Two Worlds and Their Ways

by Ivy Compton-Burnett

  “Do all men who can afford to, keep concubines?”

  “No, only in China. In England only a few keep them. And they are generally kept outside the house. Sometimes the real wife does not know about them.”

  “I am the son of a real wife,” said Sefton, with tears in his voice. “My father’s first wife died before he ever saw my mother.”

  “Well, there is no need to cry about it,” said Bacon.

  “Your father may love your mother the best. That does happen with concubines. I daresay Agamemnon loved Cassandra better than Clytaemnestra. Indeed it seems as if he did.”

  “How do you know so much about concubines? Do all your fathers keep several?”

  “What is all this noise?” said Miss James, opening her door. “No talking is allowed in the passage. Oh, it is the four new boys! Well, even you can read the rules. Were you looking for my room?”

  “Yes,” said Bacon, as he recalled this purpose.

  “‘Yes, Miss James,’” said the latter, putting things at once on a proper footing. “Why are you crying, Shelley? You are Shelley, are you not? I saw you arriving with your brother. What is wrong?”

  “My mother is not a concubine.”

  “Well, of course she is not. Who said she was?”

  “All of them. All of them, Miss James.”

  “Well, he said our fathers kept several,” said Holland.

  “Several, Miss James.”

  “I never heard of such talk. I was never so shocked in my life,” said Miss James, rapidly. “And new boys, and one of you related to the Head! I should complain to him, if I liked to talk about such things, if I wished to be degraded by them. And telling tales of each other on your first day! I can hardly believe it. Are you not ashamed of it yourselves?”

  “Yes, Miss James.”

  “Well, it is best to say no more about it. Indeed, it is not fit to speak about. Here is the key of your playbox, Bacon. And of yours, Sturgeon.” Miss James here waited for the keys to be accepted, to attach names to their owners, a capacity taken by them as part of a general unfathomable power. “You have yours, Shelley. Then Holland will lead us upstairs. You are to have a dormitory to yourselves. There is a playbox by each bed, and you must claim your own.”

  Miss James kept her eyes on Holland, to register her impression of him, and the boys gave their first signs of interest in their new world.

  “Now I am going to put you all on your honour,” said Miss James, her eyes now resting easily on the claimants of the boxes. “I am sure you know what that means. You are on your honour as gentlemen not to mention the word, ‘concubine’, again.”

  “The word comes in the Bible,” said Bacon.

  “And so do a great many words that are not fit for you to use, that are not suitable for people who do not understand how to use them,” said Miss James, with the rapidity that was frequently her resource. “And you want a great knowledge of the Bible to understand its language.”

  “Suppose we have to read the word aloud?”

  “Then you will do so without giggling or exchanging glances,” said Miss James, to the discomfort of her hearers, who recognised in her some power of divining their nature. “And in ordinary conversation you will not mention it. You are on your honour not to do so. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Miss James.”

  “And now here are the rules of the school,” said Miss James, with the faint sigh of one approaching the last and most arduous stage. “Here is the printed list on the wall. Now can you all read?”

  “Yes, Miss James.”

  “You need not say it too easily. I have often met boys who apparently could not. This is an important thing,” said Miss James, who had disposed of such matters as could be settled through the medium of honour. “Will you read the first rule, Bacon?”

  “‘Rise on hearing the first bell.’ How do we know it is the first?”

  “Well, you can count as far as one, can you not?”

  “Yes. But we might be asleep when it went. Miss James.”

  “The bell would wake you. That is its purpose. Read the second rule, Shelley.”

  “‘Leave the dormitory on second bell, and descend in silence to classroom.’”

  “And the third, Sturgeon.”

  “Observe silence in passages and on stairs.’ Suppose we observe a noise, Miss James?”

  “You do not know that use of the word?” said Miss James, in a tone that mingled kindliness, suspicion and resignation, in case any of these qualities was called for. “It just means ‘keep’. You can remember that.”

  “‘Observe silence in dormitory after lights are out,’” read Holland. “‘and when visiting dormitory during day. Observe punctuality at meals.’ Suppose we do forget what the word, ‘observe’, means?”

