The Forget-Me-Not Sonata(91)

‘I’d love to,’ said Leonora, taking the dog from her. She brought him to her face and kissed his nose. Midge had never looked so well, but Leonora wasn’t to know that. They arrived at the foot of the stairs where the other new girls waited in the Great Hall.

‘You had better go and join them. I’ll come and retrieve Midge at the end of prayers,’ said Miss Reid, pushing the child gently towards the others.

Leonora felt much better. The dog was a source of great comfort and Miss Reid made her feel good inside. She decided to write to her mother as soon as possible on the writing paper Aunt Cicely had given her to tell her about Midge and Miss Reid. She wouldn’t tell her about Mattie, because that would upset her and Leonora was too sensitive to want to cause her mother distress. She kissed Midge again and joined Cazzie who grinned at her happily.

‘Where have you been? I looked for you everywhere,’ she complained.

‘Don’t worry, I’m here now,’ she replied resolutely. ‘And I’m fine.’ She grinned back at Cazzie, grateful for her friendship. So what if she was plain, she thought to herself, she was beautiful on the inside and that was what counted. As Mercedes always said, ‘You can’t hide an ugly nature behind a beautiful face.’

In the next couple of weeks Leonora and Alicia settled into their new school. While Leonora was immediately loved by all the girls in her class as well as those above and below, Alicia was admired and feared like a lovely demon who ensnared anyone who got close with her charm and charisma. But no one was more struck than Mattie.

Diana Reid was keeping a close eye on Alicia. She had an arrogance common in children used to being told how beautiful they are and a charisma that she didn’t deserve. She looked for the weakness in people and then with the subtlety of a much older child, she gnawed on it with the slow but relentless cruelty of someone who enjoyed watching others suffer. Putting other children down raised her up and Alicia was ambitious to the point of not caring about anyone else but herself. She had many friends, but they weren’t true friends, for real friendship is built not on fear but on affection and selflessness. Alicia needed to be taught about selflessness. Not an easy task with someone of her nature.

Then one evening Alicia played straight into Miss Reid’s hand.

‘Mattie, let’s go and ride the ponies bareback in the field,’ she suggested to her friend. Mattie sat in the corner of their log camp in Chestnut Village. It was a large house built out of the remains of old trees that had fallen down in the storm the year before. Mattie and Elizabeth had constructed two rooms, stuffing the gaps between the logs with cut grass from the pile left from the summer’s mowing behind the walled vegetable garden. The roof was made of sticks and leafy branches pulled from bushes and trees. It was the snuggest camp in the avenue and envied by all the other girls. Therefore Alicia felt it was most appropriate that it now belonged to her as well. Mattie was uncomfortable with Alicia’s suggestion. Hadn’t they got up to enough mischief already? They had been at school for barely two weeks. They had crept out of the house and down the fire escape in the middle of the night to dance in the light of the moon, stolen biscuits from the larder and eaten them in Library Loo and run naked through the box garden in the afternoon after netball. They had even tormented Elizabeth by leaving her warming not one, but two loo seats until the early hours of the morning. But riding the ponies in the field without supervision was a serious offence.

‘I don’t think it’s a good idea, Alicia,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Let’s do something else.’

‘I don’t want to do anything else.’

‘We’ll get expelled for it,’ she protested, imagining the wrath of her father and shuddering. She was prepared to do almost anything, punishments meant little to her, but expulsion was something she feared.

‘I don’t care. I’ve already been kicked out of one school.’ Alicia laughed, throwing her head back, showing off the graceful curve of her long white neck. ‘What’s the worst they can do?’

‘My father would kill me.’

‘Of course he wouldn’t kill you,’ said Alicia, flashing her icy eyes at her friend, challenging her.

‘Well, he’d be furious and shout at me.’

‘But he wouldn’t kill you.’ Mattie thought about it a moment. ‘Words don’t kill, Mattie. Expulsion doesn’t kill either. In fact, they can’t do anything. I’ll happily write one hundred lines or stand in the corner of the class. Those punishments don’t hurt.’