Visitors for the Chalet School

by Helen McClelland

  ‘Before thirteen o’clock,’ said Joey. ‘We must get off quickly, or we shan’t have time to finish everything before it gets dark; the sun goes down behind the mountains quite early now. Mademoiselle says we can have Mittagessen at noon and that’s in half an hour. Do get a move on.’

  ‘Oh, Help and Blow and Bother!’ groaned Margia, getting reluctantly to her feet and beginning to collect the scattered music. ‘I know Herr Anserl will simply devour me on Monday.’

  Herr Anserl came at least once a week to the Chalet School from Spärtz, the little town at the foot of the mountains where the Tiernsee lies, to give piano lessons to the more advanced pupils; of these Margia, though the youngest, was by far the most gifted. He was a wonderful musician but not renowned for his patience.

  ‘Well, you can’t practise now,’ Jo pointed out reasonably; ‘there isn’t time. So do put that music away, Margia, and stop mooing like a lost cow.’ She ignored Margia’s indignant protest. ‘When we get back this evening I’ll help you look for the Mosh — whatever it’s called, if you like. Let’s find Elisaveta now and make sure that everything’s prepared.’

  Margia resigned herself with an exaggerated sigh, pushed the music back into her locker, in a state of disorder she would regret later, and followed Joey into the common-room.

  ***

  The term was now almost two weeks old and holidays all but forgotten, for it had been a very busy fortnight, particularly in the way of outdoor activities.

  At the Chalet School extra time for games was always allowed during the first part of the Christmas term, in order to take advantage of good weather while it lasted. Once the winter arrived there were often days when snow-storms made going out impossible. And of course the snow brought hockey and netball to an end until the spring.

  Accordingly, the third day of this term had seen the start of a series of inter-form netball and hockey matches. This had been Grizel Cochrane’s idea. Grizel took her responsibilities as games captain very seriously and was an excellent organiser.

  ‘It’ll be miles the best way of seeing who plays decently,’ she declared at the Prefects’ meeting. ‘If every single form has got to get two teams together from their own ranks, even the slackers will have to pull their weight a bit.’

  ‘But, Grizel, will it not be impossible for the smaller forms to find eleven players?’ queried Gertrud Steinbrücke, an Austrian girl, who was Grizel’s assistant games prefect. ‘And perhaps some of the new girls will never have played hockey before.’

  ‘Oh, rubbish! Well, anyway, it’ll do them good to try,’ Grizel returned. ‘And, of course,’ she added, relenting a little, ‘we can always make the hockey “seven-a-sides” if any form really can’t raise an eleven.’

  Gertrud had to be content with the small concession; she knew that Grizel was seldom inclined to make allowances for other people’s frailties.

  ***

  Mittagessen, on this second Saturday of the Christmas term, took place in an atmosphere tingling with anticipation. In addition to Joey, eleven members of the Guide company were taking tests that afternoon; some were nervous, all were excited and few showed anything like their usual interest in the excellent meal provided.

  Jo, Margia and Elisaveta made as much haste as they were allowed and then dashed upstairs to get ready. Soon, their knapsacks over their shoulders, they were making their way rapidly towards Seespitz. It was a beautifully sunny afternoon and the Tiernsee, with the surrounding mountains reflected in its unruffled surface, appeared a deep and luminous jade green. As they hurried along the lake-path, Jo glanced at her two companions: both, she was pleased to see, were looking smart and alert in their navy-blue Guide uniform.

  Margia had been at the Chalet School since a few weeks after its opening, and she and Joey had always been good friends, although there was more than a year’s difference between their ages. Elisaveta had arrived only the previous term. To all outward appearances a perfectly ordinary schoolgirl, she was in fact the only child of the Crown Prince of Belsornia. The school had at first been unaware of this; they had always accepted Elisaveta completely as one of themselves, while the Princess revelled in everyday school life. Like most of the Chalet girls she was an enthusiastic Guide, and she felt honoured at being chosen to go on this expedition with Joey, whom she admired greatly.

