And Both Were Young (13 page)

She was safe.

She lay in bed, her heart knocking against her chest. Through the window she could see the snow coming down in great soft white petals. The snow clouds in which the school lay obscured everything. She could not see the Dents du Midi or the lake or even the big elm trees that girdled the school. Everything was a soft grey filled with the gently dropping snow.

She was still a little shaky when Mlle Duvoisine came in. “All right, Philippa?”

“Yes, thank you, Mademoiselle Duvoisine.” She hoped the hoarseness would account for the breathlessness of her voice.

Mlle Duvoisine took her pulse. “Good heavens, child, your pulse is racing,” she exclaimed, and took Flip’s temperature.
But the thermometer registered only ninety-nine. Mlle Duvoisine put her hand on Flip’s forehead and Flip was terrified that the nurse would feel her wet hair, but all she said was, “Have you been asleep? Have you too many covers? You seem to be perspiring.”

“I’m very comfortable,” Flip told her. “The hot water bottle’s lovely. I hope you had a pleasant tea, Mademoiselle.”

“Yes. Thanks. Everybody’s very pleased about the snow, though Madame Perceval says it’s going to stop soon and there won’t be enough for skiing.”

“In Connecticut where I was born,” Flip said, trying to sound casual so that Mlle Duvoisine would think she had just been lying in the bed all afternoon, “people talk about the first snowfly. I think that’s beautiful, don’t you? Snowfly.”

“Yes, beautiful,” Mlle Duvoisine said. “Think you can eat your supper?”

“Oh, yes,” Flip cried hoarsely. “I’m famished.” And she was.

Mlle Dragonet made it a practice to visit the girls in the infirmary, and she came to see Flip that evening, sitting in her erect, stiff manner in the chair Mlle Duvoisine had drawn up for her. It was the first time Flip had spoken to the principal since the first day of school, and she was very nervous. Mlle Dragonet held herself aloof from the girls, delegating many duties that would ordinarily have been hers to Madame Perceval, and the bravest of them regarded her with timidity. She conducted a class in seventeenth-century French literature for the seniors; she held morning exercises in the Assembly Hall; and once a week she presided over a faculty table in
the dining room. The little visits to the infirmary were more dreaded than anticipated by the girls, and Flip had forgotten all about the prospect in the other excitements of the day until Mlle Duvoisine announced Mlle Dragonet’s arrival.

“I’m sorry to hear you aren’t well, Philippa,” the principal said formally.

“Oh, I’m fine, really, thank you, Mademoiselle Dragonet,” Flip croaked.

“Mademoiselle Duvoisine tells me you haven’t much fever.”

“Oh, no, Mademoiselle Dragonet.” Flip looked at the principal and realized with a start that she bore a faint family resemblance to her niece. The thin, aristocratic nose was very like Madame Perceval’s, and there was a similarity in the shape of the mouth, though Madame Perceval’s had a sweetness that Mlle Dragonet’s lacked. But there was the same flash of humor in the eyes, which were the same gold-flecked grey.

As though reading her thoughts, Mlle Dragonet said, “Madame Perceval tells me your work in her art classes is very promising.”

“Oh,” Flip breathed.

“Your scholastic record is in general quite satisfactory.”

“Oh,” Flip said again.

“I hope you are enjoying school?”

Flip knew that Mlle Dragonet wanted her to say yes, so she answered, “Oh, yes, thank you.”

“Are you enjoying the other girls?”

“Oh, yes, thank you.”

“Sometimes the Americans find our European girls are younger for their years, less sophisticated.”

“Oh,” Flip said. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“You have friends you enjoy?”

Flip hesitated; then she thought of Paul and answered, “Oh, yes, thank you.”

Mlle Dragonet rose, and Flip, with sudden insight, realized that the principal, though so calm and fluent when speaking to a group of girls, was almost as shy as she herself was when confronted with an individual, and these infirmary visits cost her a real effort.

Mlle Dragonet ran her fingers in a tired fashion over her grey hair. “It has been a long day,” she said to Flip, “and now the snow has started and the girls will be happy and we will have numerous strained muscles from overenthusiastic skiers. But as long as the girls are happy, perhaps that is all right. If anything should ever trouble you, remember you have only to come to me.”

“Thank you very much, Mademoiselle Dragonet,” Flip said. “I’ll remember.”

