Saki, “The Schartz-Metterklume Method.”

 This passage is adapted from Saki, “The

Schartz-Metterklume Method.” Originally published in 1911.

Lady Carlotta stepped out on to the platform of

the small wayside station and took a turn or two up

and down its uninteresting length, to kill time till the

train should be pleased to proceed on its way. Then,

in the roadway beyond, she saw a horse struggling

with a more than ample load, and a carter of the sort

that seems to bear a sullen hatred against the animal

that helps him to earn a living. Lady Carlotta

promptly betook her to the roadway, and put rather a

different complexion on the struggle. Certain of her

acquaintances were wont to give her plentiful

admonition as to the undesirability of interfering on

behalf of a distressed animal, such interference being

“none of her business.” Only once had she put the

doctrine of non-interference into practice, when one

of its most eloquent exponents had been besieged for

nearly three hours in a small and extremely

uncomfortable may-tree by an angry boar-pig, while

Lady Carlotta, on the other side of the fence, had

proceeded with the water-colour sketch she was

engaged on, and refused to interfere between the

boar and his prisoner. It is to be feared that she lost

the friendship of the ultimately rescued lady. On this

occasion she merely lost the train, which gave way to

the first sign of impatience it had shown throughout

the journey, and steamed off without her. She bore

the desertion with philosophical indifference; her

friends and relations were thoroughly well used to

the fact of her luggage arriving without her.

She wired a vague non-committal message to her

destination to say that she was coming on “by

another train.” Before she had time to think what her

next move might be she was confronted by an

imposingly attired lady, who seemed to be taking a

prolonged mental inventory of her clothes and looks.

“You must be Miss Hope, the governess I’ve come

to meet,” said the apparition, in a tone that admitted

of very little argument.

“Very well, if I must I must,” said Lady Carlotta to

herself with dangerous meekness.

“I am Mrs. Quabarl,” continued the lady; “and

where, pray, is your luggage?”

“It’s gone astray,” said the alleged governess,

falling in with the excellent rule of life that the absent

are always to blame; the luggage had, in point of fact,

behaved with perfect correctitude. “I’ve just

telegraphed about it,” she added, with a nearer

approach to truth.

“How provoking,” said Mrs. Quabarl; “these

railway companies are so careless. However, my

maid can lend you things for the night,” and she led

the way to her car.

During the drive to the Quabarl mansion

Lady Carlotta was impressively introduced to the

nature of the charge that had been thrust upon her;

she learned that Claude and Wilfrid were delicate,

sensitive young people, that Irene had the artistic

temperament highly developed, and that Viola was

something or other else of a mould equally

commonplace among children of that class and type

in the twentieth century.

“I wish them not only to be TAUGHT,” said Mrs.

Quabarl, “but INTERESTED in what they learn. In

their history lessons, for instance, you must try to

make them feel that they are being introduced to the

life-stories of men and women who really lived, not

merely committing a mass of names and dates to

memory. French, of course, I shall expect you to talk

at meal-times several days in the week.”

“I shall talk French four days of the week and

Russian in the remaining three.”

“Russian? My dear Miss Hope, no one in the

house speaks or understands Russian.”

“That will not embarrass me in the least,” said

Lady Carlotta coldly.

Mrs. Quabarl, to use a colloquial expression, was

knocked off her perch. She was one of those

imperfectly self-assured individuals who are

magnificent and autocratic as long as they are not

seriously opposed. The least show of unexpected

resistance goes a long way towards rendering them

cowed and apologetic. When the new governess

failed to express wondering admiration of the large

newly-purchased and expensive car, and lightly

alluded to the superior advantages of one or two

makes which had just been put on the market, the

discomfiture of her patroness became almost abject.

Her feelings were those which might have animated a

general of ancient warfaring days, on beholding his

heaviest battle-elephant ignominiously driven off the

field by slingers and javelin throwers.

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