The Early Stories of Truman Capote by Truman Capote

Author:Truman Capote
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2015-10-27T04:00:00+00:00

Louise

Ethel opened the door stealthily and looked up and down the dark corridor. It was deserted and she sighed with relief as she closed the door. Well, that was one thing done, and the only thing she had found out was that either Louise didn’t keep her mail or she burned it. The rest of them must be down at dinner, she thought; I’ll say I had a sick headache.

She crept down the stairs and went quickly across the great lounge, across the terrace, and into the dining room. The room was filled with the sound of girls’ laughing and talking. Unobserved, she took her place next to Madame at the fourth table in the quietly pretentious dining salon of Miss Burke’s Academy for Young Ladies.

In answer to Madame’s questioning eyes, she lied, “I’ve been suffering from a severe headache—I lay down to rest and I suppose I must have fallen asleep—I did not hear the dinner chimes.” She spoke with the smooth perfection of wording and accent that Miss Burke so desired all her students to acquire. Ethel was, in Miss Burke’s opinion, the epitome of all that she could ever hope to attain among her students. A young lady of seventeen with background, wealth, and certainly a most brilliant mind. The majority of the Academy girls thought Ethel rather on the stupid side—that is, about life. Ethel, in turn, blamed her unpopularity upon Louise Semon, a French girl of exquisite beauty.

Louise was generally acknowledged to be the Queen Bee of the Academy. The girls worshipped her, and the teachers jealously admired her both for her mind and for her almost uncanny beauty. She was a tall girl, magnificently proportioned, with dark olive skin. Jet black hair framed her face and flowed rich and wavy to her shoulders—under certain lights it cast off a bluish halo. Her eyes, as Madame of table four had once exclaimed in a rapture of admiration, were as black as the night. She was dearly loved by everyone—everyone except Ethel and possibly Miss Burke herself, who somehow vaguely resented the girl’s influence over the entire school. She did not feel that it was good for the school or for the girl herself. The girl had had excellent letters from the Petite Ecole in France and the Mantone Academy in Switzerland. Miss Burke had met neither of the girl’s parents, who resided at their chalet in Geneva. All arrangements had been made through a Mr. Nicoll, Louise’s American guardian, from whom Miss Burke received her check annually. Louise had come at the opening of the fall semester and had within five months put the Academy into the palm of her hand.

Ethel despised the Semon girl, who, it was rumored, was the daughter of a French Count and a Corsican heiress. She loathed everything about her—her looks, her popularity, the smallest detail of her person and mannerisms. And Ethel did not know exactly why—it was not altogether because she was jealous, though that was a great

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