The Finishing School by Muriel Spark Read Free Book Online Page A

you listening, Ro?” Rowland smiled at her. “Don’t I get any of the credit?”
    “In fact you do. Listen: ‘Mr. Mahler’s course in writing has really got Leg thinking. She took a bunch of newspaper clippings, jumbled them up, took the fifth word out of every printed line and made a fantastic poem. That’s freedom of expression, Mum, she said. And she said you’ll never guess how it makes you feel free just to put those words together like that. There’s a great meaning when you leave out the grammatical factor. She says Rowland says it’s not what you put in it’s what you leave out, and it’s the silences rather than the sound. I am so grateful for what you have done for Leg, Mr. Mahler. She’s a totally different person. She cut short that summer course at Cambridge of her own free will at her own discretion entirely and I admire her for it. They were teaching that pain in the neck (Leg calls it pain in the ass) George Eliot with the video shows from the BBC production. Leg said that after Mr. Mahler’s Madame Miss World Bovary she simply couldn’t sit there taking in the point about the moral dilemma. The other students were nonprofitable to be with, all leadership and laptops . . .’ —Of course,” Nina said, “Leg’s mother lives in dire wealth.”
    “People like her enthuse about everything. But it’s true we’re a great school,” Rowland said.
    “It’s so true,” said Nina. “You really don’t need to write a novel. Don’t you feel you’re one of those people who can get by without writing a novel?”
    “No.”

9
    It was well advanced into September, the last term of the College Sunrise year. All nine students were settled in again. We find, now, Nina, taking one of her casual afternoon comme il faut talks, as she called them. Five students lolled around Nina in the large sitting room: Lionel Haas, Princess Tilly, Lisa Orlando, Pallas Kapelas and Joan Archer.
    “In case you are thinking of getting a job at the United Nations,” Nina told them, “I have picked up a bit of information which may be useful, even vital to you. A senior member of the U.N. Secretariat passed it on to me especially for you young people. First, if you, as a U.N. employee, are chased by an elephant stand still and wave a white handkerchief. This confuses the elephant’s legs. Second, if chased by a large python, run away in a zigzag movement, as a python can’t coordinate its head with its tail. If you have no time to run away, sit down with your back to a tree and spread your legs. The python will hesitate, not knowing which leg to begin with. Get out your knife and cut its head off.”
    “Suppose there isn’t a tree to lean against?” Lionel said.
    “I’ve thought of that,” said Nina, “but I haven’t come up with an answer.”
    Célestine came in with a large tray of tea and fresh-baked biscuits. She was thin as a wire with black tights and top. Her yellow, bright, hairdresser-done hair fell evenly round her shoulders from a strictly black parting. She and her sister, Elaine, had originated in Marseilles. They both had thin shapes and sharp, dark, buttonlike eyes, although Elaine had kept her hair dark. Everyone knew that Célestine was Chris’s girl, but nobody, including Nina, was quite sure about Elaine, the older sister, who had opportunities to sleep with Rowland. Did she take them?
    Nina often wondered about this, but did not bother unduly. With Elaine teaching French and coping with the computer, and Célestine doing the wonderful cooking, Nina left well alone. Without the wiry girls with their spidery legs what would the school have done?
    Célestine spread out the cups and saucers and the plates of biscuits which began to disappear even as she did so. One of the girls poured the tea, another handed round the cups. All was right with the world.
    All was right with the world for Chris. He now ignored all classes, lessons, lectures of any sort. He knew that Nina and Rowland couldn’t