by Three Graces
The dining room was noticeably quieter this morning, and many of its occupants looked sleepy. The meal was eaten with dispatch, and students and mistresses went out as soon as they finished. Thalia, done eating, looked around uncertainly. Should she go directly to her classroom, or wait until she was sure all the pupils were there before her?
She had not decided this question when Miss Chadbourne spoke to her. “Miss Hartington? I will go with you to your classroom today, and present you to the fifth-form girls. We will wait a moment.”
“Thank you, Miss Chadbourne.”
“Not at all. Will you move up here?” The table was nearly empty now, and she indicated the chair beside her. Thalia rose and took it. “Another cup of tea?” continued the headmistress.
“No, thank you.”
Miss Chadbourne sipped her own tea. “Are you uneasy?” she asked then.
Thalia smiled. “A little, perhaps. I have never faced a class before.”
The other nodded. “You are very young. But you will get in the way of it in no time. And today you needn’t keep them long. You need only introduce your program. We have procured copies of most of the works you mentioned, or seen that the girls did so. I think you will find them prepared.”
“Thank you,” said Thalia again. As she waited, she was feeling more and more restless.
Miss Chadbourne rose. “Let us go, then.”
Thalia followed her down a corridor to the room where her class waited. Miss Chadbourne walked firmly in and stood behind the desk at the front, leaving Thalia to trail behind. The sounds of conversation audible from the hall ceased immediately, and the young ladies in the rows of smaller desks straightened. “Good morning, girls,” said Miss Chadbourne. “I want to introduce our new literature mistress, Miss Hartington. She is here to teach you about poetry and prose, and I know you will be very attentive.” Miss Chadbourne nodded slightly to Thalia, turned, and left the room, shutting the door with a click behind her.
Thalia moved up to stand behind the desk. She put her papers down on it and looked out over her class. When she had first entered the room, it had seemed to her that she faced a veritable sea of faces. Now, these resolved themselves into perhaps twenty young girls of sixteen or seventeen. All wore the school’s compulsory buff gowns and had their hair dressed much as Thalia’s, but in that moment, she was very conscious of the fact that she was no older than they.
“Good morning,” she said, a tiny quiver in her voice. “I am pleased to be here, and I hope we will all learn a great deal together in our sessions. I have planned a progression of studies—”
At this moment, in an audible whisper, someone in the back of the room said, “She is much too pretty to be a schoolteacher.”
Titters spread across the room and then back.
Thalia looked around sharply as every student assumed an expression of bland innocence. She realized then that her first impression had been superficial. Despite their identical costumes, there were obvious differences among her pupils. And in particular, a group in the back-right corner was conspicuous. These young ladies clearly chafed against the limits of buff gowns and braids. Most had coaxed a few curls over their ears, and all wore some ornament, several quite expensive. The whisper had come from here.
Thalia looked them over, her nervousness evaporating. “Did someone speak?” she asked blandly. “I am always ready to answer any question.” She pretended to look over the class, but kept one eye on the group in the corner.
“Do you dye your hair that lovely color?” piped up someone.
There was a collective gasp.
But Thalia smiled. She had the culprit now. It was a pretty blond girl in the farthest corner, one of the group she suspected. “What is your name?” Thalia said to her quickly.
The girl was clearly taken aback. A tall statuesque creature, with more curls and finer ornaments than any other pupil, she had the direct eyes and petulant mouth of one used to her own way and conscious of her own superiority. After a moment, her natural arrogance asserted itself. “I am Lady Agnes Crewe,” she replied haughtily, tossing her blond head. She did not rise, and her tone held contempt.
“Ah,” responded Thalia. “Well, to answer your rather tactless question, no. I do not dye my hair. It quite comes this color. And I fear I must add, Lady Agnes, that you should pay more attention in Miss Eliot’s classroom. I am convinced that she has told you that such personal questions are not at all the thing. Quite hoydenish, in fact.”
Lady Agnes flushed a dull red, and there was another wave of giggles.
“Now,” continued Thalia, “to get on with our lesson. I am going to read you a poem this morning. It is one of Cowper’s. And I want you all to listen closely, for we will discuss it after.” She picked up a sheet on which she had copied out the poem, one of her favorites, and began to read. There were no further whispers.
The rest of the time went as well as a first class can. The discussion was halting and reluctant, and Thalia often had to lecture a bit. But her confidence increased as she went, and by the time she dismissed them with an assignment, she felt wholly in control.
“And please,” she finished, “will you each come and tell me your names as you go out. I want to learn them as soon as I can.”
Accordingly, the students filed past her, saying their names shyly or stoutly according to their various natures. Lady Agnes was one of the last to go. She started to walk past without speaking, but Thalia said, “I know your name, at least, Lady Agnes, so I have made a beginning.” And she smiled warmly. Thalia did not think she would come to like this impertinent young lady, but she had no wish to be on bad terms with any of her pupils.
Lady Agnes merely stared a moment, her lips pressed together, then stalked out.
“Oh, how awful she is!” exclaimed a soft voice behind Thalia. Turning, she saw that one pupil remained in the room, a slight girl with pale skin and brown hair. She did not remember noticing her earlier. The girl flushed painfully red. “I shouldn’t say so, I know,” she added. “But she is.”
