Opal Plumstead Read Online Free PDF Page B

she didn’t set much store by books. I read avidly, racing through the latest E. Nesbit one day and then happily tackling Hardy or H. G. Wells the next. Olivia was reluctant to try any adult novels, and even found the Chalet Girls books hard work. I loved her dearly and was very grateful to have a best friend at last, but inside my head I sometimes couldn’t help wishing I could find a true soul mate. I imagined discussing books and art and sharing ideas. I grew impatient with myself because I knew this was a silly dream, as ridiculous in its way as one of Cassie’s desert romances.
    The only people who knew more than me about books and art were the teachers who taught these subjects at school. The idea of discussing anything with Miss Reed was ludicrous. Perhaps she was knowledgeable, but I disagreed violently with her opinions. She particularly admired seventeenth-century landscape paintings, all muddy browns and dreary greens. She thought anything with colour and drama was vulgar.
    Miss Peterson taught us English, mostly Shakespeare. I
liked
Shakespeare, though it was sometimes hard work unknotting his elaborate sentences to discover their full meaning. I felt a little thrill each time I deciphered a passage, and I loved the sound of the words, even when I had only a hazy understanding. Miss Peterson didn’t just like Shakespeare, she loved him with an embarrassing passion. She read poetic passages aloud in a throbbing, ardent manner, letting her voice swoop up and down as if she were singing scales, and threw her arms about in wild gestures as if conducting herself simultaneously. We always had to bite the insides of our cheeks and press our lips together to stop ourselves bursting out laughing. I couldn’t possibly discuss Juliet or Miranda or Rosalind with her.
    I found myself telling the
least
likely teacher about Father’s success – Miss Mountbank. In housecraft, I hadn’t been concentrating while preparing my dish of baked apple. I let the custard burn for lack of stirring and I forgot to cut round the skin of my apple before baking it. It exploded with extraordinary force, spattering the inside of the oven.
    ‘You hopeless fool, Opal Plumstead! I
told
you to prepare the apple properly. Now look at the mess. What were you
thinking
of?’
    ‘I’m so sorry, Miss Mountbank. I – I was thinking about my father, who has just received such exciting news. He’s going to have a novel published!’ I declared.
    Miss Mountbank seemed even less impressed than Olivia. ‘Is that so?’ she said, handing me a cloth and scouring powder. ‘Or are you telling stories again?’
    ‘I don’t tell lies, Miss Mountbank,’ I said sharply.
    ‘I dare say that’s a lie in itself,’ she said. ‘I’ve never known such an insubordinate girl. Come along – you can start scrubbing as soon as the oven cools down. Meanwhile you can clean all the work surfaces as a punishment. You can also write me two hundred lines after school:
I must not daydream
.’
    I daydreamed intensely while writing out my two hundred lines, devising hideous tortures for Mounty. I beat her about the head with her ladle, I buttered her vigorously, I baked her in her own oven. I must have had a smile on my face thinking this, because Mounty suddenly rose from her desk and approached me.
    ‘This isn’t a laughing matter, Opal Plumstead,’ she hissed. ‘You will do another hundred lines.’
    ‘Then it’s a
crying
matter,’ I muttered.
    ‘What did you say?’ she demanded.
    ‘I was just talking to myself, Miss Mountbank.’
    ‘You think you’re so superior, you silly little girl. You’ll get your come-uppance one day, just you wait and see.’ She spoke with real venom, her little eyes black beads of hatred, her great nose as sharp as any beak. It was if she were some ancient crone of the dark arts, cursing me. I couldn’t help shivering, even though I knew she was just awful old-maid Mounty, the worst teacher in the school.
    I had a roaring