Late as it was, she felt impelled to take out the College Ledger. Several of the boarders’ fees were outstanding. Although commonsense told her that prompt payment in advance of next term’s fees could hardly be expected, under the circumstances, from Miranda’s parents or the legal guardian of Marion Quade, she had been relying on the Leopold cheque with its numerous extras – dancing, drawing, monthly matinées in Melbourne, all of which showed a handsome profit to the College. On the neatly ruled page another name stood out: Sara Waybourne. Sara’s elusive guardian had failed to show himself at her study door for several months, his usual fee-paying procedure, with the amount taken from his pocket book in cash. At the present moment, a whole term of Sara’s extras was still unpaid for. For Mr Cosgrove, always expensively dressed, who left behind him in the study the tang of eau de Cologne and morocco leather, there was no excuse for delay.
Nowadays the very sight of the child Sara slumped over a book in the garden was enough to send a flush of irritation crawling up the Head’s neck under the boned net collar. The small pointed face was somehow the symbol of the nameless malady from which every inmate of the College was suffering in varying degrees. If it had been a weak rounded childish face it might have aroused an answering pity instead of a sense of resentment that one so puny and pale possessed a core of secret strength – a will as steely as her own. Sometimes, catching sight of Sara’s bent head in the schoolroom, where the Headmistress occasionally descended from Olympus to deliver a Scripture lesson, the sour taste of an unmentionable passion had momentarily choked her utterance. Yet the wretched child had remained outwardly docile, polite and diligent: only the secret pain in the absurdly large eyes. It was long past midnight. She rose, put the ledger back in its drawer and climbed heavily upstairs.
The following morning as Sara Waybourne was getting ready her drawing materials for Mrs Valange’s art class, she was summoned to the Headmistress’s desk.
‘I have sent for you, Sara, because of a serious matter I have to explain to you. Stand up straight and listen very carefully to what I have to say.’
‘Yes, Mrs Appleyard.’
‘I don’t know if you are aware that your guardian has failed to pay for your education here for several months? I have written to him at the usual bank address but my letters have been returned from the Dead Letter Office in every case.’
‘Oh,’ said the child without a change of expression.
‘When did you last have a letter from Mr Cosgrove? Think most carefully.’
‘I remember quite well. At Christmas – when he asked if I could stay at school over the holidays.’
‘I remember. It was most inconvenient.’
‘Was it? I wonder why he hasn’t written for such a long time? I want some books and some more crayons.’
‘Crayons? That reminds me, since you can give me no help in this unfortunate matter I shall have to tell Mrs Valange to discontinue your drawing lessons – as from this morning. Please note that any drawing materials in your locker are the property of the College and must be returned to Miss Lumley. Is that a hole in your stocking? You would be better employed learning to darn than playing about with books and coloured pencils.’
Sara had just reached the door when she was called back. ‘I omitted to mention that if I have not heard from your guardian by Easter I shall be obliged to make other arrangements for your education.’
For the first time a change of expression flickered behind the great eyes. ‘What arrangements?’
‘That will have to be decided. There are Institutions.’
‘Oh, no. No. Not that. Not again.’
‘One must learn to face up to facts, Sara. After all, you are thirteen years old. You may go.’
While the above conversation was taking place in the study, Mrs Valange, the visiting art mistress from Melbourne, was being hoisted into the dog-cart outside the Woodend Station by the nimble Tom, to whom the little lady clung like a drowning sailor, weighed down as usual by a sketching pad, umbrella and bulging valise. The contents of the valise were invariably the same: for the senior pupils, a plaster cast of Cicero’s head wrapped in a flannelette nightgown in case his beak of a nose got chipped in the rattling of the Melbourne train; a plaster foot for the juniors; a roll of Michalet paper; and for herself a pair of easy slippers with woollen pompoms and flask of cognac. (A taste for French brandy, had it ever come up for discussion, was about the only subject on which Mrs Valange and Mrs Appleyard were of the same mind.)
‘Well now, Tom,’ began the voluble and always agreeable art mistress as they turned into the highway under the shade of the eucalypts. ‘How’s your sweetheart?’
‘To tell you the truth, Ma’am, me and Minnie are both giving the Madam notice at Easter. We don’t seem to fancy it here any more if you know what I mean.’
‘I do know, Tom, and I’m sorry to hear it. You can’t think what horrible things people are saying about all this in the city, though I tell everyone it’s best forgotten.’
‘You’re right there, Ma’am,’ Tom agreed. ‘All the same Minnie and me will remember Miss Miranda and the other poor creatures till our dying day.’
As the dog-cart turned in at the College gates his passenger caught sight of her favourite pupil Sara Waybourne on the front lawn, and briskly waved her umbrella. ‘Good morning, Sara – no thank you, Tom, I prefer to carry the valise myself – come here, child – I’ve brought you a lovely new box of pastels from Melbourne. Rather expensive I’m afraid but it can go down on your account . . . you’re looking rather doleful this morning.’
Mrs Valange’s reception of Sara’s depressing news was characteristic. ‘Not go on with your art classes? Nonsense! I am not in the least worried about your fees considering you are the only one with an ounce of talent. I shall go straight to Mrs Appleyard and tell her so – we have ten minutes before the class begins.’
The interview which now took place behind the closed door of the study is unnecessary to record in detail. For the first and last time the two ladies stood face to face with the gloves off. After a few perfunctory civilities on both sides, the fight was on, warmhearted little Mrs Valange lashing out with colourful accusations emphasized by a dangerously waving umbrella, Mrs Appleyard shaken out of her usual public calm growing even more immense and purple. At last the door of the study was actually heard to slam and the art mistress, a moral victor, though beaten on a point of professional procedure, stood with heaving bosom in the hall. Tom was summoned, and Mrs Valange, clutching the umbrella and the valise with Cicero still wrapped in the nightdress, was hoisted into the dog-cart and driven away to the station for the last time.
After a brief unwonted silence in which his passenger scribbled on scraps of paper with a piece of coloured chalk, Tom was handed a half crown and an envelope addressed to Sara Waybourne, with instructions to deliver it as soon as possible without Mrs Appleyard’s knowledge. Tom had been only too happy to oblige. He had a soft spot for little Mrs Valange as he had for Sara, and had every intention of handing her the letter next morning when the boarders congregated for half an hour after breakfast in the garden. However, he was unexpectedly sent off on an errand for the Head, and the letter went out of his mind.