Getting to the château was difficult the next Saturday, although Madame Perceval had been right and the snow had stopped and temporarily dashed the skiers’ hopes. But enough snow remained on the ground so that Flip put on her spiked boots to help her climb the mountain. Up above her the mountain had a striped, zebralike look, long streaks of snow alternating with rock or the darker lines of the evergreens. The air was cold and clear and sent the color flying to her cheeks.

Paul greeted her with a relieved shout, crying, “Are you all better, Flip?”

“Oh, yes, I feel fine now.”

“I was worried about you. I was afraid you might have caught more cold from coming last Sunday. You shouldn’t have, you know.”

“I had to,” Flip said. “I promised.”

“I knew something you couldn’t help had kept you. Of course I was a little afraid you’d been caught and they were keeping you from coming. Did you have any trouble getting here today? What will you do when there’s a
real
snow, Flip? You’ll never be able to make it.”

“I’ll make it,” Flip assured him. “Where’s Ariel?”

“He’s home with my father. Flip, I—I’ve done something that may make you angry.”

“What?”

“Well, I got to thinking. It’s so terribly cold in the château; I’m sure that’s why you caught cold, and I didn’t think we should go back there in the damp today, so I told my father about you. He won’t give us away, Flip, I made him promise.”

“Are you sure?” Flip asked anxiously.

“Quite sure. My father would never break his word. Anyhow, he’s a philosopher and things like girls’ schools and rules and regulations and things don’t seem as important to him as they do to other people. He told me to bring you home with me and he said he’d fix some real hot chocolate for us. So come along.”

Flip followed Paul over the snow, past the château, and down an overgrown driveway. Grass and weeds and bits of stubble poked up through the snow and it did not look like much of a snowfall here, though the drifts had seemed formidable enough on her way up the mountain from school.

A tall, stooped man, whom Flip recognized as the man she had seen Paul with in the chalet on the Col de Jaman, met them at the door to the lodge. Ariel came bounding out to welcome them noisily.

“My father,” Paul announced formally. “Monsieur Georges Laurens. Papa, my friend, Miss Philippa Hunter.”

Georges Laurens bowed. “I am happy indeed to meet you, Miss Hunter. Come in by the fire and get warm.” He led them into a room, comfortable from the blazing fire in the stone fireplace, and gently pushed Flip into an easy chair. She looked about her. Two beautiful brocades were hung on the walls and there were what seemed like hundreds of books in improvised bookshelves made of packing cases. Two or three lamps were already lit against the early darkness which had settled around the mountainside by this time of the afternoon, and Flip saw a copper saucepan filled with hot chocolate sitting on the hearth.

“Flip’s afraid you’ll let the cat out of the bag, Papa,” Paul said.

Georges Laurens took a long spoon, stirred the chocolate, and poured it out. He handed a cup to Flip and pushed Ariel away from the saucepan. “Watch out, you’ll burn your nose again.” Then he turned to Flip. “Why should I let the cat out of the bag? You aren’t doing anyone any harm and you’re giving a great deal of pleasure to my lonely Paul. In fact, I like so much the idea of Paul’s having your companionship that my only concern is how to help you continue your visits. As soon as we have a heavy snow you won’t be able to climb up the mountains through the woods to us, and in any event someone would be sure to find you out sooner or later and you
would be forbidden to come, if nothing else. These are facts we have to face, isn’t that so?”

“Yes, that’s so,” Flip said.

“She has to come,” Paul said very firmly.

Georges Laurens took off his heavy steel-rimmed spectacles and wiped them on his handkerchief. Then he took the tongs and placed another log on the fire. “My suggestion is this: Why don’t I go to the headmistress of this school and get permission for Miss Flip to come to tea with us every Saturday or Sunday afternoon. That would be allowed, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Flip said. “Esmée Bodet’s parents are spending a month in Montreux and she has dinner with them every Sunday. But Paul’s a boy and we’re not allowed to have dates until we’re seniors.”

“I think if I were very charming”—Georges Laurens refilled her cup with hot chocolate from the copper saucepan—“I could manage your headmistress. What is her name?”

“Mademoiselle Dragonet,” Flip told him. “We call her the Dragon,” she said, then added, remembering the visit in the infirmary, “but she’s really quite human.”

Georges Laurens laughed. “Well, I shall be St. George, then, and conquer the dragon. I will brave her in her den this very afternoon.