  Miss James took a pencil and altered the word to ‘keep’, and on second thoughts produced a pen and traced it where it occurred.

  “Keep punctuality at meals?” said Holland, as if to himself.

  “It is an old use of the word. You would not know it,” said Miss James, going to the door. “Now, if you want me, you know where I am. Remember all I have said.”

  “If we do not want her, we forget where she is,” said Holland.

  “As is true in many cases,” said Bacon.

  “Not a bad old dame,” said Sturgeon.

  “She might be better-favoured,” said Bacon.

  “If she was, she would not be here,” said Holland. “There would be a risk of the masters’ falling in love with her.”

  “She would not be chosen for—for what must not be said,” said Sturgeon.

  “You are breaking your promise,” said Bacon.

  “He is not. He did not say the word,” said Holland.

  “And we did not really give the promise.”

  “We did in effect. There is a point beyond which we do not go. Now I am going to open my playbox.”

  “The size of mine is in keeping with myself,” said Sturgeon, getting over what had to come.

  “You are of a wizened stature,” said Bacon. “Perhaps you will grow up a dwarf.”

  “Then you could earn your living in a show,” said Holland. “Indeed, you might have to. I don’t think a dwarf would be employed in ordinary ways.”

  “Should I be paid enough for that?”

  “You would not want much,” said Bacon. “You would not have family expenses. No one would marry a dwarf.”

  “Dwarfs sometimes marry each other,” said Sturgeon. “Sometimes their children are dwarfs, and sometimes not. It happens in the big circuses, and I might succeed in my profession.”

  “And what profession is that?” said Miss James, returning with the air of one who had expected to do. so. “When you cannot remember a simple thing for a few minutes!”

  “A dwarf in a fair, Miss James.”

  “Well, what extraordinary characters you think of! First a—and then a dwarf, first one thing and then another. And did I, or did I not, tell you to read the rules, and hear you reading them?”

  “Yes, you did, Miss James.”

  “And did you read the one about keeping silence in the dormitories during the day? Or did you miss that one out?”

  “No, Miss James. But that was visiting the dormitory,” said Bacon. “We are unpacking in this one and settling down.”

  Miss James again produced her pen, made an alteration on the list, and turned on her way. A bell rang as she reached the door, and she looked at the four boys engaged with their boxes.

  “What sound was that?”

  “A bell, Miss James.”

  “And what bell would it be at this hour?”

  “A bell for tea?” said Sturgeon, in a dubious tone.

  “And did you miss this rule out?” said Miss James, tapping her pen against the list. “Will you please read it again, all together?”

  “‘Observe punctuality at meals.’”

  “Well, what are you going to do about it?”

  Four pai
rs of eyes met hers and sought each other.

  “Ought we to go down?” said Holland, in a tone of hazarding a just possible suggestion.

  “Perhaps our tea will be brought up to us on our first night,” said Sturgeon.

  “Go down, all of you, and let me have no more nonsense,” said Miss James, tapping her pen on his head and almost smiling. “You will miss grace now. You can say your grace to yourselves. You all know a grace, don’t you?”

  “Yes, Miss James.”

  “Then mind you do not forget to say it. And talk among yourselves and not to the other boys. That leads to trouble.”

  The boys went down and followed a hum of voices to the dining-room. An elder boy leaned from his seat and pointed them to their place. They took their seats and turned their eyes on the table.

  “If we were made truly thankful, we might get on better,” said Sturgeon, with no thought of attending further than this to Miss James’s injunction.

  “They should have warned us that the school was for coarse feeders,” said Bacon. “Perhaps that is true of all schools. Only coarse feeders can be educated.”

  “What is this, boys?” said Miss James, coming late to her place, with her habitual, hurried disregard of her own comfort. “What is this I hear about coarse feeders? It does not sound a polite way to talk. I hope you can all behave properly at table. Is no one going to pass anything to me?”

  The boys, who had assumed that Miss James arranged matters for herself in arranging all things, handed plates with signs of discomposure.

  “Miss James also feeds coarsely,” muttered Sturgeon.