  ‘I say, is my hat on straight?’ Joey slowed down abruptly, almost tripping up Elisaveta who was following immediately behind her. ‘Awfully sorry, ‘Veta! Hope I didn’t hurt you. I’d just remembered I never looked in the mirror to check.’

  Margia surveyed her appraisingly. ‘Looks all right to me. Anyway, the badge is bang in the middle, above your nose . . . if that’s what you mean.’

  The three paused to recover their breath and to look back for a moment, past the school, at the glorious view of the Tiern Valley stretching away into the far distance, the mountains gathered protectingly around it like guardian giants.

  ‘What a lovely place it is!’ murmured Elisaveta. ‘I’m sure there is no other school anywhere so beautiful.’

  Joey had been gazing at the mountains with a faraway expression in her dark eyes; now she came suddenly down to earth, saying in judicial tones: ‘Well, there must be some wonderful places in Switzerland, and they have simply heaps of schools there, you know.’ Then, seeing Elisaveta look rather surprised, she added: ‘But, of course, there is something very special about the Tiernsee, we all feel that.’

  ‘I thought you said we were in a hurry, Jo,’ put in Margia. ‘Can you tell us as we go what the plans are for this afternoon?’

  They turned and resumed their brisk walk. Briesau was soon left behind; on one side of the path lay the gleaming lake, on the other the steep, darkly wooded slope of the Bärenkopf.

  ‘Miss Maynard says we’re to look for the beginning of the trail two hundred paces from the gate of that little chalet at Hubertus,’ explained Joey. (Miss Maynard had joined the Chalet School staff early in the first term; she had now succeeded the former Miss Bettany as captain of the Guide company.) ‘It won’t be a very long trail, not this first part, I mean.’

  ‘But knowing Maynie,’ Margia broke in, ‘it won’t be easy to follow!’

  ‘Too right, it won’t! Anyway, at the end we’ve got to search around and find our instructions for the rest of the hike. There’ll be a map with them. Now here’s the chalet, so let’s start counting.’

  There was some argument about where exactly the two hundred paces finished. All three started looking in different places for the first clue. Jo had longer legs than the others, and she decided that Miss Maynard’s paces would probably be at least as long as her own. So she began to search further along the path. A moment or two later she exclaimed triumphantly, ‘Yes, here it is, this is the first sign!’

  Some grass at the side of the road had been tied in a way that indicated they should continue along the lake-side.

  ‘There is not really much choice anyway, is there?’ Elisaveta said. ‘I mean, we either have to go along this path, or else turn back to Briesau again.’

  ‘Don’t be too sure!’ Jo, knowing the district better, was more cautious. ‘Actually, there are dozens of small paths leading from this one up into the woods; there’s even one that takes you right over to the other side of the Bärenbad Alm; so jolly well keep your eyes open, both of you!’

  However, the signs, appearing at fairly regular intervals, made it clear that they should continue to follow the main path. Soon they had passed the landing stage at Seespitz and the terminus of the quaint little cog-wheel railway which travels to this point from Spärtz, 3,000 feet below in the valley.

  ‘Is the train still running?’ asked Margia.

  ‘Yes, I think there’s still one train a day for at least another week,’ Joey informed her. ‘Mademoiselle was saying something about it being lucky for those English girls who arrive next week, because they wouldn’t have to walk up the mountain path.’

  ‘What do you think the girls w
ill be like?’ Elisaveta wondered.

  ‘Well, for one thing, they’ll be heaps older than any of us,’ said Margia. ‘They’ll be mostly about eighteen, I should think.’ To Margia, just thirteen, this seemed a very great age.

  Joey had gone a few yards ahead, to a point where the road forked, and was looking there for the next vital sign. ‘Juliet says that some of them are awfully decent. I’m looking forward to meeting them.’

  ‘Anybody know when they get here?’ Margia enquired.

  ‘Next Tuesday or Wednesday . . . Tuesday, I think it is. Now, would you say this arrow means to go along this way? Or more to the left?’

