by Enid Blyton
‘It’s nothing to do with being a bad loser!’ Elizabeth blurted out. ‘It’s just that Kerry Dane doesn’t go with Whyteleafe School and she’s certainly not a worthy person to be its head girl!’
‘Sssh, Elizabeth!’ said Emma, unhappily. ‘You really mustn’t go around saying things like that. I forbid it. The election is behind us now and we have the result. Kerry is our new head girl and I want you to tell me that you accept it.’
‘I don’t accept it, Emma,’ replied Elizabeth, firmly. ‘I’ll never accept it. I can’t even bring myself to go to the next school Meeting. Not if she’s still head girl!’
Emma’s eyes widened.
‘Stop it, Elizabeth! Of course Kerry will still be head girl at the next Meeting! And of course you must go! If you miss another Meeting over this you will show a complete lack of self-discipline. You will be setting a bad example to the younger pupils in the school.’
Elizabeth tried to turn her eyes away.
‘Look at me, Elizabeth,’ said Emma, gently. Elizabeth met her gaze. ‘I want you to make me a promise. Even if privately you can’t accept Kerry as head girl, you are to promise not to miss another Meeting. Do you give me your promise?’
Elizabeth could see that she was making Emma unhappy. She swallowed.
‘All right,’ she mumbled. ‘I promise.’
That night she took out her autograph book and gazed at its spoiled white leather cover, with tears in her eyes. Then she opened it. She found the words that Rita had written at the end of last term, a beautiful line of poetry.
‘Kerry Dane isn’t good enough to step into Rita’s shoes,’ thought Elizabeth. ‘She never was and she never will be. Only Emma will do! It’s an outrage!’
But if the three friends tried to explain that to people, they’d only think, as Emma had gently tried to point out, that it was a case of Elizabeth and Co being bad losers.
Julian and Joan were right. They would have to bide their time.
‘I only hope my patience can last out,’ thought Elizabeth, restlessly, as she tossed and turned and tried to get to sleep. ‘I only hope nothing unexpected takes place, to push me over the edge.’
But that was exactly what happened.
It was after school, the following Friday.
It had turned out to be a very good week for Elizabeth, in other respects. She was enjoying her new lessons in the second form. And, although it was horrid not being a monitor after all, Belinda and Daniel were both very kind about it. They kept saying that they weren’t really cut out to be monitors and Elizabeth and Joan would have been so much better. She was also pleased that Miss Ranger had made her top in English this week.
But the best thing of all about the week was that she had got into the table-tennis squad! After the second coaching session, Mr Warlow’s list had gone up on the notice-board – and there was her name! Patrick was only first reserve, in spite of his excellent new bat.
Tomorrow, Saturday, they’d travel by minibus to St Faith’s and play their first match. How exciting that was going to be!
Before that, however, Elizabeth was trying to steel herself for the weekly Meeting. It was taking place on Friday this week. That morning, a dark cloud had descended over her head. When lessons were over, she went for a walk around the school grounds, trying to calm herself.
‘I just dread going into the hall today!’ she muttered to herself. ‘Even though I promised Emma I would. It will be too unbearable to sit there in silence and watch Kerry Dane being a drama queen. Acting the part of being a fine head girl! Everybody looking up to her! I really cannot bear it . . .’
Suddenly Elizabeth stopped. She had heard a funny little sound. She looked all around.
There it was again! It seemed to be coming from the shrubbery.
It was the sound of someone sobbing.
CHAPTER TEN
Elizabeth is defiant
‘WHAT’S WRONG, Rupert?’ asked Elizabeth, diving in amongst the bushes. ‘Why are you hiding? Has somebody been bullying you?’
The small new boy gazed up at Elizabeth, his cheeks stained with tears. He had hidden so that nobody would think that he was a cry-baby. Slowly he brought his sobs under control. Elizabeth gently dried his eyes with her clean white handkerchief.
‘Well, have they?’
Rupert shook his head.
