The Finishing School Page 6

  “Really—your gardener?” said Israel Brown. Albert looked fabulously rich. The applause went on so long that he had to turn round and do it all over again. “I imagine he won’t be our garden boy for long,” said Nina to Israel. The manageress of the hotel next door was also carried away by Albert’s elegance. She had been appointed one of the judges of the show and it was in fact eventually to Albert that the first prize was to be awarded. He was, indeed, a young beauty. And one of the truths about him was, he was devoted to gardening.

  Elaine and Célestine Valette concentrated respectively on a spectacular raincoat and a tennis dress, the first being a multicolored tent which gave a rainbow effect as Elaine moved. She wore knee-length red shiny boots and carried a white closed umbrella. Célestine’s tennis outfit resembled a ballet dancer’s tutu, her two-layered skirt projecting and bouncing as she moved her tawny stalklike legs up the walk.

  The whole process took place again, more quickly and boisterously. Finally, Nina and Rowland walked along the planks, hand in hand, dressed only as they were, bowed to right and left and retreated to considerable explosive noise and applause. Refreshments were then ardently served. And so ended the College Sunrise fashion show.

  11

  According to the catechism of the Roman Catholic faith, into which Rowland had been born, six sins against the Holy Spirit are specified. The fourth is “Envy of Another’s Spiritual Good,” and that was the sin from which Rowland suffered.

  “Suffered” is the right word, as it often is in cases where the perpetrators are in the clutches of their own distortions. With Rowland, his obsessive jealousy of Chris was his greatest misfortune. And jealousy is an affliction of the spirit which, unlike some sins of the flesh, gives no one any pleasure. It is a miserable emotion for the jealous one with equally miserable effects on others.

  After the fashion show Olive, that manageress of the nearby hotel, who, with Israel, had distributed the prizes, had said in her speech, “How I wish I could have spent part of my youth in a school like yours. And no exams . . . It could have been a wonderful memory.”

  “And this evening,” Israel added, “is going to be a wonderful memory.” He smiled at Nina, and she at him. This exchange of smiles was noticed by Rowland. Almost to his own surprise he didn’t feel in the least jealous of his wife. He was watchful of Chris who was telling Olive how much he enjoyed sitting in one of the hotel’s capacious public rooms, working at peace on notes for his novel.

  “You’re writing a novel?”

  “Oh yes. I’m well ahead with it.”

  Olive turned to Rowland, “You must be terribly proud of your student-novelist. What a distinction for your school—” and turning to Chris—“Do come any time and use our writing rooms. You can bring your laptops and things. We’ll be delighted.”

  “He hasn’t got a publisher yet,” said Rowland. “That’s the sine qua non of a book.”

  “He’ll get a publisher,” said Olive, brimming with goodwill and middle-aged glow.

  “I could kill him,” thought Rowland. “But would that be enough?”

  Many times, now, Rowland thought of how it would be if Chris were dead. It wouldn’t do. It wouldn’t be enough. There would always remain the fact that Chris had lived, had been writing a novel while still at school, had prevented Rowland from writing his novel.

  Rowland, opening his notebook of observations on Chris one night before going to bed, found the following words, not his: “Watch him at table sitting next to Mary Foot. He is a groper.”

  Rowland rushed into the bedroom where Nina was already in bed, propped up, reading a book. “Someone’s been meddling with my work,” he said.

  “Meddling? How?”

  “I’ve found words in my notebook that I didn’t write.”

  “I’d say it was Chris,” she said, and went on reading.

  “Are you going to let him get away with it?”

  “Oh, Rowland, can’t you talk to him yourself?”

  “No, I’d prefer to put up with him. It’s only a couple of months, and he’ll be going. Don’t let it worry you, then,” he said.

  Nothing was worrying her, but she knew he was upset once more by Chris. Only a couple of months to the end of the school year. Nina had spent the afternoon with Israel Brown, not quite in bed, but nearly. She found him attractive, learned, charming, scholarly, sexy.

