Cat Among the Pigeons - Agatha Christie [29]
“Azerbaijan,” said Miss Bulstrode automatically, her mind still on her own thoughts.
“Not enough experience,” she murmured to herself. “That’s the risk. What did you say, Chaddy?”
Miss Chadwick repeated the message.
“I told Miss Shapland to say that we’d ring him back, and sent her to find you.”
“Say it will be quite all right,” said Miss Bulstrode. “I recognize that this is an exceptional occasion.”
Miss Chadwick looked at her keenly.
“You’re worrying, Honoria.”
“Yes, I am. I don’t really know my own mind. That’s unusual for me—and it upsets me … I know what I’d like to do—but I feel that to hand over to someone without the necessary experience wouldn’t be fair to the school.”
“I wish you’d give up this idea of retirement. You belong here. Meadowbank needs you.”
“Meadowbank means a lot to you, Chaddy, doesn’t it?”
“There’s no school like it anywhere in England,” said Miss Chadwick. “We can be proud of ourselves, you and I, for having started it.”
Miss Bulstrode put an affectionate arm round her shoulders. “We can indeed, Chaddy. As for you, you’re the comfort of my life. There’s nothing about Meadowbank you don’t know. You care for it as much as I do. And that’s saying a lot, my dear.”
Miss Chadwick flushed with pleasure. It was so seldom that Honoria Bulstrode broke through her reserve.
II
“I simply can’t play with the beastly thing. It’s no good.”
Jennifer flung her racquet down in despair.
“Oh, Jennifer, what a fuss you make.”
“It’s the balance,” Jennifer picked it up again and waggled it experimentally. “It doesn’t balance right.”
“It’s much better than my old thing,” Julia compared her racquet. “Mine’s like a sponge. Listen to the sound of it.” She twanged. “We meant to have it restrung, but Mummy forgot.”
“I’d rather have it than mine, all the same.” Jennifer took it and tried a swish or two with it.
“Well, I’d rather have yours. I could really hit something then. I’ll swap, if you will.”
“All right then, swap.”
The two girls peeled off the small pieces of adhesive plaster on which their names were written, and reaffixed them, each to the other’s racquet.
“I’m not going to swap back again,” said Julia warningly. “So it’s no use saying you don’t like my old sponge.”
III
Adam whistled cheerfully as he tacked up the wire netting round the tennis court. The door of the Sports Pavilion opened and Mademoiselle Blanche, the little mousy French Mistress, looked out. She seemed startled at the sight of Adam. She hesitated for a moment and then went back inside.
“Wonder what she’s been up to,” said Adam to himself. It would not have occurred to him that Mademoiselle Blanche had been up to anything, if it had not been for her manner. She had a guilty look which immediately roused surmise in his mind. Presently she came out again, closing the door behind her, and paused to speak as she passed him.
“Ah, you repair the netting, I see.”
“Yes, miss.”
“They are very fine courts here, and the swimming pool and the pavilion too. Oh! le sport! You think a lot in England of le sport, do you not?”
“Well, I suppose we do, miss.”
“Do you play tennis yourself?” Her eyes appraised him in a definitely feminine way and with a faint invitation in her glance. Adam wondered once more about her. It struck him that Mademoiselle Blanche was a somewhat unsuitable French Mistress for Meadowbank.
“No,” he said untruthfully, “I don’t play tennis. Haven’t got the time.”
“You play cricket, then?”
“Oh well, I played cricket as a boy. Most chaps do.”
“I have not had much time to look around,” said Angèle Blanche. “Not until today and it was so fine I thought I would like to examine the Sports Pavilion. I wish to write home to my friends in France who keep a school.”
Again Adam wondered a little. It seemed a lot of unnecessary explanation. It was almost as though Mademoiselle Blanche wished to excuse her presence out here at the Sports Pavilion. But why should she? She had a perfect right to go anywhere in the school grounds that she pleased. There was certainly no need