“A very neat way of getting out of further speechifying!” said Verity, as by general consent the concert carried the day; “but you shall open it yourself, Madam Warden, so I warn you! You’re not going to be let off, don’t you think it! Silence! Ladies and gentlemen, the first item on the program will be a piano solo by Miss Ingred Saxon, the celebrated musical star, brought over at enormous expense, on purpose for this occasion.”
“You blighter!” murmured Ingred, as the prospective audience shouted “Hear! Hear!”
“Not a bit of it!” purred Verity. “I guess we’ll take sparks out of the Sixth and everybody else.”
Va that afternoon was certainly in a position to boast itself. It was the only form in possession of a piano: for by the sheerest accident it had one. The instrument was only a temporary visitor, placed there for convenience while some repairs were being done to a leaking gas-pipe in one of the music rooms. It’s an ill wind, however, that blows nobody good, and it gave Va an opportunity that was denied even to the Sixth. Ingred was at once escorted to the piano, and officious hands piled exercise books on a chair to make her seat high enough.
“I can’t remember anything! I can’t indeed!” she protested vigorously.
“Now don’t twitter nonsense!” said Nora. “I’ve heard you play dozens—yes, dozens!—of things without music at the hostel, so you’ve just got to try!”
“I shall break down, I know I shall!”
“Then you can begin again at the beginning. Fire away, and don’t be affected!” commanded Nora.
It is one thing to play a piece from memory when you have the room to yourself, and quite another to play it with half a dozen girls hanging over the piano, and the rest of the audience sitting on their desks. Ingred wisely did not venture on anything too classical, but tried a bright “Spanish Ballade,” and managed to get successfully to the end of it without any breakdown. In the midst of the clapping that followed came a loud rap-tap-tap at the door, which immediately opened to admit—much to the astonishment of the Fifth—two of the prefects, and a consignment of Sixth form girls.
“Whatever have we been and gone and done now?” murmured Verity.
“Is music taboo?” asked Ingred guiltily, slipping away from the piano.
The errand of the prefects, however, was evidently one of conciliation, and not of reproof. They were smiling, and looking amiability itself.
“We thought, as you’ve got a piano in your room,” began Lilias Ashby, “that we might as well come and join you, if you don’t mind. Janie’s got a book of songs with her.”
“Oh, by all means, of course!” replied Va politely and unanimously. “We’re just having a sort of concert, you know.”
“Sure you don’t mind?”
“Not a bit of it!”
“Right-o! Run and tell Janie then, Susie, and ask her to bring the others.”
An invasion from the Sixth was indeed an unwonted honor, which probably nothing short of a piano would have accomplished. The hostesses, somewhat overwhelmed, seated the distinguished guests to the best of their ability in the rather limited accommodation, and hospitably passed round their few remaining pieces of chocolate.
“We’ll leave the door open, please,” said Lispeth, “because I promised Miss Burd not to let those intermediates get too outrageous, and I have to listen out for them.”
Janie Potter, with her book of songs, was pushed forward, and began to entertain the company with popular selections of the day, to which they chanted the choruses. She had a good clear voice, and the audience joined with enthusiasm in the various ditties.
The clapping which followed was continued down the landing, and, through the open door, peered the interested faces of most of the members of Vb who had come to share the fun.
“May we butt in?” they asked hopefully.
“Not a square inch of room for you,” answered Lispeth, “but you may squat in the corridor outside if you like. Anybody who performs can join the show, but that’s all. I’ll tell you when it’s your turn. It’s Va next. Now then,” (turning to the hostesses), “who else can do anything? Francie Hall, come along at once!”
“I can’t! I can’t!” objected Francie. “So it’s no use asking me; it isn’t indeed! I’ll tell you what—Bess Haselford plays the violin, and, what’s more, she’s got it with her, for I saw her put it away in the dressing-room.”
“O-O-Oh! It was my lesson with Signor Chianti this afternoon, that’s why I had to bring it!” said Bess, turning red.
“Go and fetch it, Francie!” ordered Lispeth. “You know where it is.”
Francie returned in a short time, and handed the neat leather case to its owner. Bess, looking flustered and nervous, drew out the violin, and began to tune it.
“I’ve brought your music too!” said Francie, triumphantly opening a folio, “so you’ve no excuse for saying you can’t remember anything. Who’ll play your accompaniment? Here, Ingred!”
“Oh! somebody else would do it far better,” protested Ingred. “Janie—”
“I’m no reader.”
“Lilas?”
“Couldn’t to save my life!”
“Go ahead, Ingred, and don’t waste time!” said Lispeth firmly.
Ingred sat down to the piano without a smile. Her schoolmates took her unwillingness for modesty, but in her heart of hearts her main thought was: “Why should I help this new girl to show off?” She would have played accompaniments gladly for anybody else, but she considered that Bess had already received quite enough attention in one afternoon. For her own credit, however, she
