And Both Were Young (24 page)

“You look at it,” Paul said.

Flip was getting really furious. “All right, I will! And I’ll see what happens when nations go against it! You have wars and then you have bombs and concentration camps and people being killed and everything horrible. You
have
to have
some
rules! Hospitals have rules and if you’re going to be a doctor you’ll be working in hospitals. It’s just plain common sense to accept some rules! It’s just plain courtesy! I never thought I’d see you being
stupid
, Paul Laurens! And if you’re
going to tell me you’re afraid of a few girls, I won’t believe you.”

Paul stood up, knocking over his chair, and walked out of the room.

Flip sat down and she was trembling. She looked across the table at Georges Laurens, her eyes wide with dismay. “I’ve upset him. That was awful of me. I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right,” Georges Laurens said. “Losing your temper that way was the best thing you could have done. Finish your tart.”

Flip picked up her fork and began eating again, but now the tart that had looked so delectable when Thérèse put it in front of her was only something to be forced down. She had just swallowed the last bite when Paul came back and stood in the doorway.

“All right,” he almost shouted at Flip. “Get your skis. Please come for me in an hour, Papa.”

“An hour it shall be,” Georges Laurens said.

It took them less than half an hour to ski back to the school. Flip took Paul into the ski room while she put her skis in the rack. “I didn’t mean to make you angry,” she said. “I’m sorry, Paul. Please forgive me.”

Paul shook his head. “No. You were quite right. Everything you said. I don’t know what’s the matter with me.”

“Would you—” Flip asked tentatively, “would you mind if I brought Jackie and Erna down for just a minute? They’re dying to meet you and it’s—it’s strictly against the rules.”

Paul laughed. “All right. Go ahead.”

Flip went tearing along the corridor and up the stairs. She slowed down when she came to the lounge because Fräulein
Hauser was on duty, and walked as quickly as possible to the common room. Luckily Jackie and Erna were off in a corner together, reading a letter from Jackie’s mother.

“Get permission from Hauser to go to the libe and meet me in the room,” she whispered. Then she hurried away and ran up the stairs, pulling off her ski jacket and sweater on the way. Jackie and Erna came in as she was throwing on her uniform.

“What’s up?”

“Come on down to the ski room with me,” Flip panted.

“Are you crazy?” Erna asked. “Hauser won’t give us permission. The basement at this time of night is
streng verboten
.”

“Don’t be a nut,” Flip said, “Paul’s down there. He came back with me. We can slip down the back stairs. Oh, come on, kids, do hurry.”

Both Erna’s and Jackie’s faces lit up when Flip mentioned Paul and they followed her excitedly down the back stairs. For a moment when they got to the ski room Flip thought that Paul had run out on her, but, no, he turned to meet them with a grin.

“Hello,” Paul said, pulling off his cap and bowing.

“Paul, this is Erna and Jackie,” Flip said quickly. “Kids, this is Paul Laurens, Madame’s nephew.”

They all said hello and sat down on the benches.

Flip began to talk quickly. “Erna and Jackie are my roommates, Paul. You remember. I told you about them. I would have brought Gloria, you know, she’s our other roommate—but she can’t ever keep a secret. If you want anything spread all over school, you just take Gloria aside and tell it to
her as a dead secret and you know everybody’ll know about it in a couple of hours. She’s lots of fun though. Oh, and you know what we did to her!”

“What?” Paul asked, rather taken aback by this jabbering Flip.

“The ears,” Flip said to Erna and Jackie, and the three of them went off into gales of laughter. “You tell him, Jackie,” Flip said.

“Well, Gloria
never
used to wash her ears,” Jackie began, “so we wrote her a letter pretending it came from Signorina del Rossi—she’s the teacher on our corridor. We didn’t dare make it from the matron because she’d have given us deportment marks but Signorina’s a good sport. Anyhow, Flip wrote the letter, and she imitated Signorina’s handwriting, and it said that Gloria was to go to Signorina every morning right after breakfast for ear inspection. Black and Midnight—she’s the matron and sleeps on our corridor too—inspects our fingernails every morning but she doesn’t look at our ears. So Gloria got this letter and that evening we heard her washing and washing in her cubicle and the next morning we hid behind the door to the back stairs because that’s opposite Signorina’s room, and Gloria came and knocked on Signorina’s door and we heard her tell Signorina she’d come for ear inspection. And Signorina was just wonderful. She never let on that she didn’t know what it was all about but looked at Gloria’s ears and told her they were very nice and as long as she kept them that way she needn’t come back.”

