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The next day, Flora took the narrator on a tour of the old, quirky house, leading her through empty chambers, winding staircases, even the top of an ancient crenellated square tower that made the narrator dizzy with height. The little girl, in her blue frock and gold hair, darted ahead chattering, so bold and confident, and the narrator felt as if she were exploring a fairy-tale castle with a rosy sprite for a guide. Even as she delighted in the magic of the place, though, she felt a flicker of unease at its sheer size: the house and grounds were so vast, so sprawling, she felt suddenly, strangely aware that she was the one in charge here, at the helm of a life and a home far bigger than anything she’d known before.
II
Two days later, the narrator and Flora drove to the local inn to meet Miles, but the night before, a late postbag brought a letter from her employer. It was short, brusque: the enclosed unopened letter, he wrote, was from Miles’s old headmaster, a tedious bore. Read it, deal with it, but do not report back on its contents—he was leaving town immediately. The narrator wrestled with the sealed envelope for a long time before finally breaking the seal just before bed, and the words inside made her blood run cold: the headmaster wrote that Miles was expelled from his school permanently, no explanation beyond the vague, cruel note that the boy was an “injury to the other pupils.” She barely slept, her mind racing, and the next day finally confided in Mrs. Grose.
She asked what the expulsion meant, and Mrs. Grose, clearly upset, asked if all the boys were being sent home. The narrator clarified that no, this was permanent: Miles would never go back to that school, or any other, as far as she could tell. Mrs. Grose demanded to know what he had done, and when the narrator admitted the letter gave no details, only that he was a corrupting influence, the housekeeper flew into a fierce, defensive rage. “Master Miles? Him an injury?” she cried, tears in her eyes, insisting the boy was only ten years old, too sweet and good to ever hurt anyone. The narrator, who had not yet met Miles, felt her own fears melt in the face of Mrs. Grose’s unshakable faith, and agreed the charge was absurd.
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