Of his many distinctive voices it could be argued that the stories told from the child's standpoint are most uniquely Saki's.  They are, to use Robert Drake's words, "direct, forthright and untainted by the touch of civilization and adulthood".¹   Yet if we remove Vera Durmot and the thirteen-year-old Matilda of "The Boar-Pig" as belonging more to the juvenile delinquent class of whom Reginald and Clovis are the grand masters, and with whom they share a certain sophistication, there are remarkably few.  In these stories, the theme seems to be that adults are dull and lack insight whereas children have imagination and can see beneath the conventional, social facade to what is really significant.  The hypocrisy is laid bare but what underlies it is folly rather than viciousness.  The children also have a tenacity of purpose which is lacking in the adults who change tack when faced with difficulties.

Among them, "The Lumber-Room" and "Sredni Vashtar" are the most celebrated and it is proposed to subject each to close analysis for that reason.  "The Penance", while featuring in only a few of the selected editions, is worthy of note also, if only because it affords yet another view of the child versus adult struggle.  In this case, the central character is not a child at all but a foolish adult who is brought to see his folly by the "inexorable child-logic" of the children whom he has wronged; whereas in "The Lumber-Room", the child is more than a match for the oppressive adult from the start, and in "Sredni Vashtar" the Manichaean struggle between child and adult is more finely balanced.

Of the rest, the denouement of "Hyacinth" closely parallels the plot of "The Penance" with its uncompromising child protagonist holding children to ransom in a pigsty but is quite different in tone and content.  In "Hyacinth" the setting is a byelection in a marginal seat where Hyacinth's father is standing against the father of the three little Jutterly children whom Hyacinth imprisons in a pig-sty until Jutterly loses the election.  It is a political satire on "'the new fashion of introducing the candidate's children into an election contest'" (p.518) and on politicians in general.  A warning note is sounded early on by Mrs Panstreppon, Hyacinth's aunt, when, having alluded to an earlier incident of mischief, she replies to his defensive mother, "'Children with Hyacinth's temperament don't know better as they grow older; they merely know more'" (p.519).  Mrs Panstreppon is one of the very few adults - the bachelor in the "Story-Teller" is another - who understand the workings of the child mind but, as so often, Hyacinth's besotted mother does not 'listen' to the advice given her.

"Morlvera", an unusual story in that it features working-class children, "The Toys of Peace", where imagination triumphs over the short-sighted middle-class values, and "The Story-Teller", a brilliant tale where an adult with a proper insight into child psychology gives an object lesson to a typically dull, conventional aunt, make up the rest of this group.  Common to all these stories is the clear-sighted vision of the child in contrast to the clouded adult viewpoint - the gloss of conventional appearances distorting the adult's perceptions and values.  Children do appear in other stories too, of course, notably in "The Strategist", where the contest is between the less than innocent children, with the hostess hovering unsuspectingly in the background; and in "The Easter Egg" where the child is merely part of the vehicle of destruction, having no distinct personality and therefore not forming part of this group.

"Morlvera" is set outside "The Olympic Toy Emporium" but "one would never have dreamed of according it the familiar and yet pulse-quickening name of toyshop" (p.491) because it is a toyshop conceived by adults who have obviously forgotten what it is like to be children.  Perhaps it is full of toys such as those described in "The Toys of Peace" as represented in "the Children's Welfare Exhibition [...] at Olympia" (p.393).  The Morlvera of the title is an "elegantly dressed" doll in the shop window, described through the children's eyes as "cold, hostile, inquisitorial" and "sinister" (p.491).  The action of the story viewed by and discussed in the voices of the cockney children, Emmeline and Bert, revolves round the buying of Morlvera by Victor and his imperious mother, a grand lady, who is blind to everything but keeping up appearances.  "'Now, Victor, you are to [...] buy a nice doll for your cousin Bertha'", she says (p.493) (her choice of "a nice doll" ironically falling on the "sinister" Morlvera) to which Victor retorts, "'Bertha is a fat little fool.'" The exchange continues in this vein, Victor maintaining his position (in much the same way as Nicholas in "The Lumber-Room" in his dealings with the aunt), while the purchase is made.  

Emmeline and Bert meanwhile, on the outside looking in, weave a fantasy round the doll in the window, while watching the drama unfold.  When the doll is bought Victor's obtuse mother thinks, "Victor had not been half as troublesome as she had anticipated" (p.494), which echoes the unsuspecting adults in, for instance, "The Lumber-Room", "The Penance" and many more who see only what they want to see.  Emmeline and Bert witness "a look of sinister triumph" in Morlvera's "hard, inquisitorial face" (p.494) - she is clearly equated with the adults in their eyes - while "as for Victor, a certain scornful serenity had replaced the earlier scowls; he had evidently accepted defeat with a contemptuous good grace" (p.494).  The word "evidently" appears in many of these stories with ironic effect.  As always it is dangerous to judge by appearances for, as the grandlady's carriage with Victor aboard reverses before turning and driving off, Victor "very stealthily, very gently, very mercilessly [...] sent Morlvera flying over his shoulder" (p.494) and under the carriage wheels.

The adults in "The Toys of Peace" are similarly out of touch with the workings of a child's mind.  In this story, a satire on the 'heredity versus environment'² theory of child-rearing, and inspired by an article in a London paper of the time, Eleanor Bope exhorts her weak brother Harvey to bring "peace toys" (p.393) as an Easter present for her boys instead of the soldiers which they would certainly have preferred.  Harvey is unsure of the wisdom of this idea but allows himself to be persuaded by his domineering sister.  When the presents are unpacked from "a large, promising-looking red cardboard box under the expectant eyes" (p.394) of the children, appearances again deceive for instead of a fort they unpack "a municipal dust-bin" (p.395), the ridiculous nature of the "civilian" toys underlining the absurdity of the idea, doomed to failure from the first.  Their bewilderment is clear in the questions they ask of their uncle: "'What does he do?'" (p.395).  "'Are we to play with these civilian figures?'" (p.396).  The children triumph, however, for as boys will be bloodthirsty boys, "Robert Raikes, the founder of Sunday Schools" (p.395) becomes "Louis the Fourteenth" (p.397), Mrs Hemans, the poetess, becomes Madame de Maintenon and so on, the children's imagination redeeming the promise of the red cardboard box.  The experiment which "'exactly carries out some of our ideas about influence and upbringing'", to quote Eleanor (p.393), can be seen signally to have failed.

Imagination versus rigid observance of convention is apparent also in "The Story-Teller" which is set in a railway carriage, where a dull and prosaically-minded aunt is having difficulty controlling her two nieces and nephew to the irritation of the other occupant of the carriage, a bachelor - one of the storytellers of the title, the other being the aunt.  "Most of the aunt's remarks seemed to begin with 'Don't' [like Mrs De Ropp in "Sredni Vashtar" or the aunt in "The Lumber-Room"] and nearly all of the children's remarks began with 'Why?'" (p.349).  Like the children in "The Toys of Peace", they have a lively imagination and a healthy curiosity, which the aunt is bent on suppressing since she is unequal to the demands they continually make on her limited powers of invention.  As with all Saki's children they are ersistent and remorseless in their questions.  The bachelor by contrast has not forgotten what it is like to be a child.

As the children reveal the depth of their boredom, "the frown on the bachelor's face was deepening to a scowl.  He was a hard, unsympathetic man, the aunt decided in her mind" (p.350).  Of course, in one sense she is right since he is obviously entirely unsympathetic to her, but as far as the children are concerned she could hardly have been further from the truth, as shown by his spinning of a wonderful yarn - a compound of "Little Red Riding Hood", "The Three Little Pigs" and pure invention, which has the children spellbound until the journey ends.  Unlike the aunt who was "evidently" not a good storyteller "in their estimation" (p.350) - this time "evidently" can be taken at its face value because it is the children's perception that is being voiced - the bachelor, in parody of the aunt's moral tale, immediately arrests their attention by talking of Bertha who was "'horribly good'.  There was a wave of reaction in favour of the story; the word horrible in connection with goodness was a novelty that commended itself" (p.351),³ (the same surprise element that characterises most of Saki's short stories).  "It seemed to introduce a ring of truth that was absent from the aunt's tales of infant life" (p.351).  The story ends satisfyingly in Bertha's being eaten by a wolf: "all that was left of her were her shoes, bits of clothing, and the three medals for goodness," (p.353).⁴  The aunt sadly remains as dull and unenlightened as formerly, as she reveals in saying, "'A most improper story [...] you have undermined the effect of years of careful teaching'" (p.354), the word "careful" clearly evoking the repressive regime she favours in her dealings with the children.⁵

While "The Penance" and "Hyacinth" light-heartedly treat follies and hypocrisy in a more sinister way, the more unpleasant realities of life are dealt with in "The Lumber-Room" and "Sredni Vashtar".  Since "The Penance" is more akin in treatment and tone to the stories already dealt with briefly above, it is proposed to discuss it next, and then move on to the more serious undercurrents of "The Lumber-Room" and the macabre message of "Sredni Vashtar".⁶

"The Penance"

Before subjecting "The Penance" to a detailed analysis there are several general points to be considered.  As in "Sredni Vashtar", Saki uses a curious blend of Christian and pagan imagery throughout to illustrate the conflict between the illusions of the adults and the children's superior ability to separate reality from the appearance of truth.  The title itself and the form that the penance takes are Christian but the three children are likened to the Parcae Sisters of classical mythology.  Yet by his reiteration of the phrase "blank wall" (pp.423,424,425, 427), Saki calls to mind Belshazzar's Feast (in Daniel, v.5-26) where Belshazzar requires the meaning of the message - a message of doom - that has appeared on the wall to be explained to him.  Had Octavian been more enlightened he might have seen "the writing on the wall"; again the children show superior insight and sophistication.  It is the man who is childlike, having learned nothing that will fill the blank wall of his mind.

Apart from the religious strands to be disentangled are the philosophical implications.  This same phrase "blank wall", recalls the philosophy of the empiricists such as Locke,⁷ who believed that, at birth, the mind was a "tabula rasa" requiring to be written upon by experience.  On a more obvious level, of course, the wall draws attention to the children's inscrutability and may be seen as the symbolic barrier that they have erected against unwanted intrusion - like the facade of Nicholas or Conradin to protect them from the adult world.

Again it is difficult, as with all Saki's stories involving children triumphing in a despotic adult world, not to emphasise the autobiographical element.  It is perhaps in this instance merely worth pointing out that if "The Lumber-Room" and "Sredni Vashtar" depict life within the walls, where the children battle against a stifling and autocratic regime, in "The Penance" the reader is afforded a glimpse of life beyond the walls.  If the setting of the house is ignored and the significance of the three children, "a girl and two boys" (p.423),⁸ is likewise discounted, nothing is subtracted from the central theme of the story which is that an unenlightened adult is brought forcibly by the actions of the children to pay for his lack of judgement; as Loganbill puts it, "a villain is redeemed".⁹  Parallel to the religious undercurrents the judicial language and imagery are obvious throughout.

The title itself can mean either the act of penitence, i.e.  the temporal punishment, or, in theological terms, the sacrament of penance, consisting of three parts: contritio, confessio, satisfactio; and it will become clear that it is used in both these senses.  The choice of the name Octavian Ruttle is also significant.  Whether Octavian, calling to mind the Roman Emperor Augustus, has some deeper personal and ironic significance is an open question,¹⁰ but the surname, Ruttle, is certainly important.  It is a dialect form of rattle in the sense of death-rattle and since he has just pronounced "a sentence of death" (p.422) on the little tabby cat it is apt.  The word 'rut' also has 'beastly' connotations, of course, and if ruttle were pronounced 'rootle', as in some dialects, it would exactly describe the way that pigs forage for food.  In any case the surname jars in conjunction with the 'imperial' Christian name and may serve to highlight the conflict between how he wishes to be regarded by the children and how they really see him.

Unlike the "villains" of "The Lumber-Room" and "Sredni Vashtar" Octavian is described as "one of those lively cheerful individuals on whom amiability has set its unmistakable stamp" (p.422).  He values his popularity too.  "Like most of his kind, his soul's peace depended in large measure on the unstinted approval of his fellows" (p.422).  Herein lies the flaw in his nature, for if the peace of his soul depends on how it is viewed by others, then he must be shallow indeed and the "unmistakable stamp" of his "amiability" highlights his superficiality.  He does, however, have a conscience and a sense of compassion, for "in hunting to death a small tabby cat he had done a thing of which he scarcely approved himself" (p.422).  Although the "gardener had hidden the body in its hastily dug grave under a lone oak tree" (p.422), he is unable to put it out of his mind, and for this reason he is capable of salvation.