Paul laughed obligingly, then said, “It’s time for me to meet my father now, but I’ll see you all at the ski meet. It’s pretty soon now, isn’t it?”

Erna hugged herself in anticipation and said, “Fräulein Hauser told us at dinner that it was definitely going to be next Saturday. The lists go up on Friday, and it’s tremendously exciting, signing up for things.”

Paul gave a nudge. “I suppose you’ll all be signing up for things.”

“All except Flip,” Erna said, and Paul gave Flip another nudge.

They said good-bye at the foot of the back stairs. Paul bowed gallantly and told Erna and Jackie how much he’d enjoyed meeting them.

“I’ll be up in a couple of minutes,” Flip said. “I just want to say good-bye and thank you to Monsieur Laurens.”

When Erna and Jackie had gone, Paul put his hands firmly on Flip’s shoulders and turned her around. Then his lips were against hers, his arms around her.

When he let her go, she was breathless, wordless.

He said, “I know we’re still considered children, and that I have a lot of learning to do, and lots of years before I get through medical school. There are too many unexpected things that happen to people for me to ask you to make any promises, but I love you, Flip.”

“I love you, too, Paul.” She knew that he was right and that it was too early for promises and that many things could happen in the next years. But this was a memory that would always be a special treasure, and Paul had taught her about the privilege and the joy of memory.

They left the warm basement and the ski racks and the smell of wet snow and wool and warm wax, and went out to where Georges Laurens was waiting.

“Just a week more till the meet, Flip,” Paul whispered.

“I know,” Flip whispered back, and shivered, a child again.

“Don’t be scared,” Paul told her. “You’ll be fine. But, Flip, how time has crept up on us!”

“Like the wolf at the door.” Flip tried to laugh, then, her voice suddenly pleading, the voice of a very small, frightened girl, she begged, “You’ll be there, Paul?”

“I promise,” Paul said. “Don’t worry, Flip. I’ll be there.”

Friday morning after breakfast the lists for the ski meet were on the board. Flip had rushed through breakfast as usual in order to get a last morning’s workout on her skis, so she was the first to sign up. She took the pencil attached to the board by a long chain and looked at the intermediate events. There was form, which she signed up for; the short race, which she also signed for, though sprinting was not her strong point; and the long race, for which she had higher hopes. Then there was intermediate jumping, but she didn’t sign for that. Madame Perceval had told her that she was good enough to jump without worry if ever there were a necessity or emergency, but the slight stiffness and weakness in her knee held her back more on the jumping than in anything else. So there was her name at the top of the intermediate lists, P
HILIPPA
H
UNTER
, 97, in careful, decisive lettering. She looked at her name and her stomach seemed to flop over inside of her.

But there isn’t time to be scared, she thought. I’d better go out and ski.

When she came back in to get the mail the lists were pretty well filled up. Almost everybody in Flip’s class was an intermediate. A few were in the beginners group and Solvei was an expert, but almost all the girls she knew best had
signed under her name and none of them had failed to notice P
HILIPPA
H
UNTER
, 97, at the top of the list.

“But Flip, you don’t ski!”

“Pill, did you know those lists were for the
ski
meet?”

“Flip, you didn’t
mean
to sign up for the ski meet, did you?”

“Are you crazy, Philippa Hunter?”

She looked at their incredulous faces and suddenly she began to wonder if she really
could
ski. “Yes, I did mean to sign up,” she told them.

“But Flip, you can’t ski!”

“Fräulein Hauser said you couldn’t learn!”

“She said she couldn’t teach you!”

“Pill, you must have gone mad!”

“I’m not mad,” Flip said, standing with her back against the bulletin board while the girls crowded around her. “I’m not mad. I did mean to sign.” She tried to move away but they pushed her back against the board.

Fräulein Hauser came over and said, “Girls!” Then she looked at Flip and said, “Philippa Hunter, I want to speak to you.”

