The Life of Jane - Chapter Three

                      
                        

                                                School Days - Chapter Three

       Four girls surrounded Jane one recess during her second week of going to King Edward primary school "Where'd you come from?" a rough looking freckle-faced girl, who was one of Jane's classmates asked her. "You sure speak differently Think you're better than us, do you?"
    Then she smiled at another girl who stood right in front of Jane and who Jane didn't recognize. "Come here and let's see you cry," the dark-haired girl said as she beckoned  to Jane. She grabbed Jane and then pushed her backwards, while another of Jane's four tormentors kneeled behind Jane.
    Jane toppled over onto the concrete playground. When she tried to get up, the two other girls sat on her and started to slap her face.
     "You stuck-up bitch," the freckle-faced girl said. "You think you're great don't you/ We'll teach you, miss snob."
     But Beatrice was in the playground too and saw what was happening. She ran over to Jane lying on the playground, and pulled one of the girls off Jane. "Get off my sister,' she screamed. "Get off her now." The dark-haired girl tried to kick Beatrice who kicked her back, right in her shins.Another girl jumped on Beatrice's back and started pounding her.
     But in the midst of this fight the school bell rang. "Careful people,' one of the four girls said. "Recess, it's over. Let's get out of here. If Mr. Wiley, the principal catches us, we'll be up a creek."
    The four girls fled back to the school building. But one shouted back as she ran, "We're not finished with you two. We'll be back."Then they were gone.
      "Mum, you should see what happened to-day at school," Jane blurted out as soon as she got home. "These girls attacked me." Diana looked at Jane's bruised face and anger swept over her. Soon she was on the phone to the school principal, Mr. Wiley.
      "Stop this nonsense," she told him in a loud voice. "I send my daughters  to school to to learn,  not  to get beaten up by a bunch of thugs. If you don't do something soon, my husband the doctor will."
      After this phone call, the four girls didn't touch Jane or Beatrice anymore. They were warned by Principal Wiley that they'd be thrown out of school if they started any more trouble.Still, when she sat in the classroom with any of the four, they hissed at her or made faces at her when they passed her in the hall.
      Beatrice who was two years older than Jane gave her  younger sibling some advice. "Jane," she said one Saturday afternoon while a blizzard roared outside, and the two girls nestled in the living room. "We've got to start talking like Canadians. Else we'll never fit in here.'
      So the two girls started to talk like Canadians, or like English-speaking New Brunswickers. Their old upper class English accents vanished . It was a step forward in Jane and Beatrice becoming true Canadians.