  ***

  Two hours later found the three Guides hard at work making a camp-fire, in a broad flowery meadow to the west of the little hamlet of Eben. They had eventually found the packet, with their map and instructions, cunningly concealed among the roots of a pine-tree beside the path to Spärtz. It had been necessary to use compasses to follow Miss Maynard’s route, which had taken them in a deliberately roundabout fashion through the pine-woods and eventually to Eben; here the instructions told them to visit the pilgrimage church of St Nothburga.

  It is something of a surprise to find this beautiful little church, dedicated to the patron saint of servant girls, in such a tiny place. It is quite elaborately decorated with pink- and coffee-coloured stucco and there are painted panels on the ceiling. But the main impression is one of simplicity and the church appealed to all the girls, even Joey, who did not as a rule care greatly for the Baroque period.

  When they had admired the church and paid their respects to St Nothburga’s shrine, which dates from the fifteenth century, they made their way to the meadow carrying the large bundles of firewood gathered earlier in accordance with their instructions.

  Jo insisted that the fire must not be laid on the grass itself, for fear of causing damage. So they had used the big practical Guide knives, which they all carried on their belts, to cut a broad H-shape through the flower-sprinkled grass; then, carefully rolling back the turf, they built the fire on the bare earth.

  Water to fill their billy-can had come from a nearby stream and now the fire was blazing merrily and the water beginning to bubble. It was a great treat for the girls to make a camp-fire at all, because this was always forbidden during the summer for fear of causing a fire in the woods.

  Joey was now instructing the other two in the art of making kebabs. While she herself cut pieces of meat and bacon into medium-sized cubes, Margia was peeling mushrooms and Elisaveta slicing an onion, her pretty face screwed into a protesting grimace as the onion vapour stung her eyes.

  ‘What do we do next, Joey?’ she asked, giving a decidedly un-princess-like sniff.

  Jo took a newly peeled stick from the pile they had prepared.

  ‘Look, you thread bits of the meat and the other things, turn about, like this, on to the skewer, then put a dab of butter on them. Be jolly careful the skewer is right through the middle of the pieces, or they’ll drop off into the fire. And it’s best to leave a fair bit of stick empty, each end, ‘cos then it balances over the fire more easily.’

  ‘Won’t the fire burn the sticks?’ objected Margia.

  ‘Shouldn’t do. They’re all new green wood. And so long as the pieces are pushed close together the fire won’t get at the sticks anyway. ‘Veta, make the tea, will you, that water’s boiling its head off.’

  Tea was comparatively rare at the Chalet School, where milky coffee was the usual drink; but Jo had maintained that tea would help to give their hike a more English feeling.

  They were so absorbed in arranging their skewers across the stones at either side of the fire that they did not at first notice the approach of their Guide captain. All three jumped up and saluted smartly as Miss Maynard came up, smiling. She noted with approval the neatly built camp-fire; the tidy pile of equipment and groundsheets, spread out a few yards to the windward side of the fire; and the cups and plates ready for the meal.

  ‘Will you sit here, please, Miss Maynard?’ Joey asked politely, indicating one of the groundsheets, placed where a rise in the ground made a natural back for the sitter to lean against.

  ‘Thank you, Joey.’ Miss Maynard sat down. ‘Now, I must only stay a few moments, girls, as I have to visit Marie and her party on my way back to school. Have you enjoyed the afternoon?’

  They all assured her that they had, and Joey added: ‘It was lovely seeing the little church. I wonder why we’ve never been inside before. But of course it’s rather out of the way when you’re walking down to Spärtz, and the train doesn’t stop long enough at Eben for a visit.’

  ‘Yes, I thought you would appreciate St Nothburga’s,’ said Miss Maynard. ‘By the way, there are lots of stories about her, Jo, that I’m sure you’d like to investigate sometime.’

  Jo’s black eyes gleamed; she was fascinated by anything that concerned the history and legends of the Tiernsee district. ‘I did wonder about some of those pictures — you know, the ones on the ceiling of the church, you have to crane your neck like anything to look at them.’

  ‘And we couldn’t find anything about the pictures anywhere,’ Margia put in.

  ‘And one is very odd,’ said Elisaveta, with a puzzled expression. ‘There is something in the air that looks like — how do you call it? — a thing that is used to cut the harvest. No, not a scythe, smaller than that.’