The "distasteful and seemingly ruthless deed" (p.422) shows him to be guilty of rash rather than callous actions.  He has jumped to the, some would say, justifiable conclusion (Loganbill for one),¹¹ that the cat has been killing his chickens.  There is, after all, the circumstantial evidence of the dead chickens and the cat's presence in the vicinity of the hen coop.  The punning sentence "Octavian kept chickens; at least he kept some of them; others vanished" (p.422), draws attention to the later irony of this evidence.  Further in his defence, he has consulted "those in authority at the grey house" (p.422) (again this is ironic since the children are really in authority over him) before "a sentence of death had been agreed on." He has been neither precipitate - the cat "had been detected in many furtive visits" (p.422)¹² - nor cavalier in his decision.

The verdict is that "'the children will mind, but they need not know'" (p.422), a strange and almost contradictory statement.  How can they mind what they do not know? What are they not to know? It says much about the indifference of "those in authority", who are plainly at least as culpable as Octavian.  Obviously the children will know that the cat is missing, which they will mind whether or not they realise the reason for it.  It must, therefore be concluded that the manner of its going is what they need not know, i.e.  Octavian can rest assured that his popular image will not suffer.  At this juncture he is more concerned with keeping up appearances than anything else.  It is also interesting that the reader does not know how the cat has met its death because the story is told from Octavian's standpoint and he shuts out anything that is to his discredit.

He is already at a loss with the children who are "a standing puzzle" (p.422) to him.  His ignorance is stressed by the fact that the reader does not learn their names either and this limited point of view illustrates his limited knowledge.  "He considered that he should have known their names, ages, the dates of their birthdays" (p.423) by now, but they remain "as non-committal as the long blank wall [...] over which their three heads sometimes appeared at odd moments" (p.423), their inscrutability in stark contrast to his own open, simple nature.  It is clear that he has been interested enough to ask the local people about the children because he has learned that "they had parents in India" (p.423).  He also knows that they will be upset by the death of their kitten, but that is the sum total of his knowledge about them.  "And now it seemed he was engaged in something which touched them closely" (p.423) (his perplexity is clear) "but must be hidden from their knowledge" (p.423).  He is again having to act out of character, duplicity not being part of his nature any more than cruelty.

His self-justification becomes evident in the next paragraph where the fate of "the poor helpless chickens" (p.423) is touched upon.  Certainly "it was meet that their destroyer should come to a violent end" (p.423).  "The qualms" (p.423) which he feels come over strongly as he contemplates the "piteous" end of the cat.  He is not at all proud of himself, and his step is "less jaunty than usual" (p.423).  Unfortunately to compound his unhappiness "as he passed beneath the shadow of the high blank wall" (p.423) (evocative of "the valley of the shadow of death" perhaps?) he "became aware that his hunting had had undesired witnesses" (p.423).  "Three white set faces were looking down at him" (p.423).  The position of the children on top of the wall is worthy of note since this gives them the advantage of height - they can look down on Octavian in both senses of the phrase.  The "threefold¹³ study of cold human hate, impotent yet unyielding, raging yet masked in stillness" (p.423) emphasises their inscrutability while the "triple gaze that met Octavian's eye" (p.423) stresses their unanimity and intensity, the use of the singular "eye" underlining his feeling of isolation.

The "contritio" element of penance (i.e.  sorrow for sin) becomes plain in his first words to the children: "'I'm sorry, but it had to be done,' said Octavian, with genuine apology in his voice" (p.423).  Just as Octavian has stood in judgement on the cat, so now the children sit in judgement on him.  "'Beast!'" (p.423) is their uncompromising verdict.  It is a fitting penance that he should later be required to say "'I'm a miserable Beast'" (p.426) and that his absolution should consist of the one word "'Un-Beast'" (p.427).  Octavian is not insensitive, however, for in equating "the bunch of human hostility" (p.423) with "the high blank wall" he "wisely decided to withhold his peace overtures till a more hopeful occasion" (p.423).  It is interesting that the "human" status of these judges is stressed, at this stage contrasted with Octavian's status as "beast".  Later the trio has more of a godlike significance in relation to Octavian as penitent sinner.  The unanimity of their hatred is summed up in "the answer came from three throats with startling intensity" (p.423).  Again the trinity is emphasised.

Although at this stage Octavian feels that his killing of the kitten was justified he wants to "atone for the dismal deed" (p.423) by buying a suitable box of chocolates to show his contrition.  The humorous description of the boxes he rejects because "one had a group of chickens pictured on its lid, the other bore the portrait of a tabby kitten" (p.423) has two functions: it shows his painstaking efforts to avoid tactlessness, but more than that, it stresses his preoccupation with appearances again.  His final choice of "painted poppies [which] Octavian hailed [...] as a happy omen" (p.423) since they are "the flowers of forgetfulness" (p.423) (a reference to opium and presumably by inversion to rosemary, the flower of remembrance) reveals the optimistic nature of the man as well as his inability to appreciate how deep-rooted is the children's condemnation of him.

But his conscience is partially salved in anticipation of their forgiveness; he "felt distinctly more at ease" (p.424) having sent the present to the children, so that "next morning he sauntered with purposeful steps" (p.424) past the long blank wall.  This paradoxical phrase illustrates that his seeming insouciance is an attempt to hide the fact that he hopes for evidence that his gesture of conciliation has been accepted.  Not so.  The children feign not to see him at all; "their range of sight did not seem to concern itself with Octavian's presence" (p.424), though the fact that they "were perched at their accustomed look-out" (p.424) suggests that they are very much aware of him, and there on purpose to observe him.  No sooner has he become "depressingly aware of the aloofness of their gaze" (p.424) than "he also noted" the contents of the box of chocolates scattered all over the grass where the children, with their knowledge of his character, are sure he will find them, and realise that his peace offering has been rejected.  "Octavian's blood-money had been flung back at him in scorn" (p.424).  The significance of "blood-money" is twofold.  It underlines the seriousness of the crime, bloodmoney being the penalty paid in the old days by a murderer to the family of the victim.  It was also intended completely to protect the offender from the vengeance of the injured family.  Thus not only has Octavian been unable to atone for his misdeedas he wishes, he is still at the children's mercy.

Worse is to follow, for, "to increase his discomfiture" (p.424), it begins to look as though "the supposed culprit" (p.424) was not to blame after all, and that the cat "had already paid full forfeit" (p.424) with its life to add to Octavian's misery.  He cannot undo the wrong.  The chickens are still disappearing and "it seemed highly probable that the cat had only haunted the chicken-run to prey on the rats" (p.424).  Not only has he killed an innocent creature, he has killed one of his main allies.  The unbearable irony adds, to his guilt at having hurt the children, a sense of having done wrong.

Inevitably through servant's gossip the children learn of this "belated revision of verdict" (p.424).  Again the judicial analogy is drawn, and they increase his misery by laboriously writing: "'Beast, Rats eated your chickens'" (p.424).  He is more desperate than ever "for an opportunity for sloughing off the disgrace [..] and earning some happier nickname from his three unsparing judges" (p.424).  The word "sloughing" complements the accusation of "Beast" with its overtones of a snake shedding its skin.  The effect of "disgrace" is an acknowledgement on Octavian's part that he has committed a sin,¹⁶ i.e.  fallen from grace, corresponding to the "confessio" part of the sacrament of penance.  Prior to the discovery that the chickens are still being killed, he saw his killing of the cat as regrettable but justifiable.  He was sorry for the pain he had caused the children.  Now he has to face the fact that he was in error, and for that reason has wronged them also.  He needs to redeem his action for his own sake as well as the fact that he cannot bear their uncompromising judgement of him as a "Beast".

It is obvious that he has been casting around for ideas, for "one day a chance inspiration came to him" (p.424).  Again, true to nature, he acts impulsively, a characteristic which might be said to have contributed to his present plight.  He thinks he may be able to melt "the wall of ice"¹⁴ between him and the children with the help of his two-year-old daughter Olivia.  Every day for an hour between lunch and one o'clock, Octavian has charge of his daughter while "the nursemaid gobbled and digested her dinner and novelette" (p.424) as Saki dismissively observes.  (As in so many of his stories, there is no mention of a mother.) At this time of day "the blank wall was usually enlivened by the presence of its three small wardens" (p.424).  The imagery of "wardens" is interesting, suggesting as it does imprisonment.  Ironically the children who are confined by the high blank wall are effectively excluding Octavian from their territory and knowledge of their lives.  "With seeming carelessness of purpose" (p.424) (an echo of "sauntered with purposeful steps") he brings his daughter near to the dividing wall and notes "with hidden delight the growing interest that dawned in that hitherto sternly hostile quarter" (p.424).  He is so busy disguising his own motives and observing their reactions that he again assumes that the "growing interest" is a sign of the success of his plan, which is to ingratiate himself with them.

He concludes that "his little Olivia, with her sleepy placid ways, was going to succeed where he, with his anxious wellmeant overtures, had so signally failed" (p.424).  He still has much to learn.  This "sleepy placid" daughter of his is a reflection of Octavian himself as he normally is - simple, unquestioning, amiable, and it is a measure of how deeply he feels himself to have fallen from favour that he should evince such anxiety.  He brings the baby a dahlia which she accepts passively, "with a stare of benevolent boredom, such as one might bestow on amateur classical dancing performed in aid of a deserving charity" (pp.424-25).  Not only is this a humorous thrust at such social occasions, it also has the effect of underlining the amiability of Olivia likened to a member of such an audience together with the good intentions which motivate Octavian just as they underlie a performance in aid of charity.  His intentions may be good but he has no idea of how to win the interest or approval of the children.

It is an action in this instance in the cause of reconciliation and he is acting a part for his audience of three.  He turns to them "with affected carelessness" (p.425) and asks them if they like flowers.  As with the poppies on the lid of the box of chocolates, these may be seen to be flowers of forgetfulness also and with as little success.  "Three solemn nods rewarded his venture" (p.425).  This is a breakthrough of a sort, though they neither speak nor smile, but it is enough for Octavian to sense that he may be establishing contact with them.  His mask of "affected carelessness" (while never for a moment deceiving the children) slips and "with a distinct betrayal of eagerness in his voice" (p.425) he asks them which sort of flowers they like best.

When they ask "child-like" for "what lay farthest from hand" (p.425) Octavian ingenuously attributes their motives to those of typically thoughtless children.  He is concerned again only with the superficial inconvenience of their request, entirely unsuspecting of the calculation behind it, which becomes evident shortly.  Octavian "trotted off gleefully to obey their welcome behest" (p.425), "welcome" because it appears to him that he is gaining favour with them at last.  The role reversal here is made plain by the fact that he, the adult, is happy to obey and trots off at the children's bidding.  It soon becomes apparent, however, that there is nothing child-like in their request; they want Octavian out of the way so that they can put into operation the plan that the presence of the docile Olivia has sown in their minds.

Octavian's frantic plucking of sweet peas "into his bunch that was rapidly becoming a bundle" (p.425) is paralleled by the speed at which the children turn the situation to their advantage.  "Far down the meadow three children were pushing a go-cart at the utmost speed they could muster in the direction of the piggeries" (p.425).¹⁵  When Octavian has collected enough flowers he turns round "and found the blank wall blanker and more deserted than ever, while the foreground was void of all trace of Olivia" (p.425).  The blankness reflects the slowness of Octavian's reaction; his mind is a blank, he is obviously stunned at the disappearance of Olivia and the children.  Again he has misjudged the situation.  His non-comprehension is emphasised when Octavian sees the children vanishing towards the piggeries with Olivia: "it was Olivia's go-cart and Olivia sat in it" (p.425).  It takes some time for the truth to sink in.  It is also interesting that the two-year-old is "apparently retaining her wonted composure of mind" (p.425).  This would suggest a maturity beyond her years and certainly in stark contrast to her father, but appearances as ever deceive, because she is clearly rather stupid and like Octavian slow to understand, which gives her the appearance of composure when in fact it merely reflects her non-comprehension.  This is borne out later when "as she began to sink gently into the bed of slime a feeling dawned on her that she was not after all very happy" (p.426).

Octavian only acts rapidly when he is jumping to conclusions; he is slow-witted in a crisis.  "Octavian stared for a moment [...] and then started in hot pursuit, shedding as he ran sprays of blossom from the mass of sweet pea that he still clutched in his hands" (p.425).  This comic picture has a deep significance.  It underlines that in pursuit of Olivia he has forgotten everything except the danger which he has at last perceived is threatening her.  The carefully picked flowers and the reason for picking them are discarded in the heat of the moment - ironically he has forgotten his "flowers of forgetfulness".  It seems that he is capable of only one thought at a time and tends to act precipitately without due caution; but he does have a proper sense of values and acts impulsively from good intentions more often than not.  Unlike the wicked Mrs De Ropp or the domineering kill-joy "aunt" in "The Lumber-Room", he is not essentially evil.