“And now I suggest that you get back to your school and tomorrow we will have a proper visit, and I will come for you and bring you over.” He held out his hand. “I promise.”

It never occurred to Flip that on this last forbidden trip to the château she might be caught. Luck had been her friendly companion in the venture and now that the visits to Paul were
about to be approved by authority, surely fortune would not forsake her. But, just as she came to the clearing where the railroad tracks ran through the woods, she saw two figures in warm coats and snow boots and recognized Madame Perceval and Signorina del Rossi. She darted behind a tree, but they had evidently caught a glimpse of her blue uniform coat, for Signorina put a gloved hand on Madame Perceval’s arm and said something in a low voice, and Madame Perceval called out sharply, “Who is it?”

Flip thought of making a wild dash for safety, but she knew it would be useless. They were between her and the school and they would be bound to recognize her if she tried to run past them. So she stepped out from behind the tree and confronted them just as a train came around the bend. In a moment the train was between them; she was not sure whether or not they had had an opportunity to recognize her in the misty dark—the school uniforms were all identical and there were dozens of girls with short fair hair. Now was her chance to run and hide. They would never find her in the dark of the woods and the train would give her a good chance to get a head start. But somehow, even if this meant that she would never be given permission to see Paul, she could not run like a coward from Madame Perceval, so she stood very quietly, cold with fear, until the train had passed. Then she crossed the tracks to them.

“Thank you for waiting, Philippa,” Madame Perceval said.

She stood, numbly staring at the art teacher, her fingers twisting unhappily inside her mittens.

“Did you know you were out of bounds, Philippa?” Madame Perceval asked her.

She shook her head. “I didn’t remember where the bounds were.” Then she added, “But I was pretty sure I was out of them.”

Signorina stood looking at her with the serene half smile that seldom left her face even when she had to cope with the dullest and most annoying girls in her Italian classes. “Where were you going, little one?”

“Back to school.”

“Where from?”

“I was—walking.”

“Was it necessary to go out of bounds on your walk?” Madame Perceval asked coldly. “Mademoiselle Dragonet is very severe with girls who cross the railroad tracks.”

Flip remembered the walk on which she had first met Ariel, and how, somehow, it had been necessary to go up, up the mountain. “I wanted to climb.”

“Were you alone?” Madame Perceval looked at her piercingly, but the dark hid the girl’s expression. When she hesitated, Madame pursued, “Did you meet anyone?”

“Yes,” Flip answered so low that she could scarcely be heard.

“You’d better come back to the school with me,” Madame Perceval said. She turned to Signorina. “Go along, Signorina. Tell them I’ll come when I can.”

In silence Flip followed Madame down the mountain. When she slipped on a piece of ice and her long legs went flying over her head, Madame helped her to pick herself up and brush off the snow, but she said nothing. They left the trees and crossed the lawn, covered with patches of snow, and went into the big hall. Madame Perceval led the way upstairs,
and Flip followed her, on up the five flights and down the hall to Madame’s own rooms. Madame switched on the lights and when she spoke her voice was suddenly easy and pleasant.

“Sit down, Philippa.” Flip’s spindly legs seemed to collapse under her like a puppy’s as she sat on the stool in front of the fire. “Now,” Madame went on. “Can you tell me about it?”

Flip shook her head and stared miserably up at Madame. “No, Madame.”

“Who did you go to meet?”

“I’d rather not say. Please.”

“Was it anybody from school?”

“No, Madame.”

“Did anybody at school have anything to do with it?”

“No, Madame. There wasn’t anybody else but me.”

“And you can’t tell me who it was you went to meet?”

“No. I’m sorry.”

“Philippa,” Madame said slowly. “I know you’ve been trying hard and that the going has been rough for you. I understand your need for interests outside the school. But the rules we have here are all for a definite purpose and they were not made to be lightly broken.”

“I wasn’t breaking them lightly, Madame.”

“Once a girl ran away and was killed crossing the railroad tracks. They are dangerous, especially after dark. You see they are placed out of bounds for a very good reason. And if there’s anybody you want to see outside school, it’s not difficult to get permission. If you were one of the senior girls, I might think you were slipping away to meet one of the boys from the school up the mountain. But I know that’s not the
case. I don’t like having to give penalties, and if you’ll tell me about it, I promise you I’ll be as lenient as I can.”