‘Then why have you been crying?’ coaxed Elizabeth. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Mustn’t talk about it,’ he muttered. ‘Mustn’t let people know I’m greedy.’
His lip trembled and he started sobbing again.
‘I’m not greedy!’ he wailed. ‘I was going to share them with all my friends!’
‘Share what, Rupert?’ asked Elizabeth. ‘You are allowed to tell me about it. And it will make you feel better. Share what exactly?’
The words came tumbling out.
‘My chocolate soldiers grandfather sent me for my birthday! I was going to share them out at teatime. But she wouldn’t listen to me. She took them away from me! She took them away!’
‘Who did, Rupert?’
‘Kerry did!’
Elizabeth stared at him in disbelief.
‘The head girl?’
Rupert nodded solemnly.
‘When?’
‘This afternoon. She needs them for the earthquake.’
The earthquake? Elizabeth frowned. Of course. The Earthquake Bazaar, next weekend. Kerry Dane was in charge of the sweet stall. But what a mean, horrid way to behave! She had no right to force the little boy to give up his birthday present for it!
Rupert looked scared and put a hand to his mouth.
‘I promised not to tell anybody. Or else she’ll tell everybody in the whole school I’m a very greedy little boy!’
Elizabeth bent down and gently placed an arm round his shoulders.
‘You’re not greedy, Rupert. Now listen to me. You’re to go and wash your face and hands. It will soon be time for the Meeting. You’re to stop worrying about this. It’s just a – a horrid little mistake. Remember how I found your teddy bear for you, on the bus? Well – I’ll make sure you get your chocolate soldiers back, too! Off you go!’
The fair-haired boy looked pleased and grateful.
‘Oh, thank you!’
Elizabeth stood and watched him walk back to the school buildings. He turned and waved. Calmly she waved back but her cheeks were flushed with anger. What a despicable way for a head girl to behave. What an abuse of power!
‘The real Kerry Dane,’ Elizabeth thought. ‘The mask has started to crack at last!’
She reached a decision. She had promised Emma to attend the Meeting.
Well, she would keep her promise!
‘And I know exactly what I’ll do when I get there,’ thought Elizabeth, with a cheerful gleam in her eye.
‘Silence!’ shouted Thomas, banging the gavel loudly. ‘I am trying to start the Meeting!’
The head boy was angry. The children were refusing to settle down. They all kept chattering and turning round to look at Elizabeth Allen.
It was such an amazing sight.
The Naughtiest Girl was seated on the second form benches but she was facing the wrong way! She was sitting with her back to the platform.
‘What does Elizabeth think she’s doing?’ wondered Emma, in dismay.
Elizabeth sat stiffly on her bench. Instead of facing the head boy and girl and the monitors, she had turned her back on them and sat facing the other way. Her arms were folded stubbornly, in silent protest.
‘Quiet, everybody!’ cried Thomas.
The children forced themselves to stop looking at Elizabeth. The chatter died to a whisper and then to complete silence.
‘Thank you,’ said Thomas. ‘We have a lot of b
usiness to get through today. But before we begin, would Elizabeth please be kind enough to stand up and face the right way. I wish to speak to her.’
Elizabeth did so.
‘What is the meaning of this tomfoolery, Elizabeth?’ he asked.
‘I do not wish to face the platform,’ announced Elizabeth, in clear ringing tones. ‘I do not accept Kerry Dane as head girl. She has proved herself an unfit person and I think she should resign.’
The school listened in astonishment. Julian and Joan exchanged troubled glances. What had provoked this? They had all agreed they would have to be patient. Did Elizabeth know what she was doing? Was she not being very hot-headed?
Next to Thomas on the platform, Kerry Dane cast her eyes down. Her heart was bumping with anger. Who was this dreadful girl they called the Naughtiest Girl? What was this all about?
‘I see,’ replied Thomas, calmly. ‘That is a very dramatic statement, Elizabeth. Perhaps you would be good enough to explain to the Meeting your reasons for making it.’
‘I will be very pleased to, Thomas.’