  “I beg your pardon, Sturgeon?” said Miss James, in a new tone.

  “I said—I only said,” said Sturgeon, realising the interpretation put upon his words; “we were talking about the food, not about the people who ate it.”

  “Oh, I see. That explains it. But I hope you were not finding fault with the food put before you. We eat what is provided for us, without discussion or criticism. Did you all remember your grace?” Her tone suggested that such an observance might have ensured subsequent propriety.

  “No, Miss James,” said Bacon.

  “Did you actually forget it?”

  “No, Miss James,” said Holland, feeling that Sturgeon’s allusion saved them from this.

  “Then what was your reason for not saying it?”

  “I don’t know, Miss James.”

  “Now I think I can tell you,” said Miss James, leaning back and surveying the faces turned towards her. “I think it was that you felt a little ashamed of saying it in front of everyone, of standing to your colours in public. And as that is not a feeling to be proud of, you will not yield to it another time. Are you going to leave that butter on your plate, Sturgeon? Is it not wholesome food?”

  “Yes. No, Miss James. It is the fat on the top of the potted meat.”

  “It is butter. The meat is potted in the house. Put it on a piece of bread and eat it.”

  “No, Miss James. It is against my nature, and I must stand to my colours in public,” said Sturgeon, realising too late the various baseness involved in his speech.

  Miss James rose, a flush mounting her cheek, and walked down the table towards the presiding master.

  “I am about to suffer for my colours,” said Sturgeon, grinning at his companions.

  “You have time to hide the butter and say you have eaten it,” said Bacon, not pretending to accept this lightness.

  Sturgeon looked about him, but saw that the moment had passed. Miss James was returning with a gowned figure in her wake.

  “Do you ask me to countenance direct disobedience, Mr. Spode?”

  “No disobedience of any kind. It would be an improper requirement. In what way has obedience been withheld?”

  “Sturgeon refuses to eat the wholesome butter on his plate.”

  “Why did he take it, the boy called Sturgeon? He was called that a little while ago. So he is a wasteful and un-biddable boy. In my employers’ house are many monsters.”

  “I did not take it. It was on the potted meat. Sir,” said Sturgeon.

  “And you took it upon yourself to separate them? Do not take matters upon yourself in future. You are not a person to judge. You are a person to be enjoined and directed. You are the least of all persons. Do you grasp this truth about yourself?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Then render to Miss James the thing that is Miss James’s, the submission of people such as you. Take bread, place the butter upon it, and carry it with you after the meal. Do not keep a lady waiting while you eat it. Grace is about to be said.” Mr. Spode took a step apart, stood for a space with bowed head, and withdrew without a glance behind.

  Sturgeon spread the butter, with remorse welling up within him, and Miss James surveyed him with similar experience. There is a rule that no human being is perfect, and a tendency to hastiness saved Miss James from upsetting it.

  “You see, Sturgeon, the view a master takes of your behaviour. Now all go up to the dormitory, and I will follow. There are still some things to be arranged.”

  “I will eat the bread-and-butter for you,” said Holland on the stairs. “I don’t mind it as much as you do. I thought the other things were worse.”

  Sturgeon relinquished it with a shudder and wiped his hands. Miss James was aloof and preoccupied, her geniality destroyed by the recent passage and her compunction for it. She began to sort some clothes and to ask curt questions concerning them.

  “I feel sick,” said Sturgeon, in an uncertain way. “I feel sick, Miss James.”

  “Oh no, you do not,” said the latter, rapidly threading one thing through another. “Sick boys are not rude and obstinate. Use your handkerchief and stop choking like that.”

  Sturgeon obeyed the first injunction, but the smell of butter on the handkerchief disposed of the second. The other boys surveyed him, rigid and silent, and it occurred to him to wonder if they would do anything to succour him, if his life were at stake, as possibly it was. Miss James dealt with him with an efficiency and absence of fuss, that aroused his gratitude, and finally stood back and regarded him in her usual manner.

  “Well, I am glad of this sickness, Sturgeon, if it does sound an odd thing to say. It proves you were not yourself when you behaved as you did. I should be sorry to think it was your real self that you showed me.”

