3 Future Plans
Mam’zelle then turned to the other new girl. “And this is—how do you call yourself?” she asked the sturdy newcomer. “Amanda Shoutalot?”
The girls laughed. The new girl gave Mam’zelle a rather contemptuous look. “No—Amanda Chartelow,” she said, in a loud voice.
“Ah—that is what I said,” protested Mam’zelle. “Amanda Shoutalot. Poor Amanda—her school has been burnt down by fire! Hélas—it exists no longer!”
Nobody quite knew what to say. Amanda took some more bread, and ignored Mam’zelle. Gwen entered headlong into the gap in the conversation.
“Oh dear—what a dreadful thing! Did anyone get hurt?”
“No,” said Amanda, helping¹ herself to more salad. “It happened in the holidays. You probably read about it in the papers. It was Trenigan Towers.”
“Gosh, yes—I did read about it,” said Sally, remembering. “Trenigan Towers! That’s about the most famous school for sport in the country, isn’t it? I mean—you win every single match you play, and you win all the tennis shields and lacrosse cups?”
“That’s right,” said Amanda. “Well, it’s gone. There wasn’t time to find another building in a hurry, so we all had to scatter², and find other schools. I don’t know how long I’ll be here—maybe a term, maybe longer. You haven’t much of a name for sport, have you, at Malory Towers?”
This was rather too much from a new girl, even if she had come into the sixth form, and had arrived from a famous sports school. Darrell stared at her coldly.
“We’re not too bad,” she said.
“Perhaps you’d like to give us a little coaching,” said Alicia in the smooth voice that most of the girls recognized as dangerous.
“I might,” said Amanda, and said no more. The girls glanced at one another. Then they looked at Amanda and saw how strong she must be. She was a great hefty girl about five foot ten inches tall. How much did she weigh?
“Must be thirteen stone, I should think!” thought Darrell, comparing Amanda with the slim, elegant French girl. “Goodness—have we got to put up with her all the term? I shall find it hard to squash her!”
Sally was thinking the same. She was games captain for the whole school, a most important position. What Sally said had to be taken notice of, from the sixth form down to the first. Sally was a first-rate tennis player, a first-rate lacrosse player, and one of the finest swimmers Malory Towers had ever had. Nobody but Darrell could beat her at tennis, and that very seldom.

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