Elizabeth pointed accusingly at Kerry Dane.
‘Kerry thinks that this is a school where she can do whatever she likes. She has behaved today no better than a common bully. Little Rupert was sent some chocolate soldiers for his birthday, by his grandfather. This afternoon Kerry Dane forced him to hand them over to her for her stall at the Earthquake Bazaar.’
A shocked gasp ran round the hall.
Kerry Dane leapt to her feet at once, a pained expression on her face.
‘Elizabeth, how could you say such a thing?’ she asked sorrowfully. ‘How could you even think such a thing? I am very, very hurt.’
She then looked down at the juniors, sitting cross-legged on the floor at the front of the hall. Her eyes lighted on the smallest one, with very fair hair.
‘Stand up please, Rupert,’ she said, in a kindly voice. ‘I think we need to sort this out together, don’t you?’
The small boy rose.
But he was left standing there, nervously blinking, as the young actress came to the edge of the platform and looked straight past him. With arms out-flung, she began to address the school, a radiant expression on her face, her lips sweetly smiling.
‘First of all, this is exactly the right moment to say thank you! Thank you all for the wonderful response you’ve made so far! All the lovely things you’ve been bringing me for the sweet stall. Every day you come and see me and bring your goodies, knowing the money raised will help the earthquake victims. I find your generosity very touching. And I found Rupert’s gift today perhaps the most touching of all . . .’
She then looked down and fixed her eyes on the small boy, who was now beginning to feel frightened and overwhelmed.
‘Look at me, please, Rupert.’
The small child gazed up at the figure towering over him.
‘Now, Rupert, where did Elizabeth get this funny idea from? Have you been making up naughty stories? Did you regret it afterwards, giving your chocolate soldiers away? Was it something you did on the spur of the moment because you felt sorry for the earthquake victims? But you were so insistent at the time, Rupert! Don’t you remember? You told me you thought it would be a very greedy thing to keep them. Didn’t you?’
Rupert gazed up into those mesmerizing brown eyes. He was blinking non-stop, overcome with confusion. He was like a frightened rabbit in the thrall of a stoat.
‘Now, think hard, Rupert. Don’t you remember?’ repeated Kerry.
She was daring him to contradict her. His sense of confusion increased.
‘I – I can’t remember exactly. I s’pose I must have done. I don’t know. Elizabeth asked me why I was crying and I s’pose . . .’
Arabella whispered to Patrick behind her hand.
‘Elizabeth making up naughty stories, more like it!’
Kerry was finishing Rupert’s sentence for him.
‘You knew you’d given me your soldiers but then you wished you hadn’t and it made you cry. But you didn’t dare tell Elizabeth how silly you’d been, so you made up a naughty little story instead! Now, please don’t start crying again! There’s no need to get upset about it. We all make mistakes.’
‘You may sit down now, Rupert,’ intervened Thomas, feeling sorry for the child. ‘And don’t be a cry-baby. Nobody’s going to punish you. Think carefully in future before you give things away. Make quite sure that you really want to do so. Only babies give things to people and then want to have them back! You’re a big boy now, remember.’
‘Yes, Thomas.’
The child hastily sat down, feeling tearful and totally confused.
Elizabeth had listened to the whole exchange in stunned silence.
What a brilliant actress Kerry Dane was. What an Oscar-winning performance!
Thomas now spoke to the Naughtiest Girl, while the whole school listened with avid interest. Julian and Joan were feeling only total dismay.
‘We already know, Elizabeth, that you have found it very difficult to accept the results of last week’s election. And that you have lost your chance to be a monitor because of it. But you must know that the way you just spoke to our new head girl is not something that can be tolerated. She has been properly elected and she must be shown respect. You will please make a public apology to Kerry.’
‘I certainly shall not,’ said Elizabeth defiantly.
Thomas bit his lip. He felt worried and upset but he dared not show it.
‘Then you must leave the Meeting at once.’