  “I am not glad of it,” said Holland.

  “Sturgeon’s real self has not everything to recommend it,” said Bacon.

  “Now do not be foolish, boys. It might happen to you at any time. And you should never say anything to add to anyone’s discomfort. Your first thought should be to lessen it.”

  “We were not showing you our real selves, Miss James.”

  “You should have said you were not well, Sturgeon; then I should not have told you to eat the butter.”

  “Holland ate it for me. It was the smell of it on the handkerchief,” said Sturgeon, now beyond any stage but simple truth.

  “Well, I am glad it was not wasted.”

  “As it would have been, if Sturgeon had eaten it,” said Bacon.

  “Now will you all get to bed? I want you off my mind before I go to the other boys. You are only four out of sixty. I cannot give you all my time.”

  The boys, with an incredulous acceptance of the ordinary nature of their experience, prepared for the night, now finding every step an obstacle in the way of darkness and their different means of relief. These varied from tears to prayer, and rapidly ended in sleep.

  The next morning the bell tolled—as they had agreed to describe the sound—and they rose with an unexpected feeling of being able to face the day. Bacon, forgetting the congestion of the new world, led the way downstairs with mimicry of Miss James.

  “Whom are you imitating, Bacon?” said a voice in the rear.

  “The—the housemaid at home, Miss James.”

  “And do you think that is a kind thing to do?”

  “Well, she cannot s
ee me, Miss James.”

  “And does that alter the essential quality of the action?”

  “No. Yes. No, Miss James.”

  “Do you think it is a manly thing to bring ridicule upon someone of a weaker sex than your own?” said Miss James, who was at frequent pains to impress the frailty of her nature upon those who owed her subservience.

  “No, Miss James.”

  “Someone too, who spends her life in working for your comfort,” said Miss James, with a quiver of feeling, or fellow-feeling, in her tone.

  “No, Miss James,” said Bacon, with some feeling in his.

  “Well, if I try to forget it this once, will you give me your word that you will not sink to that level again?”

  “Yes, Miss James,” said Bacon, less affected by Miss James’s self-betrayal than by fear that she might realise it, and hurrying into the breakfast-room.

  “We are getting hemmed in by promises,” said Holland. “It is a good thing we have not promised not to eat and drink.”

  “It might be a solution,” said Bacon, looking at the dishes.

  “I am the hungriest. I have a right to be,” said Sturgeon, assuming that thoughts were on his late mishap, and surprised by the looks of question.

  Letters were put on the table, and there was one at Sefton’s place.

  “You are a lucky boy. A letter already!” said Miss James, something in her tone suggesting disapproval of unsettling methods.

  “It is from my mother,” said Sefton.

  “From your mater?” said Holland, in a tone that was just a question.

  “Yes,” said Sefton, tearing the envelope and surveying the round hand written by Maria for his aid.

  “My little son—A word from your mother to help you through your first day. A happy day it may not be, but a brave and busy one it can, and I am sure will be, and the first step towards the success that means so much to Father and me. So you will forget yourself, and put your heart into your new life for our sakes.—Your loving Mother.”

  Sefton sat with his eyes on the words. Forget himself he could not; put his heart into his life he could; succeed he must. He crumpled the letter and put it in his pocket, conscious of reluctance for it to be seen, conscious in a way new to him, that indifference to his progress in his parents would be more to his credit than anxiety for it. To go to expense for a son’s education, and then be unconcerned for his benefit, was the ideal thing. He felt strange knowledge welling up within him, knowledge that did not come from outside; knowledge of the world of school, of the world itself; knowledge that the parallel between them was a shallow thing. He was surprised by his perception; felt it could not be common to his kind, and set him apart; saw his parents’ ambitions fulfilled, and himself rendered fitting dues. The mood of exaltation was fostered by prayers, a ceremony new to him and coming with consequent force. A passage of scripture, chosen it seemed, at random, was read by Lucius; and a hymn chosen in another manner, by by Miss James, was rendered by all with simple feeling, and supported by Oliver with his eyes on the keyboard. Sefton’s emotions were fed, and he entered the classroom in a mood of high resolve.