Thalia suppressed a smile. “What is your name?”
The girl’s flush, impossibly, deepened. “Oh, I beg pardon, ma’am. I am Mary Deming.” She hesitated, then went on in a rush. “I waited until last because I wanted to tell you how wonderful the poem was! You read it so beautifully. How I wish I could do so.”
“I daresay you could.”
“I? Oh, no. I would trip over my tongue, or make some blunder so that everyone laughed. I always do, when I try to speak before strangers.”
“But you will get over that. It is a matter of practice.”
The girl hung her head, looking unconvinced. “Will we be reading more poems like that one?” she asked then.
“Yes indeed. And I have a volume of Cowper I could lend you, if you like.”
“W-would you?”
“Of course. I will bring it tomorrow.”
Mary smiled beautifully and turned to leave. At the door, she stopped abruptly. “Oh! Oh, thank you, Miss Hartington. Good day.”
Nearly laughing, Thalia replied, “Good day, Mary,” and the girl left.
Thalia’s second class, with the fourth form later that day, was less challenging than this one. It seemed to her that the younger girls were much more docile. As she dismissed them at one and prepared to go in to luncheon, she thought to herself that she would have no problems here, at least, which was fortunate, for she had a feeling that the fifth-formers were going to demand a good deal of her energy.
After the meal, Miss Chadbourne paused to speak to the teachers at the foot of the dining table. “Miss Hartington, you will want to speak to Miss Jones, Miss Anderson, and Miss Jacobs about special pupils. No doubt there are several lower-form girls who would benefit from extra study in your field. You can tutor them in the afternoons.”
“Of course, Miss Chadbourne,” responded Thalia, and the headmistress moved away.
Lucy Anderson giggled. “I wish I might give you Lydia Appe
lton. She is an absolute terror.”
“Yes,” said Ellen Jones, “and I should like to be rid of that new girl, Louisa Ferncliff. She does nothing but look doleful or cry quietly into her handkerchief. It is past bearing.”
Thalia laughed. “Please! I can teach literature, but those girls sound as if they need something quite different. Give them to Eliot, I beg.”
“Oh, she won’t take them,” replied Lucy. “And even if she did, she couldn’t do anything. All she knows is curtsying and how one addresses the King and that sort of twaddle.”
“Lucy!” exclaimed Miss Jacobs. “Mind your tongue.”
“Why? There’s no one to hear. Miss Hartington won’t tell, will you?”
Bemused, Thalia shook her head.
Georgina Jacobs turned a shoulder on the other. “I will prepare a list for you, Miss Hartington, and you can arrange the times with my girls. It will be a small group, I fear. The little girls are really not ready for literature, except in a few exceptional cases.”
“I have three, I think,” said Ellen Jones. “I will send them to you later this afternoon.”
“As will I,” added Miss Anderson. “I believe I have two.”
“Thank you. I shall be in my classroom from two till four; they may come anytime.”
The others nodded and drifted out of the dining room. Thalia went to collect Juvenal and took him back upstairs. In her bedchamber, she sat down and took a deep breath. She was tired. Apparently, teaching was a more exhausting task than she had ever realized.
In the next few days, Thalia gradually became accustomed to her new life. Her classes went better and better as she gained confidence in talking to the older girls, and her tutoring sessions with the younger ones were almost fun. Juvenal adjusted even more rapidly, seeming in his element in the school. He spent a great deal of time sitting in high places, a bookshelf or windowsill most often, and simply watching the people go about their routine.
Mary Deming showed more and more interest in Thalia’s subject, particularly the poetry, and Thalia lent her books and talked with her after class with enthusiasm. Here, at least, was a student who truly loved learning, as Thalia herself did. Indeed, Mary often reminded the older girl of her childhood self, and she guided her progress lovingly.
With Lady Agnes Crewe, however, relations did not improve. Apparently, once offended, this young lady did not forgive. She treated Thalia with cold contempt and was as impertinent as she dared be in the classroom. After a week of this, Thalia was at her wits’ end. She could manage the girl, of course, but it was not pleasant to have to do so. She preferred thinking about the subject matter and how best to communicate it. She wondered if she should go to Miss Chadbourne with the problem, but she hesitated. She did not wish to seem to be complaining, or to appear to require help with her job.
Then, one afternoon just before tea, she came upon Miss Hendricks, the drawing mistress, in one of the downstairs parlors. No one else was near, and Thalia took the opportunity to put the question to her, for she seemed like a sensible woman.
“Lady Agnes?” replied the other, not seeming surprised. “Oh, there is nothing to be done there. That girl likes only those who toady to her, and I’m certain that you would never do that.” She smiled ironically.
Thalia looked at the slight Miss Hendricks, somewhat taken aback. The painting teacher was very plain, with sandy hair and brows and thousands of freckles, but her voice was acidly mocking. “Surely no teacher would do so?” replied Thalia.
