My first day of school at St. Albert's passed fairly uneventful. There were fourteen girls in this Upper Fifth. As Natty told me, there was another upper fifth form with sixteen students.

Altogether, St. Albert's boasted about one hundred and twenty students in total.

In the morning, we had lessons in History, Electrodynamics, Contemporary English Literature and Vector Analysis.

Our History teacher Mr. Haskins made me come to the front of the classroom and introduce myself to my classmates and to him. I just told them the bare essentials of the elaborate story that experts at the Institute had invented for me: how I grew up in the States and lived there until, a few months ago, my dad obtained a teaching position at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, how our family had moved to Britain and how my parents had decided it would be best for me to attend a boarding school.

Like I said, nothing out of the ordinary happened on my first day at the new school. There was one minor incident, though.

During the English Lit lesson one of my classmates, the girl Nancy who had sat with Natalie and me during lunch the day before, appeared to be visibly distracted: doodling in her notebook, looking out of the window and generally not paying much attention to Miss Farrow's efforts to explain Hemingway's outlook on life, as expressed in his novel 'The old man and the sea', to us.

Miss Farrow had noticed Nancy's blatant lack of interest and had reprimanded her several times already. Eventually, our English Lit teacher lost her patience.

"Congratulations, Kerrington. You have just earned yourself a visit to your tutor." Miss Farrow consulted the class-register. "That would be Lara Wainscot. She ought to be in her office now."

She wrote something on a yellow slip of paper which she then handed to Nancy.

"Wainscot will discuss proper behavior in class with you and then deal with you as she sees fit. I expect you to be back less than twenty minutes from now. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Miss," Nancy replied unhappily and left the classroom.

She returned fifteen minutes later and handed back the yellow slip of paper to our teacher.

Miss Farrow glanced at it.

"So let's see, what did she .... Ah yes." She nodded. "Very good. Precisely what was needed." She looked at Nancy. "Wouldn't you agree, Kerrington?"

"Yes, Miss." I noticed that Nancy's cheeks had gained a bit of color.

"Very well. You may return to your seat now."

The lesson continued as before, but it seemed to me that the students were paying considerably more attention now.

I wondered idly exactly how her tutor had 'dealt with' poor Nancy. As I had learned from perusing the Complete St. Albert's Rules and Regulations booklet, possible disciplinary measures ranged from a mere scolding, the assignment of extra homework or a temporary withdrawal of certain privileges – such as, permission to visit the nearby town in your free time – all the way to the administration of a spanking.

In the afternoon, I paid my initial visit to my own tutor. I had been exempted from the afternoon classes so the two of us could get to know each other as well as discuss optional extracurricular activities for me.

Allie Thomas, a bright lively girl who reminded me of Mira Lamere a bit, met me in her tiny office located in the east wing of the building. Those were offices meant specifically for the use of the tutors, she told me. A tutor's office hours – in general, not more than ten hours per week – were scheduled to avoid collisions with the tutor's own class schedule. Students were encouraged to meet with their assigned tutors at least twice per week.

From the start, Allie and I got along famously. As a third-year student, Allie was just one year older than I. She immediately agreed to address me as Cathy rather than Catherine. Indeed she herself was not particularly fond of the complete version of her own name, Alison. Allie's interests went in the direction of math and theoretical physics, too. Soon enough we fell to talking shop. We spent most of my allotted time with that. Finally, almost as an afterthought, Allie asked me if I had made friends with any of the other students here at St. Albert's already.

"Friends? I don't know." I considered that. "Of course, there is Natalie Fogg. She is my roommate."

"Fogg? They set you up to room with her?" For some reason Allie sounded less than thrilled.

"Yes, Natalie." I frowned. "Is there anything wrong with her?"

"I wouldn't put it quite like that. From what I have heard, she is quite brilliant. Brilliant but problematic."

"Problematic how?"

"Well, Fogg is here on a scholarship. To my knowledge, she is the only student here at St. Albert's whose parents do not pay for board and tuition. Quite a few students – and, regrettably, some teachers too – feel that Fogg does not belong here. Naturally, she is aware of that. That may be the reason why she is so moody and restless at times. There have been rumors ... but that is neither here nor there. If I were you, Cathy, I would try and steer clear of her."

********************************************************

A / N : So Cathy got her first impression of teachers, students and tutors at St. Albert's. And, more importantly even, of their interactions.

As usually I would love to hear from you: comments, remarks, thoughts, ideas etc. about this chapter. And yes, thanks a lot for reading it.