3 future plans

mam’zelle then turned to the other new girl. “and this is—how do you call yourself?” she asked the sturdy newcomer. “amanda shoutalot?”

the girls laughed. the new girl gave mam’zelle a rather contemptuous look. “no—amanda chartelow,” she said, in a loud voice.

“ah—that is what i said,” protested mam’zelle. “amanda shoutalot. poor amanda—her school has been burnt down by fire! hélas—it exists no longer!”

nobody quite knew what to say. amanda took some more bread, and ignored mam’zelle. gwen entered headlong into the gap in the conversation.

“oh dear—what a dreadful thing! did anyone get hurt?”

“no,” said amanda, helping herself to more salad. “it happened in the holidays. you probably read about it in the papers. it was trenigan towers.”

“gosh, yes—i did read about it,” said sally, remembering. “trenigan towers! that’s about the most famous school for sport in the country, isn’t it? i mean—you win every single match you play, and you win all the tennis shields and lacrosse cups?”

“that’s right,” said amanda. “well, it’s gone. there wasn’t time to find another building in a hurry, so we all had to scatter, and find other schools. i don’t know how long i’ll be here—maybe a term, maybe longer. you haven’t much of a name for sport, have you, at malory towers?”

this was rather too much from a new girl, even if she had come into the sixth form, and had arrived from a famous sports school. darrell stared at her coldly.

“we’re not too bad,” she said.

“perhaps you’d like to give us a little coaching,” said alicia in the smooth voice that most of the girls recognized as dangerous.

“i might,” said amanda, and said no more. the girls glanced at one another. then they looked at amanda and saw how strong she must be. she was a great hefty girl about five foot ten inches tall. how much did she weigh?

“must be thirteen stone, i should think!” thought darrell, comparing amanda with the slim, elegant french girl. “goodness—have we got to put up with her all the term? i shall find it hard to squash her!”

sally was thinking the same. she was games captain for the whole school, a most important position. what sally said had to be taken notice of, from the sixth form down to the first. sally was a first-rate tennis player, a first-rate lacrosse player, and one of the finest swimmers malory towers had ever had. nobody but darrell could beat her at tennis, and that very seldom.

she took another look at the stolid, rather scornful-looking amanda. it was going to be very very difficult to give orders to her—especially as amanda might easily prove to be a better tennis player and swimmer than even sally herself. sally was not as hefty as amanda, though she was strong and supple.

“you were lucky to be able to find a place at malory towers,” gushed gwen.

“was i?” said amanda, coldly, staring at gwen as if she didn’t like her at all. gwen blinked. what a horrible girl! she hoped alicia would be able to deal with her. alicia could deal with anybody—her sharp tongue was quicker and more cutting than anyone else’s in the school.

“i suppose you’ll be going in for the olympic games,” said alicia, meaning to be sarcastic. “they’re held next year in . . .”

“oh yes. i should think i shall go in for about five different events,” said amanda, calmly. “my coach at trenigan said i ought to win at least two.”

the girls gasped. alicia looked taken aback. it had never entered her head that her scornful remark could be true. she looked so discomfited that irene grinned.

“we ought to feel very honoured to have you here, amanda!” she drawled.

“thanks,” said amanda, without looking at her.

“amanda is such a beeg, beeg girl,” began mam’zelle, mistaking amanda’s ungraciousness for shyness. “she will be so marvellous at tennis. sally, perhaps she will be in the second team, n’est-ce pas?”

nobody replied to this. sally merely grunted. mam’zelle pushed on, under the impression that she was putting “this great beeg amanda” at her ease.

“how tall are you, amanda?” she asked, feeling that the girl must be at least seven feet tall; she had made plump little mam’zelle feel so short when she had walked in beside her! “and how many—er—how do you say it—how many pebbles do you weight?”

there was a squeal of laughter from the table. even amanda deigned to smile. mam’zelle gazed round indignantly.

“what have i said?” she demanded. “is it not right—pebbles?”

“no—stones, mam’zelle,” chorused the girls, in delight. “our weight is measured by stones, not pebbles.”

“stones—pebbles—they are the same,” said mam’zelle. “never, never shall i learn this english language.”

the bell rang for the meal to end. all the girls got up, laughing. dear old mam’zelle—her mistakes would fill a book.

darrell and her friends went up to her study to talk and gossip. there were the usual crowd—sally, alicia, belinda, irene, mary-lou, bill and clarissa. mavis was not there.

