CHAPTER X

Sylvia's Birthday

Nina Forster was obliged to remain in bed for several days, but Hazel Prestbury came into school on the following morning, rather red about the eyes, and a little sulky. She was sorry, not so much for her fault, as for being found out, and she blamed herself for her own stupidity.

"I might have known some tiresome person would see us out of a window," she thought. "Miss Kaye always manages to get to hear everything."

She felt that the other girls disapproved of her. Marian spoke her mind freely on the subject, and even gentle Gwennie did not appear too anxious to sit next to her. Linda avoided her as much as possible, keeping strictly to Sylvia's company, and, though Connie Camden, who never thought about anything, was as friendly as ever, it did not quite make up for the general coldness of the rest. The girls were too kind to send her to Coventry, but Hazel felt she had lost her former position in the class. It was a severe wound to her pride, for she had liked to be considered a leader, and had always been pleased to see how easily the others had accepted her opinions and suggestions; as the eldest she had possessed a good deal of influence, and her greatest punishment was to find it gone.

November crept on fast, and the days seemed to grow rapidly shorter and shorter. It was chilly now in the mornings, and those whose hard fate it was to be obliged to practise before breakfast grumbled at stiff fingers and cold toes.

"I never know whether I like it or not," said Sylvia. "I hate it when I'm in bed, and feel I'd give all the world not to have to get up so early; but when it's done it's so nice to think you won't have to do it at four o'clock. I wish one could learn music without practising."

"And French without verbs," groaned Linda, looking at her exercise, nearly every line of which showed red-ink corrections in Mademoiselle's neat foreign handwriting. "I think some people are born bad at languages, and I'm one of them. I never can understand properly what Mademoiselle is saying, and then she gets cross and says I don't attend."

French was a serious trouble to Sylvia also. She had learnt very little with her governess at home, and found it most difficult to keep up with Marian, who had rather a pretty accent, and was good at translation. To encourage her pupils, Mademoiselle had offered a prize to whichever could write the best letter home in the French language. Each was to be the unaided work of the competitor, though grammars and dictionaries might be freely consulted. It was a difficult task to all the girls, and to some an almost impossible one, but Mademoiselle insisted upon everybody at least making an attempt, and laughed in private over the funny efforts which followed.

If the prize had been given for the queerest instead of the best letter Connie Camden would have gained it. She grew so tired of looking up words that she wrote anything she thought sounded like French, and the result would have puzzled a native to decipher. It ran thus:--

"Heathercliffe Maison. "Novembre la onzieme.

"Mon cher mere

"Mamzelle a tolde moi que je mustai writer une lettre en francais. Je le findai tres difficile et je ne likai pas du tout. Mamzelle a offre une prize mais je suis sure que je ne shallai pas le getter. Je begge que vous excusez moi parce que je ne canne pas thinker de rien encore a sayer.

"Votre aimant fille, "CONNIE."

This, however, was the worst of the set, some of the others having managed to express themselves quite nicely. Rather to everybody's astonishment Hazel Prestbury won the prize. She was not industrious enough to gain the highest marks in class, but on this occasion she had set her best energies to work, and her letter, both as regards composition and grammar, was far in advance of all competitors. She felt a thrill of triumph as Mademoiselle presented her with a charming Parisian basket full of choice chocolates, accompanied by a speech in French, which nobody understood in the least. She handed it round amongst the girls with a sense that she had at last somewhat regained her lost standing, and when the basket was empty had the satisfaction of overhearing Marian remark that she was generous with her sweets, and Gwennie wish that she knew French only half as well.

Nina Forster returned to class after a week's absence, looking pale and thin, and with a white knitted shawl wrapped ostentatiously round her shoulders. She was a girl who thoroughly enjoyed being delicate, and liked the importance of having a fuss made over her. There was always a large bottle of tonic on the sideboard, which Nina gloried in being obliged to swallow, and she was rather pleased than otherwise if Miss Kaye decided that it was too damp a day for her to venture out.

"I can't stand much, you know," she would explain complacently to the others in languid tones. "Every winter I have been laid up, with the doctor listening at my bronchial tube and taking my temperature night and morning. It makes Mother most unhappy, and I'm sure Miss Kaye's quite worried about me too."

As most of the girls did not know the exact meaning of either a bronchial tube or a temperature, they were a good deal impressed, and allowed Nina to take the warmest seat and the biggest piece of toffee "for the sake of her throat", a state of affairs which was just what she wanted, and of which she did not fail to take advantage to the uttermost.

With the colder weather eider-down quilts had made their appearance in the bedrooms, and now supplied the places of the pretty pink coverlets which were only used in summer. It felt very warm and comfortable to snuggle down under them at night, when the wind was howling outside and the rain beating fast against the windows, and very hard to throw them back and get up in the dark, chilly mornings, when the dressing bell was ringing in the passage outside.

