The Governesses by Anne Serre

Author:Anne Serre
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780811228077
Publisher: New Directions
Published: 2018-10-30T00:00:00+00:00

The little boys occupy a great deal of the governesses’ time. After all, they were hired to look after the boys and drum a few notions into them. They love playing at schoolmistresses, watching the little boys line up in pairs at the ring of the bell, then taking them off on a walk where they’ll gather chestnuts and plane leaves for their plant collections.

When the little boys go walking in the forest, they long to lose their way, leading the governesses off through undergrowth and thicket, meadow and marsh, eager to give themselves a good scare — and no doubt to come to the governesses’ rescue as well. They begin by gathering leaves for their collections: soft round poplar leaves, wafer-thin like the host at communion; the inevitable plane leaves; and horse chestnut leaves, which they pull apart until all that remains is a skeleton like that of a prehistoric fish.

Laden with pebbles, leaves, and flowers whose heads are already drooping, they sit themselves down in a meadow for lunch. The governesses let out a yawn and lower their guard. They unlace their boots. They even strip naked sometimes, and the little boys gaze at them in silence, petrified. For the rest of their lives, they will love only governesses naked in a soft green meadow, their long thighs in the grass, the gleaming thatch of hair where pale yellow butterflies alight, their tender, dreamy breasts.

Some of them are allowed to sketch the governesses. And beneath their sketches they write, in capital letters: The Three Graces. The older ones timidly reach out a hand. They’re allowed to cup a breast, run their hand along the contour of a thigh, hover above the thatch of hair. But not more than that. Then it’s time for dancing, a moment the boys adore. The governesses rise to their feet and, to the sound of tambourines and pipes, start to dance, lifting a long leg in time to the beat, then an arm, then another leg and another arm. The older boys lie in the grass, watching them, happy as kings. The dance goes on for a long time. It can even last until nightfall. They’ve forgotten about their chestnuts and plant collections, the buckeyes in their prickly casings, the bluebells and bindweed. They’ve lit a fire and are clapping their hands. Animals appear on the edge of the woods, like a scene in a fairy tale. You can see their dark forms moving around behind the trees and hear the soft stamp of their delicate hooves: a hundred eyes, some bright, some dark, some black, some red, stare out at the governesses as they dance on the meadow, licked by the flames that leap back and forth to the beat of the tambourines.

Then all of a sudden they’ve had enough, feel frozen by the cold night air, stop dancing, and put their clothes back on. It’s time to go home. They tramp through the forest together, silent and at one, their step more harmonious than when they first set out.

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