And Both Were Young (12 page)

“Yes,” Flip said, blushing at his words. “I want to paint and paint. Everything in the world. Mostly people, though. Paul—” she asked hesitantly.

“What?”

“It doesn’t make you like me any less because—”

“Because what?”

“Because the girls at school don’t like me . . .”

Paul looked at her severely. “You can’t think much of me if you think I’d stop liking you just because a few silly girls in
school haven’t any sense. If they don’t like you, it’s because they don’t know you. That’s all.”

“It’s funny,” Flip said, “how you can know someone for years and years and never know them and how you can know someone else all at once in no time at all. I’ll never know Eunice. I’ll always feel funny with her. But the very first day I saw you I felt as though I knew you, and when I’m with you I can talk . . . I’d better go now. It’s getting awfully late. See how dark the towns are getting down by the lake.”

“Can you come back tomorrow?” Paul asked.

“Yes. I know they’ll catch me sooner or later and then it’ll be awful, but I’ll come till they catch me.”

“They wouldn’t give you permission to see me if you asked?”

“Oh, no! Nobody except seniors is allowed to see boys—except brothers.”

“Well, I’ll think of something.” Paul sounded so convincing that Flip almost believed he really would be able to work out a plan. “Come on,” he said. “Ariel and I’ll walk as far as the woods with you, but I think it would be dangerous if I went any farther. We mustn’t run any risk of being seen together.”

As she followed Paul down from the tower Flip felt so happy over their friendship that she almost wanted to cry, it was so wonderful. She said good-bye to Paul at the edge of the woods and was nearly back at school when something terrible almost happened. She had cleared the ring of trees and was scurrying across the lawn, when Martha Downs and Kaatje van Leyden came around the corner of the building. Flip saw them and started to hurry toward the side door, but Martha called her. Flip was awed by both of them at the best
of times—Martha, the beautiful and popular head girl of the school, and Kaatje, the equally popular and formidable games captain and head monitor; and Flip knew that this was anything but the best of times. She felt as though her guilt were sticking all over her like molasses.

“Where are you off to in such a hurry?” Martha asked.

“Nowhere,” Flip answered. “I just went for a walk.”

“All by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“Couldn’t you find anyone to go with you?”

“I wanted to be by myself,” Flip said.

“That’s all right,” Kaatje interposed kindly. “We all like to be by ourselves once in a while. She wasn’t breaking any rules.”

Flip was sure that they would ask her where she had been, but Martha said instead, “You’re Philippa Hunter, aren’t you?”

Flip nodded.

“I’m glad we bumped into you,” Martha told her. “I’ve been meaning to look you up. I had a letter a few days ago from a friend of my mother’s, Mrs. Jackman.”

“Oh,” Flip said.

“And she asked me to keep an eye on you.”

“Oh,” Flip said again. Why did Eunice have to pursue her even at school?

“She said she was a very dear friend of your father’s, and that it was through her you had come here.”

That’s right, Flip thought. It’s all because of Eunice.

But she knew she couldn’t really blame Eunice and anyhow, now that there was Paul, being miserable while she was actually at the school didn’t matter so much anymore.

“Everything all right?” Martha asked. “You’re all settled and everything?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Anything I can do for you?”

“No, thank you.”

“Well, if you ever want me for anything, just come along and give a bang on my study door.”

“I will. Thank you very much,” Flip said, knowing that she wouldn’t. And she went back into the common room and sat at the big billiard table, a legacy from the days when the school had been a hotel, and tried to write a letter to her father. But she could not concentrate. Images of Eunice kept crowding themselves into her mind. Eunice. Eunice and her father. Once Eunice had even said something to her about her father being young and probably marrying again—but not Eunice! Please, not anybody, but especially please, not Eunice!

The next morning when she woke up, Flip’s throat was raw and her head was hot and when she opened her mouth to speak her voice came out in a hoarse croak.

“You’d better report to the nurse,” Erna told her.

Flip shook her head violently. “I’m all right. Just getting a cold.”

“Sounds as though you’d got one, ducky,” Gloria said.

“Oh, well, it’s nothing,” Flip creaked in a voice like a rusty hinge.

Nothing, she thought, nothing must keep her from going up to the château to see Paul.

Fortunately it was Sunday and breakfast was unsupervised; she might have escaped detection if it hadn’t been for
Madame Perceval. Madame Perceval was planning an art exhibit, and, after chapel, she came into the common room and walked over to the corner where Flip sat reading
Anna Karenina
.

“Philippa,” she said as Flip scrambled clumsily to her feet.

“Yes, Madame?”