Elizabeth barely heard him. She was already striding out of the hall. Her eyes were misted with anger and there was only one thought on her mind.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The Naughtiest Girl wins through
‘I DON’T believe Kerry Dane for one instant!’ she thought. ‘I’m going to get Rupert’s chocolates back for him!’
Elizabeth raced upstairs to the seniors’ common room. She knew that she was strictly forbidden to enter without permission, but she didn’t care. There was nobody to stop her. The entire school was seated safely at the Meeting.
‘I know where they keep everything for the Bazaar!’ thought Elizabeth. ‘It’s going to be quite easy to get Rupert’s soldiers! I promised him!’
Elizabeth was quite positive that Rupert had been telling her the truth. It was Kerry Dane who’d been telling the naughty little stories, as she called them! But how could the school know how awful she was? That she had actually taken a junior’s birthday present away from him? Even for a good cause, it was such an unbelievable thing to do!
But that, Elizabeth felt quite sure, was exactly what had happened.
‘Goodness only knows why’, thought Elizabeth, as she slipped into the big common room and headed for the cupboard in the corner. ‘But I’ll see that Rupert gets his birthday present back if it’s the last thing I ever do at Whyteleafe!’
At her boldest and most reckless, Elizabeth found the key to the cupboard. She knew where it was because she’d been here with Daniel when he’d handed in some pottery for Philippa’s craft stall. She turned the key in the lock.
The cupboard door creaked open.
The shelves were neatly labelled: Craft Stall . . . White Elephant . . . Sweet Stall . . .
The shelf set aside for the sweet stall was already nearly full. There were sweets of every description, some of them shop sweets, many of them home-made. There were jars of home-made peppermints, toffees and coconut ice. There were at least three sugar mice. There was Arabella’s fudge, too. Elizabeth recognized the box. How busy all the children had been, eager to please the young film star.
She frowned, beginning to feel uneasy.
‘It’s true what she said, then. The children have been giving her stacks of things for the sweet stall.
The shelf’s almost full and there’s still a whole week to go before the Bazaar! So there’s hardly any danger of her stall not being a success, then . . .’
It made her mean behaviour seem more unbelievable than ever.
‘I know!’ Elizabeth said to herself. ‘Perhaps there isn’t very much chocolate. Everybody’s giving her sweets but she wants to have some chocolate things to go with them.’
Elizabeth then checked each item on the shelf, very carefully.
And then she realized something.
It wasn’t that there was not very much chocolate.
There was no chocolate at all!
‘Even Rupert’s chocolate soldiers aren’t here,’ she realized, in surprise. She relocked the cupboard and carefully replaced the key in its hiding place, puzzled. ‘What can she have done with them?’
Elizabeth came out of the seniors’ common room and closed the door. She looked up and down the corridor.
‘It must be that she simply hasn’t bothered to put them in the cupboard yet,’ Elizabeth decided. ‘Yes, that will be it! They must still be somewhere in her room.’
Slowly, hesitantly, she walked along the corridor until she came to a door. It said: HEAD GIRL, PRIVATE. She hesitated for many seconds. Much as she hated Kerry Dane, it seemed a very wrong thing to do.
But then she thought of Rupert, and his tears, and the terrible injustice he had suffered.
She turned the handle and eased open the door of Kerry Dane’s private quarters.
The Meeting was in full swing. On the platform, the head boy and girl had just been in a huddle with the monitors and come to a decision. Kerry and Thomas returned to their special table. It was Kerry’s turn to pick up the gavel and bang for silence.
‘Quiet, please, everybody!’ she smiled. What a satisfying sound that gavel made. How quickly it brought the Meeting to order! She was beginning to enjoy herself again. ‘The Meeting has now decided on the matter of punishment for the three pupils who walked out of last week’s Meeting,’ she announced. ‘We have listened to the representations made by Belinda and Daniel on behalf of the two girls. And the Meeting has agreed that the losing of the monitorships is sufficient punishment for their last week’s behaviour. As far as Elizabeth’s behaviour today is concerned, the Meeting has decided that she is not a fit person to represent the school at table tennis.’