“it seems queer without mavis,” said sally. “she’s gone to train as a singer now. perhaps we shall all crowd into her concerts one day!”

“i miss quiet old jane too,” said darrell. “she is training as a dress designer. she ought to be jolly good at it! do you remember the marvellous dresses she made for us when we gave that pantomime in the fifth form?”

“catherine has left too,” said alicia. “thank goodness! i never knew such a door-mat in my life. no wonder we called her saint catherine!”

“she wasn’t so bad,” said mary-lou, loyally. “it was only that she did like doing things for people so much.”

“she did them in the wrong way, that’s all,” said bill. “she always made herself such a martyr. what’s she going to do?”

“she’s going to stay at home and help mama,” said alicia, rather maliciously. “it’ll suit her down to the ground. mama thinks herself a bit of an invalid, i gather—so catherine will really enjoy herself, being a saintly little daughter.”

“don’t be unkind, alicia,” said mary-lou. “catherine was kind underneath her door-mat ways.”

“i take your word for it,” said alicia, smiling at mary-lou. “don’t get all hot and bothered. this is only a good old gossip! what are you going to do when you leave next year, mary-lou?”

“i’m leaving sooner than that,” said mary-lou. “i’ve made up my mind what i’m going to be, and i’m going off to train in september. i’m going to be a hospital nurse—a children’s nurse. i never wanted to be anything else, really. i’m going to train at great ormond street hospital. it’s all settled.”

the others looked at quiet, loyal, idealistic mary-lou. immediately each one of them saw that she had chosen the right career for herself. nursing was a vocation—something you felt you had to do, for the sake of other people. it was absolutely right for mary-lou.

“i can’t imagine anything you’d love better, mary-lou!” said darrell, warmly. “it’s exactly right for you, and you’re exactly right for it! lucky children who have you to nurse them!”

mary-lou looked pleased and embarrassed. she looked round at the others. “what are we all going to do?” she said. “belinda’s easy, of course.”

“yes. i’ve got to be an artist,” said belinda. “i always knew that. it’s easy, of course, when you’ve got a gift. you can’t do anything else but use it.”

“and irene will study music,” said sally. “that’s easy too. bill—what about you—and clarissa? you are both so mad on horses that i can’t imagine you taking a job unless it’s on horseback.”

clarissa looked at bill. she grinned. “you’ve hit the nail on the head,” she said. “our job will be on horseback. won’t it, bill?”

bill nodded. “yes. clarissa and i are going to run a riding school together.”

“you’re not!” exclaimed the others, amazed and interested.

“yes, we are. we decided it last hols,” explained clarissa. “i was staying with bill, and we heard there were some stables for sale. we thought we’d like to get them, take our own horses, buy a few more, and begin a riding school. actually it’s not very far from here. we did wonder if we could get miss grayling to let us have some malory towers girls for pupils.”

“well!” said alicia, in deep admiration. “if you two aren’t dark horses!”

there was a yell of laughter at this typical alicia joke. bill grinned. she never said very much but she was a most determined young person. nobody had any doubt at all but that the bill-clarissa riding school would be very successful indeed.

“i’ll see that all my children are your pupils, when they come to malory towers,” promised alicia, with a grin. “fancy you two thinking all this out and never saying a word!”

there was a short silence. it seemed as if most of them knew what they were going to do when they left school—and had chosen rightly.

“well, sally and i are going to college,” said darrell. “and so is alicia—and betty is coming too. we’re all going to st. andrews up in scotland, and what a good time we’ll have!”

“you’ll feel funny at first—being the youngest again, instead of the oldest,” said belinda. “i suppose you’ll take arts, darrell, and eventually be a writer?”

“i don’t know,” said darrell. “it’s what i’d like to be. but, you see, sally and i are not as lucky as you and irene, belinda. we haven’t a gift that sticks out a mile—or a vocation like mary-lou. we’ve got to find what we’re best fitted for, and we can do that at the university. we’ll jolly well have to use our brains there, too. we’ll be up against some brilliant people.”

sally got up. “where did we put those biscuits, darrell?” she said. “talking always makes me hungry. that’s one thing that still makes me think we’re not really very grown-up, even though we sometimes think we’re getting on that way—we always feel so hungry. grown-ups never seem to feel like that!”

“long live our appetites!” said alicia, taking a biscuit. “and may our shadows never grow less!”