Keeping up Appearances

Within the six sub-headings to choose from, in the book “Stories from two centuries” Which is a small book which is a compilation of short stories, I chose to base my piece of work on the sub-setting “Keeping up appearances”. This has two tales in it, and as the book is titled, they are tales from two different centuries. Two heads of the same coin, “Front” (1990) by Jan Mark and “The Man With The Twisted Lip” (1892) by Arthur Conan Doyle. (The famous creator of Inspector Holmes) Both these short stories are on the subject of lies and deception, of masks and pretences… of Keeping up appearances. Although they are very close to the point of pretence, there is the differentiating fact of self enforced deceit, where the person hadn’t chosen to be in the situation and there is self enforced deception, where it was the persons self decision to lie.

In the story “front” there consists of a character called Pat who is force to lie, in order for her to “exercise her right to ask a friend home for tea, like anyone else”. Whereas in the mystery Of “the man with the twisted lip”, Neville St. Clair of whom, this story is about chose his own fate. He chose to lie and deceive, by choosing to become a professional beggar. This wasn’t a thing to be proud of, and so he kept the secret to himself. His alternative lifestyle was kept very nebulous, and his pretence was very well kept. NSC’s own wife didn’t even have any clue; she was left thinking that NSC was the normal “businessman” leaving for work “each morning” and “returning by the 5.14 from Cannon-street every night”. He had a brilliant cover as a “red headed”, “scarred faced” beggar and he “determined to preserve” his “disguise as long as possible”. It was his past experience in “acting and “make-up” which had made him as pitiable as possible and so gained riches. On the other hand, Pat’s attempt hadn’t gone as well as NSC’s. Before the narrator actually visited Pat’s house, she had noticed the Pat was “normal”, “middle” & even “well spoken”. It’s true that you can only go so far with substandard equipment “You can only read as well as the book you read”. One look at the once profound and commendable “Rockingham Crescent”, Pat’s “condemned” home, the secret was out.

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As I had briefly mentioned before, these two stories are so similar and yet so different. They both laired but Pat hadn’t had any chose to her situation, whereas Neville St. Claire chose his own path. Pat was like any other girl, but she wasn’t as lucky as them. She held the burden and misfortune of being deprived, deprived of all a girl wants and should have, deprived of the right at being normal and just a girl and not as the poor girl. Because of this she was forced to lie. But NSC was contradictory, for he had had a well off life and an average job, but he was not contempt with the “arduous work at two pounds a week”. It had all began when he was working as a reporter, and an article came to him about beggary. To gain a feeling of what he was chatting about, he then sat as a beggar. This was when his skills of acting and make-up came into play. After dressing up and stationing himself at the busiest spot in the city be did his research and gaining money. Little did he know how effective he was as a beggar. He wrote his article and carried on a usually but he owed money due to no fault of his own but he had to acquire quick cash and so went back to begging. He found it very hard to leave and so chose to be a beggar.

“One day my editor wished to have a series or articles upon begging in the metropolis, and i volunteered to supply them. There was the piont from which all my adventures stared…”

“…well as you can imagine how hard it was to settle down to arduouse work at two pounds a week…”

Really it was his greed which drove him to choosing to become a full time beggar. But why did he hide and conceal the fact? Well being a beggar wasn’t the thing to be shouting on the roofs about, especially feeding on others good nature for own gain. There are other people out there who are real beggars and who are really poor like “The Coleman’s”. But NSC’s biggest reason for concealing the whole sordid affair was due to his children. He was didn’t want them to be “ashamed of their father”, like Pat was of her mother. He was very passionate about the whole family matter.

“It was not the wife, it was the children,” groaned the prisoner. “God help me, I would not have them ashamed of their father. My God What an exposure…”

“I would have endured imprisonment, aye, even execution, rather than have left my miserable secret as a family blot to my children”

And so he kept the whole thing a secret bar him and the Lascar. Even his wife wasn’t to know. He had to pretend to be something he was not because of his own decision… because of greed… because of pride… because he thought that it was best.

Hoang Ha Nguyen English 16 May 2002