So she took rather a fancy to fat, slow, little Miss St. John, and kept glancing toward her through the morning. She saw that lessons were no easy matter to her, and that there was no danger of her ever being spoiled by being treated as a show pupil. Her French lesson was a pathetic thing. Her pronunciation
made even Monsieur Dufarge smile in spite of himself, and Lavinia and Jessie and the more fortunate girls either giggled or looked at her in wondering disdain. But Sara did not laugh. She tried to look as if she did not hear when Miss St. John called le bon pain , lee bong pang . She had a fine, hot little temper of her own, and it made her feel rather savage when she heard the titters and saw the poor, stupid, distressed childs face.
It isnt funny, really, she said between her teeth, as she bent over her book. They ought not to laugh.
When lessons were over and the pupils gathered together in groups to talk, Sara looked for Miss St. John, and finding her bundled rather disconsolately in a window-seat, she walked over to her and spoke. She only said the kind of thing little girls always say to each other by way of beginning an acquaintance, but there was something nice and friendly about Sara, and people always felt it.
What is your name? she said.
To explain Miss St. Johns amazement one must recall that a new pupil is, for a short time, a somewhat uncertain thing; and of this new pupil the entire school had talked the night before until it fell asleep quite exhausted by excitement and contradictory stories. A new pupil with a carriage and a pony and a maid, and a voyage from India to discuss, was not an ordinary acquaintance.
My names Ermengarde St. John, she answered.
Mine is Sara Crewe, said Sara. Yours is very pretty. It sounds like a story-book.
Do you like it? fluttered Ermengarde. I I like yours.
Miss St. Johns chief trouble in life was that she had a clever father. Sometimes this seemed to her a dreadful calamity. If you have a father who knows everything, who speaks seven or eight languages, and has thousands of volumes which he has apparently learned by heart, he frequently expects you to be familiar with the contents of your lesson-books at least; and it is not improbable that he will feel you ought to be able to remember a few incidents of history and to write a French exercise. Ermengarde was a severe trial to Mr. St. John. He could not understand how a child of his could be a notably and unmistakably dull creature who never shone in anything.
Good heavens! he had said more than once, as he stared at her, there are times when I think she is as stupid as her Aunt Eliza!
If her Aunt Eliza had been slow to learn and quick to forget a thing entirely when she had learned it, Ermengarde was strikingly like her. She was the monumental dunce of the school, and it could not be denied.
She must be made to learn, her father said to Miss Minchin.
Consequently Ermengarde spent the greater part of her life in disgrace or in tears. She learned things and forgot them; or, if she remembered them, she did not understand them. So it was natural that, having made Saras acquaintance, she should sit and stare at her with profound admiration.
You can speak French, cant you? she said respectfully.
Sara got on to the window-seat, which was a big, deep one, and, tucking up her feet, sat with her hands clasped round her knees.
I can speak it because I have heard it all my life, she answered. You could speak it if you had always heard it.
Oh, no, I couldnt, said Ermengarde. I never could speak it!
Why? inquired Sara, curiously.
Ermengarde shook her head so that the pigtail wabbled.
You heard me just now, she said. Im always like that. I cant say the words. Theyre so queer.
She paused a moment, and then added with a touch of awe in her voice:
You are clever , arent you?
Sara looked out of the window into the dingy square, where the sparrows were hopping and twittering on the wet, iron railings and the sooty branches of the trees. She reflected a few moments. She had heard it said very often that she was clever, and she wondered if she was, and if she was, how it had happened.
I dont know, she said. I cant tell. Then, seeing a mournful look on the round, chubby face, she gave a little laugh and changed the subject.
Would you like to see Emily? she inquired.
Who is Emily? Ermengarde asked, just as Miss Minchin had done.
Come up to my room and see, said Sara, holding out her hand.
They jumped down from the window-seat together, and went up-stairs.
Is it true, Ermengarde whispered, as they went through the hall is it true that you have a play-room all to yourself?
Yes, Sara answered. Papa asked Miss Minchin to let me have one, because well, it was because when I play I make up stories and tell them to myself,
and I dont like people to hear me. It spoils it if I think people listen.
They had reached the passage leading to Saras room by this time, and Ermengarde stopped short, staring, and quite losing her breath.