An elegant establishment for young ladies, by Francis Burney

Last week, we talked about the reader’s first encounter with our hero. This week, let’s spotlight the heroine. Put an excerpt in the comment that shows the first time your heroine appears in the book. Mine is a scene from The Realm of Silence — a scene less than a couple of weeks old, written in response to a request from my editor, who thought my first effort at a first meeting was a bit lame. (She put it far more politely than that.)

Susan Cunningham fumbled for the chair behind her, her legs suddenly too weak to keep her upright.

“Missing?” she repeated, frowning as she tried to make the word mean something else. Anything else. “But where? How?”

Mrs Fellowes, the proprietor and headmistress, took the chair behind the desk, her lips pinched and her nostrils flared. “The school has been much deceived, Mrs Cunningham. The girls clearly planned this escapade very carefully. We could not have discovered their absence any earlier.”

“I don’t understand…” Susan frowned, trying to think through the panic that howled and gibbered in her mind. “How can she be missing?” Slowly, as if working in thick mud, her mind pulled some more facts out of the headmistress’s complaint. “How long has she been gone? Who is she with?”

“We could not have known,” Mrs Fellowes insisted. “The girls sent a note saying they were going to the art exhibition with Miss Foster, Miss Grahame’s aunt, and that Miss Cunningham would stay with her friend for the remainder of the weekend. This is a common occurrence, Mrs Cunningham, and has your approval.”

That was true. Patrice Grahame was Amy’s dearest friend. Wait. The weekend? “This was yesterday?” she asked. Please let it be yesterday. Surely two sixteen-year-old girls could not travel far in one day?

Mrs Fellowes sniffed. “Not Sunday, no. The notes were sent on Saturday morning, Mrs Cunningham, and Miss Grahame and Miss Cunningham have not been seen since.”

She unbent a little, “I was in the process of writing you a letter when you arrived unexpectedly.” A slight edge to that last word. Mrs Fellowes did not approve of parents who arrived during term time, and without warning. But Susan had been passing on her way to London, with only a ten-mile detour between her and her daughter.

Not to the point. Susan reined in her skittering thoughts and pursued the question of why two girls could be absent from Saturday to Monday with no one the wiser.

“Did Miss Foster not report the girls missing?”

“She also received a note, in which the girls said Miss Grahame would be staying at the school with your daughter. I am very disappointed in them, Mrs Cunningham. They are not biddable girls, but I had not thought them liars.” She sniffed again, jerking her chin upward as she did so. “You will wish to speak to Miss Foster. You have her direction, I imagine.”

Susan was ushered firmly to the door before she could formulate a response and did not think to ask what measures had been taken to find the missing girls until she was halfway to Miss Foster’s townhouse. She continued on, as more and more questions crowded her mind. Perhaps Miss Foster knew the answers. If not, she would go back to the school and demand explanations. Later.