—this baby of thirteen? And what on earth would staff and school say? She stole a look at her colleagues. Some were interested, she could see, but obviously puzzled. A couple were whispering together. A third had chosen the moment to yawn. Her contradictory mind instantly despised them for fools that could not appreciate what manner of work they were privileged to watch. She saw her path clear—her attitude outlined for her. She would glorify a glorious effort (it was pleasant that for once justice might walk with expediency) and her sure, instant tribute would, she knew, suffice to quiet the carpers. But, for all that, the performances themselves should be, she promised herself, on less dangerous lines than the dress-rehearsal. She would have a word with Louise: the imp needed a cold douche.... But what an actress it would make later on! Clare sighed enviously. The scene was nearly over. With the glad cry—"Ah! now you look like Hubert," the enchantment of terror broke. A few more sentences and Arthur was left alone on the stage. As the door clanged (Alwynne was juggling with hardware in the wings) the child's strained attitude relaxed and the audience unconsciously relaxed with it. He swayed a moment, then collapsed brokenly into a chair. The long pause was an exquisite relief.[203] But before long the small face puckered into frowns; a back-wash of subsiding fear swept across it. The hands twitched and drummed. You felt that a plan was maturing. At last, after furtive glances at the door, he rose with an air of decision, and crossed quickly to the alcove of the window. For an instant the curtains hid him, and the audience stared expectantly at an empty stage. When he turned to them again, holding the great draperies apart with little, resolute fists, his face was alight with hope, and, for the first time, wholly youthful. In the soft voice ringing out the last courageous sentences, detailing the plan of the escape, there was a little quiver of excitement, of childish delight in an adventure. He ended; stood a moment smiling; then the heavy folds hid him again as they swept into position. There was a tense pause. Suddenly as from a great distance, came a faint wailing cry. Thereon, silence. The curtains wheezed and rattled into place. Alwynne, hurrying on to the stage to shift scenery for the following act, nearly tripped, as she dismantled the alcove, over a huddle of clothes crouched between backing and wall. She stooped and shook it. A small arm flung up in instant guard. "Louise? Get up! The act's over. Run out of the way. Stop—help me with this, as you're here." Obediently the child scrambled to her feet. She gripped an armful of curtain, and trailed across the stage in Alwynne's wake. Till the curtains rose on the final act, she trotted after her meekly, helping where she could. With King John embarked on his opening speech, Alwynne drew breath again. She ran her eye over the actors, palpitant at their several entrances, saw the prompter still established with book and lantern, and decided that all could go on without her for a moment. She put her hand on Louise's shoulder and drew her into the passage.[204] "What is it, Louise?" "Nothing." "What were you doing just now? Were you scared? Was it stage fright?" "Oh no." Louise smiled faintly. "Then what were you doing?" Louise considered. "I was dead. I had jumped, you know. I was finding out how it would feel." "Louise! You gruesome child!" "I liked it—it was so quiet. I'd forgotten about shifting the scenery. I'm sorry. Does it—did it hurt him, do you think, the falling?" Alwynne put both her hands on the thin shoulders and shook her gently. "Louise! Wake up! You're not Prince Arthur now! Gracious me, child—it's only a play. You mustn't take it so seriously." Louise made no answer; she did not seem to understand. Alwynne was struck by a new idea. She took the child's face in her hand and turned it to the gaslight. "Did I see you at lunch, Louise? I don't believe I did. Do you know you're a very naughty child to take advantage of the confusion?" "Miss Durand, I had to learn. I was forgetting it all. I slipped the last two lines as it was—you know, the 'My uncle's spirit is in these stones' bit. I wasn't hungry." "And you were very late, too. What did you have for breakfast?" An agitated face peered round the corner. "Miss Durand, which side do I come on from? Hubert's nearly off." "The left." Alwynne hurried to the rescue, dragging Louise after her. She hustled the anxious courier to his entrance, twitched his mantle into position, and saw him safely on the stage. Then she turned to Louise. "Louise, will you please go to the kitchen and ask Mrs.