conversation was made to the two new members of the staff. Had Mademoiselle Blanche been in England before? What part of France did she come from?
Mademoiselle Blanche replied politely but with reserve.
Miss Springer was more forthcoming.
She spoke with emphasis and decision. It might almost havebeen said that she was giving a lecture. Subject: The excellence of Miss Springer. How much she had been appreciated as a colleague. How headmistresses had accepted her advice with gratitude and had reorganized their schedules accordingly.
Miss Springer was not sensitive. A restlessness in her audience was not noticed by her. It remained for Miss Johnson to ask in her mild tones:
âAll the same, I expect your ideas havenât always been accepted in the way theyâerâshould have been.â
âOne must be prepared for ingratitude,â said Miss Springer. Her voice, already loud, became louder. âThe trouble is, people are so cowardlyâwonât face facts. They often prefer not to see whatâs under their noses all the time. Iâm not like that. I go straight to the point. More than once Iâve unearthed a nasty scandalâbrought it into the open. Iâve a good noseâonce Iâm on the trail, I donât leave itânot till Iâve pinned down my quarry.â She gave a loud jolly laugh. âIn my opinion, no one should teach in a school whose life isnât an open book. If anyoneâs got anything to hide, one can soon tell. Oh! youâd be surprised if I told you some of the things Iâve found out about people. Things that nobody else had dreamed of.â
âYou enjoyed that experience, yes?â said Mademoiselle Blanche.
âOf course not. Just doing my duty. But I wasnât backed up. Shameful laxness. So I resignedâas a protest.â
She looked round and gave her jolly sporting laugh again.
âHope nobody here has anything to hide,â she said gaily.
Nobody was amused. But Miss Springer was not the kind of woman to notice that.
II
âCan I speak to you, Miss Bulstrode?â
Miss Bulstrode laid her pen aside and looked up into the flushed face of the matron, Miss Johnson.
âYes, Miss Johnson.â
âItâs that girl Shaistaâthe Egyptian girl or whatever she is.â
âYes?â
âItâs herâerâunderclothing.â
Miss Bulstrodeâs eyebrows rose in patient surprise.
âHerâwellâher bust bodice.â
âWhat is wrong with her brassière?â
âWellâit isnât an ordinary kindâI mean it doesnât hold her in, exactly. Itâerâwell it pushes her upâreally quite unnecessarily.â
Miss Bulstrode bit her lip to keep back a smile, as so often when in colloquy with Miss Johnson.
âPerhaps Iâd better come and look at it,â she said gravely.
A kind of inquest was then held with the offending contraption held up to display by Miss Johnson, whilst Shaista looked on with lively interest.
âItâs this sort of wire andâerâboning arrangement,â said Miss Johnson with disapprobation.
Shaista burst into animated explanation.
âBut you see my breasts they are not very bigânot nearly big enough. I do not look enough like a woman. And it is very important for a girlâto show she is a woman and not a boy.â
âPlenty of time for that. Youâre only fifteen,â said Miss Johnson.
âFifteenâthat is a woman! And I look like a woman, do I not?â
She appealed to Miss Bulstrode who nodded gravely.
âOnly my breasts, they are poor. So I want to make them look not so poor. You understand?â
âI understand perfectly,â said Miss Bulstrode. âAnd I quite see your point of view. But in this school, you see, you are amongst girls who are, for the most part, English, and English girls are not very often women at the age of fifteen. I like my girls to
Aimee Liu, Daniel McNeill