"Nothing particular; don't be so vehement, my dear! You do not quite understand me. A girl who is so uncertain of herself and--well--whom one can so easily confuse--there might come a time when you would repent that you had been intimate with her."
Milla got up, literally as white as a sheet. She felt exactly as though he had spoken of her; there are very few girls of her age who would not have felt so. But she did not say a word. She cried bitterly as she went into her bedroom, shutting the door behind her.
The next day, the moment the time for recreation was sounded, Milla took Tora by the arm, and during every recreation it was the same thing. They were both beaming with good-humour; Nora and Tinka greatly admired Milla for this. They had not thought that she had so much heart and spirit.
This little occurrence, more than anything else laid the foundation of their friendship.
The Staff was formed.
CHAPTER III
THE SOCIETY
It was soon noticed that the whole of the senior class and that next to it had come under a single influence.
Rendalen was so much struck by the alteration, without understanding the ground for it, that at last he made inquiries, and it was explained to him. He was much amused, gave the four girls their celebrated name, and at the same time suggested that they should form a "Society." It was true that they already had social evenings at his mother's, and they would continue these, but it would be better if they took the whole affair into their own hands; select the subjects for readings and lectures, or for discussion, among themselves. The last especially.
Girls had so many "fancies" in their heads that they ought to learn in early life to be able to carry out a thought, to pursue a special interest. A Society! The senior class is to institute a Society. They may invite their friends from the town or the elder girls from the second class. They will be allowed to speak at the meetings on what subjects they choose, invite whom they like to take part in the readings and music, they and no one else. They were to be empowered to make rules, elect a president and secretary, impose fines! What fancies this awakened, not in the senior class alone, but in all of them, down to the little ones who learned to spell and sing songs about the cat.
What a stir at meal-times, what a whispering during lessons, what commotions at play-time! When a school is excited by a question which must not be openly discussed in lesson hours, it causes despair among the teachers. No one studies, no one listens, no one keeps order or remembers anything. If one wishes really to be amused by the suppressed excitement of the class, one must not stand in front of them; there they restrain themselves.
No, take up your position behind them and observe their plaits; you might imagine that they had gained an independent life--they jump, they dance, they curl and uncurl themselves. The changes of colour during this extreme restlessness are comical. All the fiery red, sandy and brown-red, up to black, look as though they were wet or shining with oil, or take a dead colour like coffee grounds. There are locks which are black above and brown underneath, and those of absolute raven black; there are light ones in every shade of ashen, of yellow, or an ugly mixture of both, with green for a foundation. All these assume the wonderful changes of colour which belong to their years. The braids are as excited as though they were chattering to each other, playing tricks on one another, springing towards each other. The life behind is a perfect reflex of that in front.
At the first--that is to say, the preliminary--meeting of the Society, Nora was elected president; Tinka was so accustomed to have all the work put upon her that she knew beforehand that she would be chosen secretary; she was right, she was chosen unanimously.
It had this advantage, Nora considered, that she would thus be able to copy the minutes of the proceedings for Frederik. It was true that their earliest determination was that the proceedings should not be made public, but then Tinka was engaged.
Otherwise they began without written rules, but Frederik wrote from Christiania requiring the most clearly defined ones. He sent a draft.
There were fines for non-attendance, fines for disregarding the rules therein set down, fines for every other kind of disorder, fines for omitting to vote. But the girls took it more practically than he--the donkey--as Tinka called him on this occasion. Nora and she worked out, quite quietly, a new set of rules; they were discussed at the next meeting amid some disorder; rules did not appear to be to their taste.
A great deal of fun was made in the town over the "Society;" there were some, however, who considered it unbecoming, some thought it dangerous, but when a theatrical company visited the town and its most select representation fell on the same day as a meeting of the Society, and the members, with a few exceptions, were with difficulty persuaded to sacrifice this meeting, it was allowed that a proof had been given of their zeal. No one thought it worth while to raise the question again as regarded the chief representation; they were left in peace.
Very soon a serious error showed itself in the rules of the Society.
Any one might anonymously propose a subject for discussion to the president, and it was decided by vote whether it should be placed on the agenda.
Thus it was anonymously proposed to discuss "Immortality," but this did not obtain a single vote. The proposer was evidently not a member.
Another proposal ran, "Ought men to be allowed to wear moustaches?" and this was written in the same hand. It was now suggested that no notice should be taken of any communication which was not laid on the secretary's table during the course of the meeting. It was objected that the proposal in this case would no longer remain anonymous, but they were sufficiently confident in their own adroitness, for it was adopted.
Although the discussions were absolutely private, it was maintained in the town that one young lady in the course of her lecture had declared that it was most pitiful of men that they could not keep their vows of chastity so well as women. It was then that Dosen composed his famous "_Nora, Tora, ora pro nobis_."