Sylvia's eider-down quilt once caused her an experience which gave her a greater fright than she had ever had in her life before. She had been to sleep for what seemed to her several hours, and woke suddenly with a curious sense that someone besides herself and Linda was in the room. It seemed to her as if her quilt were being very gently but surely pulled from her bed. Wideawake in an instant, she pulled it back and lay listening with strained ears. There was nothing to be heard but Linda's placid breathing and the drip of the rain from the spout outside the window. Again the quilt slowly began to move, and this time she was certain she caught a slight sound. Could it be possible that a burglar was concealed under her bed? The idea was too dreadful, and a cold shiver ran through her. What was she to do? She did not dare to call to Linda; she felt as if her tongue would refuse to utter a cry, and perhaps if she did the man would at once crawl out. The room was not quite dark, as a fitful moon shone in through the blind between the storm clouds, and to poor Sylvia it made the horror almost worse to know that she would be able to see somebody rise up suddenly by her bedside.

"I'd give him anything and everything he wants to steal," she thought, "if only he wouldn't frighten me so. Oh, I wonder whether he's really there or not!"

She held the edge of the quilt in her hand. Was it slipping once more? Yes, it was most undoubtedly being pulled from her grasp, and, as her hair nearly stood on end with fear, she heard an unmistakable sneeze from somewhere just underneath her bed. She gave a little agonized gasp of terror, and at the same moment something sprang up and plumped on to her chest. Nearly dead with fright, she yet managed to look, and to her astonishment beheld only the waving tail and round green eyes of Toby, the school cat, which, settling himself comfortably, began to claw the quilt with his paws, purring his loudest the while as if quite proud and pleased with himself. Sylvia sat up in bed and laughed heartily at her burglar.

"Toby, you wretch," she cried, stroking his soft fur, "how did you manage to get in here? I suppose it was you that was trying to tug my quilt from me. No doubt you wanted to make yourself a nice bed on the floor. And then you sneezed! What shall I do with you? I can't take you to the kitchen in the middle of the night. You'll have to cuddle down with me; you're beautifully warm at any rate. Here, come inside, you'll be as good as a hot bottle." And, clasping the purring cat close in her arms, she was soon back in the land of dreams.

It was quite a little adventure to relate to Linda next morning, and the latter wondered how she had been able to sleep so stolidly through it.

"You always say I shouldn't hear either a burglar or an earthquake," she declared, "and Toby was very nearly as bad. You naughty, precious puss! What do you mean by coming and scaring my Sylvia? There, you didn't do it on purpose, did you? Come into my bed for a minute before I get up. You're the sweetest, softest darling that ever was."

Sylvia's birthday was on the nineteenth of November, and to her great delight it happened this year on a Saturday. Miss Kaye, who tried to make school seem as much like home as possible, was indulgent regarding such anniversaries, and permitted many small privileges to the fortunate owner of a birthday. Sylvia was allowed to choose the dinner, an important decision, over which she lingered so long that the mistress nearly lost patience.

"Of course you must not order turkey and ice cream," said Miss Kaye; "it must be two of our ordinary dishes, only you may have which you like. Be quick, for Cook is waiting to know."

After some hesitation Sylvia decided on hotpot and fig pudding.

"I like the potatoes on the top of the hotpot," she explained to Linda, "especially when they're crisp and brown, and the fig pudding always has delicious sweet sauce, and Miss Kaye lets one take plenty of sugar with it. Jessie Ellis chose boiled mutton and corn-flour blancmange with jam on her birthday. I don't think that was nice at all."

The girls in her class subscribed, and gave Sylvia a birthday book as their joint present, containing poetical quotations from Shakespeare for each day, and one or two pretty illustrations of Perdita, Portia, and other heroines. She was charmed with such a remembrance and asked them all to write their names in it.

"We chose a fawn cover," said Nina, "because topaz is the birthday stone for November. Marian wanted a green one, but I said that wouldn't do. It's a funny thing, but people always say your month stone matches your eyes. I never can quite decide whether yours are brown or dark grey, but I'm sure a necklace of topaz would suit you beautifully, and you'll have to wear one when you're grown up. By the by, on which day of the week were you born?"

"On a Friday," said Sylvia; "but why do you want to know?"

"Then you're loving and giving."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, don't you know the old rhyme?

'Monday's child is fair of face, Tuesday's child is full of grace, Wednesday's child is a child of woe, Thursday's child has far to go, Friday's child is loving and giving, Saturday's child must work for its living, But the child that is born on the Sabbath day Is good and truthful and happy and gay.'"

"Where do you learn all these things?" asked Sylvia.

"From our old cook. She's a daleswoman, and she can tell what it means when the candle gutters or the clock stops, or a swarm of bees comes, or you see magpies, or your ear burns, or you sneeze, and what's lucky to do and what's unlucky."

"You are the greatest goose!" said Marian scornfully. "You don't mean to say you believe that silly rubbish? We shouldn't be allowed to talk to our cook at home if she told us such nonsense. You'd better not let Miss Kaye see you throwing salt over your shoulder, or crossing the water when you wash with anybody."

"You always make fun of everything I do," exclaimed Nina plaintively.

"Then you should have more sense," snapped Marian, who prided herself upon being strong-minded.

"Sylvia has a pretty name at any rate," continued Nina, "and so have I. I shouldn't like to be called Marian; it's just like Mary Ann."

But as Marian wisely took no notice, and walked away, the shot fell rather flat.

