Chapter 22

7 min

Yet it was when she had got off—and I missed her on the spot—that the great pinch really came. If I had counted on what it would give me to find myself alone with Miles, I speedily perceived, at least, that it would give me a measure. No hour of my stay in fact was so assailed with apprehensions as that of my coming down to learn that the carriage containing Mrs. Grose and my younger pupil had already rolled out of the gates. Now I was, I said to myself, face to face with the elements, and for much of the rest of the day, while I fought my weakness, I could consider that I had been supremely rash. It was a tighter place still than I had yet turned round in; all the more that, for the first time, I could see in the aspect of others a confused reflection of the crisis. What had happened naturally caused them all to stare; there was too little of the explained, throw out whatever we might, in the suddenness of my colleague’s act. The maids and the men looked blank; the effect of which on my nerves was an aggravation until I saw the necessity of making it a positive aid. It was precisely, in short, by just clutching the helm that I avoided total wreck; and I dare say that, to bear up at all, I became, that morning, very grand and very dry. I welcomed the consciousness that I was charged with much to do, and I caused it to be known as well that, left thus to myself, I was quite remarkably firm. I wandered with that manner, for the next hour or two, all over the place and looked, I have no doubt, as if I were ready for any onset. So, for the benefit of whom it might concern, I paraded with a sick heart.

Yet the real crisis came when she left, and I missed her at once. If I had expected being alone with Miles to give me something, I soon saw that it gave me a measure of the situation. No hour of my stay was filled with such fear as the one when I came downstairs. I learned that the carriage carrying Mrs. Grose and my younger pupil had already passed through the gates. Now I was, I told myself, face to face with the elements. For much of the rest of the day, as I fought my weakness, I could see that I had been extremely rash. I was in a tighter spot than any I had faced before. It was all the worse because, for the first time, I could see a confused reflection of the crisis in other people’s faces. Naturally, what had happened made them all stare. Whatever explanations we offered, they did too little to account for my colleague’s sudden departure. The maids and the men looked bewildered. Their bewilderment made my nerves worse until I saw that I had to turn it into a help. In short, I avoided total wreck by taking a firm grip on the helm. I dare say that, to keep going at all, I became very grand and very dry that morning. I welcomed the knowledge that I had a great deal to do. I also made it known that, now I was left to myself, I was remarkably firm. For the next hour or two, I wandered all over the place with that air. I looked, no doubt, as if I were ready for any attack. So, for the benefit of anyone it might concern, I paraded about with a sick heart.

The person it appeared least to concern proved to be, till dinner, little Miles himself. My perambulations had given me, meanwhile, no glimpse of him, but they had tended to make more public the change taking place in our relation as a consequence of his having at the piano, the day before, kept me, in Flora’s interest, so beguiled and befooled. The stamp of publicity had of course been fully given by her confinement and departure, and the change itself was now ushered in by our nonobservance of the regular custom of the schoolroom. He had already disappeared when, on my way down, I pushed open his door, and I learned below that he had breakfasted—in the presence of a couple of the maids—with Mrs. Grose and his sister. He had then gone out, as he said, for a stroll; than which nothing, I reflected, could better have expressed his frank view of the abrupt transformation of my office. What he would not permit this office to consist of was yet to be settled: there was a queer relief, at all events—I mean for myself in especial—in the renouncement of one pretension. If so much had sprung to the surface, I scarce put it too strongly in saying that what had perhaps sprung highest was the absurdity of our prolonging the fiction that I had anything more to teach him. It sufficiently stuck out that, by tacit little tricks in which even more than myself he carried out the care for my dignity, I had had to appeal to him to let me off straining to meet him on the ground of his true capacity. He had at any rate his freedom now; I was never to touch it again; as I had amply shown, moreover, when, on his joining me in the schoolroom the previous night, I had uttered, on the subject of the interval just concluded, neither challenge nor hint. I had too much, from this moment, my other ideas. Yet when he at last arrived, the difficulty of applying them, the accumulations of my problem, were brought straight home to me by the beautiful little presence on which what had occurred had as yet, for the eye, dropped neither stain nor shadow.