With this exception it was not certain what the girls discussed, they had agreed to pretend that everything that was said about them was true, a roguish Freemasonry kept this joke going.
One of those who teased them the most was Consul Engel. He had soon made his peace with the Staff, having sent his apologies through his daughter. Besides this, he had presented Tora with a nest of Japanese boxes, in the smallest of which was a charming pin. In order to make everything smooth again, he gave a "Reconciliation Dinner," to which Milla invited several of her friends. An enormous doll had been sent by _grande vitesse_, which he set up on the table and ceremoniously introduced to the four girls. It was magnificent; Tinka had put on her stoutest dress; Tora, who was in a wild mood, sat next to Milla. She chattered without stopping for a moment, so that Milla had to pinch her under the table to make her be silent, at which Tora laughed as though she were mad. Nora ran to the piano in the middle of dessert, to sing a song which the Consul had never heard. He declared afterwards that he had never amused himself more innocently. His only notion of talking to them was to tease them, his favourite theme was the Society. They laughed at his jokes and kept them up, but they would not give in; for women are used to having the things they are fond of held up to contempt. The Society was a new thing in their lives, soon it became something more. But to show this we must return to one who is waiting for us. Anna Rogne did not come to school that Monday; Milla came up to muster with her heart full of self-reproach. Directly after school she drove round to see her, but Anna was ill; her aunts came out smiling and told her that she could not be disturbed. The next day Milla came again. She asked if she might not at least be allowed to see the invalid. Anna and she had begun to read Fabiola together; might she not read aloud to her? "Little Anna hoped she would excuse her," they said smiling, and Milla went away. Anna was away three weeks, and Milla called two or three times more, but did not see her. After that she gave up the attempt.
Anna was not ill, she told her aunts openly what was the matter; she had been deceived and slighted--nay, more than that, she had been robbed. What she meant by this last she would not explain for a long time; she could not. She must be quite alone. They could hear her the whole day walking about in the attic, and sometimes in the night as well; they were terribly frightened, but did as she wished. They always told her when they were going to have prayers, but she would never join them; when she noticed their increasing astonishment and anxiety, she at last told them that _that_ had been her greatest loss; for all that she valued most she had shared with Milla. Not to speak of their mutual profession, there was not a prayer, not a hymn, not a favourite passage of Scripture which had not been exchanged between her and her friend, as lovers exchange their betrothal rings, make presents to each other, and kiss each other's portraits.
She could no longer bear to see, to be present, to hear or think any more about the subject.
She did not cry, at all events not when any one saw her; little Anna had a strong will. She looked on what had happened as one foe looks at another. Her feelings did not take the form of _pain_, but of _anger_.
She hated the others, she pitied herself. The misapprehension she had laboured under, up to the last hour of that last day when she stood before Milla's door and heard the others laughing inside--could anything more absurd be imagined! What had she not, in utmost seriousness, shared with a girl like that, and the inward strength with which she had credited her; there were no bounds to her sense of shame when she thought of it, and yet she was obliged to think of it. She forced herself to confess it to her aunts, she forced herself to probe down into the most remote causes; it became an employment which brought others in its train. She roused herself, began to stir about, to take long lonely walks, and at last to read. At the end of three weeks she returned to school, rather paler than usual and a little thinner, but in all other respects, apparently, just as before. She did not take her old place, but was still friendly with every one, even with Milla.
Milla made no further attempts at explanation, though it was not perhaps without her knowledge that Tora did so. Anna listened to her, and asked for a little yellow cotton; she would return it the next day.
She attended all the meetings of the Society most regularly; it was evident that it interested her, but she took no active part.
Just before Christmas Rendalen was invited, on a suggestion of Nora, to tell them something about Henrik Ibsen's "Ghosts." He refused this, but asked leave to speak to them a little on hereditary responsibility; he considered that in this, when it had been thoroughly worked out and realised, were contained several new moral laws--indeed, that a revolution would be caused by it in many things.
There was great eagerness over this; they looked forward to a quiet and interesting account, but were given a wild though stirring lecture. The girls were not less frightened by Rendalen's personal agitation than by his words. At the end he shouted out that those who passed on an hereditary disease to their children--those, for example, who had frequent insanity in their families, and nevertheless, married; those who, though weakened by debauchery, brought children into the world; those who, for the sake of money, married cripples or unhealthy people and endowed their children with these afflictions--were worse than the greatest scoundrels, worse than thieves, forgers, robbers, murderers; that he would maintain.
Something must have happened: for several days Fru Rendalen had gone about with red eyes, and he himself had been away, probably to Christiania. Anna came forward and thanked him for his lecture in her own _pretentieuse_ manner; after he had gone, she said it was the best she had heard. Only one person agreed with her, and that was Miss Hall; the others said nothing, there was a painful silence. At last some one said that the lecture appeared to her to be terribly violent. Little Anna replied that people must be roused, everything was made into an _amusement_. There was too much of that in the Society itself. This caused still greater discord; Nora was annoyed, and asked if Anna would not in that case do something to help it. Anna coloured, but to every one's astonishment she replied: "Yes, she would try."
