They were puzzled to describe her position whenever their parents took notice of the pretty, well-spoken girl who was Mrs. Daubeney’s shadow. Prunella was not quite a servant, though she was as likely to be sent out to buy a black pudding for Mrs. Daubeney’s dinner as to take a cup of tea with the headmistress. Nor did she seem to be any relation of Mrs. Daubeney’s, for though they were both dark, Mrs. Daubeney’s was a thoroughly English darkness, while Prunella’s clear brown skin spoke of foreign antecedents.
When questioned Mrs. Daubeney only said, “Oh, her father was a friend of the family. Poor Gentleman, he died when she was still a babe, and entrusted her to my care.” But she would not be drawn any further, and Prunella was as ignorant of her own origins as any of the girls.
That there was a special connection between the headmistress and Prunella everyone knew, however, and Henrietta looked at her hopefully. “Could not you speak to Mrs. Daubeney? She is so busy with theSorcerer Royal I do not like to trouble her, but I know she intends to show us to him, and it will look so bad for us to lack an instructress.”
“Show you to him? What does she mean to show?”
“We are to demonstrate the Seven Shackles,” explained Henrietta. “Mrs. Daubeney thinks the exercise will make a remarkable impression upon the Sorcerer Royal. She says no other school makes its girls perform it.” Henrietta made a face. “I wish we did not have to! It makes one feel so cotton-woollish and good for nothing.”
Prunella shook her head.
“I am under strict orders to keep out of the Sorcerer Royal’s way,” she said. “I could not speak to Mrs. D without attracting Mr. Wythe’s attention—that is, I suppose I could make myself invisible, but likely he would see through that, and Mrs. Daubeney wishes me to stay away precisely because I am too magical! The class will simply have to amuse itself, Henny, and demonstrate its Shackles without Miss Liddiard’s guidance. The girls are all old enough to know how to behave themselves.”
“I would not be so sure,” said Henrietta darkly, but she rose to leave. “I hope Mrs. Daubeney may not scold Miss Liddiard. She was dreadfully cut up, and kept insisting she would stay, but she was so pale we were all afraid she would do herself an injury.”
“If good nature were all that were needed, no one could object to Miss Liddiard,” said Prunella. “But a female making her own way in the world requires more than that to get on!”
This exchange with Henrietta left Prunella rather solemn. Despite her cross words she liked Miss Liddiard, and her position struck Prunella as pitiable in the extreme. Miss Liddiard was not strong, and the solitary life of a schoolmistress, with its tedious routine and its innumerable little snubs, did not suit her. But her father had bequeathed her nothing but his own uncertain constitution upon his death; it was necessary for her to earn her own bread.
If she were a man she might be a thaumaturge, and employ hermagical abilities to good purpose. Since she was a female of gentle birth, however, she could not, in propriety, employ her magical talent toanypurpose. If she could not marry, her best hope of establishing herself lay in teaching other females afflicted with magical ability how best to avoid using it.
From Miss Liddiard’s position it was a natural progression for Prunella to consider her own, for this subject occupied an ever greater part of her thoughts as she grew older. She had always been set apart from the schoolgirls, even as she had passed her life among them. The fact that she remained at the school only at Mrs. Daubeney’s sufferance would have ensured this in any event, but the distance was increased by the colour of Prunella’s skin, the cast of her features, and the likelihood both suggested that her mother had been a native.
Mrs. Daubeney had not separated Prunella from the others by any deliberate measure. As a child Prunella had attended lessons, played and dined with the schoolgirls, and she had scarcely noticed the difference between their position and her own.
At nineteen, however, Prunella was no longer quite a girl. The older girls’ tales of their families and dreams for their futures brought her own prospects into stark relief. No chance of a glittering Season in London or a grand marriage for Prunella. For as long as she wished she might stay with Mrs. Daubeney, and do everything desired of her for no wages, but that was as much as she might look forward to in the coming years.
Of course, if she were patient and tractable, there was a chance she might inherit Mrs. Daubeney’s worldly possessions, but:I am the most impatient, intractable creature I know!thought Prunella.
In her reverie she might easily have missed the valise, for she was bundling things into chests without stopping to examine them. But as Prunella gathered another armful of objects she felt leather under her fingertips, and a curious sensation came over her.
She thought she stood, not in the familiar dusty attic, but in adifferent room altogether. A room in an alien land, for though it was dark and cool she knew somehow that it was a blazing-hot day outdoors. She felt the grit of dust between her teeth. The very air smelt different, perfumed with foreign scents—warm air, sluggish water, and earth baking under the sun.
“There you are!” said a soft voice. Though Prunella longed to see who it was, she could not raise her eyes, struggle as she might. The things in her arms clattered to the floor. She wrenched her gaze up, and saw—
Nothing. She was alone in the attic, stupefied with magic.
“Oh!” said Prunella. She put her hands over her eyes. She felt as if she had lost something terribly important, though she could not say what it was. For a moment she feared, absurdly, that she might cry. Then she remembered the touch of leather beneath her fingers.
On the floor, jumbled with split embroidery hoops and a stuffed owl, was a valise. It was made of brown leather, scuffed and worn as though it had been much used, though Prunella could not recall ever having seen it in Mrs. Daubeney’s possession. There were initials engraved upon it:HRG.
“Was not my father’s name Hilary?” said Prunella, and started at the sound of her voice echoing in the empty room.
“Prunella!” said Henrietta behind her.
Prunella jumped. Acting on an unexamined impulse, she hid the valise under a dusty old piece of tarpaulin. She was inclined to snap when she turned to greet Henrietta, but she forgot her irritation when she saw the girl’s anxious face.
“Why, what’s amiss?” she said.
“Emily Villiers and Clarissa Midsomer are quarrelling,” said Henrietta. “I hate to play the informer, but you know what Clarissa is like, and she is so cross I believe she would not stop at murder. She hasbitEmmy!”
“Wretched creatures! I hope they may bite each other’s heads off!” Prunella exclaimed, but she divested herself of her apron. “If theSorcerer Royal arrives while I am there, you will simply have to distract him, Henny. I declare there are times I do not know if I am in a school or a travelling circus!”
•••
WHENPrunella entered the classroom, Clarissa Midsomer was trying to bang Emily Villiers’s head against a desk. Emily was resisting this, screeching in a manner fit to bring the ceiling down.
“That is quite enough of that!” said Prunella, pushing between the combatants.
