A boy called Charles and his parents are visiting a prospective new boarding school. They are welcomed by the headmaster and his wife. Read the passage by Penelope Lively and answer the questions.
The headmaster's wife said, 'And this is Charles? My dear, we've been forgetting about you! In a minute I'm going to borrow Charles and take him off to meet some of the boys because after all you're choosing a school for him, aren't you, and not for you, so he ought to know what he might be letting himself in for and it shows we've got nothing to hide.'
The parents laughed. The father, sherry warming his guts, thought that this was an amusing woman. Not attractive, of course, a bit homespun, but impressive all the same. Partly the voice, of course; it takes a jolly expensive education to produce a voice like that. And other things, of course, background and all that stuff.
1. What two things about the headmaster's wife impress the father?
2. Why does the headmaster's wife say 'it shows we've got nothing to hide'?
“I think I can hear the thud of the Fourth Form coming in from games, which means my husband is on his way, and then I shall leave you with him while I take Charles off to the common room.”
For a moment the three adults centred on the child, looking, judging. The mother said, “He looks so hideously pale, compared to those boys we saw outside.”
“My dear, that's London, isn't it? You just have to get them out, to get some colour into them. Ah, here's James. James – Mr and Mrs Manders. You remember, one of our parents was mentioning at Sports Day.”
The headmaster reflected his wife's style, like paired cards in Happy Families. His clothes were mature rather than old, his skin well-scrubbed, his shoes clean, his friendliness untainted by the least condescension. He was genuinely sorry to have kept them waiting, but in this business one lurches from one minor crisis to the next… “And this is Charles? Hello, there, Charles.” His large hand rested for a moment on the child's head, quite extinguishing the thin, dark hair. It was as though he had but to clench his fingers to crush the skull, but he took his hand away and moved the parents to the window, to observe the broken window of the cricket pavilion, with indulgent laughter.
3. What does 'the three adults centred on the child, looking, judging' suggest about how Charles feels?
4. What does the image of the headmaster's hand 'quite extinguishing the thin, dark hair' suggest?
And the child is borne away by the headmaster's wife. She never touches him or tells him to come, but simply bears him away like some relentless tide, down corridors and through swinging glass doors, towing him like a frail craft, not bothering to look back to see if he is following, confident in the strength of magnetism, or obedience. And delivers him to a room where boys are scattered among inky tables and rungless chairs, and sprawled on a mangy carpet. There is a scampering and a rising, and a silence falling as she opens the door.
5. Why does the writer compare Charles to 'a frail craft' being towed by a 'relentless tide'?
6. What does the phrase 'confident in the strength of magnetism, or obedience' tell us about the wife?
“Now, this is the Lower Third, Charles, who you'd be with if you come to us in September. Boys, this is Charles Manders, and I want you to tell him all about things and answer any questions he wants to ask. You can believe about half of what they say, Charles, and they will tell you the most fearful lies about the food, which is excellent.”
The boys laugh and groan; amiable, exaggerated groans. They must like the headmaster's wife: there is licensed joking. They look at her with bright eyes in open, eager faces. Someone leaps to hold the door for her, and close it behind her. She is gone.
7. What evidence shows the boys like the headmaster's wife?
8. Why is the two-word sentence 'She is gone' so powerful?
The child stands in the centre of the room, and it draws in around him. The circle of children contracts, faces are only a yard or so from him, strange faces, looking, assessing.
Asking questions. They help themselves to his name, his age, his school. Over their heads he sees beyond the window an inaccessible world of shivering trees and high racing clouds and his voice which has floated like a feather in the dusty schoolroom air dies altogether and he becomes mute, and he stands in the middle of them with shoulders humped, staring down at feet: grubby plimsolls and kicked brown sandals. There is a noise in his ears like rushing water, a torrential din out of which voices boom, blotting each other out so that he cannot always hear the words.
Do you? they say, and Have you? and What's your? and the faces, if he looks up, swing into one another in kaleidoscopic patterns and the floor under his feet is unsteady, lifting and falling.
And out of the noises comes one voice that is complete, that he can hear. “Next term we'll mash you,” it says. “We always mash new boys.”
9. What does 'they help themselves to his name, his age, his school' suggest about how the boys treat Charles?
10. How does Penelope Lively show that Charles is losing control of his senses?
11. What does the boy mean by 'Next term we'll mash you. We always mash new boys'?
12. Looking at the whole passage, are the boys kind or cruel to Charles?