The parcel post came in at half-past ten, and brought several bulky-looking packages addressed to "Miss S. Lindsay". Sylvia bore them off to the playroom and untied the strings before an audience of sympathetic girls, each of whom was almost as interested as if the birthday had been her own.

"Which shall I open first?" she said. "This one feels nice, and it's in Mother's writing, too. Lend me your scissors, Marian, that's a dear. I can't unfasten this knot. Oh, look! Exactly what I wanted."

And she drew from a cardboard box a charming little Brownie camera with several rolls of films quite ready to use.

"How delightful!" she cried. "Now I can take snapshots of you all, and the house, and Miss Kaye, and everything. I'll send them home to Father to develop; he's very clever at photos."

"You won't be able to take snaps in this dark weather," said Hazel. "I don't expect you can do much with it until spring. I took some last autumn, and they were so faint you couldn't tell what they were meant for."

"Well, she can try, at any rate," said Linda. "Perhaps she can manage a time exposure if she puts the camera on something steady, and get a group of the whole class in the garden. What's in the next parcel?"

It proved to be a copy of the _Talisman_, with "Sylvia Lindsay, from her loving Father", written inside--a welcome present, as Sylvia was collecting Scott, and was glad to have an addition to her number of volumes.

"This is a child's writing," said Marian, taking up a small packet, addressed in a round, rather shaky-looking hand. "Shall I cut the string for you?"

"Really, Marian! Let her open her own parcels. They're her presents," said Linda.

"And my scissors," returned Marian. "I only wanted to help her. Oh! That's pretty!" she exclaimed as Sylvia unwrapped a purse made of mother-of-pearl with a gilt clasp and lined with crimson silk. On a half-sheet of notepaper was written: "With best wishes for your birthday from Effie and May".

"How kind of them to send me anything!" said Sylvia. "They never have done before. I suppose it's because I'm at school. I really am in luck this time."

The next parcel was from Aunt Louisa and Cousin Cuthbert. It was an upright wooden box, containing a set of table croquet, eight little mallets and balls, with hoops and sticks, arranged on a polished wood stand, and sandbags to place round the table to prevent the balls from rolling off on to the floor.

"I think this is the nicest of all," cried Linda. "There are just eight mallets, so that the whole class can play, and it will be such fun on wet days when we can't go out."

"I never expected another present from Aunt Louisa," said Sylvia. "She gave me that writing case when I came, and Cuthbert the pencil box, the one I gave to Sadie Thompson, you know."

"I wish she were my aunt," said Marian; "I should think she's nice."

"She is generally, but it was she who made Father and Mother send me here, and I didn't want to come in the least."

"Why, but you're glad now, aren't you? Everybody likes being at Miss Kaye's."

"Yes, I'm very glad, though I'm looking forward immensely to Christmas and going home. I wonder what's inside this smallest parcel. Oh, a brooch from Aunt Mabel and Uncle Herbert! Such a pretty one, like little silver daisies. It will go beautifully with my best dress."

Miss Holt had sent a writing album, Granny a bottle of scent, and Uncle Wallace a box of chocolates, so there was quite a show of gifts arranged upon the table.

"You haven't opened this one yet," said Linda, pointing to the largest parcel, which had been left till the last.

"No, because I knew what it was," said Sylvia. "It's my birthday cake, and mother said it was to be a present for the whole school."

It was so carefully packed in a wooden box that the children were not able to open it themselves, and were obliged to fetch Miss Coleman, who prised up the lid with a screwdriver and lifted out such a wonderful cake that, as she laid it on a plate, everybody gave a gasping "Oh!" of admiration. It was beautifully iced, with ornaments of pink and white sugar, and Sylvia's name in sugary letters on the top, and it was of such a large and substantial size that it looked as if even thirty-four girls would be able to cut and come again.

"Mother says there's a sixpence inside," said Sylvia, "so it will be very exciting to see who gets it at tea. I hope it will be right in the middle of a slice, and not tumble out just when it's being cut."

"You're a very fortunate girl," said Miss Coleman. "You'll have to be quite busy the rest of the day writing letters to thank all these kind friends. I'm going to take the cake to the storeroom, but you may keep the box of chocolates."

Tea was a festive meal. The cake looked most imposing, placed on one of Miss Kaye's largest dessert dishes in the centre of the table. Sylvia was allowed to cut it herself, and handed generous slices round to everybody, and she was particularly glad when little Elsie Thompson got the coveted sixpence.

"They never have a cake of their own," whispered Linda; "their aunt doesn't think of making one for them, and their father is too far away. Sadie had only one present on her birthday besides what we gave her."

Before bedtime came, Sylvia took her handsome bottle of scent, and, wrapping it in a parcel, wrote on a piece of paper: "Will you please accept this from me. I shall feel very hurt if you don't". Then in defiance of rules she ran into Mercy's room, and laid it on her pillow, where she would find it when she went to bed.

"I'm sure Granny wouldn't mind," she said to herself. "No one knows exactly which day is Mercy's birthday, and, though they keep it on the one when she was found, it might perhaps be to-day, and I couldn't bear to think that I've had all these lovely presents and she should have got nothing at all."