All the same, this one detested her sister and I thought I could drag any number of revelations about Aimee out of her by cramming her with sweets and also by beating her.
‘Have you finished your essay?’
‘Yes, I’ve finished … but I didn’t know the stuff a bit … I’m sure I’ll get rotten marks …’
‘Give me your exercise-book.’
I read her essay, which was very so-so; then I dictated some things she’d forgotten and remodelled her sentences a little.
She was in a welter of joy and astonishment and observed me slyly, with surprised, enchanted eyes.
‘There, you see, it’s better like that … Tell me, do the boarders in the boys’ school have their dormitory opposite yours?’
Her eyes lit up with mischief.
‘Yes, and at night they go to bed the same time as we do, on purpose. And, you know, the windows have no shutters so the boys try and see us in our chemises.
We lift up the corners of the curtains to look at them and it’s no good Mademoiselle Griset keeping watch on us till the light’s put out.
We always find a way of pulling a curtain right up, all of a sudden, and that makes the boys come back every night to spy.’
‘Well, well! You have a gay time undressing up there!’
‘We certainly do!’
She was becoming lively and more familiar.
Mademoiselle Sergent and Mademoiselle Lanthenay were still together in the Second classroom.
Aimee showed the Redhead a letter and the two of them burst out laughing, but they kept their laughter very low.
‘Do you know where your sister’s ex-Armand has gone to bury his sorrows, young Luce?’
‘No, I don’t.
Aimee never talks to me about her private affairs.’
‘I thought as much.
Has she got her room upstairs too?’
‘Yes, the nicest and most comfortable of the assistant-mistresses’ rooms – much prettier and warmer than Mademoiselle Griset’s.
Mademoiselle’s had curtains with pink flowers put in it and linoleum on the floor, my dear, and a goatskin rug. And they’ve enamelled the bed white.
Aimee even wanted to make me believe that she’d bought all these lovely things out of her savings.
I told her straight:
“I’ll ask Mamma if it’s true.”
Then she said:
“If you mention it to Mamma, I’ll have you sent back home on the excuse that you’re not working.”
So, as you can imagine, there was nothing for me to do but keep my mouth shut.’
‘Ssh.
Mademoiselle’s coming back.’
And, indeed, Mademoiselle was approaching, abandoning her tender, laughing expression for her school-mistress’s face.
‘Have you finished, girls?
I am going to dictate you a problem in geometry.’
Dolorous protests arose, demanding another five minutes’ grace.
But Mademoiselle Sergent was not moved by these supplications, which were repeated three times a day, and began calmly to dictate the problem.
Heaven confound similar triangles!
I was careful to bring sweets to school often with the object of seducing young Luce completely.
She took them, hardly saying thank you, filled her little hands with them and hid them in an old mother-of-pearl rosary-case.
For ten sous’ worth of too-hot English peppermints, she would have sold her big sister and one of her brothers into the bargain.
She opened her mouth, breathed in the air as to feel the cold of the peppermint and exclaimed:
‘My tongue’s freezing, my tongue’s freezing,’ her eyes rapturous.
Anais shamelessly begged sweets off me, stuffed her cheeks with them, then hastily asked again, with an irresistible grimace of affected disgust:
‘Quick, quick … give me some more to take the taste away – those had gone bad.’
As if by chance, while we were playing ‘He’, Rabastens came into the playground, bearing some exercise-books or other as an excuse.
He feigned an amiable surprise at seeing me again and profited by the occasion to thrust a love-song under my nose. He proceeded to read its amorous words in a cooing voice.
Poor noodle of an Antonin, you’re no longer any use to me now – and you never were much use! The very most you’re good for is to keep me amused for a little while and to excite the jealousy of my schoolfriends.
If only you’d go away …
‘Monsieur, you’ll find those ladies in the end classroom. I think I saw them coming downstairs … weren’t they, Anais?’
Thinking I was sending him away on account of the malignant glances of my companions, he threw me an eloquent look and departed.