The children have perilously dragged Olivia on to the roof of a sty, whose state of repair makes it certain that it would "not have borne Octavian's weight" (p.425) if he had tried to climb on to it to rescue her.  Olivia's reaction to this is "wondering but unprotesting" (p.425), again reflecting her amiable lack of understanding.  The children have exchanged the blank wall for "their new vantage ground" (p.425) where they are again in command, once more in a superior position in both senses of the word, Octavian forced to look up to them as he negotiates with them.  Even he can accurately read some malicious intent, fear sharpening his perception as in panic he asks, "'What are you going to do with her?'" (p.425).  "There was no mistaking the grim trend of mischief in those flushed but sternly composed young faces" (p.425).  No longer are they "white set faces" (p.423), they are animated now with revenge for the death of their kitten, excited at having exchanged their impotence for a strong bargaining position.  Like the fiendish Hyacinth in the story of that name they are blackmailing him.

One of the children in answer to his question, betraying his extreme youth as well as evidence that "they had been reading English History" (they are knowledgeable children in contrast to Octavian) proposes, "'Hang her in chains over a slow fire.'"¹⁶  But it is the second proposal "which most alarmed Octavian" (p.425): "'Frow her down and the pigs will d'vour her, every bit 'cept the palms of her hands'" (p.425).  This, obviously the voice of a very young child, unnerves him because it is all too likely to happen, given the proximity of the pigs and her precarious position on the roof of the sty.  "It was also evident that they had studied Biblical history" (p.425).¹⁷  The word "studied" draws attention to the paradoxical mixture of childish language and Biblical allusion which again stresses that the children have unknown depths unlike the superficial Octavian.

Octavian, a kind man if a fool, finds it hard to believe this, saying, "'You surely wouldn't treat my poor little Olivia in that way?'" (p.426), although the tone - a pleading one - suggests that he does believe it.  He is beginning to learn.  The children are uncompromising in their answer: "'You killed our little cat'" (p.426), the "little cat" being a mocking dismissal of "poor little Olivia".  Their concept of justice is of the Old Testament variety.¹⁸  In the children's eyes Olivia, as the daughter of a "Beast", has the same animal status as a kitten; she is perceived moreover to be as precious to Octavian as their pet was to them.  The "stern reminder" (p.426) as if he needed reminding comes in chorus "from three throats" (p.426).  They are of one mind and the emphasis on the three takes on a new significance which is explained later.

Octavian assures them, "'I'm very sorry I did'" and Saki observes "if there is a standard of measurement in truth Octavian's statement was assuredly a large nine" (p.426).¹⁹  But despite this measurement of sincere contrition, the girl is quite unmoved, dispassionately pointing out, "'We shall be very sorry when we've killed Olivia [...] but we can't be sorry till we've done it'" (p.426).  There is no answer to such "inexorable child-logic" (p.426) despite "Octavian's scared pleadings" (p.426).  Like the "high blank wall", the impassive logic of the children is "like an unyielding rampart" (p.426).  He is still thrashing around for a new line of approach when Olivia falls "with a soft unctuous splash into a morass of muck and decaying straw" (p.426).  The choice of adjective, "unctuous", which complements the grovelling humility of Octavian's position, also suggests extreme unction highlighting both Olivia's peril and Octavian's penance.  Initially "after the first shock" (p.426) Olivia is "mildly pleased at [...] close and unstinted contact with the sticky element that oozed around her" (p.426), just as a young child would be, but this gives way to "tentative" crying as she becomes dimly aware of a vague unease, her slow thought processes again being emphasised.

Octavian meanwhile, only too aware of his daughter's danger, is engaged in a desperate battle with "the quagmire, which seemed to have learned the rare art of giving way at all points without yielding an inch," (p.426), as inexorable as the children, while Octavian can be seen to have "given way at all points" and gained nothing.  Despite poor Olivia's face contorted with "whimpering wonder", the children remain impervious, looking "down with the cold unpitying detachment of the Parcae Sisters" (p.426), i.e.  The Fates, who according to classical legend arbitrarily controlled the birth, life and death of everyone.  Like the children, there were three of them, Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos.  This allusion to the "Parcae Sisters" heralds a subtle shift in the relationship between the children and Octavian onto a different plane.  Instead of their human and his bestial status, they now sit godlike in judgement on him as a human; to this extent he has already redeemed himself by his concern for his child and his true contrition.  He is no longer so concerned with appearances.

In the realisation that his child is being steadily sucked into the mud, Octavian gasps, "'I can't reach her in time [...] won't you help her?'" (p.426).  The inevitable reminder that "'no one helped our cat'" (p.426) evokes the rash response from Octavian, "'I'll do anything to show you how sorry I am about that'" (p.426).  Immediately the children pounce.  It is clear that they have already rehearsed the questions that follow: "'Will you stand in a white sheet by the grave?'", "'Holding a candle?'", "' An' saying, "I'm a miserable Beast?"'" (p.426),²⁰ "'For a long, long time?'" (p.427).  The breakthrough having come, Octavian is sufficiently self-possessed to make a tentative attempt at bargaining on his own account.  "'For half an hour,'" he says, (p.427) but "there was an anxious ring in his voice [...]; was there not the precedent of a German king who did open air penance for several days and nights at Christmas-time clad only in his shirt?" (p.427)²¹  (Any reading of history on Octavian's part must have been long ago or only dimly remembered - unlike the shrewd children.)

"'All right,' came with threefold solemnity from the roof" (p.427).  The Trinity of the group is stressed here, the pagan element of their godliness when likened to the Parcae Sisters giving way to a more Christian Being overseeing Octavian's penance.  Also Biblical in tone is the phrase "half an hour seemed long and goodly in their eyes" (p.427) which draws attention moreover to their extreme youth.  Terms agreed, the children promptly fulfill their part of the pact by producing a ladder which enables him to rescue Olivia.  The ironic observation that "a few minutes later he was listening to the shrill and repeated assurances of the nursemaid that her previous experience of filthy spectacles had been on a notably smaller scale" (p.427), underlines her preoccupation with appearance too.  She is merely concerned that the child is in a mess and appears to have overlooked the possibility that Olivia's life might have been in danger.  Clearly she is of Octavian's household, and she highlights the standards set by Octavian in the past, but he is learning to judge differently while she remains unenlightened.

The act of penance, the "satisfactio", takes place "that same evening when twilight was deepening into darkness [...] under the lone oak tree" (p.427) (a phrase repeated from page 422) where the cat was hunted to death and is now buried, "having first carefully undressed the part" (p.427) - a punning inversion which shows how seriously Octavian is taking his role as penitent, although it also reveals that he is still very much concerned with correct form.  "Clad in a zephyr shirt" (p.427)²²  Octavian stands with a candle in one hand and a watch in the other.  (If he was hoping to hide, the children have outsmarted him by insisting on the candle).  The zephyr shirt "on this occasion thoroughly merited its name" (p.427), a punning reference to the "fairly frequent occasions when the candle succumbed to the night breezes" (p.427).  The significance of the oak tree is worth mentioning too.  In the Old Testament there are several references to the oak as a sacred tree, sometimes used for burial purposes to mark a grave.  In later times or in pagan cultures peasants often superstitiously believed in the oak's sacred properties.²³  The half hour turns out to be as long as the children could wish as Octavian consults his "watch, into which the soul of a dead plumber seemed to have passed" (p.427), time elapsing on leaden feet.  But the important thing to Octavian is that "the house loomed inscrutable in the middle distance" (p.427), like the long blank wall and the mask of the children's faces; but "as Octavian conscientiously repeated the formula of his penance he felt certain that three pairs of solemn eyes were watching his moth-shared vigil" (p.427).  The house may be as blankly inscrutable as the wall over which the children's unreadable faces have been wont to appear but Octavian has learned at least a little of what goes on behind the facade.  The "three pairs of solemn eyes" have the all-seeing quality of God to Octavian, and the nature of the penance is similar to the ritual of lighting candles in church in supplication.  The ludicrous picture²⁴ that Octavian makes standing in his night shirt in the dusk, candle in hand, calls the children's nursery rhyme, "Wee Willie Winkie" to mind, and prompts the thought that in this further evidence of role reversal, Octavian must become childlike in order to be redeemed.²⁵

Had Octavian been worthless he could have reneged on his part of the bargain, after rescuing Olivia, but it is to his credit that he keeps his promise.  This is, of course, partly due to the fact that he desperately wants their approval and thus, "the next morning his eyes were gladdened by a sheet of copybook paper lying beside the blank wall, on which was written the message 'Un-beast'" (p.427).  Octavian has received the sign for which he has prayed in much the same way as Conradin in "Sredni Vashtar".  The frequent allusions to eyes and sight and seeing call forth the "eye for an eye" vengeance of the Old Testament God as well as symbolising perception and understanding.  Because Octavian shows true penitence he does not suffer the ultimate penalty.  His fault lies in jumping to conclusions rather than pursuing a deliberately chosen path of oppression, nor is he guilty of hypocrisy (unlike the "aunt" in "The Lumber-Room" or Mrs De Ropp in "Sredni Vashtar").  Because Octavian is not wicked, he is redeemed.  His is an error of judgement, not hubris.  If a moral were to be found for this story it might be: "Judge not that ye be not judged."

"The Lumber-Room"

"The Penance", then, reveals the follies of the adult through the children's reaction to him.  In all his actions and in his wish to please he is seen to be more childlike than the children who have a clarity of vision that he lacks.  This same role reversal features in "The Lumber-Room" but with several important differences which will become apparent.

To the Victorian or Edwardian, the very title, "The Lumber-Room", would immediately have conjured up a "Box of Delights".  MacQueen Pope in his book, Back Numbers,²⁶ evocative of late Victorian middle-class England, devotes an entire chapter to what he calls "The Box Room", describing his young boyhood and the escape from reality which his "place of magic" afforded him.  It seems that to a reader of Saki's period the lumber room and its mysterious contents full of the promise of adventure were a commonplace in most middle-class homes, and thus much of the sense of anticipation felt by Nicholas in the story would already have been conveyed by the title.

The theme of this story is again a familiar one in the Saki canon: the youthful protagonist versus the despotic adult²⁷ or as Robert Drake puts it: social conflicts between the imaginative - represented by Nicholas - and the "devitalisers"²⁸ (in this case as in so many, the "aunt").  Perhaps one of the most startling features is Saki's understanding of child psychology; this story is told not from the adult standpoint but from the point of view of the child, distance lending not enchantment, but merely the vocabulary to convey the experiences and thought processes of a child, perfectly reproduced.

Nicholas is portrayed as intelligent, shrewd and imaginative, while his "aunt" by contrast is petty, stupid and vindictive.  Given these characteristics it is hardly surprising that she is a victim of her own shortcomings which Nicholas exploits to his own ends.  The opening three sentences, in the voice and tone of the domineering aunt, briskly and directly involve the reader in what is to follow by inducing in quick succession, first a sense of anticipation: "The children were to be driven, as a special treat, to the sands at Jagborough" (p.371); then dismay: "Nicholas was not to be of the party; he was in disgrace" (p.371); and finally utter surprise: "Only that morning he had refused to eat his wholesome bread-and-milk on the seemingly frivolous ground that there was a frog in it" (p.371).  The word "seemingly" is explained two sentences later: "The dramatic part of the incident was that there really was a frog in Nicholas' basin of bread-and-milk" (p.372).  This is confounding until the obvious but no less astonishing explanation is given that "he had put it there himself, so he felt entitled to know" (p.372).  The whole story is full of such inversions, surprising because so inconceivable, satisfying because the explanations when they come are so simple.  Now there is the promise of all manner of improbable possibilities in Saki's looking-glass world.²⁹  Right from the outset it is clear that nothing is at it seems, and the child's perception of truth is superior to the adult's.

For Nicholas the important "fact that stood out clearest in the whole affair [...] was that the older, wiser and better people [a phrase repeated from p.371] had been proved to be profoundly in error in matters about which they had expressed the utmost assurance" (p.372).³⁰  His 'aunt' meanwhile has tried to justify herself by enlarging on "the sin of taking a frog from the garden and putting it into a bowl of wholesome bread-and-milk" (p.372).  Unable to deny the truth of Nicholas's repeated point ("'You said there couldn't possibly be a frog in my bread-andmilk; there was a frog in my bread-and-milk'", p.372) she changes the subject and her self-righteous tone is clear in the ironic religious imagery of the phrases "fell from grace", "sinned collectively" and "depravity" (p.372).

