Chapter XI: With Sybil, in the Wood

Betty had never spent such a day. It had been bad enough to have to blurt out before everybody the fact that she herself must certainly have been the last girl to have seen the Cup. It was worse to see the frank and absolute amazement in Sybil’s face at her words.

“_You_--Betty?”

“I--” began Betty nervously. Her fingers were flying by this time; she could hardly bring out the words; and the sight of Sybil standing quietly before her made her somehow feel all the more what a harum-scarum helter-skelter she was.

“I only meant--I mean, I didn’t mean--” she floundered. Oh, if Sybil would only let her explain the matter all by herself instead of standing, as she was, in the midst of a group of junior Guides all staring incredulously at her.

But the head of the Daisies did _not_ make the matter easier for her in that way. Her eyes were grave and quiet; but the blue of them looked stern, Betty thought. “Speak slowly; there is no hurry. Why did you touch the Cup at all without leave?” said Sybil.

“It was to help. I mean--I was cleaning it. I took it out in the gardens. I put it back. I _know_ I did,” began Betty in a quivery voice.

At this juncture, on account of the quiver, Dad would have put his arm round her and called her “Bet, pet,” and she would have felt better at once. Sybil, who _could_ be kind and sweet, as Betty knew, did none of these things.

“You took the Guide Cup, then, from the shelf without asking, Betty? And cleaned it in the garden without leave? It did not occur to you, then, that the Cup is the property of every one of the Guides, and that we are the patrol responsible for it this year. As I am head of that patrol, you should have asked _me_.”

“I just thought--” Betty would have welcomed a yawning cavern if it would only kindly have opened its jaws to receive her.

But it did not. She was left, for the first time in her life, perhaps, to bear the brunt of her helter-skelter ways as she stood for several moments surrounded by the junior Guides of the company, and with the full consciousness of Sybil’s cool, quiet gaze fixed upon her while she waited thoughtfully without speaking a word.

Then--“You took a very great responsibility on yourself, Betty Carlyle, in doing what you did,” said the head. “I am afraid that indirectly your action may be at the root of the loss of the Cup.” She spoke in tones as cold as the glance from her blue eyes. Then she turned and began to cross the lawn again.

But even as she went she seemed to recollect something, and for one instant turned again. “All of you juniors will go at once, please,” she said, “and get ready for games. As I have kept you back for a moment it will be best, I think, for you not to waste time now in talking while you change your shoes, but to go straight to the field. Gerry and Betty, will you collect the rugs before you go?”

It was kind of Sybil. Even at that moment, even while Betty was in the direst disgrace that had ever fallen upon her, the head girl had realized--even while blaming the culprit--her state of mind. By this arrangement Betty gained a few minutes’ breathing-space, with Gerry her friend at her side, before joining the rest. The Mascot bent over her task with a crimson face.

_Would_ Gerry say anything comforting?

But Gerry was apparently too much overwhelmed to speak. It was only when, carrying the rugs between them, they had nearly reached the house, that Betty summoned up courage to gulp out an inquiry.

“Gerry,” she whispered in a panting voice, “I didn’t mean anything. I truly thought I was helping.”

Gerry said nothing.

“I--Sybil doesn’t think I--_took_ it, does she?” said poor Betty.

“_Took_ it!” almost shouted Gerry in an outraged tone. “_Took_ it! Do you mean to say that Sybil--or any Guide--would think that of any other? You may be only a mascot,” went on Gerry, “but you’ve been at Benedick’s a month, and you ought to know.”

“Oh.” Betty was half-relieved but almost half-frightened, too, by the vehemence of her friend’s tone. “Why----?”

It was with Gerry’s next words that the full force of the situation struck her. “It’s not that Sybil thinks that; she couldn’t. We none of us could. And you couldn’t have done it; none of us could. But the Cup was taken by some one, I suppose, who saw you with it. A tramp, perhaps, creeping in while we were at dinner. And the Cup is in the Daisies’ charge this year; and our patrol is responsible for it.”

“But it will be found. It couldn’t have gone far. I put it back quite carefully though I was hurrying, so it couldn’t have slipped off the ledge, or I would have thought it was just that. Gerry, you don’t mean that, if it isn’t found, the patrol will lose _marks_?”

“_Marks!_” repeated Gerry almost scornfully. “As though marks were everything!” She stopped.

The others were not so reticent. On the arrival of the two last-comers on the cricket field the excited looks of the players were hard to bear. When the game was over, too, and they all trooped back through the grounds and on to the terrace for tea, the same subject was on every lip.

“Is the Cup found?”