[205] Random for two cups of tea and some buns—at once. There is some tea made, I know. I'm tired and thirsty—two cups, please. Bring it to me here, and don't run into any one with your hands full. Be quick—I'm dying for some." Louise darted away on her errand. Poor Daffy did look hot and flustered.... Daffy was such a dear ... every one worried her ... it was a shame.... Wouldn't Daffy have been a pleasant mother? Better than shouting Constance.... What was it she had asked for? A plum, a cherry and a fig? No, that wasn't it. Oh, of course, tea—tea and buns. Alwynne looked after her, smiling and frowning; she was not in the least thirsty. What a baby it was.... But nothing to eat all day! Mrs. Denny ought to be ashamed of herself.... She, Alwynne, would keep a vigilant eye on her to-morrow, poor little soul.... Had she really lost herself so entirely in the part—or was there a touch of pose? No, that was more Agatha's line.... Agatha was enjoying herself.... She listened amusedly, watching through a crack in the screen, till a far-away chink caught her ear. She went out again into the passage, and met Louise with a laden tray. Alwynne drank with expressive pantomime and motioned to the other cup. "Drink it up," she commanded. "It's a second cup—for you——" began Louise. "Be a good child and do as you're told! I must fly in a minute." The child looked doubtful; but the steaming liquid was tempting and the new-baked, shining cakes. She obeyed. Alwynne watched the faint colour flush her cheeks with a satisfaction that surprised herself. "Finish it all up—d'you hear? I must go." She hesitated: "Louise—you were very good to-day. I am sure Miss Hartill must have been awfully pleased." She went back to the stage. She had had the pleasure of[206] bringing a look of relief to Louise's face. Alwynne could never remember that the kindest lie is a lie none the less. In the part of Arthur the child, unconsciously, had seen embodied her own psychological situation. She had enacted the spirit, if not the letter, of her own state of mind, and in the mock death had experienced something of the sensations, the sense of release, of a real one. Left to herself, she might gradually have dreamed and imagined and acted herself out of her troubles, have drifted back to real life again, cured and sane. But Alwynne, with her suggestion of good cheer, had destroyed the skin of make-believe that was forming healingly upon the child's sore heart. Louise awoke, with a pang of hope, to her real situation. "I am sure Miss Hartill must have been awfully pleased." ... So pleased that, who knew, she might yet forgive the crime of the examination? If it might be.... "What might be must be," cried the child within her. There came a crash of clapping; the rehearsal was over at last, and in a few moments flocks of girls, chattering and excited, came trouping past Louise on their way to tea. She did not follow them. She was suddenly aware of boy's clothes. She must change them.... She could not find Miss Hartill till she was tidy, and she had determined to speak with her. Miss Durand had said.... She would do as Arthur did to Hubert—she would besiege Miss Hartill, force her to be kind, till she could say, "Oh, now you look Miss Hartill! all this while you were disguised." She shivered at the idea of undergoing once more the emotional experience of the scene—but the vision of Miss Hartill transfigured drew her as a magnet pulls a needle. She went towards the stairs. The big music-room at the top of the house had been temporarily converted into a dressing-room, and she thought she would go quickly and change, while it was still quiet[207] and spacious. But as she pushed open the swinging doors that divided staircase from passage, she saw Clare coming down the long corridor. There was no one else in sight. Again wild, unreasoning hopes flooded her. She would seize the opportunity ... she would speak to Miss Hartill there and then.... She would ask her why she was always angry.... Perhaps she would be kind? "I am sure Miss Hartill must have been awfully pleased...." She must have speech with her at once—at once.... She waited, holding open the door, her heart beating violently, her face steeled to composure. Clare, passing with a nod, found her way barred by a white-faced scrap of humanity, whose courage, obviously and pitifully, was desperation. But Clare could be very blind when she did not choose to see. "Miss Hartill, may I speak to you?" "I can't wait, Louise. I'm busy." "Miss Hartill, was it all right? Were you pleased? I tried furiously. Was it as you wanted it?" "Oh, you played your own version." Clare caught her up sharply. "But Miss Durand said—you said I was to." "I expect it was all right," said Clare lightly. "I'm afraid I was too busy to attend much, even to your efforts, Louise." She smiled crookedly. "And now run along and change." She pushed against the door, but Louise, beyond all control, caught back the handles. "Miss Hartill—you shall listen. Are you always going to be angry? What have I done? Will you never be good to me again as you used to be?" Clare's face grew