CHAPTER FIVE

By the time I arrived back at the house, the sun had completely gone down and night had settled upon the land. I was troubled. Who was this man? Was he a crazy family member I had not been told about? Immediately, I looked for Mrs Grose, hoping she could tell me who this person was. When I found her, she immediately expressed how worried she had been about me, for I had been out much later than usual. I suddenly lost the desire to tell her what I had seen. I did not want to frighten her.

For the next three days, my worries increased. I could not understand why that man had been there. And because I could not explain it to myself, my fear grew larger than before. It was possible that the servants might have been playing a trick on me. But no one behaved unusually towards me. No laughing could be heard and no strange looks were given.

Finally, I managed to get myself to believe that it was just some impolite stranger who wanted to look at the old house. He must have just climbed the tower without asking for permission. Only the rudest people would behave in such a way. That then explained the way that he had looked at me for so long. This comforted me a little, for it would mean that he would probably never come back again.

I decided to try to forget about the man by working harder on the children's lessons. I truly enjoyed teaching them. I never once felt tired of my job. Most teachers lose interest in their students after just a short time. But I found them as charming as always. Every class I would learn something new about each of my beautiful, young students. I could not, however, learn why the boy had been dismissed from his school. I decided that he had probably done nothing wrong. It was likely that other children had been jealous of his beauty and intelligence and then told lies to the teacher about him. It was possible that the leader of the school might have been jealous of him too. Young Miles was simply too good for them.

And yet, Miles seemed so happy and sweet. I had never met another child like him in all the days of my teaching. This made me doubt the possibility that the other children had treated him badly. Surely, he would have been a sadder child if they had. The idea of Miles, himself, being a badly behaved boy seemed impossible, too. I was always with him during the day and early evening. Nothing ever seemed wrong with him. Not once did he ever mention the school or any of his friends or teachers. I, of course, feeling so angry with the school, never said a word about it either.

The effect that Miles and Flora had on me was simply magical. I always felt wonderful around them. Nothing could upset me. Even the unhappy letters I received from my family, talking about their many problems at home, did not make me feel bad.

One Sunday, it rained so hard and for so long that it made it impossible to go to church. Mrs Grose and I then decided that if the weather improved we would go in the evening. Eventually, it did stop raining, and I prepared to go. As I was coming downstairs to meet my companion at the front door, I remembered a pair of gloves that I had recently repaired. There had been an embarrassing hole in one of the fingers, so one of the servants offered to sew it for me. After finishing the job, the servant told me she had left the gloves in one of the dining room chairs. I decided that this would be a good opportunity to wear them again, so I went into the dining room to get them.

When I entered the dining room to look for them, I immediately saw a man standing outside the window across from me. It was the same stranger I had seen in the tower. He was looking directly at me. He looked exactly like he had before, only now he was much closer. I felt that I could not move and a cold feeling ran through my body. Although I was very afraid, it seemed to me that I was looking at someone familiar. In fact, I had the strange feeling that I had known him my whole life. Our eyes met for a few seconds and then he turned away. I continued to watch him. He seemed uninterested in me and began to look at other parts of the house. It quickly became clear to me that he was looking for someone.

Being the master of the house, a natural desire to protect the children came over me. Immediately, I ran back into the hallway and out the front door of the house. When I went around the corner to meet him, I found no one there. He had completely disappeared. I felt glad that he had gone, for as brave as I was to face him, I still felt terribly frightened. I then waited for him to return. I do not know how long I stood there. I remember looking about the land and feeling certain that none of the trees or bushes were hiding him. He was gone.

The idea then came to me to go to the window I had seen him standing outside of. I walked to the window and looked inside, just as he had done. Mrs Grose happened to walk into the dining room just then and, seeing me in the window, had the same fright that I had experienced only a few moments before. It was like history repeating itself again. I noticed her face as it changed to white, and wondered to myself if mine had done the same thing when I saw the man. I then watched her do exactly as I had done. She stood for a moment, her eyes looking into mine. Then she walked back into the hallway and through the front door of the house. As I waited for her to round the corner to meet me, I thought to myself, "Should she be as frightened as I had been?"

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