“Would they not? It depends upon what they think they can get out of it.” Seeing Thalia’s astonishment, Miss Hendricks laughed. “You’ll see, if you stay here long enough. You are not really meant to be a teacher, you know, Miss Hartington. Oh, I’m certain you can teach well enough, but you have no understanding of schools and the plotting and nastiness that go on behind our demure facades.”
Thalia frowned at her.
“But as for Lady Agnes, I’d advise that you ignore her. She can make trouble, there’s no question about that. Her father is an earl and very powerful. But fortunately, she’s leaving us very soon. She’s to ‘come out’ this season, and London is welcome to her.”
“I thought perhaps if I talked to her…” began Thalia.
“It would do no good. In fact, it might even do harm. She would interpret it as a sign of weakness, see you as giving in to her. Really, I would ignore her if I were you.”
“That is what you do?”
“Generally. Unless she becomes too exasperating. Then I set her down. The amusing thing is that she is never sure if that is what I am doing. She is not very intelligent, really.”
“But this seems so cold. She is hardly more than a child.”
Miss Hendricks fastened her pale eyes on Thalia’s face. “That may be true of others here, but not Lady Agnes. She has never been a child. She was an overbearing arrogant girl when she arrived here, and she remains so. We have barely managed to force a few facts into her mind and make her understand that certain polite forms must be observed in public. There will be a general sigh of relief when she goes.”
Unsatisfied, Thalia thanked the other woman and turned away. It seemed wrong, somehow, to dismiss a young girl as intractable. But she did not know how one would go about changing a pupil who had defied the efforts of a whole school of more experienced teachers.
In the days that followed, she thought further on this subject, but found no answers. She also explored the gardens, which were very pleasant, and wrote her sisters amusing, anecdotal letters describing her new life.
In these pastimes, several weeks went by, and Thalia felt generally content with her lot.
Nine
Thursdays were half-holidays at the Chadbourne School, though some of the teachers were usually required to oversee outings for the girls. When her fourth such holiday came around, Thalia felt a great urge to get away by herself, and she determined to take a long solitary walk through the countryside near the school.
Accordingly, she set off directly after luncheon, taking only a book and Juvenal, who seemed nearly as pleased as she to get away.
They moved quickly across the school gardens, greeting several girls on the way, and out the great gate at the front. A road here ran into Bath on the left and into country the other way, soon degenerating into a mere lane. Thalia went right, stepping briskly along. She wore a walking dress and stout shoes, for she intended to leave the road as soon as possible. Juvenal paced beside her with his usual gravity.
They soon left the school wall behind, coming to cultivated fields on either side of the road. Several prosperous-looking farms were visible, as was a sizable copse, and Thalia headed for the latter.
It was a fine spring day. The sun was bright but not hot, and a breeze stirred the air, carrying the scent of sun-warmed grass and budding leaves. Thalia took deep breaths and walked with increasing pleasure. She had not tramped in the country since before her aunt died, and she realized now how she had missed it.
At the first opportunity, she left the road for a footpath which wandered in the general direction of the trees. Here Juvenal showed more liveliness, bounding ahead to attack grass hummocks and then returning, proud of himself, for Thalia’s approval. He even flushed a rabbit, though this startled him quite as much as it did his prey, and he fell back on his haunches dumbfounded instead of chasing it.
They reached the edge of the trees well before midafternoon. The footpath continued through the copse, and Thalia enjoyed the sudden quiet that came when they walked under the first trees. She sighed with happiness. “Where shall we go, Juvenal?” she said. “Shall we stay on this path and see where it leads? Or shall we strike off into the forest? I want to find a lovely comfortable place and read for a while, out here where everything smells so fresh and wonderful.”
Juvenal, a patch of black against the green shoots, looked up at her for a moment, then, as if in answer to her questions, bounded off to the left, away from the path.
Thali
a smiled. “Are you sure you know where you’re going?” she called. But she followed him, pushing aside branches and stepping over an occasional fallen log.
These obstacles made the going slower, and Thalia twice lost sight of the kitten as he ran ahead. But when she called him, he immediately reappeared, staring inquiringly from his golden eyes, as if to ask why she did not go faster.
At last Thalia heard the sound of water ahead, and saw brighter sunlight through gaps in the trees. “Is it a stream?” she asked Juvenal, but he ignored her.
The sound indeed came from a stream, she found a moment later, stepping from the trees into a wide clear area. But the tiny brook ran into a pond, overhung with willow and moss, in the midst of the copse. Thalia was delighted. “Juvenal, you splendid animal. Did you know this was here?” she exclaimed. “This is a perfect spot. I shall settle under that willow right there and idle away the afternoon.” As she spoke, she walked around the edge of the pond toward the tree. She sank down on the moss under it, after spreading an old shawl she had brought for just this purpose, and looked happily about. The pond was small and closely shrouded by trees and underbrush, giving it the feeling of a secret place. Thalia could easily imagine that fairies gathered here on moonlit nights, or that Pan might visit on his northern journeys. She smiled at her own silliness. But at that very moment, a strange sound came to her ears. She cocked her head, listening, and her eyes gradually widened. It couldn’t be, but it was; yes, it was unmistakably ancient Greek. Someone was declaiming here in this secret spot. Astonished, she looked around.