Summary: Chapter XIII
The governess believes that the children are aware that
she knows about their relationships with Quint and Miss Jessel.
When together, she and the children avoid any subject that nears
forbidden territory, and she finds herself repeatedly recalling
events in her personal history to fill conversational space. The
season changes to autumn. As day after day passes without incident,
the governess thinks perhaps her eyes have been sealed and that
the children are communicating with unseen visitors in her very
presence. Even so, her charges are more likeable each day.
Unable to broach the topic of Quint and Miss
Jessel with the children, the governess shuts herself up in a room
to rehearse. Still, in their company, she cannot find the nerve
and instead finds herself chattering more than ever, always until
she notices a sudden, strange silence. These perceived stillnesses
have become common when she is with her pupils, but all three refuse
to acknowledge that they occur. The children begin to ask the governess
about their uncle and why he hasn’t visited or written. The governess
has the children write letters to him with the understanding that
such writings are merely educational exercises.
Analysis
These chapters detail the governess’s struggle to protect
and save the children, together with her growing impression that
the children are deceiving her and that things are worse than she
thought. Although she does see Quint and Jessel again, most of the
suspense is now generated by what she suspects and imagines about
the children’s dealings with the ghosts. She no longer fears confronting
the ghosts but instead fears that she has lost the power to see
them and that the ghosts are appearing to the children in her very
presence, telling them something infernal or referring to “dreadful
passages of intercourse in the past.” Now the terror is purely psychological,
and we are drawn in to share her fears because, just like her, there
seems to be something terrible going on that we also can’t define.
We see things from the governess’s point of view, and
the children appear to be a mixture of things—charming, affectionate,
angelic, and wonderfully tactful but also duplicitous and subtle.
We are given much less information about how the children may perceive
the governess, but that which we are given is rather unsettling.
The governess describes her own behavior as both extremely vigilant
and watchful and extremely affectionate—she perpetually bows down
and hugs the children. Yet her expressions of affection and her
constant surveillance have oppressive and suffocating overtones,
and there are hints that the children tolerate rather than welcome
it. In moments of crisis, the governess seems downright frightening.
Thinking Flora has lied, the governess grips her in a “spasm” and
reports being surprised that Flora does not cry out in surprise
or fright. When she questions Miles, she is aware of answering him
“only with a vague repeated grimacing nod.” She always suppresses
her urge to ask about the ghosts but instead cross-examines the
children about what they say and do. If the children
are innocent and do not see the ghosts, the
governess’s behavior must seem strange and terrifying.