stern. "Louise, you are being very silly. Let me pass." "Because I can't bear it. It's killing me. Couldn't you stop being angry?" Clare, ignoring her, wrenched open the door. Louise, flung sideways, slipped on the polished floor. She crouched[208] where she fell, and caught at Clare's skirts. She was completely demoralised. "Miss Hartill! Oh, please—please—if you would only understand. You hurt me so. You hurt me so." Clare stood looking down at her. "Once and for all, Louise, I dislike scenes. Let me go, please." For a moment their eyes strove. And suddenly Louise, relaxing all effort, let her go. Without another look, Clare retraced her steps and entered the Common-room. Louise, still crouching against the wall, watched her till she disappeared. The doors swung and clicked into rigidity. There was a sudden uproar of voices and laughter and scraping chairs. A distant door had opened. Louise started to her feet, and sped swiftly up the stairs, flight on flight, of the tall old house, till she reached the top floor and the music-room. It was empty. She flung-to the door, and fumbled with the stiff key. It turned at last, and she leaned back against the lock, shaking and breathless, but with a sense of relief. She was safe.... Not for long—they would be coming up soon—but long enough for her purpose. But first she must recover breath. It was foolish to tremble so. It only hindered one ... when there was so little time to lose. Hurriedly she sorted out her little pile of everyday clothes—some irrelevant instinct insisting on the paramount necessity of changing into them. Mrs. Denny would be annoyed if she spoiled the new costume. She re-dressed hastily and, clasping her belt, crossed to the window. It was tall and divided into three casements. The centre door was open. A low seat ran round the bay. She climbed upon it and stood upright, peering out. How high up she was! There was a blue haze on the horizon, above the line of faint hills, that melted in turn into a weald, chequered like the chessboard counties in Alice. So there was a world beyond the school! Nearer[209] still, the suburb spread map-like. She craned forward. Directly under her lay the front garden, and a row of white steps that grinned like teeth. It was on them that she would fall—not on the grass.... She imagined the sensation of the impact, and shuddered. But at least they would kill one outright.... One would not die groaning in rhymed couplets, like Arthur.... Clasping the shafts, she hoisted herself upwards, till she stood upon the inner sill. Instantly the fear of falling caught her by the throat. She swayed backwards, gasping and dizzy, steadying herself against the stout curtains. "I can't do it," whispered Louise hoarsely. "I can't do it." Slowly the vertigo passed. She fought with her rampant fear, wrenching away her thoughts from the terror of the death she had chosen, to the terror of the life she was leaving. She stood a space, balanced between time and eternity, weighing them. With an effort she straightened herself, and put a foot on the outer ledge. Again, inevitably, she sickened. Huddled in the safety of the window-seat, stray phrases thrummed in her head: "My bones turn to water"—"There is no strength in me." He knew—that Psalmist man.... She slipped back on to the floor, and walked unsteadily to the littered table. Her hands were so weak that she could hardly lift them to pour out a glass of water. She leaned against the table and drank thirstily. What a fool she was.... What a weak fool.... An instant's courage—one little second—and peace for ever after.... Wasn't it worth while? Wasn't it? Wasn't it? She turned again to her deliverance. As she pulled herself on to the seat, she heard a noise of footsteps in the passage without, and the handle of the door was rattled impatiently. In an instant she was on the sill. This was pursuit—Miss Hartill, and all the terrors! There must be no more hesitation. Once more she crouched for[210] the leap, only, with a supreme effort, to swing herself back to safety again. Her hands were so slippery with sweat that they could barely grip the window-shafts. There was a banging at the door and a sound of voices calling. She swayed in a double agony, as fear strove against fear. She heard the voice of a prefect— "Who is it in there? Open the door at once." They would break open the door.... They would find her.... They would stop her.... Coward that she was—fool and coward.... One instant's courage—one little movement! She stiffened herself anew. Poised on the extreme edge of the outer sill, she pushed her two hands through the belt of her dress, lest they should save her in her own despite. She stood an instant, her eyes closed. Then she sprang.... <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [211] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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