The Adventures of Fiona McCormack
A Story by Jenny O’Brien
Four very sorry and very tearful little girls arrived in the office and stood in a line, in front of the Mother superior’s desk, while she looked up and down the line, fixing each of them with her steely gaze. The girls all avoid eye contact and stared down at the floor in front of them, shuffling their feet slightly. “Heads up! Look at me girls!” barked the Mother Superior. “I didn’t invite you here so you could study the carpet!” Very slowly, four reddened and tear-stained faces looked up towards her, apprehensively. “You do all understand that you have committed a very wicked and cruel act?” she continued. The four girls all nodded sadly. “My first inclination”, said the head, “is to expel you all immediately. But first I want to hear your side of the story”. Fiona was terrified. If she were expelled, what would happen to her? The other girls had parents that could enrol them in new schools, but she had nobody. “Please Reverend Mother”, said Fiona, her voice breaking with fear, “how is Sister Dominique?” The Mother Superior looked over the top of her glasses dismissively. “It’s a bit late to be concerned about Sister Dominique’s health girl. You should have considered her welfare before you played such a wicked trick on her!” Fiona looked back down at the floor. “She is still unconscious. We will know more in the morning”, she added.
The Reverend Mother walked around her desk, stood a couple of feet in front of the four girls and addressed each of them in turn. “Fiona McCormack, I’m very surprised that you are involved in this”. Fiona wanted the floor to swallow her up. “I can’t think why you agreed to this. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!” Fiona was already very ashamed of herself and the lecture wasn’t making her feel any better. “Can you think of a single reason”, the Reverend Mother continued, “why you shouldn’t be expelled?” Fiona couldn’t think of anything, so she just shook her head sorrowfully. “Nor can I!” declared the Reverend Mother, before turning her attention to Rebecca. “Rebecca Cartwright. Stop that blubbering and look at me while I’m talking to you!” This was Rebecca’s first visit to the office and she was now crying freely. She would have liked to be able to dry her eyes, but hadn’t dared to move her hands from her head, where she had been instructed to keep them. “You haven’t been sent to me before, have you?” Rebecca managed to whisper “no Reverend Mother”. “You have certainly chosen quite a way to start girl. Would you like to explain to me why this shouldn’t be your last visit?” “I won’t ever do anything like this again”, Rebecca blurted out, totally missing the point. “Are your parents collecting you tomorrow?” asked the Head. Rebecca nodded. “How are they going to feel when I tell them not to bring you back?” This proved too much for the sensitive and generally well behaved Rebecca, who immediately dissolved into a flood of tears.
The Mother Superior decided that there was little point in carrying on any conversation with the weeping Rebecca, so moved on to Hannah. “Hannah Hall. This isn’t the first time that you have been here, is it?” Hannah was made of sterner stuff than Rebecca and answered “No Reverend Mother”, clearly and without tears. “Would I be right to say that on several occasions, you were not standing here alone?” “Yes Reverend Mother”, came the reply. “And who was it, standing alongside you?” Hannah glanced quickly to her right, where Pippa was standing, trying not to look too conspicuous. “It was Pippa, Reverend Mother”. “It was Pippa, Reverend Mother”, the head repeated in her most sarcastic tone. “Why does that name always come up?” “If Pippa jumped off a cliff, would you follow her, girl?” Hannah shook her head. “If Pippa found a way of getting expelled, would you join her?” Hannah shook her head again. “Are you sure that you wouldn’t?” asked the Mother Superior, pointedly. “No Reverend Mother”, came the reply.
