The Secrets of Drearcliff Grange School Read Online Free Page A

before word gets out.’
    For the first time, Amy wondered if Mother was wrong. Maybe floating wasn’t entirely wicked.
    She was tired of hearing things like ‘how are you ever going to get a husband if you can’t keep your feet on the ground?’
    She wasn’t sure about netball though.
    A bell sounded, from down below.
    ‘Grub’s up,’ announced Frecks. ‘Form an orderly rabble and proceed to the Refectory. Come on, Thomsett, we’ll get you there alive. Then it’s down to whether you can survive the worst Cook flings at you. Word to the wise, shun the semolina. I have it on an impeccable authority that it’s bat’s blood in sick.’

IV: School Supper
    T HE R EFECTORY MADE Amy wonder if Old House had begun as Drearcliff Abbey or Drearcliff Castle. The feeding trough was the sort of place Douglas Fairbanks generally did sword-fighting in, complete with flying buttresses, depressed arches, ribbed vaults and other features of architectural interest.
    Stained-glass windows showed men in armour battling she-demons, who were generally getting the best of the fight. Amy wasn’t sure the windows were appropriate for younger girls. Several panels showed dismembered knights roasted on spits by happy, red-skinned devil cooks with extra mouths in their bosoms.
    Pupils sat on benches at five long House tables, arranged by year. This meant roughly by size, though the odd freakishly tall or stunted specimen broke up any neat arrangement. Thirds had places half-way along the Desdemona table. They could look across at their contemporaries in other Houses. It was not done to pay attention up-table or down-table, where seniors or juniors sat.
    Hundreds of girls, talking all at once, clattered to their table-places. The sound of wooden bench-legs scraping on stone set Amy’s teeth on edge.
    Frecks anatomised the Houses.
    ‘Goneril are Sport House,’ Frecks explained. ‘Win at absolutely everything, from cross-country runs to tiddlybloodywinks. It’s
so
tedious. They used to play boys’ schools at football, but an archdeacon’s son got crippled – and his side took a ten-two hammering – so that was stopped. Tamora has the terrors. I josh you not. You’d do well to stay away. The most evil Witches are Tamora. Viola are babies. Blub all the time. The Greek dancing on the lawn soppists you saw earlier. Utterly wet and contemptible. Ariel are so stuck up you’d think they were
port over starboard home
through and through. Their people are mostly in trade. We can’t stand ’em. Got all that?’
    ‘Sporty, terrifying, babies and posh, yes. What are we?’
    ‘Desdemona? Red-headed stepchildren. Who don’t fit anywhere else. Come second in most things. If we’re top, it doesn’t count because we don’t win
properly
. You’ll hear that a lot.’
    High Table was set on a dais before a triptych of especially ferocious dragons. It had a white tablecloth and the best china. Also, decanters of spirits and wine glasses. Girls made do with tumblers and jugs of brackish water, though Princess Kali surreptitiously dripped something fiery from a bullet-dented hip flask into her tumbler.
    Once the girls were settled, they were counted off by Table Captains from each form, with the few absences due to illness listed. Light Fingers was the Third Desdemona Captain. Then, Headmistress made an entrance, cape flapping. Raucous hubbub ceased. After Dr Swan was settled on a throne at the centre of High Table, nine women – and one man! – walked in a processional and took high-backed chairs either side. Teachers wore capes and mortar-boards. Keys, the custodian, had no academic accoutrements, but her jangling keys were a mark of authority. A woman in a white starched wimple and an apron with a red cross on it must be Nurse. The man was very fat, nearly bald and wore a clergyman’s collar. Amy guessed he was School chaplain. The Staff faced out at the Refectory, at once on display and commanding an audience.
    Servants rolled trolleys