The person who seemed least concerned by it all, until dinner, was little Miles himself. Meanwhile, I had seen no sign of him on my walks. But my walking about had made our changed relationship more public. The change had come about because, the day before, he had played the piano and kept me so charmed and fooled, for Flora’s sake. Her confinement and departure had, of course, already made matters public. Now the change in our relationship began with our failure to follow the usual schoolroom routine. When I came downstairs, I pushed open Miles’s door, but he had already gone. Downstairs I learned that he had eaten breakfast with Mrs. Grose and his sister, in the presence of two maids. He had then gone out, he said, for a stroll. Nothing, I thought, could have expressed more clearly his frank view of the sudden change in my role. It remained to be seen what he would not allow my role to include. In any case, there was a strange relief, especially for me, in giving up one claim. So much had come to the surface. If I said that the most striking thing was perhaps the absurdity of pretending I had anything more to teach him, I was hardly exaggerating. It was plain enough that I had needed to appeal to him to spare me the strain of matching his true abilities. We had managed this through little unspoken tricks, with him taking even more care of my dignity than I did myself. At any rate, he had his freedom now, and I would never interfere with it again. I had shown this clearly enough the previous night, when he joined me in the schoolroom. I had not challenged him or even hinted at what he had been doing during the time just past. From now on, my mind was too full of my other ideas. Yet when he finally arrived, I saw at once how difficult it would be to act on them. I also felt the full weight of my growing problem. For there stood the beautiful little boy, with no visible stain or shadow from what had happened.

To mark, for the house, the high state I cultivated I decreed that my meals with the boy should be served, as we called it, downstairs; so that I had been awaiting him in the ponderous pomp of the room outside of the window of which I had had from Mrs. Grose, that first scared Sunday, my flash of something it would scarce have done to call light. Here at present I felt afresh—for I had felt it again and again—how my equilibrium depended on the success of my rigid will, the will to shut my eyes as tight as possible to the truth that what I had to deal with was, revoltingly, against nature. I could only get on at all by taking “nature” into my confidence and my account, by treating my monstrous ordeal as a push in a direction unusual, of course, and unpleasant, but demanding, after all, for a fair front, only another turn of the screw of ordinary human virtue. No attempt, nonetheless, could well require more tact than just this attempt to supply, one’s self, all the nature. How could I put even a little of that article into a suppression of reference to what had occurred? How, on the other hand, could I make reference without a new plunge into the hideous obscure? Well, a sort of answer, after a time, had come to me, and it was so far confirmed as that I was met, incontestably, by the quickened vision of what was rare in my little companion. It was indeed as if he had found even now—as he had so often found at lessons—still some other delicate way to ease me off. Wasn’t there light in the fact which, as we shared our solitude, broke out with a specious glitter it had never yet quite worn?—the fact that (opportunity aiding, precious opportunity which had now come) it would be preposterous, with a child so endowed, to forego the help one might wrest from absolute intelligence? What had his intelligence been given him for but to save him? Mightn’t one, to reach his mind, risk the stretch of an angular arm over his character? It was as if, when we were face to face in the dining room, he had literally shown me the way. The roast mutton was on the table, and I had dispensed with attendance. Miles, before he sat down, stood a moment with his hands in his pockets and looked at the joint, on which he seemed on the point of passing some humorous judgment. But what he presently produced was: “I say, my dear, is she really very awfully ill?”