It was not, as Doron, prefect in charge of the meal, told them all tersely. She did not encourage conversation in the matter, but it would have been as easy for her to stem a mill-stream as to quench the curiosity of the juniors. Cowslips, Foxgloves, Buttercups, Daisies--there was horror in every eye. Then it _was_ gone. It hadn’t just slipped down or anything when Betty--Every one of them stopped short at the utterance of her name. Not one of them blamed her in words. But there was a look of horrified amazement in their eyes as they gazed at her, which was worse, Betty felt, to bear than anything at all. A greater “worst” came, however, when tea was over.

She was collecting her goods and chattels in a corner of the study. Her eyes were filled with tears by this time, and she had found it difficult for that reason to distinguish between the names of the subjects written on the labels of her books. She was still, perforce, then, gropingly trying to mop her eyes when--the rest having found their way preparation-roomwards--two prefects entered the study for reasons of their own.

Doron and Sylvia talking together.

“I thought Sybil was taking on unnecessary trouble for herself by adopting the child as mascot.”

It was Sylvia.

“Quixotic, I call it. Especially when the Daisies were so keen to hold the Cup for the second year, and a newcomer might easily have pulled them down. Well, they’ve lost it now, I’m afraid; and even though it will go to the Foxgloves instead, yet Hilda was saying that it _is_ hard on Sybil.”

“Lost the Cup; yes, in two senses.” It was Doron’s voice. “I suppose you are right. Miss Carey could not overlook it, I should think. She would say, I expect, that even though the child isn’t enrolled yet, Sybil should have had more control over her.”

The said “child” suddenly appeared--choking, speechless, rising from the lowest shelf but attempting to face the two. “I--” began Betty.

“Go and take your place in the preparation-room,” said Sylvia in level tones. “We did not know you were there,” she added quietly, “or we should not have said what we did in your hearing, of course. Still, you must know it some time.”

They had said she was to go to the preparation-room: they expected her to obey, of course; but Betty couldn’t. Saddled even though she was with books of every description, she took a flying headlong race down the corridor and into the cloakrooms behind. Then she flung down her impedimenta and hurried breathlessly miserable into the garden. She must get away; she must. Up the green strip between the gardens into the school wood behind she went, and flung herself down under the trees.

She had lost the Cup! Even if it were found, yet she had still lost it in another way to the Daisy patrol! The prefects had said so. She, their mascot, who had been taken on by Sybil in spite of the fact that she might ruin their chances. And she had done this! As she lay there face down in the bracken and blue-bells, life seemed unhappier than it had ever seemed before. It was not until she had sobbed till she was weary and weak that she fell asleep.

It was from a medley of dreams that she was roused. She had been dreaming of the piper and the cottage in the wood; and that the fairies were guarding the Cup; and that the patrol had adopted a fairy as a mascot instead of herself. She gave a little sob as she woke up, however, and as she did so she heard a voice.

“Oh, poor little thing!” said the voice. “Wake up.”

It was Sybil’s voice, and Sybil was seated beside her among the bracken. It may have been the first waking sight of her that had given the Mascot the fairy dream, so she thought suddenly; because, with a background of blue-bells and green trees, Sybil, sitting there crowned with her halo of corn-coloured hair, and with the old kind look in her eyes again, might have been, to Betty’s eyes anyhow, a most beautiful fairy princess.

“I--” began Betty, sitting up and rubbing her eyes; “I heard what they said; and it’s true. And I--” She began to cry again.

“I know what you heard,” said Sybil’s voice, “for they told me. They told me, too, that they were sorry that you heard. Well, in one way, Sylvia is right; but in another way she was not. Betty, listen. Even although, just because of your helter-skelter ways, it seems that we may lose the Cup for the patrol, yet I shall never be sorry we took you as mascot.” Sybil’s voice was quiet, and felt like cool, refreshing springs to Betty’s thirsty heart.

“Why?” whispered Betty, turning tear-stained eyes on the head girl.

“Just because you came to us to be trained to be a true Guide; and if, in your learning, we have to help you to buy your experience, we’ll do it gladly, because we’re your fellow-Guides,” said Sybil. “You’ll learn more by this, I’m sure, than in any other way. Well, that will be knowledge gained by all of us because you’re a part of the patrol. Betty, do you understand?”

Sybil bent down and kissed her.

And as Sybil kissed her, Betty knew one thing; and that was that some day, even if it took a whole lifetime of trying, she would hope to be like Sybil herself, and to help other would-be Guides in just the same way to try again. She got up without a word and smoothed back her hair.

“Go straight to the dormitory,” said Sybil in a different tone. “I guessed you might be here, so I came to see. It is nearly bedtime, and I will ask Nurse if you may have something in bed instead of supper. Don’t fuss any more.”

Betty went.

She was in bed when the rest came up. Perhaps Sybil had spoken to them also; perhaps not; Betty never knew. But at any rate they began to talk to each other, and did not trouble her to join in.

“There’s one thing certain and sure,” said Mona, “that there’ll be some reason now for that tracking expedition next Saturday----”

Betty fell asleep while the discussion was still going on.