Nicholas's punishment then is to be excluded from the trip to the beach.  "A few decent tears were looked for on the part of Nicholas when the moment for the departure of the expedition arrived" (p.372), but again surprisingly, Nicholas is cheerful (a fact calculated to annoy his aunt) and "the party drove off without any of the elation of high spirits that should have characterised it" (p.372).  There is an apparent inconsistency which leads to the suspicion that Nicholas has somehow planned the entire situation for some reason of his own.  Similar confrontations must have taken place in the past between the aunt and the children if "it was her habit, whenever one of the children fell from grace, to improvise something of a festival nature from which the offender would be rigorously debarred" (p.372).  What then is the purpose of Nicholas's deliberate ploy whereby he is excluded from the treat? This does not become clear immediately.

In an attempt to induce the proper feeling of disappointment in Nicholas his odious aunt says, "'How they will enjoy themselves!'" (p.373), but, unimpressed, Nicholas points out that Bobby's boots are too tight.  To the aunt's indignant question, "'Why didn't he tell me they were hurting?'" (p.373) he retorts, "'He told you twice, but you weren't listening.  You often don't listen when we tell you important things'" (p.373).  Nicholas is dismissive of his "aunt" in other ways too - not even according her the status of aunt (she "insisted, by an unwarranted stretch of imagination, in styling herself his aunt also", p.372).  She is merely a bogus figure of authority like Mrs De Ropp or "those in authority" in "The Penance", one of the "wiser adults" whom he has proved wrong.  This denial of identity is similar in purpose and tone to Conradin's scornful naming of his guardian "The Woman", or the children in "The Penance" calling Octavian "Beast".

Even more revealing of the aunt's character is her response to this charge of negligence - not a denial of its truth, nor, surprisingly, a warning against insolence - but another change of subject.  (This same technique of evasion is employed by the aunt in "The Story-Teller" too).  It seems to be her only defence against Nicholas's barbs.  She forbids him to go into the gooseberry garden.  Nicholas on the other hand, already demonstrating his moral superiority, is not afraid to confront issues.  "'Why not?'" he demands (p.373).  In her unsuspecting way she replies, "'Because you are in disgrace'" (p.373).  "Nicholas did not admit the flawlessness of the reasoning; he felt perfectly capable of being in disgrace and in a gooseberry garden" as Saki sylleptically observes (p.373).  There is a further irony here, for if the commandment not to enter the gooseberry garden seems to have the overtones of a "forbidden paradise" (p.373) about it, it becomes perfectly clear how by analogy Nicholas can feel capable of being in disgrace and in the 'Garden of Eden' at the same time.  He is as ever several steps ahead of the aunt.

Nicholas now begins to see the possibilities in allowing his aunt to believe that the gooseberry garden is his goal and by making "one or two sorties [...] with obvious stealth" (p.373), the oxymoron drawing attention to his forward planning and her stupidity, towards one or other of the two doors into the forbidden garden ensures that she will be kept "on self-imposed sentry-duty for the greater part of the afternoon" (p.373).  As "a woman of few ideas, with immense powers of concentration" (p.373) she has allowed herself to be manipulated by the devious child, the irony being that in seeking to punish Nicholas she effectively punishes herself.  This tunnel vision is a quality that she shares with Mrs De Ropp.

Having neatly dealt with the obstacle of his aunt he "rapidly put into execution a plan of action that had long germinated in his brain" (p.373), as opposed to the adults who "improvise" and make up the rules as they go along.  At last Nicholas's bizarre and mischievous behaviour is explained.  There follows a description of his anticipation of the "mysteries of the lumberroom" (p.374), the "unknown land, compared with which the gooseberry garden was a stale delight, a mere material pleasure" (p.374).  He has practised unlocking the schoolroom door since he "had not much experience of the art of fitting keys into keyholes" (p.374) (he realises his shortcomings) and he knows that he can reach the "fat, important-looking key" (p.373) to the lumber-room by standing on a chair to reach the shelf in the library where it is hidden.  Unlike his unimaginative, impetuous aunt, "he did not believe in trusting too much to luck and accident" (p.374), although the clear implication is that he is ready to do so if necessary (has in fact already done so), and events prove that he is not only a careful strategist but an inspired opportunist also, like the children in "The Penance".

At last the lumber-room is open to view and the voyage of discovery begun.  Saki states simply, "It came up to his expectations" (p.374).³¹  Again the boy has a wisdom superior to his aunt who is constantly being surprised by events.  His sense of wonder at "that region that was so carefully sealed from youthful eyes" (p.374) takes on the mystical quality of a hero's journey or a religious experience.  It is described as "large and dimly lit" (p.374) (in significance like the 'cathedral' tool-shed in "Sredni Vashtar") with "one high window opening on to the forbidden garden" (p.374) described on p.373 as "the forbidden paradise" and thus evocative of 'The Garden of Eden'.  The significance of the "key", "the mysteries", the "unknown land" and dismissal of "material pleasure" all combine to reinforce Nicholas's perception of the lumber-room as "a storehouse of unimagined treasures" (p.374), a phrase which suggests 'storing up treasure in Heaven.'

Nicholas is very much a loner, the stuff of which pioneers are made - independent-minded, ruthless and with a strong sense of self.  He has no need to take anyone into his confidence, there is no sense of sharing or consultation or equality; the reader follows where he leads, as little party to his surprises as the adult against whom he is pitting himself.  Because Nicholas is a loner only his actions proclaim his purpose, his reactions reveal his thoughts and the surprise element is preserved.  This has the effect of drawing attention to the transparent stupidity of the aunt whose motives can be all too plainly understood.

As soon as Nicholas crosses the threshold his eye alights on "a piece of framed tapestry that was evidently meant to be a firescreen" (p.374) the word "evidently" drawing attention to the fact that Nicholas is perfectly aware of its original purpose.  The adults with their blinkered hidebound preconceptions only see the obvious, but to Nicholas "it was a living, breathing story" (p.374).  This is one of many treasures which his "aunt-by-assertion" has consigned "to dust and damp by way of preserving them" (p.374) as Saki ironically observes.  Even the roll of Indian carpet on which he is sitting cannot disguise "beneath a layer of dust" the "wonderful colours" glowing there (p.374).  The tapestry is described in detail together with Nicholas's rapt response to it.  "But did the huntsman see [he wonders] what Nicholas saw, that four galloping wolves were coming in his direction through the wood?" The man "had only two arrows left in his quiver, and he might miss with one or both of them" (p.374).  As he scornfully notes, "all one knew about his skill in shooting was that he could hit a large stag at a ridiculously short range" (pp.374-75).  The analytical child mind is seen clearly at work here.  The hunter is obviously another inept and blind adult, foolishly exulting in 'victory' only to be robbed of it.  The adults as hunters reveal the children as victims in a manner calculated to enlist the reader's sympathy on the side of the children.

Dispassionately abandoning the figures on the tapestry to a potentially grisly fate (in which respect he resembles Saki's other child figures as in "The Penance", "The Story-Teller" etc.), Nicholas turns his attention to the other contents of the lumber-room.  His delight in the exotic and curious objects is evident and natural ("the twisted candlesticks in the shape of snakes" [p.375] for instance, again evokes comparison with the Garden of Eden), but in examining the "less promising [...] large square book with plain black covers" (p.375) (reminiscent of a Family Bible perhaps?) he has already made another important discovery - that appearances are deceptive.  As Nicholas turns the pages of the "whole portrait gallery of undreamed of creatures" (p.375), relating them to his own limited experience, the intrusion of his aunt's voice in "shrill vociferation of his name" (p.375) is an irritant to the reader also.  She is "engaged in energetic and rather hopeless search for him among the artichokes and raspberry canes" (p.375), a double irony since in the first place he is not in the garden, but had he been he "could effectually disappear from view amid the masking growth..." (p.373).  "'Nicholas, Nicholas!' she screamed! 'You are to come out of this at once [...] I can see you all the time'" (p.375).  This preposterous lie underlines the folly of the adults who do not see what is there - the hunter in the tapestry does not see the wolves, visible only to the child - and claim to see what is not there.  Saki at his most subtle merely remarks, "It was probably the first time for twenty years that any one had smiled in that lumber-room".³²  Since no-one but the aunt "and such-like privileged persons" (p.374) have entered its sacred portals in the last twenty years the impression of their joyless prosaic minds is conveyed together with the fact that Nicholas has caught the aunt out in a patent falsehood.

It is also significant that Nicholas deliberately ignores his aunt and calls to mind how she often doesn't hear when the children tell her something important.  When the screams "gave way to a shriek and a cry for somebody to come quickly" (p.375), the calculating nature of Nicholas's response ought to be chilling, but so thoroughly has the reader entered into the conspiracy, and so detestable and mean-spirited is the aunt, that it merely elicits ungrudging admiration.  "Nicholas shut the book, restored it carefully to its place in a corner, and shook some dust from a neighbouring pile of newspapers over it" (p.375).  Nothing is overlooked in his care to restore everything to its former appearance.

The dialogue which follows further demonstrates the superiority of Nicholas's reasoning and debating powers and the stupidity and deceit of the aunt.  His first question, "'Who's calling?'" (p.375), is deliberately provocative, since he most certainly knows the answer, but his aunt falls into the trap as awkwardly as she has fallen into the rain-water tank.  "'Me', came the answer from the other side of the wall" (p.375), an arrogant and self-centred response.  She explains that she has fallen into the tank in her search for him in the gooseberry garden.  It is interesting to speculate how she could have "'slipped into the rain-water tank'" (p.376) unless it was at ground level which would be most unusual.  The likelihood is that she would have had to climb up (the "energetic" nature of her search would bear this out) and would probably have fallen head first into the tank - a ludicrous picture which rivals Octavian Ruttle in his nightshirt in its undignified absurdity.  She adds in typically obtuse fashion, "'luckily there's no water in it, but the sides are slippery and I can't get out'" (p.376).  There is a double irony here.  If there had been water in the tank, while she would certainly have got wet, which would have been a further insult to her dignity, she could have floated out.  But, more importantly, since it is a measure of her stupidity, what use is a rain water tank if there is no water in it? This distorted perception of what is "lucky" or useful calls to mind the lumber-room itself containing what the aunt believes to be useless objects while to Nicholas it is "a storehouse of unimagined treasures" (p.374).

She is at his mercy, and he is happy to savour the moment, so that in answer to her command, "'fetch the little ladder'" (p.376), Nicholas "promptly" and self-righteously points out, "'I was told I wasn't to go into the gooseberry garden'" (p.376).  To this she replies, "'I told you not to, and now I tell you that you may'" (p.376).  This remark - imperious, irrational, contradictory - sums up her worst attributes.  But it also highlights the subtlety of Nicholas's mind which has escaped her - the implicit inconsistency of the aunt's search for him in the gooseberry-garden where she has expressly forbidden him to go.  Not only is she capable of only one idea at a time, namely, that he will have to enter the forbidden zone in order to rescue her, but it also appears that she accepts the likelihood of his ability to outwit her.  Thus the boy wins by obeying her, and she loses because she assumes that she will be disobeyed.

Nicholas further objects, "'Your voice doesn't sound like aunt's'" (there would be an element of distortion if she were shouting from the confines of a tank) and adds, "'You may be the Evil One tempting me to be disobedient'" (p.376).  Again the religious overtones are evident, Satan in the pit being called to mind here.  His revenge has never been sweeter as he continues, "'Aunt often tells me that the Evil One tempts me and that I always yield.  This time I'm not going to yield" (p.376).  The mindless attempts at discipline which would be all too transparent to a child of his intelligence can be readily deduced.  Instead of changing tack as a more reasonable or imaginative woman might, "the prisoner in the tank", retorts, "'Don't talk nonsense [...] go and fetch the ladder'" (p.376).  This single sentence seems to contain three points of significance.  Firstly as "prisoner" she is hardly in a strong position and her tone is still peremptory, secondly, if he is talking "nonsense" it is nonsense that he has learnt from her, and lastly she still has not said "please", a word whose omission would assuredly have attracted her disapproval had roles been reversed.

Undaunted, Nicholas baits another trap, so thoroughly is he enjoying her discomfiture.  He asks if there will be "'strawberry jam for tea'" (p.376), the predictable response - another blatant lie - furnishing him with the coup de grâce which he exultantly delivers: "'Now I know you are the Evil One [...] Oh, Devil, you have sold yourself!'" (p.376).  The irony here is that Nicholas knows perfectly well that when the aunt said that there was no jam for tea on the previous day she was lying, but here he is pretending that his aunt would not lie and therefore the disembodied voice in the tank cannot be that of his aunt.  It is interesting that "Nicholas knew, with childish discernment" that the "unusual sense of luxury in being able to talk to an aunt as though one were talking to the Evil One" should not be "overindulged" (p.376).  From this it is clear that Nicholas has more self-control and far more insight than the adults and furthermore has succeeded in resisting temptation - again the religious parallels are implicit in the word "luxury" with its connotations of sinful excess.  In walking away he has effectively said, 'Get thee behind me, Satan'.