To show the household the elevated position I claimed, I ordered that my meals with the boy be served “downstairs,” as we called it. So I waited for him in the heavy grandeur of the dining room. It was outside its window that Mrs. Grose had given me my first glimpse of understanding, on that first frightening Sunday. It hardly deserved to be called light. Here I felt once again, as I had felt so often, how much my balance depended on my firm resolve. I was determined to shut my eyes as tightly as possible to the truth that what I faced was revoltingly unnatural. I could only go on at all by taking “nature” into my confidence and reckoning with it. I had to treat my monstrous ordeal as a push in an unusual and unpleasant direction, of course. But to face it properly, I needed only one more turn of the screw of ordinary human virtue. Even so, few attempts could require more tact than my effort to provide all the natural feeling myself. How could I make it seem even a little natural to avoid mentioning what had happened? But how could I mention it without plunging again into that dreadful darkness? Well, in time, a kind of answer had come to me. My growing awareness of what was exceptional in my little companion seemed to confirm it. There was no denying that I saw this quality more clearly now. Indeed, it was as if he had found yet another subtle way to put me at ease, as he so often had during lessons. Wasn’t there light in a certain fact that now shone with a deceptive glitter? As we spent this time alone together, the fact seemed more brilliant than ever before. Now that I had the chance, the precious chance, surely it would be absurd to forgo the help I might gain from a child so gifted, through sheer intelligence? What had he been given his intelligence for, if not to save him? To reach his mind, might one risk stretching an awkward arm across his character? When we came face to face in the dining room, it was as if he had literally shown me the way. The roast mutton was on the table, and I had sent the servants away. Before sitting down, Miles stood for a moment with his hands in his pockets and looked at the joint. He seemed about to make some amusing remark about it. But what he said was: “I say, my dear, is she really very awfully ill?”

“Little Flora? Not so bad but that she’ll presently be better. London will set her up. Bly had ceased to agree with her. Come here and take your mutton.”

“Little Flora? She’s not so ill that she won’t soon get better. London will do her good. Bly no longer suited her. Come here and have your mutton.”

He alertly obeyed me, carried the plate carefully to his seat, and, when he was established, went on. “Did Bly disagree with her so terribly suddenly?”

He promptly did as I asked and carried the plate carefully to his seat. Once seated, he continued. “Did Bly upset her so terribly all of a sudden?”

“Not so suddenly as you might think. One had seen it coming on.”

“Not as suddenly as you might think. You could see it coming.”

“Then why didn’t you get her off before?”

“Before what?”

“Before she became too ill to travel.”

“Before she became too sick to travel.”

I found myself prompt. “She’s not too ill to travel: she only might have become so if she had stayed. This was just the moment to seize. The journey will dissipate the influence”—oh, I was grand!—“and carry it off.”

I answered at once. “She’s not too ill to travel. She only might have become too ill if she had stayed. This was just the moment to act. The journey will dispel the influence and carry it away.” Oh, how grand I sounded!

“I see, I see”—Miles, for that matter, was grand, too. He settled to his repast with the charming little “table manner” that, from the day of his arrival, had relieved me of all grossness of admonition. Whatever he had been driven from school for, it was not for ugly feeding. He was irreproachable, as always, today; but he was unmistakably more conscious. He was discernibly trying to take for granted more things than he found, without assistance, quite easy; and he dropped into peaceful silence while he felt his situation. Our meal was of the briefest—mine a vain pretense, and I had the things immediately removed. While this was done Miles stood again with his hands in his little pockets and his back to me—stood and looked out of the wide window through which, that other day, I had seen what pulled me up. We continued silent while the maid was with us—as silent, it whimsically occurred to me, as some young couple who, on their wedding journey, at the inn, feel shy in the presence of the waiter. He turned round only when the waiter had left us. “Well—so we’re alone!”

“I see, I see.” Miles, for his part, was splendid too. He settled down to eat with the charming little table manners that had spared me any need to scold him. He had been like that since the day he arrived. Whatever he had been expelled from school for, it was not for eating badly. His manners were perfect today, as always, but he was unmistakably more self-conscious. I could see that he was trying to take more things for granted than he found easy without help. He fell into a peaceful silence as he took stock of his situation. Our meal was very brief. Mine was a pointless pretence, and I had the dishes cleared away at once. While the maid cleared them, Miles stood again with his hands in his little pockets and his back to me. He looked out of the wide window through which, the other day, I had seen what stopped me short. We remained silent while the maid was with us. It struck me as a whimsical comparison: we were as silent as a young couple on their wedding journey, shy of the waiter at an inn. He turned around only when the maid had left us. “Well, so we’re alone!”