The Finishing School

by Gail Godwin

  “Who are the DeVanes?” asked my mother.

  “All that’s left of them are a brother and sister who live in the old family house over on Old Clove. The brother is an awful man who used to teach Becky piano; she puts on a show of having been greater places and done greater things. But get your daughter to tell you about her: they’re great friends.”

  “That’s not so, Aunt Mona,” I said, feeling my face go hot, “I only met her that once.”

  “You never mentioned it to me, Justin,” said my mother.

  “I didn’t think you’d be interested.” Then, sensing that I had hurt her feelings, I added somewhat coldly, “It just wasn’t very important. She was just this woman I happened to meet when I was out riding my bike.”

  “Why is the man awful?” Jem wanted to know. “Has he done something bad?”

  “Well, he killed music for your cousin Becky,” said Aunt Mona, her feather cut starting to quiver a little. “But get Justin to tell you about it. We don’t talk about it in front of Beck, because it’s not productive to bring up old setbacks. But, Louise, the Cristianas are perfectly okay for Justin to know. They’re good, hardworking types. He built up that horse business himself, after the war. Before that it was just a rundown farm he’d inherited from his father. Mott liked him when they were on the Fire Squad together. Mott said he’d had a good war. That’s Mott’s measuring stick for a man. Now, Mr. Julian DeVane had a very questionable war. But”—she gestured toward me—“get the Equestrian Lady there to tell you about it. I told her the other day, and I haven’t got the time to dwell on people like that.”

  And I might have had to, had Aunt Mona not suddenly got another bee in her bonnet. She cocked her head and looked disapprovingly at the former den, which was now my mother’s bedroom. “Louise, why don’t we redo this room? You can’t be happy with those old plaid curtains.”

  “Oh, they’re fine,” said my mother.

  “But they’re so plain,” said my aunt. “They’re so unlike what you’ve been used to.”

  “Maybe that’s why I like them,” said my mother.

  “I was thinking maybe organdy,” said Aunt Mona. “Of course we’d have to iron them. But no, they might look a little out of place against the pine paneling. I wonder if we could wallpaper over pine paneling. One of those soft English country scenes would just suit you, Louise.”

  “Honestly, Mona, I’m just fine as I am down here. I mean, there’s nothing here that reminds me of anything.” And then I saw my mother look embarrassed, because this statement might be conceived by Aunt Mona as a slur on her taste. “I mean I really do like those plaid curtains,” she added quickly.

  “Well,” said Aunt Mona, not seeming to notice any slur, “I really should have done it over before you came, to be a little more like the style you are accustomed to, but I thought it was more important to get the kids’ rooms fixed up first. I was so tickled with that circus wallpaper I found for Jimbo … excuse me, Jem”—and she made a mock bow to my brother—“and with that nice screen we found to put in front of the washing machine and dryer—nobody would know it was a utility room. But I was really happy with the way Justin’s room turned out. Exactly the kind of room I might have wanted for myself when I was Justin’s age—that is, if we could have afforded luxuries like new curtains and flounces and two cans of paint. I wanted to do Beck’s room over, but she wouldn’t let me near it with a ten-foot pole. Beck is going through a moody phase.”

  “Well, I really am very comfortable, just as I am,” insisted my mother, careful not to catch my eye. I had informed her, in no uncertain language, how I felt about my room.

  After Mona had gone upstairs, I posed some more in my jodhpurs and boots. I liked the way I looked in the full-length mirror affixed to the door. My mother must have liked it, too, because she sat looking at me in a wistfully admiring way, as if she were thinking, Ah yes, my daughter is becoming an attractive young woman, even if life is over for me.

  “You certainly do look the part, Justin,” she finally said. “But you must promise me one thing, before I let you go.”

  “What?” I said.

  “That you’ll tell those Cristianas you haven’t ridden very much, and to give you a gentle horse.”

  I made this promise to my mother, and my dilemma grew acute as I changed into the riding clothes in Ann’s bedroom the next afternoon. It was a warm day and the windows were open, and the sounds and smells of horses were all around us. As I buckled the straps of the jodhpur boots into their tightest holes, I knew Ann, who had simply put on old jeans and a pair of heavy brown oxfords, was impressed by the clothes and assumed I wore them all the time. Then, to make things worse, her little sister Jenny, who was in grammar school with Becky, stuck her pigtailed head in the door, looked me over with awe, and said, “Boy, Annie, do we have anything good enough for her to ride?”