The girls moved away and Flip followed Fräulein Hauser up the stairs. Now that Madame Perceval was no longer at the school Fräulein Hauser had taken her place as second to Mlle Dragonet and most popular of the teachers. But Flip still stung from the gym teacher’s scorn and when she drew Fräulein Hauser’s table at meals she did not regard it as a piece of good fortune.

Now Fräulein Hauser led her to the deserted classroom and said, “What did you mean by signing up for three events in the ski meet?”

Flip looked stubbornly into Fräulein Hauser’s determined, suntanned face. “I want to ski in them.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Frälein Hauser’s voice was sharp and annoyance robbed her features of their usually pleasant expression. “You know you can’t ski well enough to enter even the beginners’ events, much less the intermediate.”

“I’ve been practicing every morning after breakfast for an hour.”

“I assure you, Philippa, that you are not a skier. You simply are not good at sports because of your bad knee and you might as well face it. You had better stick to your painting. I thought you were settling down nicely and I must say I don’t understand this wild idea of yours in entering the ski meet. Now be a sensible girl and go downstairs and take your name off.”

Now I shall have to explain, Flip thought, and started, “No, please, Fräulein Hauser, you see I really do want to enter the ski meet because—”

But Fräulein Hauser did not give her a chance to finish. “I’m sorry, Philippa. I haven’t time to waste on this nonsense. Suppose you let me be the judge of whether or not you can ski well enough to enter the meet. Now go downstairs and cross your name off the list or I shall.”

“But please, Fräulein Hauser—” Flip started.

Fräulein Hauser turned away without listening. “I’m sorry, Philippa,” she said.

“But Fräulein Hauser, I
can
ski!” Flip cried after her. But the gym teacher was already out of the room and didn’t hear.

Flip waited long enough to give Fräulein Hauser time to get to the faculty room. Then she walked swiftly down the corridor before she had time to lose her nerve, and knocked on the door to Mlle Dragonet’s sitting room.

When Mlle Dragonet’s voice called out “Come in,” she didn’t know whether she was filled with relief or regret. She opened the door and slipped inside, shut it, and stood with her back to it as she had stood against the bulletin board downstairs.

Mlle Dragonet was drinking coffee and going over some papers at a table in front of the fire; she looked up and said kindly, “Well, Philippa, what can I do for you?”

“Please, Mademoiselle Dragonet,” Flip said desperately, “isn’t it entirely up to the girls whether or not we enter the ski meet and what we sign up for? I mean, Erna told me you didn’t have to be in it if you didn’t want to, and if you did, you could sign up for anything and it was entirely your own responsibility what you thought you were good enough for.”

“Yes. That’s right.” Mlle Dragonet nodded and poured herself some more coffee out of a silver coffeepot.

“Well, Fräulein Hauser says I must take my name off the lists.”

“Why does she say that?” Mlle Dragonet dropped a saccharin tablet into her coffee and poured some hot milk into it as though it were the one thing in the world she was thinking of at the moment.

“Well, when we first started skiing she said I couldn’t learn to ski and she couldn’t teach me and I had to give it up. Then Madame Perceval found out my skis were too long and there was a pair some girl had left that fitted me and Madame and Paul have been teaching me to ski. I’ve practiced every morning after breakfast for an hour and during the Christmas hols we skied all the time and went on overnight skiing trips and things and Madame said I should enter the ski meet as an
intermediate. But now Fräulein Hauser says I have to take my name off the list because she doesn’t know I can ski.”

“Why didn’t you explain to Fräulein Hauser?” Mlle Dragonet asked.

“I tried to, but she wouldn’t listen. I don’t think she knew I had anything to explain. And Madame Perceval said I shouldn’t say anything about her helping me. She said I should say it was just Paul, and I don’t think that would have convinced Fräulein Hauser, no matter how good a skier Paul is, because I was so
awful
before. That’s why I had to come to you, Mademoiselle.”

Mlle Dragonet picked up her pencil and twirled it. “So you’ve been keeping your skiing a secret?”

“Yes, Mademoiselle Dragonet.”

“Whose idea was this?”

“Paul’s. He thought it would be so much fun to surprise everybody.”

“Was he coming to the ski meet?”

“Yes, Mademoiselle.”

“I can see,” Mlle Dragonet said, “how Paul would think it was fun to surprise everybody, and how you would think it was fun too. But don’t you think it’s a little hard on Fräulein Hauser?” Her brown eyes looked mildly at Flip.