She strives, understanding the futility of it, for perfection. To arrive properly equipped, to cross the room deliberately, circumspectly, without affectation (as he has taught her), to fling open the garden doors and let the sweet breath of morning flow in and chase the night away, to strip and air the bed and, after all her common tasks, her trivial round, to remake it smooth and tight, all the sheets and blankets tucked in neatly at the sides and bottom, the upper sheet and blankets turned down at the head just so far that their fold covers only half the pillows, all topped with the spread, laid to hang evenly at all sides. And today — perhaps at last! She straightens up, wipes her brow, looks around: yes! he’ll be so surprised! Everything perfect! Her heart is pounding as the master, dressed for the day, steps out of the bathroom, marches directly over to the bed, hauls back the covers, picks up a pillow, and hits her in the face with it. Now what did he do that for? ‘And another thing!’ he says.
He awakes, feeling sorry for himself (he’s not sure why, something he’s been dreaming perhaps, or merely the need to wake just by itself: come, day, do your damage!), tears himself painfully from the bed’s embrace, sits up, pushes his feet into slippers. He grunts, squinting in the dimness at his watch: she’s late. Just as well. He can shower before she gets here. He staggers into the bathroom and drops his pajamas, struggling to recall his dream. Something about a woman in the civil service, which in her ignorance or cupidity, she insisted on calling the ‘sibyl service.’ He is relieving himself noisily when the maid comes in. ‘Oh! I beg your pardon, sir!’ ‘Good morning,’ he replies crisply, and pulls his pajamas up, but she is gone. He can hear her outside the door, walking quickly back and forth, flinging open the curtains and garden doors, singing to herself as though lifted by the tasks before her. Sometimes he envies her, having him. Her footsteps carry her to the bed and he hears the rush and flutter of sheets and blankets being thrown back. Hears her scream.
He’s not unkind, demands no more than is his right, pays her well, and teaches her things like, ‘All life is a service, a consecration to some high end,’ and, ‘If domestic service is to be tolerable, there must be an attitude of habitual deference on the one side and one of sympathetic protection on the other.’ ‘Every state and condition of life has its particular duties,’ he has taught her. ‘The duty of a servant is to be obedient, diligent, sober, just, honest, frugal, orderly in her behavior, submissive and respectful toward her master. She must be contented in her station, because it is necessary that some should be above others in this world, and it was the will of the Almighty to place you in a state of servitude.’ Her soul, in short, is his invention, and she is grateful to him for it. ‘Whatever thy hand findeth to do,’ he has admonished, ‘do it with all thy might!’ Nevertheless, looking over her shoulder at her striped sit-me-down in the wardrobe mirror, she wishes he might be a little less literal in applying his own maxims: he’s drawn blood!
He awakes, mumbling something about a dream, a teacher he once had, some woman, infirmities. ‘A sort of fever of the mind,’ he explains, his throat phlegmy with sleep. ‘Yes, sir,’ she says, and flings open the curtains and the garden doors, letting light and air into the stale bedroom. She takes pleasure in all her appointed tasks, but enjoys this one most of all, more so when the master is already out of bed, for he seems to resent her waking him like this. Just as he resents her arriving late, after he’s risen. Either way, sooner or later, she’ll have to pay for it. ‘It’s a beautiful day,’ she remarks hopefully. He sits up with an ambiguous grunt, rubs his eyes, yawns, shudders. ‘You may speak when spoken to,’ he grumbles, tucking his closing morning glory back inside his pajamas (behind her, bees are humming in the garden and there’s a crackly pulsing of insects, but the birds have fallen silent: she had thought today might be perfect, but already it is slipping away from her), ‘unless it be to deliver a message or ask a necessary question.’ ‘Yes, sir.’ He shoves his feet into slippers and staggers off to the bathroom, leaving her to face (she expects the worst) — shadows have invaded the room — the rumpled bed alone.
It’s not just the damp towels. It’s also the streaked floor, the careless banging of the garden doors, her bedraggled uniform, the wrinkled sheets, the confusion of her mind. He lectures her patiently on the proper way to make a bed, the airing of the blankets, turning of the mattress, changing of the sheets, the importance of a smooth surface. ‘Like a blank sheet of crisp new paper,’ he tells her. He shows her how to make the correct diagonal creases at the corners, how to fold the top edge of the upper sheet back over the blankets, how to carry the spread under and then over the pillows. Oh, not for his benefit and advantage — he could sleep anywhere or for that matter (in extremity) could make his own bed — but for hers. How else would she ever be able to realize what is best in herself? ‘A little arrangement and thought will give you method and habit,’ he explains (it is his ‘two fairies’ lecture), but though she seems willing enough, is polite and deferential, even eager to please, she can never seem to get it just right. Is it a weakness on her part, he wonders as he watches her place the pillows on the bed upside down, then tug so hard on the bottom blanket that it comes out at the foot, or some perversity? Is she testing him? She refits the bottom blanket, tucks it in again, but he knows the sheet beneath is now wrinkled. He sighs, removes his belt. Perfection is elusive, but what else is there worth striving for? ‘Am I being unfair?’ he insists.
He’s standing there in the sunlight in his slippers and pajama bottoms, cracking his palm with a leather strap, when she enters (once and for all) with all her paraphernalia. She plants the bucket and brushes beside the door, leans the mop and broom against the wall, stacks the fresh linens and towels on a chair. She is late — the curtains and doors are open, her circumspect crossing of the room no longer required — but she remains hopeful. Running his maxims over in her head, she checks off her rags and brushes, her polishes, cleaning powders, razor blades, toilet paper, dustpans — oh no …! Her heart sinks like soap in a bucket. The soap she has forgotten to bring. She sighs, then deliberately and gravely, without affectation, not stamping too loud, nor dragging her legs after her, not marching as if leading a dance, nor keeping time with her head and hands, nor staring or turning her head either one way or the other, she advances sedately and discreetly across the gleaming tiles to the bed, and tucking up her dress and apron, pulling down her flannelette drawers, bends over the foot of it, exposing her soul’s ingress to the sweet breath of morning, blowing in from the garden. ‘I wonder if you can appreciate,’ he says, picking a bit of lint off his target before applying his corrective measures to it, ‘how difficult this is for me?’