  “I’m sure we’ll find the right horse for her,” said Ann, with the calm I already admired. There was a sweet, motherly quality about Ann, who was the oldest child in the family. “If not, I’m sure Ed will let her have Mercury.”

  Mercury! Wasn’t he the god of speed? Now, I thought, was the perfect time to speak out, to explain about my riding experience. Hadn’t I promised my mother?

  We went downstairs. My boots sounded loud and pretentious on the bare boards, compared to the soft, placid scuffle of Ann’s oxfords. I felt like a pretender hiding behind a costume from these simple, friendly people who were so willing to accept me at face value. Their house was rather bare and shabby—everywhere you could see signs of patching up and making do—but it made me homesick for the house in Fredericksburg to hear the stairs squeak. Ann introduced me to her mother in the kitchen. Mrs. Cristiana was a thin, older version of Ann. There was the same calm, accepting manner about her, only she looked rather tired and was expecting a baby.

  Out in the stableyard Ed was saddling the horses, assisted by his young brother. They had already saddled a restless mahogany one, who backstepped when we approached: was that Mercury? Across the road Mr. Cristiana was in the training ring with the stallion. He was walking the animal testily around the circle, holding him by a lead attached to the halter. The stallion was tense and wary, and the horsebreeder carried a stick, which he nudged threateningly against the stallion’s muzzle whenever the animal started shaking his head. Even from where I was standing I could see that there was a war of wills being played out between the tough man and the excited horse. For one panicked moment I thought that maybe the stallion was Mercury, and that Mr. Cristiana was getting him ready for me to ride, someone having sent down the news about my elegant jodhpurs. Maybe Mr. Cristiana thought it would be poetic justice to put the pretentious girl in her citified finery up on the beast she had gaped at while he mated.

  Then Ed came over to me with that bouncy, country walk that kept me from taking him seriously. He began explaining at once the plans for our afternoon ride, as impersonally as if I were just some stranger who was hiring one of the horses for the afternoon. But as he talked about the route we would take around the fields, he never once met my eyes, and a pink glow spread up his neck and over his entire face. I remembered the way he had looked at me at school, and put two and two together: Ann Cristiana had asked me here because her brother liked me. I was annoyed because I had no intention of being “fixed up” with Ed, but at the same time I felt more sure of myself.

  “We won’t be able to warm up in the ring,” Ed was apologizing, “because my Dad’s stallion, Turk, has this bad swollen tendon and has to be walked there so he can get his exercise. I know you’re probably used to warming up in a ring.” He cast a shy glance at my riding outfit.

  “Turk has to keep in shape,” explained the little brother, “so he’ll stay fertile. Turk will serve more than twenty mares before the summer’s over, and that’s strenuous work!”

  “And that’s enough, Petey,” said Ann, blushing. “Who’s Justin going to ride, Ed?”

  This was the time for me
to speak. “I think I’d better explain something,” I said. “It’s been a little while since I last rode a horse. In fact, the last time I did ride—I was thrown. It was a … a stallion. I really shouldn’t have been allowed to ride him at all, but I wanted to. Since then, I’ve been a little nervous. So maybe you’d better start me off on a … you know … gentle horse.”

  I was amazed at how fluently this story sprang to my lips. While I was telling it, I actually saw myself, wearing these very clothes, toppling through the bright air like a stunt girl in the movies. I was equally amazed at how readily they accepted it.

  “Gee, it’s lucky you weren’t hurt,” said Ed, venturing to meet my eyes for the first time.

  “Our father would never let anybody ride Turk except himself,” murmured Ann.

  “And even he’s scared of Turk when he’s in one of his moods,” put in Petey.

  And then I was being mounted on a horse called Gentleman Johnny, who, they explained to me, was to have been my horse all along. “Johnny’s dependable,” said Ed, “and as we didn’t know how much you had ridden … how would you like your stirrups? Southerners like them long, don’t they?”