  ‘I think you mean a sickle,’ Miss Maynard said.

  ‘Oh, yes, a sickle. And it looks almost as though St Nothburga had thrown the sickle at someone. But I think a saint would not do that.’

  ‘No, no, she didn’t!’ Miss Maynard suppressed a smile at the unlikely picture this presented. ‘I haven’t time to tell you the details now, but the story goes that St Nothburga was working in the fields near Eben, for a very grasping employer. He was in a great hurry to get one particular field harvested because a storm had been predicted. So he ordered his workers to continue reaping all through Saturday, and he wanted them to keep going on the Sunday as well. But St Nothburga reproached him, saying that Sunday was a day of rest for all. She then let go of her sickle, which immediately flew into the air and remained suspended there. This, she told him, was a sign that God willed that all people, and even inanimate things, should rest from their labours on holy days. That’s the legend, anyway. And that’s what the picture’s about.’

  ‘What about the other painting?’ Joey asked. ‘The one where it looks as though they’re driving a pair of oxen right through a river?’

  ‘The water’s all tucked up at the sides,’ said Margia.

  And Elisaveta, who had been well grounded in biblical history by the royal governesses, added, ‘like the Israelites and the Red Sea.’

  ‘You’ll have to find out about that for yourselves,’ Miss Maynard said briskly. ‘I’m told, Joey, there’s a wonderful book with all those Tyrolean legends, by some Victorian lady — I’ve forgotten her name for the moment. But we ought to try to get a copy for the library. In the mean time, why don’t you all ask Frieda Mensch or Marie von Eschenau — I’m sure they would know all the old stories.’

  ‘And Frieda’s father is a real mine of information,’ Joey said. ‘Thanks, Miss Maynard, I’ll certainly see what I can find out.’

  ‘Now, girls, I must be off again.’ Miss Maynard began to get up from her lowly position but Elisaveta said pleadingly: ‘Oh, Miss Maynard, do please have a cup of tea! I have made it myself, and it is absolutely the first time I have ever made tea.’

  Miss Maynard laughed, but she allowed herself to be persuaded to drink the tea, which she pronounced excellent.

  Then, in spite of enticing smells from the kebabs, now sizzling over the fire, she refused to remain any longer and departed, reminding the girls to put out the fire most carefully and to clear up all traces of their visit before they left.

  ‘I should think you’ve passed the test easily, Jo,’ Margia said later as they sat enjoying their delicious meal.

 
; ‘It’s funny.’ Joey stopped to take a vast bite out of an apple. ‘I’d quite forgotten about it being a test, it’s been such a gorgeous afternoon. Thanks awfully much for your help, you two. Now I think we’d better get on with the tidying; we’ve got a fair walk back to the school and it’ll be getting dark in an hour or so.’

  It was just as they reached the corner by St Nothburga’s church that they saw the three girls: obviously English, from both speech and appearance, they were standing there, evidently discussing some problem.

  The tallest of the three, a very serious-looking girl, glanced round as the Chalet girls approached and, for a moment, her surprise at seeing the British Girl Guide uniform showed clearly on her face. Then she smiled, the first expression of severity immediately banished, and said, ‘But of course! You must be from the Chalet School. I wonder if you can help us, please; we seem to have got lost.’

  Joey, always ready to make friends, went up smiling: ‘Yes, we do come from the Chalet School; I’m Jo Bettany and these are Margia Stevens and Elisaveta Arnsonira. Of course we’d like to help you if we can. Who are you and what’s the trouble?’

  ‘We’re from Grange House School in London,’ put in another of the English group, a much shorter girl, with dark curly hair, an upturned nose and deep-set blue eyes. ‘I’m Pamela Trent; this,’ indicating the girl who had spoken first, ‘is Patricia Davidson, and this is Joan Hatherley. The rest of our party went straight to Briesau, but we three got permission to walk up the mountain from that little town down there; we should be joining Miss Bruce and the others at the Stephanie, and we were just wondering which path would be the quickest.’