1-8（在线收听）

8.

Despite its two male headmasters—Mr. Gerald and Mr. Marston, both legends—Ludgrove waslargely run by women. We called them the matrons. Whatever tenderness we got, day to day,came from them. The matrons hugged us, kissed us, bandaged our injuries, wiped our tears. (Allexcept mine, that is. After that one graveside outburst I’d not cried again.) They fanciedthemselves our surrogates. Mums-Away-From-Mums, they’d always chirp, which had alwaysbeen odd, but now was especially confusing, because of Mummy’s disappearance, and alsobecause the matrons were suddenly…hot.

I had a crush on Miss Roberts. I felt certain I’d marry her one day. I also recall two MissLynns. Miss Lynn Major and Miss Lynn Minor. They were sisters. I was deeply smitten with thelatter. I reckoned I’d marry her too.

Three times a week, after dinner, the matrons would assist the youngest boys with the nightlywash. I can still see the long row of white baths, each with a boy reclining like a little pharaoh,awaiting his personalized hair-washing. (For older boys who’d reached puberty there were twotubs in a separate room, behind a yellow door.) The matrons came down the row of tubs with stiffbrushes, bars of floral soap. Every boy had his own towel, embossed with his school number.

Mine was 116.

After shampooing a boy the matrons would ease back his head, give him a slow and luxuriousrinse.

Confusing as hell.

Matrons would also help with the crucial extraction of lice. Outbreaks were common. Nearlyevery week another boy would come down with a fierce case. We’d all point and laugh. Nyah,nyah, you’ve got nits! Before long a matron would be kneeling over the patient, rubbing somesolution into his scalp, then scraping out the dead beasts with a special comb.

As a thirteen-year-old I graduated from matronly bathing assistance. But I still depended ontheir nightly tuck-ins, still treasured their morning greetings. They were the first faces we saw eachday. They swept into our rooms, threw open our curtains. Morning, boys! Bleary, I’d gaze up intoa beautiful visage framed by a halo of sun…

Is that…could that be…?

It never was.

The matron I dealt with the most was Pat. Unlike the other matrons, Pat wasn’t hot. Pat wascold. Pat was small, mousy, frazzled, and her hair fell greasily into her always tired eyes. Patdidn’t seem to get much joy out of life, though she did find two things reliably satisfying—catching a boy somewhere he wasn’t supposed to be, and shutting down any bouts ofroughhousing. Before every pillow fight we’d put a sentry on the door. If Pat (or the headmasters)approached, the sentry was instructed to cry: KV! KV! Latin, I think? Someone said it meant: Thehead’s coming! Someone else said it meant: Beware!

Whichever, when you heard it you knew to get out of there. Or pretend to be asleep.

Only the newest and stupidest boys would go to Pat with a problem. Or, worse, a cut. Shewouldn’t bandage it: she’d poke it with a finger or squirt something into it that hurt twice as much.

She wasn’t a sadist, she just seemed “empathy- challenged.” Odd, because she knew aboutsuffering. Pat had many crosses to bear.

The biggest seemed her knees and spine. The latter was crooked, the former chronically stiff.

Walking was hard, stairs were torture. She’d descend backwards, glacially. Often we’d stand onthe landing below her, doing antic dances, making faces.

Do I need to say which boy did this with the most enthusiasm?

We never worried about Pat catching us. She was a tortoise and we were tree frogs. Still, nowand then the tortoise would luck out. She’d lunge, grab a fistful of boy. Aha! That lad would thenbe well and truly fucked.

Didn’t stop us. We went on mocking her as she came down the stairs. The reward was worththe risk. For me, the reward wasn’t tormenting poor Pat, but making my mates laugh. It felt sogood to make others laugh, especially when I hadn’t laughed for months.

Maybe Pat knew this. Now and then she’d turn, see me being a perfect ass, and she’d laughtoo. That was the best. I loved cracking up my mates, but nothing quite did it for me like makingthe otherwise miserable Pat bust a gut.