Free Francie by Emily Hahn

maddening mist which Francie could never get used to; looked at from indoors it was exactly like a fine rain, yet out of doors one couldn’t feel separate drops of water. There was just a general clamminess everywhere, all the time. Still, she reflected, one shouldn’t complain about England’s climate. What was the use? There it was, and in a way it was a good climate; nowhere else had she seen such rich green grass and beautiful trees. That was the rain’s doing. Jefferson’s countryside seemed parched and brown when she thought of it.
    â€œGoing to be—a good—day,” said Penny, panting now as she jogged along, for the girls’ pace had been quickened by the games mistress who led them, as they approached the big front door.
    â€œThat won’t do me much good. I’m still way behind in maths and today I’ve got to swot.”
    â€œPity,” said Penny, who was quick at mathematics. “I do wish I could give you a hand. Still, you have it easy in your turn when it comes to history, and I’m no good at that.… Home at last.” She puffed out her cheeks. “Just in time, too; I’m dying for brekker.”
    The girls filed into the refectory in a general symphony of sniffling, nose-blowing and throat-clearing. Surveying her companions Francie was struck, as usual, by their luxuriant tresses worn in many stages of disarray. There wasn’t what she considered a well-groomed head in the room. Hair at school wasn’t an adornment at all, but a nuisance.
    Francie, looking around her at the table, suddenly realized that she was beginning to feel a part of the group that filled the dining hall. They looked a nice crowd of girls. They weren’t unglamorous strangers as they had seemed at first, but pleasant enough creatures. She felt a surge of affection for them, though no doubt that was due in part to relief at being back in the building, sitting down at table, instead of still trotting about in the slanting lines of dank mist. Everyone looked nice this morning, even Miss Turner. This week she was at Miss Turner’s table; there was a mistress presiding at each, and the girls moved around from one table to the next, every week. Miss Turner had been their chaperone in the train at the beginning of term—what the girls called a “traveling aunt.” She was stiff and humorless and usually difficult. This morning, however, for the first time, Francie did not hate her.
    Nevertheless a familiar thought assailed her. “What am I doing here?” she asked herself. How strange were the ways of Fate! She thought of morning coffee in Aunt Norah’s breakfast nook, with Ruth dropping in early to pick her up for school, drinking a glass of orange juice with her at the little red-lacquered table between the benches. The sun was coming in through the red-checked curtains at the kitchen window. The Frigidaire sang its happy little song, that humming buzz of America that has taken the place of the outdated teakettle singing away on the hob. It was hot, but not as hot as it would be by nine o’clock when it was time to go to school. Ruth and she were giggling about something they had seen at the movies the night before. Francie was wearing black shoes like ballet slippers and—let’s see, what would she be wearing? Her plaid skirt and white blouse, perhaps.… She was just reaching for that American glass of orange juice when she recovered herself with a slight start.
    The Jefferson breakfast nook was far away. She was sitting at a refectory table in damp, dark, dank England, spooning up the last of her porridge, which was eaten without milk. She was dressed like all the other girls there, but there was nothing soldier-like or smart in these depressing gray costumes. If the idea was to make them all look alike, she reflected, it was a theory that failed in practice; the more they stuck to the pattern the more the individual stood out