“I want to use two of your paintings in my exhibit and you haven’t signed either of them. Come up to the studio with me and do it now.”

“Yes, Madame,” Flip croaked.

“What on earth is the matter with your voice, child?”

“Oh, nothing, Madame, really. I’m just a little hoarse.”

“After you’ve finished signing your pictures you’d better report to Mademoiselle Duvoisine.”

Mlle Duvoisine was the school nurse, and since she was a special friend of Miss Tulip’s, Flip rather distrusted her. “Oh, no, Madame, I’m all right, truly. Please, I promise you.”

“We’ll leave that up to Mademoiselle Duvoisine. Come along, please, Philippa.”

As they walked along the corridor and started up the stairs Madame Perceval said in her pleasant voice, “You’ve been trying hard, Philippa. Keep it up.”

Flip bowed her head and muttered something unintelligible, blushing with pleasure that her efforts had been noticed.

After she had signed her pictures, writing
HUNTER
carefully in one corner the way her father did, Madame Perceval walked back to the infirmary with her. Mlle Duvoisine was sitting at the infirmary desk, knitting a heather-colored sweater, and she looked up and dropped a stitch as they approached.

Madame Perceval smiled. “Pick up your stitch,” she said. “We can wait.”

Mlle Duvoisine picked up her stitch, rolled up the knitting, put it into a drawer, and said, “There. Now what can I do for you, Madame Perceval?”

Madame Perceval pushed Flip forward. “This child sounds like a frog with a cold and I thought you’d better have a look at her.”

“Open your mouth,” Mlle Duvoisine said to Flip. She peered down her throat, said “hmm,” and pulled her thermometer out of her pocket, popping it into Flip’s mouth.

Madame Perceval sat on the desk, opened the drawer, and pulled out the sweater. “A work of art,” she sighed. “My knitting always looks as though a cat had nested in it.”

“My skiing looks as though I had my skis on backwards,” Mlle Duvoisine said. “Radio says snow tonight. What do you think?”

“Smells like it, and it’s about time we had some. Fräulein Hauser’s been opening the window in the faculty room every ten minutes to sniff the air, and freezing the rest of us to death.”

Mlle Duvoisine drew the thermometer out of Flip’s mouth and looked at it. “Well, it’s barely ninety-nine, but with that throat and voice I think you’d better come to the infirmary overnight, Philippa. You won’t be missing any classes. If your temperature’s normal tomorrow, I’ll let you up.”

“Oh, please!” Flip begged, dismay flooding her face. “Please don’t make me go to bed, please! I feel wonderful, just wonderful, really!” Her voice cracked and almost disappeared.

“I knew the infirmary was referred to as the Dungeon,” Mlle Duvoisine said, “but I didn’t think it was considered as terrible as all that. Go get your night things and your toothbrush, Philippa.”

“But I’m not sick,” Flip protested hoarsely.

Mlle Duvoisine looked at Madame Perceval and raised her eyebrows. “I don’t want any more nonsense,” she said briskly. “Go get your things and be back here in ten minutes.”

Flip opened her mouth to speak again, but Madame Perceval said quietly, “Philippa,” and she turned and ran miserably down the corridor.

“Really!” she heard Mlle Duvoisine exclaim. “Now what’s the matter with the child?”

Oh, dear, Flip thought. Now Madame will think I’m sulking again and Paul will think I’ve broken my word.

And she gathered up her pajamas and toothbrush and trailed miserably back to the infirmary.

When she was in bed with the hot water bottle Mlle Duvoisine had brought her as a peace offering, she could think of nothing but way after impossible way to let Paul know why she couldn’t come to the château that afternoon.

“You look as though you had something on your mind, Philippa,” Mlle Duvoisine said when she brought in the lunch tray.

“I have,” Flip answered in the strange raucous voice that issued in so unwelcome a manner from her throat. “Please, couldn’t I get up, Mademoiselle Duvoisine? I’m not sick, truly, and I do so hate being in bed.”

“What is this nonsense?” Mlle Duvoisine asked sharply.
“You can hear what you sound like yourself. I know you aren’t ill, but I have you in bed so that you won’t be, and so that you won’t give your germs to anyone else. If you dislike me so intensely that you can’t bear to be around me, just get well as quickly as you can.”

“Oh, no. Mademoiselle Duvoisine, it isn’t that!” Flip protested. “It isn’t anything to do with you. I just promised someone I’d do something this afternoon, and I don’t know what they’ll think if I don’t keep my word.”

“I can give anyone a message for you, explaining that you’re in the infirmary,” Mlle Duvoisine said, and her voice was kind.