  “Geldings,” explained Petey from the ground, “are better mannered than stallions. That’s because—”

  “That’s enough, now, Petey,” said Ann, mounting her palomino; then she gave her little brother some instructions about mucking out the stalls.

  Ed gave his horse, Mercury, some slight signal that set all three mounts moving slowly toward the pasture, where we were “just going to hack around,” Ed said protectively, until I got accustomed to riding again.

  It was a beautiful afternoon, with a bright golden light on the pasture that made you have to squint your eyes. Ed and Ann made brother-and-sister horse talk, tactfully letting me get the feel of my horse. Gentleman Johnny was unusually smooth and agreeable and responded to my lightest touch; sometimes it even seemed that he responded before my touch, as though he had taken this same ride many times before and knew exactly what was expected of him. I was almost sorry I had told my fib. With this diplomatic horse I could have passed easily as an intermediate-class rider.

  “Annie and I thought we’d ride over and show you our new land,” said Ed, coming alongside of me. “Our dad just bought it. It’s great land; we were lucky to get it. Our neighbors had to sell because they needed the money. But I’ve got my work cut out this summer because of it. I have to put up post-and-rail fences all around the new acreage.”

  I was so intent upon keeping my heels down and my hands relaxed and my spine straight and my face casual that it took me a minute to realize Ed must be talking about the DeVanes. Hadn’t she said, that day in the hut, that Mr. Cristiana’s land had been their land until sacrifices had to be made?

  “Oh, which neighbors are those?” I asked.

  “The DeVanes,” said Ed.

  “They live in that stone house. You know, the one you asked me about on the bus,” said Ann. “Only they had to take a mortgage on it. Our father says that’s the beginning of the end when you have to borrow money on your own house.”

  “Well, we borrowed money to buy their fields,” said Ed to his sister.

  “That’s different,” she said in her motherly tone. “That was just getting a straight-out loan from the bank, because the bank knows our credit is good and we can pay it back. But we didn’t mortgage our own house that has never been out of the family, like the DeVanes did.”

  “I guess you’re right,” said Ed, deferring to his older sister. “Anyway, it’s fine land, with a stream and everything. Only she refused to sell us the pond. There’s this great little freshwater pond in the middle of the woods. Dad was going to stock it with fish, but she told him she couldn’t give up her refuge. There’s this old stone hut in there, too. It would have been great. We begged Dad to insist on that hut and the pond as part of the bargain. But Dad said she was entitled to the few pleasures she had left and he wasn’t going to push her.”

  “Are they so poor, then?” I asked.

  “Pretty poor. They don’t have any income, except from his teaching. He teaches piano. But my dad told us she wants him to make a comeback and that costs money. He was going to be a concert pianist before the war. So what she’s trying to do is invest everything in this comeback. Dad says it’s a big gamble. The reason they had to sell the land was so he could buy a really good Steinway to practice on. He’s kind of a strange guy. He and Dad don’t get along at all. He didn’t want to sell the land when he found out we wanted to buy, but she talked him into it. My dad says she’s sacrificing herself for him, when she could have done great things herself.”

  “Like what?” I asked.

  “I’m not really sure,” said Ed. “How do you like Gentleman Johnny?”

  “He’s very smooth.”

  “He’s a Tennessee walker. We bought him for my little sister Jenny, but you shouldn’t feel insulted or anything. My dad rides Johnny sometimes, when he’s inspecting the land. You know, these horses were bred for Southern planters, so they could ride them all day long without getting tired. That’s because of their gait. It’s this soft rocking motion where you don’t have to post. Want to trot him now? Just give him the slightest pressure with your legs and he’ll do the rest.”

  The next thing I knew, I was gliding along on the affable Johnny, who was certainly doing everything he could to let me pretend I was boss. I didn’t even have to post. Ed posted on Mercury, showing off a bit, but I had to admit he looked much more commanding on a horse than down on the ground, bobbing up and down with his bouncy walk. I would have liked to ask more questions about the DeVanes, but I couldn’t trot and talk at the same time. Ann had dropped some distance behind us, and I was certain that my being there was at her brother’s instigation. Well, I would do the same thing for Jem, when the time came, so I really couldn’t blame her.