The setting of the last paragraph is at the tea table where "tea that evening was partaken of in a fearsome silence" (p.376), the word "partaken" highlighting the strained gentility of the proceeding.  This is a perfect antithesis of the opening paragraph which alludes to the scene at breakfast where the altercation about the frog suggests the reverse of silence.  But everything has turned out as Nicholas predicted.  The children have had a miserable time since "there had been no sands to play on - a circumstance that the aunt had overlooked in the haste of organizing her punitive expedition" (p.376).  The "punitive expedition" is the so-called "special treat" described in paragraph one and underlines the hypocrisy of the aunt in pretending that the other children are being rewarded when instead her sole intention is to punish Nicholas.  "The tightness of Bobby's boots had had disastrous effect on his temper" (p.376) and the aunt has suffered the ignominious punishment of "undignified" and (in her view) "unmerited detention in a rain-water tank for thirty-five minutes" (pp.376-77).³³

The self-possession which Nicholas displays at the outset is matched by his composure at the end of the story where his cousins have been exploited, his aunt routed and "as for Nicholas, he, too was silent, in the absorption of one who has much to think about" (p.377).  But is he contemplating his misdeeds? Of course not; "it was just possible, he considered, that the huntsman would escape with his hounds while the wolves feasted on the stricken stag" (p.377) (which constitutes a pyrrhic victory for the huntsman).  The blood-thirsty little boy has created a merciful solution to the story of the tapestry, perhaps as an expression of his inward satisfaction.  The ending is similar in tone to Conradin's eating another piece of toast in "Sredni Vashtar", stressing as it does the extreme selfpossession indicative of inner strength.  On a symbolic level Nicholas revolving in his mind the story of the tapestry draws attention to the analogy of the aunt as 'hunter' and Nicholas as 'hunted'.  The aunt, like the hunter lives to hunt another day (unlike the guardian in "Sredni Vashtar"), but the wolves, like Nicholas, get the prize.  Just as Nicholas can picture them feasting on the stag which allows the hunter to escape, so the lumber-room was full of "wonderful things for the eye to feast on" (p.374).³⁴

As Drake says, "Saki's continual thesis regarding children seems to be that their conduct is more nearly rational than that of the decorous adults because they have not yet learned the deceptions and hypocrisies of civilisation".³⁵  While there is nothing particularly decorous about the aunt and while it seems that Nicholas has acquired a useful repertoire of deceptions of his own, there is no doubt that his behaviour is consistent and justified in the light of his "aunt's" arbitrary and irrational behaviour.  He at least knows the nature of truth, and understands hypocrisy in a way that his aunt does not.

The choice of title is apt and not merely because of its significance to Saki's contemporaries earlier mentioned.  While the exploration of the room is a small part of the story, it is nevertheless the focal point which helps to explain Nicholas's actions in the light of his underlying purpose.  Everything he has done, all his seemingly inexplicable behaviour, is part of a predetermined plan, prompted by his knowledge of his aunt's character, to leave the coast clear so that he can explore the lumber-room.  Add to this the aunt's perception of lumber as a collection of useless odds and ends (just as the disused toolshed in 'Sredni Vashtar' is seen as redundant) when in fact it is such a paradise for Nicholas, and the meaning of the whole story can be seen to hinge on the contrasting perceptions of child and adult and the superior wisdom of the child.

The same themes that recur throughout Saki's short stories are obvious in "The Lumber-Room".  As John Letts points out: "If Thurber saw life in terms of a Battle of the Sexes, there are some grounds for thinking that Saki saw it in terms of a war between the adult and the young and free".³⁶  Here as in so many other stories the contest is between an adult and a young child, in this instance Nicholas scoring a temporary victory over the aunt.³⁷  What makes the story unique to Saki is his ability to see things through the child's eyes, to apply a child's logic to the actions of the adults in such a way as to reveal them as they are and not as they seem.³⁸

The same themes that recur throughout Saki's short stories are obvious in "The Lumber-Room".  As John Letts points out: "If Thurber saw life in terms of a Battle of the Sexes, there are some grounds for thinking that Saki saw it in terms of a war between the adult and the young and free".36 Here as in so many other stories the contest is between an adult and a young child, in this instance Nicholas scoring a temporary victory over the aunt.37 What makes the story unique to Saki is his ability to see things through the child's eyes, to apply a child's logic to the actions of the adults in such a way as to reveal them as they are and not as they seem.38

His brilliant gift for the absurd is again brought into play in the aunt's dealings with recalcitrant children so that the ridiculous dilemma in which she finds herself is a fitting retribution.  Retribution is itself, of course, a recurrent theme.  Even animals so prevalent throughout Saki's writing figure here, the frog in the bread-and-milk as a kind of catalyst, and the wolves in the tapestry in their typically savage role.  The deliberate act of putting a frog in the breadand-milk, which is so surprising to the adult with conditioned preconceptions, makes perfect sense to Nicholas; and so perfectly does Saki represent the child's point of view it seems reasonable to the reader by comparison with the clear irrationality of the aunt.

It is possible to follow Loganbill's lead and interpret the story in terms of an initiation rite,³⁹ whereby the key, the threshold, and the exploration of the lumber-room itself are seen as a symbolic initiation into mysteries revealed to Nicholas but not to the unimaginative world peopled by his aunt and his dull cousins and "quite uninteresting younger brother" (p.372).  The same analysis can be applied to tales such as "Sredni Vashtar" and is a cogent interpretation.

Philip Stevick⁴⁰ agrees with the initiation theory but carries it one stage further, defining it in terms of Freudian symbolism.  If so this would be an unusual element in a Saki story.  While it is true that several of the images - the key, the candlesticks like snakes, the teapot with its spout, for instance - might be accorded a sexual significance there are one or two anomalies.  As Loganbill points out, there are two doors into the forbidden garden, since the story depends on the aunt being forced to patrol the area between them, but if as the aunt believes Nicholas has gained access to the garden by scaling the wall, what of the Freudian significance then?

The choice of the name 'Nicholas' is in itself interesting, suggesting as it does the conflict between saint and devil, innocence and corruption; certainly elements of both characteristics are present in Nicholas.⁴¹  It is also significant that the other main character, the aunt, has no name, and in his ruthlessly logical way, Nicholas denies her even the status of aunt, uncharitably viewing her self-styling as yet another of her failures of judgement or truth.  The other characters in the story are merely dimly perceived 'extras', only Bobby having a name and his status - cousin or despised younger brother - unknown.⁴²

Saki's ability to get right into the mind of a child has been justly celebrated by Porterfield⁴³ and by Bilton,⁴⁴ who thinks that "'The Lumber-Room' reveals a child's mind in a manner no less remarkable for being autobiographical".⁴⁵  But whether this is accepted or not, no discussion of the role of the child in Saki's stories would be complete without reference to "The Lumber-Room", described by Letts as a "classic".⁴⁶  In fact, so highly is that story regarded by Brian Inglis⁴⁷ that he devotes half an article to a discussion of "The Lumber-Room" on the grounds of its exclusion from a selection of short stories he is reviewing - an irony which it is tempting to think Saki would have appreciated.

"Sredni Vashtar"

If the tone of "The Lumber-Room" is more sombre than "The Penance" or most of Saki's other short stories in this chapter, then "Sredni Vashtar" is grim, serious and has been thought to rival the stories of W.W.  Jacobs for its sinister undercurrents.  Among Saki's most celebrated short stories, "Sredni Vashtar" (pp.136-140) is variously described as a "creepy gruesome tale",⁴⁸ "the finest of his sketches in the macabre",⁴⁹ "one of Saki's handful of masterpieces"⁵⁰ and the product of someone whose "soul was not quite sane".⁵¹ Many other critics have discussed it but with very few exceptions (notably Robert Drake and Dean Loganbill who will be discussed later) they mention the autobiographical content, in particular the despotic regime of Hector's Aunt Augusta, and seem happy to leave it at that.  Graham Greene aroused a storm of protest from Ethel Munro in saying of "Sredni Vashtar": "Unhappiness wonderfully aids the memory, and the best stories of Munro are all of childhood, its humour, and its anarchy as well as its cruelty and unhappiness."⁵²  This is very possibly true but it does not examine the moral, if there is one, or at any rate the underlying theme of the tale, which is the struggle, in this instance mortal, between the boy and his guardian, between truth and hypocrisy.  As Fogle eloquently expresses it, "'Sredni Vashtar' reverberates beyond its limits"⁵³ and close examination of the text may reveal why.

The plight of Conradin is baldly stated in the opening sentence.  He "was ten years old, and the doctor had pronounced his professional opinion that the boy would not live another five years" (p.136).  This calls to mind the opening of "Laura" (p.241), where the doctor is proved right to within a day.⁵⁴  Conradin is able to discount the doctor's prognosis since the latter is "silky and effete" (p.136), a phrase which shows that there is more form than substance to the man, that he is pliant to Mrs De Ropp's will.  She, on the other hand, his cousin and guardian, is of the same opinion, in fact, actively wants to hear that verdict and she is a force to be reckoned with.  "In his eyes she represented those three-fifths of the world that are necessary and disagreeable and real" (p.136).  All that he has to counter this unequal opposition is "himself and his imagination" (p.136), in which respect he resembles Nicholas.  He has no real hopes of survival since "illnesses and coddling restrictions and drawn-out dulness" (p.136) threaten to stifle him; that is, Mrs De Ropp has willed it otherwise.

The crucial differences between Mrs De Ropp and Conradin are not only her stupidity and his imagination but her wilful blindness and his intellectual honesty.  Early in the story his moral superiority is established, a core of integrity which remains unassailable and proves to be his salvation.  She "might have been dimly aware" (p.136) that she enjoyed "thwarting him 'for his good'" but she "would never, in her honestest moments, have confessed to herself that she disliked Conradin" (p.136).  (The fact that she thinks in degrees of honesty underlines her innate hypocrisy.) This conveys to the reader the smug self-righteousness of her behaviour, and her inability to see what to others must have been obvious in her attitude to Conradin, that thwarting him was not a "duty" (p.136) but a pleasure - again the antagonism between Nicholas and the aunt is brought to mind.  Conradin by contrast "hated her with a desperate sincerity which he was perfectly able to mask" (pp.136-37).  He is her superior on two counts; not only is he honest with himself, he is capable of disguising his feelings, a vital weapon in his limited armoury, and one common to most of Saki's child protagonists.⁵⁵

His pleasures are few but they gain immeasurably "from the likelihood that they would be displeasing to his guardian" (p.137), an element of childish spite that has the ring of truth about it.  She is "locked out" from his imagination as "an unclean thing, which should find no entrance" (p.137).  Later it becomes apparent that there are analogies which may be drawn to Sredni Vashtar's cage, another locked secret from which she is debarred.

Corresponding to the oppressive "three-fifths of the world" (p.136) are "the dull, cheerless garden", the "many windows that were ready to open with a message not to do this or that" and the "reminder that medicines were due" (p.137).  These recall the "drawn-out dulness", "coddling restrictions" and "illnesses" earlier mentioned (p.136).  In this unpromising garden Mrs De Ropp forbids the picking of fruit - just as Nicholas is forbidden the delights of the gooseberry garden - deluding herself even about the value of the fruit trees.  More important is her failure of judgement in the matter of the shed.  It is "in a forgotten corner [...] almost hidden behind a dismal shrubbery [...] a disused tool-shed" (p.137).  Again appearances deceive.  Given life by Conradin's imagination and memory it becomes something between "a playroom" (he is only ten years old) "and a cathedral" (he is mature beyond his years and his soul is being starved).  This secret place of Conradin's has magic properties similar to those of "The Lumber-Room" for Nicholas; a place of escape and for the exercise of his fertile imagination.

More wonderful than this, however, are "two inmates of flesh and blood [...] a ragged-plumaged Houdan hen" for him to love and "a large pole-cat ferret" (p.137) for him to worship, these two elements of his nature being starved by Mrs De Ropp.  "A friendly butcher-boy had once smuggled [the ferret] cage and all [...] in exchange for a long-secreted hoard of small silver" (p.137).  This imparts yet more crucial information about Conradin's character: he is tenacious, a forward planner and capable of outwitting his guardian, more qualities that he shares with Nicholas.  It is more readily believable that Conradin could get hold of a ferret than many another pet, his contact with the outside world being severely limited.  The butcher boy with whom he has obviously had furtive dealings would keep ferrets for rabbiting and the nature of the animal, vicious and carnivorous, makes it the perfect choice of instrument for his guardian's death as it turns out.  The fact that ferrets are short-sighted, like Mrs De Ropp, and according to Bewick have "a natural attachment to everything that is corrupt"⁵⁶ adds to the ironic piquancy of her fate.

