Villette

After a meal and evening prayers, Lucy is led to the children’s room, where the current nurse, Mrs. Sweeny, is passed out drunk. Lucy is thankful for a place to sleep. The mistress enters the room in the middle of the night and examines all of Lucy’s belongings, including a set of keys Madame Beck makes an impression of in wax. Lucy watches it all as she pretends to sleep.

The next day Lucy learns that Mrs. Sweeny obtained her job under false pretenses; she claimed to be an Englishwoman of some importance but is a poor Irishwoman. Lucy suspects Mrs. Sweeny got the job thanks to her wardrobe of fancy clothing. Mrs. Sweeny is angry that Madame Beck has hired Lucy to replace her, and Madame Beck calls the police to subdue her.

In addition to supervising the nursery children and teaching them English, Lucy becomes a maid to “Madame” (Madame Beck). Lucy observes the way Madame Beck runs the school, which has both boarders and day students, shrewdly managing both the school’s operations and the students’ behavior. She spies on them and employs her staff and others around town to do the same. The students enjoy a good education under the firm control of Madame. Though Lucy still sees English education as superior, she comes to respect and admire Madame.

Madame often fires teachers she sees as weak. She begins to watch Lucy and one day approaches her with an opportunity to teach in the classroom. Lucy has no teaching experience and lacks confidence in her French, though she has been studying at night. However, Lucy subdues the wild, rebellious class of 60; she tears one student’s unimpressive composition in half and locks the worst girl in the closet. Madame, pleased with her performance, moves Lucy from the nursery to the classroom.

The students at Rue Fossette are diverse in social rankings but similar in their unruliness and tendency to lie. Lucy finds their behavior abhorrent but receives no help from Madame, who expects the teachers to handle the discipline. Lucy finds the French students especially unwilling to be disciplined in their studies. However, Lucy gains the girls’ respect by being firm and direct with them about their laziness. There is some religious friction between Lucy and the girls, as she is a Protestant and they are Catholic.

When Ginevra Fanshawe arrives, she takes to using Lucy as a repository for all her selfish complaints about the school and forces her to do her mending. Ginevra is beautiful and has fallen for a young man in town she calls “Isidore.” She has not told her family about him. Ginevra does not truly love him but loves that he adores her. She says, “He is, [a fool] about me; but he is wise in other things” (111). Ginevra spends time with a lady in town called Mrs. Cholmondeley, who takes her to parties and sometimes buys her clothing. Lucy notices Ginevra has an excess of dresses and accessories she cannot afford. She confesses to Lucy that Isidore gives them to her. Lucy expresses her disapproval, considering that Ginevra has no plans to marry him. Ginevra says she is bored by Isidore and in love with a colonel.