  At dinner the next day, Tilly, with her genius for making unsettling remarks, asked Chris how he was getting on with his novel.

  “It’s growing,” he said.

  “Growing fat,” said Pallas to remind everyone that it was she who kept notes, discs and printed pages of Chris’s book as it developed, when he was not working on it.

  “Why did Darnley murder Rizzio?” said Mary Foot.

  “Jealousy. Rizzio was more interesting to the Queen than her husband was. Rizzio and Darnley were close, confidential friends to start with. But Darnley became obsessed with jealousy.”

  “The Queen forgave him for Rizzio’s murder?” said Joan Archer.

  “She was a politician at that point. She was . . .”

  He was unusually happy and expressive on his theme, and especially on the question of jealousy. “Darnley was a tall, handsome fellow. A cousin of the Queen, a royal. It quite appalled him that word was going round, as it did, that Rizzio, small and humbly born, was her lover. Rizzio had a great talent for music, for courtiership. He had already been a diplomat when he’d met Bonivard, or might have met— that’s a fictional proposition of course . . .”

  Rowland was unable to eat, or even of going through the motions of touching food with his fork. He sat immobile. Tilly prodded on:

  “It’s true you will need a publisher. How do you go about that?”

  “Well, as a matter of fact,” said Chris, “I’ve got three publishers nibbling already. I’ll tell you how I went about it.” And he soon had the table shouting with laughter (Rowland did not join) as he told how he had written to the three publishers in London: “I have just turned seventeen and I am writing an historical novel based on Mary Queen of Scots and the murder of her husband Darnley. The theme is jealousy and passion.” Chris said, “They all seemed to find this irresistible. I have the feeling that my being seventeen is an attractive part of the deal. One of them has offered to come and see me. Another has offered me a contract on sight of the first ten pages. They’re terribly enthusiastic. I can get money for my book.”

  “Money?” said Opal.

  “Yes, real money. But I won’t let that influence me in my choice of publisher.”

  “Quite right,” said Mary Foot.

  “I don’t agree,” said Pallas. “If they invest money, they will put an effort into publishing the book. The highest bidder should never, never, be entirely ignored. My Pa says so.”

  “But a novel is a work of art,” Mary said. “Or should be. And a work of art is without price. Art comes before commerce.”

  Everyone at the table agreed to that. Everyone excluding Rowland, who remained in a catatonic pose, his elbows on the table and his two hands some inches in front of his eyes as if he was amazed at something. He was in fact amazed that those hands would decidedly want to strangle Chris.

  “But,” said Nina, “the laborer is worthy of his hire and so let’s hope that Chris will get reasonable pay for his work—Rowland, will you pass down the sauce, please?”

  Rowland did not move.

  “Rowland . . .”

  He slowly unwound himself from his trance and pushed the sauceboat across the table. He said, “Don’t count your chickens before . . . well, Chris, they might not accept the book.”

  Many protests arose from round the table, but Chris said, “I might never even live to finish the book, Rowland. How can one know?”

  Israel Brown said to Nina, “He should go on a spiritual retreat. I know of a Catholic monastery in the mountains. They don’t try to convert you, they just give peace of mind. If you like I’ll get them to arrange something
for Rowland. It’s obviously what he needs.”

  “He’s already a Catholic,” Nina said, “nominally.” In desperation, she had been describing Rowland’s condition to Israel on one of her afternoon visits. She had said, “He needs a psychiatrist,” but Israel had said, “No, I think it’s a spiritual problem.”

  “It’s difficult, right in the middle of term,” said Nina. “I’d have to cope alone. But with this obsession . . .”

  “The boy should leave, of course,” Israel said.

  “We can’t send him away. We took him on as a sort of apprentice writer. He said he was writing a novel and we agreed. Rowland was supposed to help him. Rowland published an article in his university review and he has had a novel in mind. That’s all he’s done for three years. He’s come to a block. I keep telling him it’s nothing to do with his fundamental talent. He genuinely thinks Chris is a menace to the literary profession. A romantic novel from a boy of seventeen will always be popular.”