The ferret's hutch is "divided into two compartments, one of which was fronted with close iron bars" (p.137).  On a symbolic level the ferret and the cage correspond to Conradin and his life: the ferret behind bars is Conradin as he appears to the outside world, but the unseen compartment is like Conradin's imagination, secret and apart.⁵⁷  It has a further more functional significance which becomes evident at the denouement of the story.  When Mrs De Ropp beards Sredni Vashtar in his cage in the belief that it is guinea pigs that she will find, had Sredni Vashtar been visible in the barred part of his cage even with her short sight she would have been saved.  But he has obviously withdrawn to his inner sanctum which corresponds to Conradin's inner thoughts, and this is what causes her downfall.  She has to unlock the cage to find out the truth.

Conradin is "dreadfully afraid" of the ferret but values it all the more.  He is aware of its power, and keeps its presence "scrupulously from the knowledge of the Woman" (p.137).  "Scrupulously" underlines both his basic honesty and her lack of scruple.  Just as he disparages her as "the Woman" so he elevates the ferret to the status of a god, bestowing on him the wonderful name of "Sredni Vashtar", redolent of things Russian and remote and romantic - an heroic, god-like name.  It is interesting that the name Conradin itself has many of these properties and would almost certainly call to mind the contemporary writer Joseph Conrad ("Sredni Vashtar" was written n 1910).

The perfunctory nature of Mrs De Ropp's religion is compared to the "mystic and elaborate ceremonial before the wooden hutch" with "red flowers in their season and scarlet berries in the winter-time" (p.137).  Unlike the passive religion of "the Woman" Sredni Vashtar "laid some special stress on the fierce impatient side of things" (p.137).  Noteworthy here is the fact that the apparently passive Conradin worships a fierce god, while the Woman's religion "went to great lengths in the contrary direction" (p.138 ).  She hypocritically worships a patient god although she is impatient, and thus it is a fitting irony that her death should be meted out by the impatient god, Sredni Vashtar.  Conradin is obliged to attend Mrs De Ropp's church service which is "an alien rite in the House of Rimmon" (p.137) - a reference to II Kings, v, 18, where Naaman after being cured of leprosy by Elisha begs his leave to worship the Babylonian god of storms when with his master.  Conradin likewise has no choice in the matter of worship when with his guardian but the implication is that like Naaman he believes in the true god, (i.e.  Sredni Vashtar) who will effect his cure.  His own religion which he practises in secret has exacting rituals which satisfy his craving for spiritual sustenance.  

The "powdered nutmeg [which] was strewn in front of his hutch" (p.138) has to be stolen, presumably because this increases the danger and thereby enhances the solemnity of the ritual.  It is also the action of a naughty child in defiance of all that Mrs De Ropp stands for.  Even at his most imaginative Conradin's sense of reality is present.  He "almost succeeded in persuading himself that Sredni Vashtar was personally responsible for the toothache" (p.138) that laid Mrs De Ropp low for three days.  It is fortuitous that she recovers before the grated nutmeg runs out, but he is all the time aware of the reality: he can recognise wishful thinking and coincidence.  The choice of nutmeg as a votive offering is itself interesting.  It may be that as a sickly child on a restricted diet of the bread-and-milk sort (such as that desecrated by Nicholas to such good effect in "The Lumber-Room") Conradin was occasionally allowed a sprinkling of nutmeg in order to make it more palatable.  Or perhaps Conradin, in his child-like way, has chosen it as a carminative for the mitigation of one of the polecat-ferret's less god-like propensities.

The other inmate of the shed, the hen, exists only to be loved and does not figure in the worship.  Conradin "had long ago settled that she was an Anabaptist" (p.138).  Since Mrs De Ropp represents "all respectability" he not unreasonably hopes that being an Anabaptist is "dashing and not very respectable" (p.138).  What is worthy of note here is that, again true to character, Conradin "did not pretend to have the remotest knowledge as to what an Anabaptist was" (p.138) and the probability is that he had heard the term discussed by Mrs De Ropp disapprovingly from the depths of her bigotry and ignorance.  The irony, of course, is that Conradin's perception of the "dashing" nature of the Anabapist could hardly be farther from the truth but the pernicious nature of Mrs De Ropp's overweening prejudice is clearly voiced.

Short-sighted she may be, but eventually "Conradin's absorption in the tool-shed began to attract the notice of his guardian" (p.138).  In this struggle for mastery of Conradin's soul it is necessary for this enterprise to be frustrated.  Thus on the pretext that "'it is not good for him to be pottering down there in all weathers'" (p.138), she removes and sells the Houdan hen - the only thing he has to love.  Not only is she guilty of cruelty but she is again dishonest with herself in giving her reasons for depriving him of his pet.  It is significant too that she has only spotted the hen at this juncture, a fact which that the hen is the sole reason for his visiting the shed.  Her vindictiveness is plain also.  "With her short-sighted eyes she peered at Conradin" (p.138) waiting for his reaction to her hateful news.  "But Conradin said nothing: there was nothing to be said" (p.138).  This sentence underlines the enormity of what she has done and Conradin's wonderful self-containment perfected over many years of privations.

Even the insensitive Mrs De Ropp feels that she has gone too far this time and offers him toast for tea, "a delicacy which she usually banned on the ground that it was bad for him" (p.138) - again she reveals her hypocrisy - and "also because the making of it 'gave trouble', a deadly offence in the middle-class feminine eye" (p.138).  The irony here is the distortion of values: the nature of the "deadly offence" is such a trifling matter compared to the hideous cruelty which she has just inflicted on the boy of whose welfare she pretends to be so solicitous.  The "qualms" felt by Mrs De Ropp have come too late for her salvation unlike Octavian in "The Penance" who feels "qualms" which motivate him to propitiate the children.  She pays the ultimate penalty for her "deadly offence".

When he refuses the toast, she exclaims "with an injured air" (as if she is the wronged party and not the offender - her ability to fool herself is boundless), "'I thought you liked toast'" (p.138).  He replies, "'Sometimes'" (p.138).  This uncompromising answer (the first word he has spoken, and the only one he addresses to her) encapsulates the nature of Conradin's superiority and marks a turning point in the story.  By saying that, he acknowledges that she is making a concession and he chooses to reject it, just as the children in "The Penance" reject Octavian's peace offering of chocolates.  Conradin is not to be bought off so cheaply.  He has spotted a weakness in her, that she is not impervious to that "white set face" (p.138),⁵⁸ whether because of some premonition that she has gone too far, or some faint compunction.  The one word illustrates the steel within him.  This economy with words (the children in "The Penance" calling Octavian "Beast" is another example) contrasts starkly with the bluster of the adults.  "'Sometimes'" also points to the moment of her downfall, to be remembered later in his triumphant eating of toast at the end of the story.  His passive acceptance is banished and a more active role begins in the life and death struggle.

Conradin now asks of Sredni Vashtar a boon, the nature of which is unstated since the ferret as a god "must be supposed to know" (pp.138-39), and the reader is left to deduce its nature also.  "Choking back a sob [...] Conradin went back to the world he so hated" (pp.13£|j).  He has been dealt an almost mortal blow, his last tenuous hope now lying with this unspecified "boon".  His "bitter litany" is repeated "every evening in the dusk of the tool-shed" and "every night, in the welcome darkness of his bedroom" (p.139), welcome because he is safe from his guardian's scrutiny and can give free rein to his imagination, Conradin is living a twilight existence, confined as he is by the restrictions and petty domination of Mrs De Ropp, as much a captive as Sredni Vashtar in his dark cage - his potential saviour.

Inevitably the woman "noticed that the visits to the shed did not cease" (p.139) and having found the locked hutch assumes in her purblind way that he is keeping guinea pigs.  Predictably she decides, "'I'll have them all cleared away'" (p.139).  Conradin's reaction is interesting.  He "shut his lips tight" (p.139).  He does not make it easy for her.  She must be allowed to take full responsibility for her fate by ransacking "his bedroom till she found the carefully hidden key" (p.139).  ("Carefully" reveals his forward planning and his understanding of her character.  Has he hidden it where she will find it?) If he helps her she may wonder why he is being unusually cooperative.  On a moral level, however, it is necessary that she should choose in her hubris to pursue this course and thereby effect her own downfall.

From his strategic post at the dining room window Conradin watches the woman disappearing into the shed to make the discovery, this time fatally, that she is once again in error.  He can imagine her "opening the door of the sacred hutch and peering down with her short-sighted eyes [...] Perhaps she would prod at the straw in her clumsy impatience.  And Conradin fervently breathed his prayer for the last time" (p.139).  But nothing in his earlier life has given him reason to hope that this will happen.  As Fogle observes, "he knew as he prayed that he did not believe" (p.139) brings to mind "'Lord, I believe: help thou my unbelief'".⁵⁹  This is the only failure of understanding throughout, that "he knew that the Woman would come out presently [...] the Woman would triumph always as she triumphed now, and that he would grow ever more sickly under her [...] superior wisdom, till one day [...] the doctor would be proved right" (p.139).  It is interesting, however, that what he imagines, i.e.  the woman prodding "at the straw in her clumsy impatience", is the reality of what happens.  Conradin's imagination is based on what he knows of Mrs De Ropp's character, therefore it is right.  When Saki says, "he knew as he prayed" this is in reality what Conradin fears.  Like Nicholas he can accurately predict his guardian's movements which enable him to foresee the outcome.  Again the "superior wisdom" of the adults has been found wanting as in "The Lumber-Room" .  The "clumsy impatience" of the woman which is to prove fatal in this instance calls to mind the less drastic consequences of similar behaviour on the part of Nicholas's aunt when she falls into the rain-water tank.

Everything hangs in the balance at this moment: total victory or total defeat, survival or extinction.  But his courage does not fail him and he chants in defiance (his "threatened idol" is at risk as well as Conradin):

"Sredni Vashtar went forth,
His thoughts were red thoughts and his teeth were white.
His enemies called for peace, but he brought them death.
Sredni Vashtar the Beautiful" (p.139).

The tension mounts as the minutes pass.  "They were long minutes, but they slipped by nevertheless" (p.139), a sentence which recalls Octavian's lengthy half-hour vigil in "The Penance." In contrast to his guardian Conradin has learned patience.  The process that the woman has set in motion by her wilful actions is inexorably tending towards its final resolution.  She is about to learn the ultimate truth, too late, that one reaps what one sows;⁶⁰ that in a world dominated by 'nature red in tooth and claw' only the fittest can survive.  As he keeps his vigil, watching the starlings, those commonest of birds, "running and flying in little parties across the lawn; he counted them over and over again" (p.140).  This emphasises not only the passage of time so agonisingly measured but also how ordinary everything appears while such an extraordinary, cataclysmic event is taking place.  It also stresses Conradin's ability to see - unlike Mrs De Ropp he is not short-sighted.

"Hope had crept by inches into his heart" and "in his eyes that had only known the wistful patience of defeat" "a look of triumph began to blaze" (p.140).⁶¹  The "paean of victory and devastation", begun in defiance, is now repeated "under his breath with a furtive exultation" (p.140).  And out comes the ferret from the shed, "a long, low, yellow-and-brown beast, with eyes a-blink at the waning daylight, and dark wet stains around the fur of jaws and throat" (p.140).⁶³  The moment of Sredni Vashtar's emergence from the shed parallels Conradin's deliverance, both held captive, Sredni Vashtar in his cage in the dark, Conradin in the darkness imposed on him by the unenlightened regime of his guardian.  It is already dusk before Sredni Vashtar emerges "eyes a-blink" (p.140) which underlines how dark his captivity must have been, and by analogy how perilously close to extinction Conradin was.

As Sredni Vashtar appears, Conradin "dropped on his knees" (p.140) in a prayer of gratitude.  The ferret drinks at the brook, natural and instinctive behaviour, before disappearing in unhurried fashion into the bushes.63 "Such was the passing of Sredni Vashtar" (p.140) has a poetic resonance that expresses the solemnity of the moment for Conradin.  More than that, however, it reveals how the boy sees the ferret as it really is, acknowledging to himself that the instrument of his deliverance is an animal and not a god.  It is also worth noting that Saki does not at this point say, "Such was the passing of Mrs De Ropp"; she is of less account than the beast who has killed her.