“And finally”, said the Mother Superior, turning to a sheepish looking Pippa, who was shuffling her feet nervously, “we have Pippa Harris. I won’t bother to ask you about your previous visits to me, other than to say that they have been numerous. Would you agree, girl?” Pippa nodded. Normally when she stood here, Pippa remained defiant, but the Reverend Mother could detect a change this time. For once, Pippa actually looked contrite! “I never thought that I would say this, Harris, but this time you have surprised me”. Pippa shifted her weight from one leg to the other. “I always knew that you were a naughty little girl, but I never thought that you were wicked. I think that you were trying to get expelled. Is that right girl?” Pippa looked indignant. “No, that’s not right!” she declared. “No, that’s not right, Reverend Mother!” corrected the Head. “Please address me properly, girl”. “Wouldn’t you like to go to a new school?” Pippa shook her head forcefully. “Maybe one that doesn’t spank naughty girls?” enquired the Mother Superior. Pippa shook her head again. “The way you behave, anyone would think that you actually like being spanked”, said the Head, now sounding exasperated. “Doesn’t hurt much, anyway”, muttered Pippa, by way of justification.
Realising that she was in danger of losing control of the conversation, the Mother Superior returned to the other side of the desk and sat down. “I have taken the trouble this afternoon”, she started, “to talk to the other members of staff. It would seem that this was by no means, an isolated incident”. She then proceeded to go through an exhaustive list of the four girl’s misdeeds during the previous days. Nothing was missing. From the stone-throwing episode to the letting down of the Janitor’s tyres, it was all there. “Have I missed anything”, she asked looking up at the four surprised girls. Truthfully, they all shook their heads. “Quite a little crime spree, isn’t it? Who do you think you are? The Hole in the Wall Gang? None of the schoolgirls knew who she was talking about, but they shook their heads anyway. “I want to know, what is going on”, she demanded. “But quite frankly, I can’t be bothered to listen to the same story, four times, so can one of you please explain to me how four, eleven year old schoolgirls, have put Sister Dominique in intensive care. I would really like to know!” The girls all looked at each other, before she added, “Not Pippa Harris please. It has already been a very hard day and I am not sure that I can take much more!”
Fiona took a deep breath and moved a step forward. “Please Reverend Mother, we didn’t mean to hurt Sister Dominique, we really didn’t. It just happened like this”. And with that, Fiona started to explain how it all happened. She spoke about how Rebecca and Pippa had visited her in the sick room, after she had heard about her Father, how Pippa had cheered her up with the story about escaping two spankings in one day and how the Untouchables had been formed. She explained how, whatever they did, they escaped without punishment and how this had led to their last and biggest trick.
The Reverend mother listened intently, without interrupting, as Fiona gave her detailed account of their career in crime. The three other girls winced, as Fiona outlined the full extent of their activities, which sounded much worse than they had expected, when all listed together. “So you see, Reverend Mother, we know that what we did was very naughty, but we really didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt and we are very sorry about Sister Dominique, we really are!” Fiona was finishing her speech. “Please don’t expel us, we won’t ever do it again”. The Mother Superior didn’t doubt that they were sorry. One look at the four tearstained faces, made it abundantly clear that they were very sorry indeed. But she knew that with Sister Dominique in hospital, she couldn’t just let them off with a spanking. What message would that send to the rest of the school? Discipline must be maintained at all costs, even if that meant expelling all four girls. She didn’t really want to get rid of them all. Rebecca and Fiona had extremely good records, but the offence was so serious, that she knew that she couldn’t differentiate between the culprits. She knew that she would even miss her regular meetings with Pippa. She drove her to distraction, but she had a sneaking admiration for the brave, feisty little girl, who would take her hardest spankings and still come back for more. It was clear, either they would all have to go, or none of them, but she needed time to think.
“Thank you for being so honest”, she said to Fiona. “Now I must consider the next course of action. Please can you all wait outside in the hall until I have come to a decision”. As the four girls left, Sister Teresa was waiting outside for them. After a quick word with the Reverend Mother, she directed them back into the corners of the hall, insuring that their hands were on their heads and that their noses were pressed into the corners. There, they waited, for what seemed like an age, every noise making them jump for fear that it might be the door opening, summoning them back in to hear their fate.