“I’m afraid you couldn’t, to this person,” Flip answered mournfully. “Thank you ever so much anyhow, Mademoiselle Duvoisine, and I’m sorry to be such a bother.”

“All right, Philippa.” Mlle Duvoisine put the lunch tray down and left.

When she brought in Flip’s tea she said, “Since you’re the only victim in my dungeon at present, Philippa, I think I’ll run down to the faculty room for an hour. If you want me for anything, all you need do is press that button. It’s connected with the faculty room as well as my desk, and Miss Tulip or I will come right away.”

“Thank you very much,” Flip said. “I’m sure I won’t need anything.”

“I’ve filled your hot water bottle for you,” Mademoiselle said kindly and stopped at the window, screwing in the top. “It’s just beginning to snow. Now Fräulein Hauser and Madame Perceval and all the skiers will be happy. Sure you don’t mind my leaving you?”

“Oh, no, Mademoiselle!”

This was the opportunity Flip had not dared hope for. When Mlle Duvoisine had left she sprang out of bed and got her clothes out of the closet. She dressed without giving herself time to think. If Mlle Duvoisine were going to be gone an hour, she would just have time, if she ran, to get to the château, tell Paul what had happened, and get back to the infirmary. That is, as long as she wasn’t caught. But she knew that she must not let herself even think about being caught. Desperately she shoved her pillows under the covers so that they looked like someone asleep, peered out the door, saw that the way down the corridor was clear, and pelted for the back stairs. The girls were strictly forbidden to use the back stairs, which afforded a means of entrance and exit that could not be detected by the teacher on duty at the desk in the lounge, but Flip was too desperate to care. When she got out the small back door she looked around wildly and ran for the woods like one pursued. Thank heaven everyone was at tea. When she got in sight of the château she was winded, her knee ached, and her hair was flecked with the first falling flakes of snow. She did not see Paul and her heart sank.

“Paul!” Flip cried, her throat dry, her voice coming out in an ineffectual squeak. “Paul!”

There was no answer. She tried to call again, but this time her voice seemed to have left her completely and only her lips shaped the syllable of Paul’s name. Then she heard the familiar baying bark, and Ariel came bounding out of the château to meet her, jumping up at her and knocking her down in his pleasure. She scrambled to her feet, hugging him on the way up, and then she saw Paul come running around a corner of the château.

“What happened to you, Flip!” he cried. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

“So did I,” Flip croaked, “and I can’t stay.”

“What’s the matter with your voice?”

“I have a cold, they’ve got me in the infirmary, I managed to escape, but I’ve got to rush back or I’ll be caught, I’ll come next Saturday unless something awful happens to keep me away.” The words came out in one hoarse gasp.

“Flip, you idiot!” Paul cried. “What do you mean by coming here.”

“But I said I’d come!” Flip panted. “I’ve got to get back.”

“Not until you rest and get your breath back,” Paul commanded. “You’ll make yourself really ill.”

“But, Paul,” Flip wailed, “I’ve
got
to get back. If Mademoiselle Duvoisine finds out I’ve gone, I’ll be expelled!” Tears rushed to her eyes.

Paul took her hand and shook his head. “Flip, Flip,” he said. “Don’t you realize what a little idiot you were to make this dangerous trip just to tell me you
couldn’t
come? You should know that I understand you well enough to know that if you didn’t come you’d have a reason. You should never have gotten out of bed and come all this way through the snow. But”—suddenly his eyes were warm with affection—“it was just like you to do it. Now, go back and take care of yourself.”

“I will—good-bye.” And she turned back down the mountain.

Flip ran. Going down the mountain was quicker, though not much easier, than coming up had been. Several times she slipped on the wet pine needles and almost fell. The snow was coming more thickly now, and a cloud had folded itself about
the school, so that its outlines were lost in gray fuzziness. As she slipped in the small side door she heard someone coming down the back stairs. It was Fräulein Hauser, on her way to the ski room to wax her skis. Flip pressed into the shadows until Fräulein Hauser passed on down the damp corridor and then Flip suddenly wilted against the wall. But every moment that she was away from the infirmary was dangerous; there was no time for her to lean there limply and catch her breath, so she gave herself a shake and hurried up the stairs. She opened the door at the third floor and peered out. The corridor was empty. She held her breath, ran for the infirmary, and opened the door a crack. Mlle Duvoisine’s desk was unoccupied. She made a mad dash for her room, threw off her clothes, dumped them onto the floor of the closet, and scrambled into bed, pushing the pillows out of her way.