"Blyton, Enid - St Clare's 06 - Fifth Formers at St Clare's" - читать интересную книгу автора (Blyton Enid)

' Tomorrow I'll get Violet Hill,' said Angela. ' Clear out, Antoinette, you're a perfect menace.'
Antoinette cleared out and there was peace. ' Well,' said Angela,' she'll wish she'd been more sensible tomorrow. Serves her right ! I was nice to her, and she thought the world of me-but I can't put up with idiots. She'll be jolly sorry when she sees I don't mean to give her another chance!'
' I don't feel like any tea now,' said Alison, looking at the remains of the toast with dislike. ' Do you, Anne-Marie ?'
'No,' said Anne-Marie, and shuddered. 'I still feel
sick. I don't even know if I can read my poem. It doesn't go very well with shoe-polish.'
' Oh, do read it, Anne-Marie,' begged Angela, who really did admire her poems. ' What's it about ?'
' It's all about the sadness of spring,' said Anne-Marie, reaching for her poem. ' It's a very sad poem, really.'
' All your poems are sad,' said Alison. ' Why are they, Anne-Marie ? I like poems that make me feel happy.'
' I am not a very happy person,' said Anne-Marie, very solemnly, and looked intense. ' Poets aren't, you know.'
' But some must have been,' objected Alison. ' I know lots of very cheerful poems.'
'Shut up, Alison,' said Angela. 'Read your poem, Anne-Marie.'
Anne-Marie began her poem. It was very doleful, full of impressive words, and rather dull. Neither Alison nor Angela liked it very much, but they couldn't help feeling impressed. However could Anne-Marie write like that ? She must indeed be a genius!
' It must be nice for you, sharing a study with Felicity, who thinks as much of music as you do of poetry,' said Alison. ' You ought to get Felicity to set some of your poems to music. That would be wonderful.'
' I've asked her. She won't,' said Anne-Marie, shortly. The truth was that Felicity would not admit that Anne-Marie's poems were worth tuppence. It was very humiliating to Anne-Marie.
' Write something real, and I'll put a tune to it,' Felicity had said. ' I'm not going to waste my music on second-rate stuff.'
The door opened suddenly and Matron looked in. ' I hear yon poor girls have had a nasty dose of shoe-polish,' she said. ' I hope it wasn't anything very serious.'
Angela thought she would take the chance of getting Antoinette into trouble, so she exaggerated at once.
' Oh, Matron, it. was awful! We had our mouths absolutely full of the beastly stuff. Anne-Marie must
have swallowed a lot, because she was sick. I shouldn't be surprised if we are ill, seriously ill tonight,' said Angela.
' I'm sure I swallowed some,' said Anne-Marie, looking solemn. ' I expect we all did.'
' Then you must come and have a dose at once,' said Matron. ' That shoe-cream contains a poisonous ingredient which may irritate your insides for a week or more, unless I give you a dose to get rid of it. Come along with me straight-away.'
The three girls stared at her in alarm. They simply could not bear Matron's medicines. They were really so very nasty! Angela wished fervently that she had not exaggerated so much.
She tried to take back what she had said. ' Oh well, Matron,' she said, with a little laugh, 'it wasn't as bad as all that, you know. We spat out practically all of it- and we rinsed our mouths out at once. We're perfectly all right now.'
' I dare say,' said Matron. ' But I'd rather be on the safe side, I don't want you in bed for a week with a tummy upset of some sort. Come along. I've got something that will stop any trouble immediately.'
'But Matron,' began Alison.
It was no good. Nobody could reason with Matron once she had really decided to give any one a dose. The three girls had to get up and follow her. They looked very blue, and felt most humiliated. As a rule Matron left the fifth and sixth formers to look after themselves, and seldom came after them, suggesting medicine. They felt like first or second formers, trooping after her for a dose.
Matron took them to her room, and measured out the medicine into table-spoons, one for each of them. It tasted almost as nasty as the shoe-polish toast !
' Pooh!' said Alison, trying to get the taste out of her mouth. 'Why don't you get some nice-tasting medicines, Matron ? I've never tasted any so beastly as yours.'
' Well, I've got a much worse one here,' said Matron. ' Would you just like to try it ? '
' Of course not!' said Alison. Then a thought struck her. ' Matron—how did you know we'd had shoe-polish on our toast today? We hadn't told a soul. Who told you?'
' Why, the poor little Antoinette told me,' said Matron, corking up the bottle. ' Poor child, she came to me in a terrible state, saying she had poisoned you all by mistake, and what was she to do if you died in the night, and couldn't I do something about it ? '
The three girls listened to this with mixed feelings. So it was Antoinette who not only provided them with shoe-polish toast, but also with medicine from Matron ! The little horror !
' You've no idea how upset she was,' went on Matron, briskly. ' Poor little soul, I felt really sorry for her. An English girl might have been amused at the mistake she had made, but Antoinette was so upset I had to comfort her and give her some chocolate. It's wonderful what chocolate will do to soothe the nerves of a first or second former ! Nothing but babies, really.'
The thought of Antoinette eating Matron's chocolate was too much for Angela, Alison and Anne-Marie. They felt that they simply must get hold of Antoinette and tell her what they thought of her.
' Where is Antoinette, do you know, Matron ?' asked Angela, wishing she could get the combined tastes of shoe-polish and medicine out of her mouth.
' I sent her to her aunt, Mam'zelle,' said Matron. ' I'm sure she would cheer her up and make her think she hadn't done such a dreadful thing after all ! Fancy thinking she really had poisoned you ! '
The three fifth-formers went back to the study. It wouldn't be a bit of good going to fetch Antoinette now. She would probably be having a nice cosy tea with Mam'zelle, who would be fussing her up and telling her everything was all right, a mistake was a mistake, and not to worry, pauvre petite Antoinette!
' I'll send for her tomorrow and jolly well keep her nose to the grindstone,' said Angela, angrily. ' I told her she needn't do anything more for me—but I'll make her now. I'll make her sorry she ever played those tricks. Clever little beast—going off to Matron and play-acting like that. She's worse than Claudine !'
Alison was alarmed to hear that Angela was going to make Antoinette do some more jobs for them.
' For goodness' sake, don't be silly !' she said to Angela. 'Antoinette is far too clever for us to get even with. She'll only do something even worse than she has already done. I told you she wouldn't be like the others, silly and worshipping. I told you she would size you up! I told you. . . .'
' Shut up, Alison,' said Angela. ' I hate people who say " I told you, I told you ! " I won't have Antoinette if you think she'll play worse tricks. She'd end in poisoning us, I should think. I wish I could pay her out, though.'
' It's partly your own fault, all this,' said Alison. ' If only you'd treat the younger ones like the others do, sensibly and properly, we shouldn't have all these upsets.'
Anne-Marie thought it was time to go. She always said that quarrels upset her poetic feelings. So she went, taking her mournful poem with her.
' We'd better not say a word about this to any one,' said Angela. ' Else the whole school will be laughing at us. We won't let it go any further.'
But alas for their plans—Antoinette told the story to everyone, and soon the whole school was enjoying the joke. It made Angela furious, for she hated being laughed at, it humiliated Alison too, for even Miss Willcox got to hear of it and teased her and Anne-Marie.
' What about a little essay on " Anchovy Sauce ",' she said. ' Poor Alison, poor Anne-Marie, what a shame !'


9 MISS WILLCOX IS IN A BAD TEMPER