The candle was instantly extinguished.In discreet silence the girls stole back to their beds,and listened.
As an aid to the vigilance of the sentinel,the door had been left ajar.Through the narrow opening,a creaking of the broad wooden stairs of the old house became audible.In another moment there was silence.An interval passed,and the creaking was heard again.This time,the sound was distant and diminishing.On a sudden it stopped.The midnight silence was disturbed no more.
What did this mean?
Had one among the many persons in authority under Miss Ladd's roof heard the girls talking,and ascended the stairs to surprise them in the act of violating one of the rules of the house?So far,such a proceeding was by no means uncommon.But was it within the limits of probability that a teacher should alter her opinion of her own duty half-way up the stairs,and deliberately go back to her own room again?The bare idea of such a thing was absurd on the face of it.What more rational explanation could ingenuity discover on the spur of the moment?
Francine was the first to offer a suggestion.She shook and shivered in her bed,and said,"For heaven's sake,light the candle again!It's a Ghost.""Clear away the supper,you fools,before the ghost can report us to Miss Ladd."With this excellent advice Emily checked the rising panic.The door was closed,the candle was lit;all traces of the supper disappeared.For five minutes more they listened again.No sound came from the stairs;no teacher,or ghost of a teacher,appeared at the door.
Having eaten her supper,Cecilia's immediate anxieties were at an end;she was at leisure to exert her intelligence for the benefit of her schoolfellows.In her gentle ingratiating way,she offered a composing suggestion."When we heard the creaking,I don't believe there was anybody on the stairs.In these old houses there are always strange noises at night--and they say the stairs here were made more than two hundred years since."The girls looked at each other with a sense of relief--but they waited to hear the opinion of the queen.Emily,as usual,justified the confidence placed in her.She discovered an ingenious method of putting Cecilia's suggestion to the test.
"Let's go on talking,"she said."If Cecilia is right,the teachers are all asleep,and we have nothing to fear from them.
If she's wrong,we shall sooner or later see one of them at the door.Don't be alarmed,Miss de Sor.Catching us talking at night,in this school,only means a reprimand.Catching us with a light,ends in punishment.Blow out the candle."Francine's belief in the ghost was too sincerely superstitious to be shaken:she started up in bed."Oh,don't leave me in the dark!I'll take the punishment,if we are found out.""On your sacred word of honor?"Emily stipulated.
"Yes--yes."
The queen's sense of humor was tickled.
"There's something funny,"she remarked,addressing her subjects,"in a big girl like this coming to a new school and beginning with a punishment.May I ask if you are a foreigner,Miss de Sor?""My papa is a Spanish gentleman,"Francine answered,with dignity.
"And your mamma?"
"My mamma is English."
"And you have always lived in the West Indies?""I have always lived in the Island of St.Domingo."Emily checked off on her fingers the different points thus far discovered in the character of Mr.de Sor's daughter."She's ignorant,and superstitious,and foreign,and rich.My dear (forgive the familiarity),you are an interesting girl--and we must really know more of you.Entertain the bedroom.What have you been about all your life?And what in the name of wonder,brings you here?Before you begin I insist on one condition,in the name of all the young ladies in the room.No useful information about the West Indies!"Francine disappointed her audience.
She was ready enough to make herself an object of interest to her companions;but she was not possessed of the capacity to arrange events in their proper order,necessary to the recital of the simplest narrative.Emily was obliged to help her,by means of questions.In one respect,the result justified the trouble taken to obtain it.A sufficient reason was discovered for the extraordinary appearance of a new pupil,on the day before the school closed for the holidays.
Mr.de Sor's elder brother had left him an estate in St.Domingo,and a fortune in money as well;on the one easy condition that he continued to reside in the island.The question of expense being now beneath the notice of the family,Francine had been sent to England,especially recommended to Miss Ladd as a young lady with grand prospects,sorely in need of a fashionable education.The voyage had been so timed,by the advice of the schoolmistress,as to make the holidays a means of obtaining this object privately.
Francine was to be taken to Brighton,where excellent masters could be obtained to assist Miss Ladd.With six weeks before her,she might in some degree make up for lost time;and,when the school opened again,she would avoid the mortification of being put down in the lowest class,along with the children.
The examination of Miss de Sor having produced these results was pursued no further.Her character now appeared in a new,and not very attractive,light.She audaciously took to herself the whole credit of telling her story:
"I think it's my turn now,"she said,"to be interested and amused.May I ask you to begin,Miss Emily?All I know of you at present is,t hat your family name is Brown."Emily held up her hand for silence.
Was the mysterious creaking on the stairs making itself heard once more?No.The sound that had caught Emily's quick ear came from the beds,on the opposite side of the room,occupied by the three lazy girls.With no new alarm to disturb them,Effie,Annis,and Priscilla had yielded to the composing influences of a good supper and a warm night.They were fast asleep--and the stoutest of the three (softly,as became a young lady)was snoring!