  “Could Rowland be an unconscious gay?”

  “He could be, but how would I know?”

  “You would know,” said Israel.

  “He’s hypnotized by Chris.”

  “By Chris or by his novel?”

  “How would I know?”

  “You would know,” said Israel.

  “I know you’re right,” she said. “In fact our marriage is all washed up. I’m just waiting till the end of term.”

  “Doesn’t he know that?”

  “Not a bit. He no longer thinks of me, his marriage, the school or anything at all but Chris, his novel. The students are aware there’s something wrong, they’re not fools.”

  “Can you tell him to his face that he’s ill?”

  “Not yet.”

  It was Chris who told Rowland that he was ill. He had taken it for granted that Rowland knew himself to be in a state of bad nerves. Rowland was sometimes in the habit of taking a long ride on his motorbike in the mountains in the early afternoons. In the past spring one of the students, very often Chris or Lionel Haas, had accompanied him on the back of the bike. It was good to get the mountain air. Chris had always enjoyed a ride with Rowland. But now when, one afternoon, Rowland said, “Coming for a spin?” Chris said, “No, thanks.”

  It was a cold, sunny day. Rowland said, “Come on, Chris, it will do you good. You must get some air.”

  “No, thanks, Rowland. Those steep roads are quite dangerous, you know. I honestly don’t think you’re in good enough shape to take the bike up there. Your nerves . . .”

  “My nerves? They’re all right. What’s the matter? Do you think I want to land you over a precipice?”

  “No, you wouldn’t want to, but you might.”

  “You think I would want to kill you?”

  “Not really.” They were in the entrance hall, and Chris turned to go upstairs. Tilly was coming down just then.

  “Tilly, will you come for a spin in the mountains on the bike?”

  “It’s our drama class this afternoon,” she said. “I don’t want to miss it.”

  It was true that a teacher of drama, a retired actress from Geneva, was due to take her weekly class that afternoon.

  “Are you afraid?” Rowland said.

  “Afraid?”

  “To come on my bike?”

  “Of course not, Rowland. But I do like the drama class. It’s so marvelous to learn how to arrange flowers that aren’t there and talk to someone who actually isn’t there, at the same time.” She was dressed in a tight-fitting orange wool dress, very much prepared for her drama class.

  Rowland went to Nina. “I offered Tilly. I offered Chris a ride on my bike, but they won’t come.”

  “There’s the drama class this afternoon,” she said. The drama class was extremely successful. Nina knew that the students wrote home enthusiastically about it. And indeed they were lucky with Mme. Sousy de Merier, a born conveyor of the facts and tricks of the profession. Even Chris would leave his novel to participate in Mme. Sousy’s lessons. “They can’t leave the lessons,” Nina said. “I won’t allow it.”

  “But Chris and Tilly are afraid to ride on the back of my bike. I can feel it. I can sense it. Am I in a nervous condition?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Everyone knows.”

  “Everybody is discussing me?”

  “That’s not so. And it’s neither here nor there.”

  “It’s Chris. He’s getting me down.”

  “I’ll send him home if you like.”

  “Home? Where does he live? I’d only follow him. You don’t understand what it’s like to feel this compulsion to stop a kid writing an idiotic book. He’s got publishers now, on account of his age. Every publisher wants a novel by a red-haired youth of seventeen with a smattering of history and a good opinion of himself.”

  “Maybe it’s a good novel.”

  “Impossible.” Rowland’s voice went up to something near a scream.

  “Listen, Rowland,” she said. “I’ve been talking to Israel Brown.”

  “And you’re having an affair with him,” he said suddenly very bored, very weary.

  “And you don’t care.”

  “No, frankly, I don’t. Who is he? What does he do?”

  “I think he has a gallery. I think he studies art and music. Maybe philosophy . . .”

  Rowland was not listening. He said, “I could even take out a boat on the lake and tip all Chris’s possessions, all of them including his computer, his discs, his printouts, into the lake . . .”

