Genevois House was all gray stone and iron grilles on the outside. On the inside it was white plaster and carved wood and marble and velvet. The bare gymnasia were cavernous and echoing; but even there mirrors towered between gold-leaf piers and the floors were set in wood mosaic. The stuffy parlors were small and hushed and elegant. In the former, Mouche learned to fight hand to hand, to dance, and to fence with a sword. In the other, he learned from the conversation mistress to fence with words. Learning to fence in the bedroom would come later, though he was soon started on erotic exercises. Simon said boys his age all did erotic exercises anyhow, so better put it to some use.
As before, he spent hours in the library, reading all manner of books which were commonly read among the better classes of women, some of them written centuries before on Old Earth or the old colonial worlds, and all of them imported from worlds that had had time to develop the arts past the purely provincial. There were other hours in the kitchen, being lectured by the chef and the wine master. Not that Newholme had many vintages to brag of, but those they did should be properly appreciated. There were hours at the table, learning how to discriminate among foods, how to eat them elegantly, and how to manage veils of various weights while one carried on charming and amusing conversation. It became second nature: the left hand up to catch the veil at the right side; the upward sweep of the fingers to lift the veil from the mouth; the release, letting the veil drop as one chewed and swallowed. Not that the gauzy stuff Hunks usually wore was much of an impediment. Only respectable men wore real veils, and respectable men did not eat with their wives in public. They stayed in their offices at home or at their businesses among other men, where they belonged. “Or should be at,” so the saying went. “Men of Business should be at business.” Or else.
Several times each tenday—forty tendays the year, divided into four seasons—the new boys, who were not yet sexually mature and therefore not yet veiled, walked with their teachers to the park to watch the show put on by the advanced students. The older boys rode gracefully on horseback, glittering like gems. They picked quarrels with one another, and debated eloquently, declaiming dramatically, with many references to honor. Sometimes they fought with swords, brilliantly but inconsequentially, until one of the uniformed Housemasters stopped the battle and made them shake hands. The new boys were not the only ones watching. From closed carriages along the bridle paths, eyes watched and hands took notes, and it was for these watchers that the charades were played. The merchandise, so Simon said, had to go on display, for House Genevois often received bids for certain Consorts years before they were fully trained.
When the short nights of summertime came, the advanced students went off in all directions: the tongue-tied to summer conversation classes; the lazy to remedial fencing school; the merely awkward to dancing school. There were no remedial courses in amatory arts.
One either did well in those or one was given one’s pension money and dismissed. Very few were dismissed, said Simon. Madame had an instinct for boys who would do well in amatory arts.
Almost all the newest boys were sent to the equestrian school owned by House Genevois, where Mouche rode horseback, at first a few hours each day, then all day every day, until he could stay on anything with legs, whether bareback or asaddle. By this time he had friends among the students—as Madame called them—and had himself taken part in the harassment of several new boys. He had also grown taller by a handspan and added weight to match, had found the first pale hairs sprouting near his groin, and had heard his voice crack on at least three occasions.
“So, Mouche,” said Madame, the day after he returned to Sendoph, “today you are one year with us. As of today, you are no longer a new boy.”
Mouche swept her a bow in which no hint of servility was allowed. He would learn about groveling, Simon said, but not until later. Groveling was sometimes necessary for Hunks, but the dangers inherent in the practice had to be weighed in the light of experience, which Mouche had none of at this stage.