Into this mood of hallowed truth, marking the end of Mrs De Ropp's life and the beginning of Conradin's, the maid's voice intrudes, just as in "The Lumber-Room" the voice of the aunt breaks into Nicholas's thoughts (p.375).  The mundane announcement of tea highlights her unawareness and ignorance of mysteries - it is a sacrilegious interruption.  She asks, "'Where is the mistress?'" (she is Mrs De Ropp's creature) to which Conradin merely responds, "'She went down to the shed some time ago'" (p.140).  He is completely dispassionate, as able to mask his elation as his former misery; indifferent also to the horror which is soon to greet the maid on her discovery of her mistress's body.

Conradin meanwhile "fished a toasting-fork out of the sideboard drawer" (p.140), his own master at last, and proceeds to make a piece of toast.  The toasting and buttering of the bread takes on a ritual significance and the "sometimes" at the turning point of the story is called to mind.  Imperviously he listens to the "noises and silences which fell in quick spasms beyond the dining-room door," and the macabre sounds of "the shuffling tread of those who bore a heavy burden into the house" (p.140).  The irony of "heavy burden" is complex.  Not only does it refer to the body of his guardian but to the news that they must impart to the boy, news that will come not as a grief to him, as they think, but as confirmation of his release from the heavy burden of her life-threatening domination of him.

When the servants exclaim, "'Whoever will break it to the poor child? I couldn't for the life of me!'" (p.140) it is clear that either they are ignorant of the true nature of his relationship to Mrs De Ropp or they are as hypocritical as she was.  The fact that the maid is described as "sour-faced" would suggest that she at least has done little in the past to make Conradin's life more bearable.  If they genuinely feel he will be devastated then they are as blind as she was to the truth.  The making of the second piece of toast is an effective way of drawing attention to the fact that they have no place in Conradin's new world, as Loganbill points out.⁶⁴

The entire story has been interpreted by Loganbill as an initiation rite in much the same way as "The Lumber-Room",⁶⁵ in this instance a dual initiation in which Conradin passes but Mrs De Ropp does not.  The symbolism of the shed as the separate place where the initiation happens, the ceremonies performed, the religious significance, the key and the final eating of the toast as a breaking of a fast are all elements of traditional rites of passage, of souls in travail.

It is interesting to trace the development of the religious imagery throughout the story.  Initially it is implicit in such words as "confessed" or "duty" (p.137).  Mrs De Ropp is thought of by the boy as "an unclean thing" (p.137), she issues 'commandments' "not to do this or that" and forbids the picking of fruit in the garden (just as Nicholas in "The Lumber-Room" is also banned from his 'Garden of Eden').  The shed is likened to a "cathedral" and the ferret to a god (p.137).  Then there is the "hoard of small silver" (p.137) like that of Judas.  The "mystic and elaborate ceremonial" is compared to the Woman's religion and direct reference is made to the House of Rimmon (p.137).  Anabaptists are mentioned (p.138); and "Conradin went back to the world that he so hated" (p.139), the world of his guardian in contrast to the paradise promised by Sredni Vashtar.  The words "bitter litany", "prayer" "believe", "hymn", "threatened idol" appear on page 139, and the repetition of 'eyes' and 'seeing', in particular the phrase "his eyes were rewarded" (p.140) (which is reminiscent of "the next morning his [Octavian's] eyes were gladdened" in "The Penance", p.427) are Biblical in tone and the Old Testament God of vengeance is called to mind.

The struggle between Conradin and Mrs De Ropp, a struggle between good and evil, depends on Conradin's imagination and integrity, the lack of which in Mrs De Ropp marks her our as more of an animal than the ferret who kills her.  Sredni Vashtar has at least acted true to his nature, killing from instinct; Mrs De Ropp is the victim of self-delusion.⁶⁶  As Robert Drake puts it, "Conradin [...] has a degree of wisdom, a belief in the fanciful and imaginative that his guardian does not possess [...] She does not believe in the elusive, the mysterious, the exotic represented by Sredni Vashtar and the cult which Conradin has built around him - the mysterious which is essentially a part of the whole life [...] Cognizance of the very thing she scoffs at is brought upon Mrs De Ropp by the thing itself; but it is too late."⁶⁷  The irony is that the child has again shown a greater knowledge of life than the adult; just as in "The Lumber-Room" where the "older wiser and better people" were also in error.

At the end of the story, Conradin stands on the threshold of a new life and while the reader does not know that the doctor's prognosis is wrong - only time can prove that -symbolically he is cured.  At last he is a whole person, master of himself, the 'reality' of Mrs De Ropp's world having been disproved, fatally for her.  Conradin's integrity and imagination have triumphed over Mrs De Ropp's self-deception.

Parallels

It is not so much the theme and gruesome treatment of "Sredni Vashtar" that marks it out as different from Saki's other child versus adult stories, but the savage tone.  It is a story written in deadly earnest and the almost complete lack of dialogue adds to the sombre treatment.  In total there are only one hundred and twelve words of dialogue, fourteen implicit from Mrs De Ropp: "It is not good for him to be pottering down there in all weathers" (p.138); and two exchanges with Conradin: "'I thought you liked toast'" (p.138) and "'What are you keeping in that locked hutch? [...] I believe it's guineapigs.  I'll have them all cleared away'" (p.139).  Conradin says one word to Mrs De Ropp: "'Sometimes'" (p.138), then "'Do one thing for me, Sredni Vashtar'" (p 138), repeated (p.139), his twenty-eight word chant, and in answer to the maid's: "'Tea is ready [...] Where is the mistress?'" (p.140), "'She went down to the shed some time ago'" (p.140).  Then in the last paragraph there is the fifteen word exclamation.  This lack of verbal communication enhances the sense of the very confined world which Conradin endures with its "coddling restrictions" together with his extreme self-containment.

Compared to this the lighter stories are characterised by dialogue, often witty or humorous; "The Story-Teller", "The Toys of Peace", "Hyacinth", "Morlvera", all depending in large measure for their satirical effect and the impetus of the narrative on verbal exchanges.  Nicholas in "The Lumber-Room" uses words to good effect but never to excess in his dialogues with the aunt whose muddled thinking is revealed by her utterances; but a great part of the story is narration.  The same is true of "The Penance" where the inscrutability of the children and the impotence of Octavian in his attempts to break down the barrier are stressed in the paucity of the dialogue which is concentrated towards the end of the story as understanding is reached.  Generally it seems that the higher the proportion of dialogue to narration, the lighter the tone or more comic the effect - and conversely.

In "The Toys of Peace" the dialogue between Harvey and the children, where they keep asking questions which he finds difficulty in answering, is similar to the plight of the aunt in "The Story-Teller".  It is a common factor in "The Lumber-Room" and "Morlvera" also where uncomfortable questions or unanswerable objections are countered by attempts to change the subject to distract the children from their relentless pursuit of what they perceive to be inconsistencies.

Harvey is well-meaning but weak; his initial reaction to his sister's suggestion: "'the idea is certainly an interesting and very well-meaning one [...] whether it would succeed well in practice- '" (p.394) showing his lack of conviction.  Most of his remarks in fact reveal a prosaic mind.  His statements are bald and factual: "'Here is a model of a municipal wash-house'", "'Here are some tools of industry'" (p.395) and so on, while the children say, "'We'll give him a purple coat'" and "'we must pretend that they have thousands of men'" (p.397), thereby showing their powers of imagination.

In "Sredni Vashtar" there is the effect of Mrs De Ropp muttering to herself: "'It is not good for him to be pottering down there in all weathers'" (p.138) and in "The Lumber-Room": "It was clear to his aunt that he was determined to get into the gooseberry garden 'only,' as she remarked to herself, 'because I have told him he is not to'" (p.373).  In "The Penance" and "Sredni Vashtar", the adults' attempts to propitiate the children are met with the same stony response.

It is through speech also that the "inexorable child-logic" becomes evident.  Hyacinth retorts when reprimanded for hitting Jacky Gaffin who was "only half French", "it was only the French half of Jacky that he had been hitting" (p.519) and again when he is reproached for leaving "'those poor little children there alone in the pigsty'", "'They're not alone, they've got ten little pigs in with them'" (p.520).  In "The Lumber-Room", Nicholas is proved right about the frog in his bread-and-milk: "'You said there couldn't possibly be a frog in my bread-andmilk; there was a frog in my bread-and-milk'" (p.372) and in his dialogue with the aunt in the rain-water tank.  Harvey Bope in "The Toys of Peace" says, "'Votes are put into it at election times'", which elicits the inevitable question, "'What is put into it at other times?'" (p.395).  "The Penance" affords several instances.  '"You killed our little cat'", "'we shall be very sorry when we've killed Olivia [...] but we can't be sorry till we've done it '", "'no one helped our cat'" (p.426).  And in "The Story-Teller" when the aunt feebly says that the sheep are being driven out of one field and into another because there is more grass in it, the children object, "'But there is lots of grass in that field [...] there's nothing else but grass there'" (p.349); and at the end of the boring moral tale where the little girl is rescued from the bull because she was good, "'Wouldn't they have saved her if she hadn't been good?'" (p.350) which "was exactly the question that the bachelor had wanted to ask" (p.350).

The ability of children to judge dispassionately is another common feature in these stories - overtly in "The Penance" with judicial imagery throughout.  In "Morlvera" the cockney children are in the role of witnesses and judge accordingly - Bertha "was doubtless as fat and foolish as [Victor] had described her to be" (p.493).  The children in "The Story-Teller" judge that another Bertha deserves her fate and in "Sredni Vashtar" Mrs De Ropp has reaped what she sowed leaving Conradin unmoved.  Hyacinth is willing to sacrifice the Jutterly children but is equally prompt to release them when he perceives justice has been done and in "The Lumber-Room" Nicholas walks away from his aunt's predicament, judging correctly that she has brought it on herself.  In "The Toys of Peace" the children judge the toys to be useless in their present form and adapt them to suit their purposes.

In each story the punishment fits the crime - in "Sredni Vashtar" at one end of the scale, Mrs De Ropp actually forfeits her life.  The aunt in "The Lumber-Room" suffers mortification which she richly deserves and Octavian loses face but gains favour.  The aunt in "The Story-Teller" metaphorically digs her own grave at the end of the story by saying disapprovingly, "'a most improper story'" (p.354), thereby guaranteeing her future embarrassment.  At the end of "Hyacinth" the adults who did not heed the warning signs deserve no better than is meted out to them and in "The Toys of Peace" the end is a foregone conclusion to anyone with imagination or common sense.  In "Morlvera", in the story within a story, Emmeline justifies the doll's destruction by Victor in saying, "'I've bin finking.  Do you know oo 'e was? 'E was 'er little boy wot she'd sent away to live wiv poor folks.  'E come back and done that'" (p.495).

The religious imagery which "The Penance", "The Lumber-Room" and "Sredni Vashtar" have in common has already been noted but there are other common factors too.  A knowledge of history is referred to in "The Toys of Peace", "Hyacinth" and "The Penance", and political issues are touched on in "The Toys of Peace " and "Hyacinth".  The savagery of animals, the ferret in "Sredni Vashtar" being the prime example, is a recurrent theme.  In "The Lumber-Room" and "The Story-Teller", there are wolves, while pigs feature in "The Penance", "Hyacinth" and "The Story-Teller".  Bloodthirsty children appear throughout, while the 'refined' adults in Saki's stories attempt to draw a veil over the relish with which children enjoy gruesome stories, as in "The Story- Teller", or even playing with toy soldiers as in "The Toys of Peace".

The children triumph because they know what is real and show up the adults for the posturing fools that they are.  The ghoulish delight of "The Penance", and Nicholas's bloodthirsty contemplation of the tapestry are unfeigned; Emmeline and Bert give a hoarse cheer when the sinister Morlvera is destroyed, Conradin eats another piece of toast when Mrs De Ropp's body is carried into the house.  This seeming callousness is in fact a portrayal of pure honesty.  Unlike the adults they are able to admit to themselves the true nature of their feelings - they act naturally and with an integrity which the adults lack; but they are also able when necessary to disguise their feelings.  Hyacinth says, "'Liar!'" (p.522) without equivocation and acts with diabolical ruthlessness, though he has been able to look like a perfect angel.  The adults on the other hand are hypocritical, with a set of false values, which are nevertheless transparent to the children's all-seeing eyes.  The children in every case demonstrate their ability to see beneath the superficial behaviour of the "older, wiser and better people" (p.372) to the underlying motives.  Their clear-sightedness and "inexorable child-logic" leave the adults with their follies and hypocrisies exposed.