  “And Chris as well,” said Nina.

  “Yes, I could tip him over the edge. He stopped me writing my novel. I have a book of observations about Chris that would make you shriek and shiver. I could . . .”

  “Enough,” said Nina. “You’re ill.”

  12

  It was the end of October and Rowland had been three weeks at the Monastery of St. Justin Amadeus on a Swiss mountain plateau near the French border. He was soothed; he was calm. The sound of plainsong three times daily so filled his ear that he found it difficult to rid his mind of the music in between the services. He helped to chop wood every day. He meditated, he prayed.

  In these weeks he had written three long essays on the subject of literary composition which Nina, who visited him every other day, had taken back to College Sunrise to be read aloud to the creative writing class in Rowland’s absence, by Lionel Haas. Nina brought Mary Foot to visit Rowland several times, and had promised to bring other students to the monastery. These visits, in fact, seemed quite naturally to fit in with part of their education. The white-robed monks moved like automatons about their duties, sometimes separately, sometimes, on their way to the chapel, in single file. The prior, who had a becoming white beard, caused them to be served carrot juice, which was, he held, a good drink for high altitudes. The friars made a wine which they sold to merchants in the French valleys. On the labels, in English, it was pronounced to have “a great personality in the mouth, savoring of prunes, tobacco, wild fruits.”

  Rowland had managed to put the thought of Chris aside, as something to be dealt with when he should later “return to reality,” as he told himself. When he thought of Chris, he felt a decided simmering of resentment.

  But he was now thoroughly bored at the monastery. He knew the Psalms by heart, so that they had become just words, and there was really nobody for him to talk to. The good prior scarcely appeared outside of the Mass and other services in the chapel. One morning he decided to go home and avoid Chris as much as possible. He was expecting Nina to arrive that afternoon.

  He left word with the prior that he was leaving, wrote a gracious letter thanking the community for their support in his difficulties and made ready to go in to the refectory for his last lunch of barley soup and macaroni-cheese. He crossed the courtyard for this purpose. Around the bend toward the main gate came hooting a Honda piled with a backseat bundle; it was ridden by a lithe, helmeted youth.

 
; “Hallo, Rowland,” said the youth, and drew up noisily, dramatically, at the doorway.

  Rowland peered at his face. The boy took off his helmet and shook his red, red hair.

  “Chris.”

  “Yes, Rowland.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I phoned the prior. They’ve got a place for me.”

  “You want to come here?”

  “I can’t work without you, Rowland. I need whatever it is you radiate. I have to finish my novel in peace.”

  “You’re mad.”

  “And you?”

  “I? —I’m going home with Nina this afternoon.”

  Chris left his bike in the courtyard and pushed his way through the door into the house. He said, over his shoulder, “Nina isn’t coming this afternoon.”

  “Come in and meet the sub-prior. It’s lunchtime. Remember this is a religious house.”

  The friar whose duty it was that day to read to the assembled company during their midday meal had chosen a passage from the English mystical book The Scale of Perfection. Chris listened, absorbed, as he chewed his bread and swallowed his soup, and did not notice when Rowland helped himself to the keys on the table; he didn’t notice that Rowland’s place was suddenly vacant.

  Rowland, in fact, having liberated the Honda from its package by dumping it in the courtyard, was on his way back to Ouchy on Chris’s Honda, stopping only to fill up with petrol.

  Nina was conducting her comme il faut class. “Be careful who takes you to Ascot,” she said, “because, unless you have married a rich husband, he is probably a crook. Even if he’s your husband, well . . . Not many honest men can take four days off their work, dress themselves in a black suit and a silk hat with all the accoutrements, and lose a lot of money on the horses, and take you out afterward or join a party of people like him. For Ascot you will need warm underwear in case it’s cold. You can wear a flimsy dress on top. But your man is bound to be a crook, bound to be. It teems with crooks . . .”

  “My Dad doesn’t go to Ascot,” said Pallas.