She disappeared from school for several days; but she announced that she would give a lecture at the next meeting. She wished that Rendalen, Fru Rendalen, and Karl Vangen should hear it; this was certainly not hiding her light under a bushel, her companions thought. Of course the invited guests came.
When little Anna arrived she looked overstrung, her hands trembled as her thin fingers turned the pages of her manuscript and arranged the lights on the tribune. Her voice and delivery were measured, sometimes almost sharp; she did not often raise her large eyes, but when she did so it was with a significance which was most irritating. She read her lecture--the opening was especially pointed:
"Woman does not labour to improve herself in the same degree that she expects man to do. She does not lay aside the failings which she acquired when in another and worse position. I will this evening mention one fault--lying. In her position as the weaker, woman has accustomed herself to lying, but she is no longer so defenceless as to need this. Thus I consider that in making herself appear so gentle, so pious, so modest, so lovable before strangers, even if only one is present, she lies. It is the same thing when, a straight course being disagreeable to her, she at once takes a crooked one; she gives a false reason, she makes excuses. If there is anything to be done which has grown distasteful she pleads a headache; if any one calls whom she does not wish to see, she is 'out,' though she is sitting in the parlour. It does not disturb her in the least to make her servant, her daughter, or her friend lie for her when she cannot do so herself.
"Some ladies, possibly a large proportion, have so accustomed themselves to giving untrue reasons, or to concealing the real ones, to making up excuses, that they do it without any necessity; they delight in it as in a kind of coquetry.
"Would this were only in their relations with mankind, but it is the same towards God. I will quote a writer on the subject; he says, 'It is difficult to judge woman's religious faith so long as religion remains her single intellectual interest; but when one sees a hundred, two hundred, three hundred ladies round one fashionable preacher, one suspects mischief. The easiest thing to think of is to allow oneself to be guided by another's words; it is only a step further to be enthusiastic about the preacher himself, easiest of all to feign an enthusiasm which others feel.
"'The faith which has lost its ideals on earth, and therefore transfers them to heaven, is certainly not so secure of a good reception there as the clergy promise. As a rule, there does not remain much more than a vague need.
"'There are besides many women who are very cautious; it is best to make things safe for them and theirs. I often wonder what our Lord says when they begin.'"
She quoted further, and many of the quotations aroused laughter. Karl Vangen was especially amused. From this she passed on to woman's share in societies for charitable objects; how the needs of the poor furnished an excuse for gay dances ("the proceeds for the poor," as they say); how amusing balls and even theatrical performances are organised in aid of the sufferers from shipwreck or fire.
She described how a society such as this trifled with great questions and raved about particular lecturers. Anna was severe, as young people generally are when they take upon themselves to criticise.
When she left the tribune she did not grasp what was said to her; she answered at cross purposes, or asked them what they had said, but little by little she recovered herself; when she looked for Rendalen he was gone.
She was utterly astonished; she slipped across to Fru Rendalen to hear the reason. Of course, she had to begin by asking her what _she_ had thought of it.
"Yes, my child, there is a great deal of right in what you say, but I fear that you will all inflate it into something to be taken seriously.
Poor things, you will learn then to lie to some purpose. Few women can take this seriously, my child, but they can affect to do so and overstrain themselves as well--ah yes, they often become horribly unnatural----"
At last, slowly and cautiously, came Anna's question, "Why did Herr Rendalen go?"
"Heaven knows!" She sighed, looked towards the door where he had disappeared, got up, and left the room.
Karl Vangen was talking to Tora; he now saw that Anna was disengaged, and came up to her to say that he had been "very much delighted" with some of the quotations; he knew the book. Karl Vangen had been on the high road to become a fashionable preacher; happily he had escaped, but the terror still remained with him. Anna knew this from her aunts, so she had the secret key to his remarks. He believed entirely in woman's religious convictions, he said, and did not quite agree with her.
She asked him his opinion in other respects. "I know so little about women in other ways," he said, colouring slightly, "I dare not enter into it."
As soon as ever the elders were gone, the enthusiasm of the girls broke out. "Little Anna" was the eldest of them, a thing people very easily forgot--she was so undeveloped in appearance. They had never thought her capable of such an effort. "What a remarkable point of view! how well expressed! and that by one of ourselves."
Nora and Tora were especially charmed. "That is just what we are, just as untruthful, principally in little things of course. And how we play with serious questions. We must have deeds as well, or if not deeds, then----"
"Snuff," said somebody, and the whole party burst into roars of laughter, but they began again: "It is true, Heaven knows it is true.