Notes

1. Robert Drake, "The Sauce for the Asparagus", The Saturday Book, 20 (1960), 68.
2. Reginald also touches on this in "Reginald’s Drama": "And of course one would have to work in studies of the struggle of hereditary tendency against environment" (p.30).
3. John Letts in his "Introduction", Saki: Short Stories (London: Folio Society, 1976), p.11, says, "One of Saki's most frequently used weapons was inversion.  This is seen at its best in "The Story-Teller".
4. This calls to mind the ghoulish child in "The Penance" saying, "'Frow her down and the pigs will d'vour her, every bit 'cept the palms of her hands'" (p.425).
5. Alexander Porterfield in "Saki", London Mercury, 12 (August 1925), 388, says of "The Story-Teller": "the keynote of the story, of all his stories - that blithe negation of the dull and laudable, that quiet derision of pretentiousness and cant."
6. Likened by W.D. Cobley in "The Tales of Saki", Papers of the Manchester Literary Club, 47 (1921), 231, to "The Monkey's Paw" by W.W. Jacobs, though Cobley refers to "Shredni Vashtar".
7. John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (London: Dent, 1990), p.33.  At birth the mind is "white paper, void of all characters".
8. Hector Hugh Munro himself and his brother and sister.
9. Dean Loganbill, 'Saki: A Literary and Critical Study' (Unpublished Ph.D.  dissertation, University of Denver, 1973), p.85.
10. It could be another oblique reference to his Aunt Augusta.
11. Op. cit., p.86.
12. "Furtive" is a favourite word throughout the stories.
13. It is perhaps worth noting how often the word "three" or "triple" crops up throughout the story.  Reference is made to "three heads", "three white set faces", "threefold study","triple gaze", "three throats" (p.423); "three children", "three unsparing judges", "three small wardens" (p.424); "three solemn nods", "three children", "three chubby arms" (p.425); "three throats", "three children" (p.426); "threefold solemnity" and "three pairs of solemn eyes" (p.427), no fewer than fifteen references.  As Brewer (Dictionary of Phrase and Fable) says, "three according to Pythagoras was 'the perfect number, expressive of beginning, middle and end', wherefore he makes it a symbol of Deity".  There are certainly many instances in mythology of the threefold nature of deity: the Fates or Parcae Sisters, the Barpies, the Furies, The Graces both pagan and Christian (i.e.  Faith, Hope and Charity, the three Cardinal Virtues).  As Brewer points out, "A Trinity is by no means confined to the Christian creed" and this confusion of pagan and Christian is illustrated throughout "The Penance".  The use of religious symbolism together with the reversal of child and adult roles serves to show the errors of perception made by Octavian and the means by which he is brought face to face with the truth.
14. "A wall of ice had grown up gradually between mother and son, a barrier across which they could hold converse, but which gave a wintry chill even to the sparkle of their lightest words." The Unbearable Bassington, p.589.  This is like "the high blank wall" in "The Penance".
15. In "The Story-Teller" the children approve when they hear that "the gardeners had told the Prince that you couldn't have pigs and flowers, so he decided to have pigs and no flowers" (p.352).  There is nothing sentimental about Saki's children.
16. In "The Toys of Peace", pp.393-98, children's familiarity with the bloodthirsty elements of history is likewise celebrated.
17. A reference to II Kings ix.35: "and they went to bury her [Jezebel]: but they found no more of her than the skull, and her feet, and the palms of her hands".
18. "Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand" (Exodus xxi.23).
19. This standard of measurement recalls the early "Reginald" sketches: "Reginald on Christmas Presents", "There is my Aunt Agatha [...] who sent me a pair of gloves [...] But - they were nines!" (p.9).  The same glove-sizing metaphor occurs in "The Innocence of Reginald", "Miriam takes nines in voices" (p.39), and also "The Schartz-Metterklume Method", "a number nine spanking" (p.286).
20. It is worth noting that the form of the penance calls to mind "brute beasts that have no understanding" (from the Book of Common Prayer) and "I shall light a candle of understanding in thine heart" (from II Esdras iii. 10).
21. According to Brewer, a reference to "the Holy Roman Emperor, Henry IV, [who] humbled himself to Pope Gregory VII (Hildebrand) by standing for three days barefooted in the courtyard of the palace in the garb of a penitent (January 1077)".
22. That is, a light-weight shirt of the sort worn by athletes.
23. James George Frazer, Folk-Lore in the Old Testament (London: Macmillan, 1923), pp.322-37.
24. Robert Drake, "The Sauce for the Asparagus", describes Octavian as "a dignified gentleman of middle age" who is threatened by the children "into standing for an hour in his shirt with a candle in his hand over the grave of their cat [...] Their 'inexorable child-logic' provides a perfect contrast to Octavian's superficial 'adult' dignity" (p.68).  There seem to be several inaccuracies here.  There is nothing in the text to suggest that Octavian is either middle-aged or particularly middle-aged; he is "lively", "cheerful", and he desires "the unstinted approval of his fellows" (p.422).  Nor does he do penance for an hour: "half an hour seemed long and goodly in their eyes" (p.427).
25. In the words of Matthew xviii.2-3, "Except that ye become as little children ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven." There is perhaps also an echo of Psalms xviii.28-29, "For thou wilt light my candle; the Lord my God will enlighten my darkness.  For by thee have I run through a troop; and by my God have I leaped over a wall."
26. MacQueen Pope, Back Numbers (London: Hutchinson, 1954), p.57: "There it was - before him.  The heaps of treasure, all the lumber, the throw-outs, the discards which made a Victorian Box Room one of the most delectable places in the world - a place of Magic.  Some folks called it the Lumber Room, in this house it was always the Box Room".
27. Don Henry Otto in 'The Development of Method and Meaning in the Fiction of Saki' (Unpublished Ph.D dissertation, University of S. California, 1969), pp.105-32, discusses the role of the "juvenile protagonist" seeking to subvert "conventional society".
28. "Saki: Some Problems and a Bibliography", English Fiction in Transition, 5 (September 1962), 9.
29. Miriam Quen Cheikin, "Saki: Practical Jokes as a Clue to Comedy", English Literature in Transition, 21 (1978), 123: "Running through the stories are the other essentials of comedy, including the unexpected, the incongruous, and the action that breaks the rules of decorum".
30. Porterfield, "Saki", states: "this is just the way a child would feel in such circumstances; and it is in all such similar passages that Saki is at his best" (p.390).
31. It is part of Saki's technique to intersperse his descriptive passages with short summary sentences to highlight a point.
32. Stating by indirection is another trick to involve the reader by allowing him to draw his own conclusions.
33. John Letts, "Introduction", p.14, says of "The Lumber-Room", "the aunt is forced to plead for release with a relentless Nicholas [...who] condemns her to a just and sodden hour or two in the rain-water tank" (p.14).  Not only is the time factor inaccurate but the aunt says, "'luckily there's no water'" (p.376) in the tank.  Such errors are a pity because they inevitably raise doubts about the accuracy of other observations in an otherwise shrewd explication.
34. This echoes the phrase "his eyes were rewarded" (p.140) in "Sredni Vashtar" and "his eyes were gladdened" in "The Penance" (p.427).
35. Drake, "The Sauce for the Asparagus", p.68.
36. "Introduction", p.11.
37. J.W. Lambert, in "Jungle Boy in the Drawing Room", Listener, 9 January 1956, p.211, says: "unsuitable guardians are a frequent target in his stories."
38. In the words of S.P.B. Mais, "A Great Humourist", Bookman, 56 (April 1919), 20: "Munro's understanding of children can only be explained by the fact that he was in many ways a child himself [...] Manhood has but placed in his hands a perfect sense of irony and withheld all other adult traits".
39. Loganbill, op.cit., pp.155-163.
40. Philip Stevick, "Saki's Beasts", English Literature in Transition, 9 (September 1966), 33-37.
41. Loganbill, pp.55-66, discusses the 'Doppelganger' in Saki's stories.
42. Elizabeth Drew, "Saki", Atlantic Monthly, 166 (1940), 98, says, "To talk about Saki's 'characterization' is absurd.  Hischaracters are constructed to form a front against which his light satiric artillery can most effectively be deployed." This is certainly true of his practical jokes or Reginald sketches, but it is disappointing to find such a perceptive critic unwilling to point out such obvious exceptions to this rule as "The Lumber-Room".
43. In "Saki", London Mercury (1925), 389: "It is with children especially, in fact, that he is at his best, not because they talk or act like children in his stories, since they do not particularly, but because they think, they re-act, like children.  It is in their own imaginative world we move".
44. Peter Bilton, 'Saki and his stories' (Unpublished MA dissertation, University of Oslo, 1959), p.7.
45. Ethel Munro in her biography of Saki in The Square Egg (London: Viking Press, 1926), p.7, says, "But the character of the aunt in 'The Lumber-Room' is Aunt Augusta to the life".  Hector and his brother and sister, like many children of that class and that period, were brought up by aunts.
46. "Introduction", p.13, "one must go back to one of his classic stories of childhood, 'The Lumber-Room'".
47. Brian Inglis, "The Lumber-Room", Spectator, 147 (1956), 907.  "Nobody can touch Saki as a conveyor of the fearful joys of overturning taboos; of breaking into forbidden rooms".  "Even when Saki's children are fiends [...] they are preferable to the grown-ups: always we are on their side against cousin, guardian and aunt."
48. Porterfield, "Saki", p.390.
49. Elizabeth Drew, "Saki", p.96.
50. V.S. Pritchett, "The Performing Lynx", New Statesman and Nation, 53 (1957), 18.
51. R. Ellis Roberts, "Saki", New Statesman, 24 July 1926,pp.416-17.  This is an interesting if somewhat contradictory discussion of Saki's 'cruelty'.  In likening him to Kipling, Roberts says, "There is no story of Kipling's, not even 'The End of the Passage', which makes one doubt the author's sanity, common sense and capacity to decide on the right side.  There is scarcely a grim story of Saki's which does not fill one with apprehensions for the author's balance" (p.416).  Compare this to "many of his stories are stories with the same lust which invigorates 'Sredni Vashtar'.  His soul was not quite sane; and his insanity is the more horrible because of his obvious sanity of mind, and his known sanity of body" (p.417).
52. Graham Greene, "The Burden of Childhood," Collected Essays (London: Bodley Head, 1969), pp.128-29.  Ethel may have been justified in thinking that Greene's judgement is facile, since he says: "Munro was not himself beaten, Augusta preferred his younger brother for that exercise" (p.128).  Saki was in fact the youngest of the three children.
53. Richard Harter Fogle, "Saki and Wodehouse", The English Short Story 1880-1945: A Critical History (New York: Twayne, 1985), p.95.
54. "'I have the doctor's permission to live till Tuesday,' said Laura" (p.241).  "As a matter of fact Laura died on Monday" (p.243).
55. In "The Penance", for instance, the children are described thus: "a threefold study of cold human hate [...] raging yet masked in stillness" (p.423).
56. Thomas Bewick, the famous early nineteenth century naturalist, is quoted in Harriet Ritvo, The Animal Estate (London: Penguin, 1990), p.25: "According to Bewick, the weasel was 'wild and untractable', dedicated to 'rapine and cruelty' and displayed 'a natural attachment to everything that is corrupt.'" Since the weasel and ferret are closely related members of the Mustela family the same characteristics may be noted in the ferret.
57. Robert Drake, "Saki's Ironic Stories," Texas Studies in Language and Literature, 5 (1963), 383.  Drake has also noted this view of a separate compartment likened to the imagination, but he sees the unused tool-shed as the parallel: "Corresponding to the compartment of his mind - the imagination - from which he can shut out Mrs De Ropp and the 'three-fifths of the world which are necessary and disagreeable and real' is the unused tool shed in the garden".
58. This recalls the "three white set faces [...] looking down at him" in "The Penance" (p.423).
59. Fogle, "Saki and Wodehouse", p.95: "The probability of a different conclusion is glanced at with a blasphemous echoing of 'Lord, I believe'".
60. Loganbill makes this same observation, p.98.
61. An echo perhaps of the wolf's "pale grey eyes gleaming with ferocity and triumph" in "The Story-Teller" (p.353).
62. Maria Katrakis, 'The Satiric Art of H.H.Munro (Saki)' (Unpublished MA dissertation, University of South Africa, 1979), pp.69-70, draws attention to the lack of mention of blood.
63. The slaking of thirst and the "dark wet stains" are more macabre than any mention of blood would have been, as Katrakis points out.  They also help to stress Conradin's detachment.
64. Loganbill, p.191.
65. Ibid., pp.181-91.
66. This is reminiscent of "Beast" and "Un-Beast", the children's definition of Octavian in "The Penance", pp.422, 427 respectively.
67. "Saki's Ironic Stories", p.385.

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