  “You’re doing great!” Ed called to me, riding a little ahead. There might as well have been a lead tied between his horse and mine, so dutifully did Gentleman Johnny follow in Mercury’s steps.

  We descended into a lower field and I looked to the right and realized that this was the spot at which I had entered, the day I found Ursula. There was the haywagon road that stopped abruptly at the beginning of the field. And there was the pine forest. She might even be reading in the hut right now. I strained to listen for music coming from the house somewhere on the other side, but all I heard was my own creaking saddle and Gentleman Johnny’s rhythmic footfalls in the grass.

  We rode a little farther; then Ed abruptly turned Mercury around, as if stopped at a border. “That’s as far as we’ll go now,” he said.

  “But where is the DeVane house?” I asked. “I don’t see it.” Gentleman Johnny was obediently turning around, to follow Mercury.

  “Well, it’s just around the corner from those pines,” said Ed. “It sits up on a hill. I’d be glad to point it out to you, but our father told us to stay out of sight of it whenever we could. You see, it makes DeVane mad to see us, and then he takes it out on his sister. Of course, we’re going to have to be in sight when we start putting up the fences, but for now Dad said play it cool.”

  “He sounds like an ogre. Why does he hate you all so much?”

  “I don’t think he hates us, except that we’re my father’s children. He and Dad had this fight about something a long time ago, when they were both a lot younger. It wasn’t a real fight, because Dad says DeVane never could fight with his hands on account of his talent, but they had a terrible argument about something and he’s hated Dad ever since.”

  “Does your father hate him?”

  “Not really. He just thinks he’s kind of strange. And he thinks he’s a drag on his sister.”

  “What was the fight about?”

  “I’m not sure. I think it was something about their mother. She was in an insane asylum. I think Dad said he had mentioned it once, and then DeVane got mad and said some pretty unkind things about our f
amily. The DeVanes are terrible snobs, my mom says. Anyway, Dad doesn’t talk about it much, except to tell us to avoid him as much as we can.”

  “I guess that’s best,” I said. An insane asylum! I thought she said her mother had died.

  We rode together in silence for a few minutes. I was so deeply engrossed in all this new information I had learned about the DeVanes that I was borne along on my horse in complete unselfconsciousness. Gone were all fears of making myself ridiculous.

  Then Ed looked over at me and swallowed hard and blushed again. “Justin, you’re doing just great,” he said.

  “I’m having a wonderful time,” I told him.

  “Well, you’ll have to come back and we’ll … do it again. I mean, if I have any free time between putting up those fences. Of course … of course, you and Ann can always ride …” He stopped, looking thoroughly confused at all he was trying to say and trying not to say.

  “Of course,” I said graciously. All I felt was a sort of wonderment that I could have power over someone without having tried for it, without even wanting it.

  We trotted our horses back to where Ann, that cupid, was actually allowing her horse to graze, so as to let us keep to ourselves. I was sorry not to have been spotted in my equestrian glory by Ursula DeVane, but, because of this ride, I knew more about her than I had before. A mother in the insane asylum! And Mr. Cristiana thought she was sacrificing herself for her brother, when she could have done great things herself. It had all the makings of a drama, and with quite a bit of mystery attached, as well.

  As the three of us made our way back to the stableyard across the bright fields, I felt happy and at the same time pensive. The happiness was because I had comported myself well on my horse, however much that horse had contributed to the effect. I had not disgraced myself with these new friends, and Ed Cristiana admired me. It was not that I wanted a boyfriend—or that I wanted Ed Cristiana as a boyfriend—but I knew that the time was coming when it would be desirable for me to have boyfriends, and I was relieved to know that my charms were sufficient to attract one without even trying. My pensiveness came from what I felt to be a new and profound truth I had discovered during this outing: that the same things can be important to people for entirely different reasons. Ed Cristiana had been satisfied with this afternoon because I had been in it; whereas my greatest interest in the afternoon had come out of the additional things I had been able to learn about his fascinating neighbors. Poor Ed would never in a million years suspect this divergence, and if someone told him, I knew he would not be happy to know it.