So we went on making music, with no remorse.
At ten o’clock, I thought I ought to go and I managed to persuade them to let only an old servant take me back … Nevertheless I wondered what on earth the peppery Redhead would say to me!
The servant came into the hotel with me and I discovered that my companions were still in the courtyard, occupied in crumpling up roses and drinking beer and lemonade.
I could have returned to my room unnoticed but I preferred to stage a little effect so I presented myself modestly to Mademoiselle who leapt to her feet at the sight of me.
‘Where have you come from?’
With my chin, I indicated the servant accompanying me and she meekly produced her set speech:
‘Mademoiselle spent the evening at the Master’s with the young ladies.’
Then she murmured a vague good night and vanished.
I was left alone (one, two, three!) with … a fury!
Her eyes blazed, her eyebrows knitted together till they touched, while my stupefied classmates remained standing, their half-finished roses in their hands.
From Luce’s brilliant glances and Marie’s scarlet cheeks, and Anais’s feverish appearance, it looked to me as if they were a little tight; of course, there was no harm in that.
Mademoiselle Sergent did not utter a word; either she was trying to find adequate ones or else she was forcibly controlling herself so as not to explode.
At last she spoke, but not to me.
‘Let us go upstairs, it’s late.’
So it was in my room that she was going to burst out?
Very well, then … On the stairs, all the girls stared at me as if I had the plague: little Luce questioned me with her imploring eyes.
In the room, there was, at first, a portentous silence; then the Redhead interrogated me with weighty solemnity:
‘Where were you?’
‘You know very well … at the X’s … some friends of my father’s.’
‘How did you dare leave your room?’
‘How? You can see for yourself. I pulled out the dressing-table that barred that door.’
‘This is the most odious insolence!
I shall inform your father of your monstrous behaviour. No doubt it will give him intense pleasure.’
‘Papa?
He’ll say:
“Good gracious, yes, that child has a passion for liberty”, and he’ll wait impatiently for you to finish your story so that he can eagerly bury himself again in the Malacology of Fresnois.’
She noticed that the others were listening and turned on her heels.
‘Off to bed, all of you!
If your candles aren’t out in a quarter of an hour, you’ll have me to deal with!
As to Mademoiselle Claudine, she is no longer my responsibility and she can elope this very night, if she pleases!’
Oh! shocking! Really, Mademoiselle!
The girls had disappeared like frightened mice and I was left alone with Marie Belhomme who declared:
‘It’s absolutely true that they can’t shut you up. But do stir your stumps a little so that she doesn’t come back to blow out the candle.’
One sleeps badly in a strange bed and, besides, I glued myself all night against the wall so as not to brush against Marie’s legs.
In the morning, they woke us up at half past five: we got up in a state of torpor and I drenched myself in cold water to rouse myself a little.
While I was splashing, Luce and the lanky Anais came in to borrow my scented soap, ask for a corkscrew, etc.
Marie begged me to start plaiting her chignon for her.
They were an amusing sight, all those little creatures, still half-asleep and wearing next to nothing.
We exchanged views on ingenious precautions to take against the examinations.
Anais had copied out all the history dates she wasn’t sure of on the corner of her handkerchief (I should need a tablecloth!). Marie Belhomme had contrived to make a minute atlas which could be slipped into the palm of her hand. On her white cuffs, Luce had written dates, fragments of royal reigns, arithmetic theorems – a whole manual. The Jaubert sisters had also put down quantities of useful information on strips of thin paper which they rolled up in the tubes of their penholders.
They were all very anxious concerning the examiners themselves; I heard Luce say:
‘In arithmetic, it’s Lerouge who takes the oral questions; in physics and chemistry, it’s Roubaud … apparently he’s an absolute beast; in literature, it’s old Salle …’
I broke in:
‘Which Salle?
The one who used to be Principal of the college?’
‘Yes, that’s the one.’
‘What luck!’
I was delighted that I was to be questioned by this extremely kind old gentleman whom Papa and I knew very well; he would be good to me.
Mademoiselle Sergent appeared, concentrated and taciturn at this zero hour before battle.
‘You haven’t forgotten anything?