Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Mysterious Benedict Society, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Confidence and Growing Up
Deception vs. Truth
Loneliness vs. Friendship
Control vs. Freedom
Hope
Summary
Analysis
Room 7-B is on the 7th floor, and when the children reach it, Kate knocks loudly on the door over and over until she is told to stop by a deep voice from behind the children. They turn to find a tall man in weather-beaten clothes. He wears an expression of such profound sadness that Reynie asks if he is alright. The man responds that he is not alright, but that isn’t relevant. He tells the children his name is Milligan, and he is here to administer the third test.
Kate continues to demonstrate her boisterous attitude as she knocks on the door far longer than is necessary. Her knocking calls the attention of Milligan, whose deep sorrow contrasts her cheerfulness. Reynie proves once again that he is kind in addition to smart, noting Milligan’s obvious sadness and asking if the man is all right. Milligan dismisses the question, which indicates that he does not care about his own wellbeing. He is also yet another strange person affiliated with the tests.
Themes
Milligan asks which child is George, prompting Sticky to reveal that his real name is George Washington. He is touchy about sharing a name with a president, and defensively tells the other children not to tease him. Milligan tells Sticky that he will take the test first, and a nervous Sticky steps into Room 7-B. A little while later, Milligan tells Reynie it is his turn.
Sticky is immediately defensive about his name, so much so that his first reaction is to insist that the others not tease him. This hints that Sticky has suffered similar bullying and ostracization to Reynie. The fact that Sticky has to take the test first, despite his nervousness, also foreshadows how the plans of the tests’ creator will force Sticky to face his fears.
Themes
Room 7-B has a checkerboard floor, with alternating rectangles of blue, black, and yellow. On the opposite wall to Reynie is a door and a sign that reads, “CROSS THE ROOM WITHOUT SETTING FOOT ON A BLUE OR BLACK SQUARE.” Reynie realizes it will be impossible to cross the room without stepping on blue or black. He reads the sign again, then laughs and confidently walks across the room and out the door.
This test presents Reynie with another opportunity to prove his skill with riddles. He solves this one quickly and confidently, suggesting that passing the previous tests has bolstered his confidence enough that he no longer doubts his ability to solve the tests’ puzzles.
Themes
Reynie and Sticky wait quietly in the other room and watch while Kate completes the test. Using tools from her bucket, she fashions a tightrope and expertly lassoes it on the handle of the opposite door. She walks across the tightrope and reaches the door, but Milligan stops her and tells her she has to try again without the rope. Kate returns to the starting point and stuffs all the contents of her bucket into her pocket. She kicks the bucket onto its side and rolls it forward with her feet. Milligan again comes in, confiscates her bucket and its contents, and tells her to try again. Kate pushes herself onto her hands and walks across the room on her hands instead of her feet. Milligan gives up and tells Kate she passes.
Kate proves the scale of her abilities. Not only is she gifted with distances, but she is also capable of astounding physical feats. She also solves problems creatively, coming up with three alternative solutions for the puzzle after Milligan discounts each one. Her first two attempts make use of her bucket, which shows the bucket’s importance to her. However, when she is forced to work without the bucket, she is still able to think of a solution. This indicates that although Kate treasures her bucket, it is not as necessary as she might think.
Themes
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As the children follow Milligan through a dark underground passage, Sticky asks Reynie how he passed. Sticky crossed on his hands and knees, but Reynie’s feet touched many black and blue squares. Reynie tells the others that there were no squares on the floors, only rectangles, so he could step on them. Sticky is frustrated and calls himself stupid for not figuring this out, but Reynie reassures him that he isn’t stupid.
Sticky continues to struggle with his self-confidence. He thought of a perfectly reasonable answer to the puzzle, but since he feels that Reynie’s answer was smarter, Sticky calls himself stupid. Reynie again takes on a position of leadership to reassure Sticky and keep him moving forward.
Themes
Milligan leads the children out of the underground passage, and when they emerge, the sunlight briefly blinds them. When they can see again, they find Milligan replaced with a short, big-bellied man. He tells them he is Milligan, only in disguise, and as they look closer, they recognize him. Sticky, impressed, asks if Milligan is a magician, but Milligan answers, “I’m nobody.” He directs them to a house and tells them Rhonda will let them inside soon.
Like the children, Milligan possesses a unique gift: he can disguise himself with ease. Unlike the children’s talents, though, Milligan’s ability relies on deception and dishonesty, introducing an element of moral ambiguity. His assertion that he is “nobody” highlights the disregard for himself that he demonstrated earlier, when he insisted that his wellbeing was unimportant. This claim also speaks to a lack of identity––Milligan can disguise himself as anyone, but he has no true sense of self.
Themes
Sitting on the stairs to the house, Reynie tries to ask Sticky about his parents, but Sticky changes the subject and asks if Kate shared their experience with the test administrator and her telephone. She shrugs and says she has no one to call––her mother is dead, and her father left her when she was two. Her only memory of her father is a day he took her swimming at an old mill pond. She asked if they could return, and he affectionately told her they could. She remembers that her father called her “Katie-Cat,” and that he seemed like a nice man, which she takes to mean that people aren’t always what they seem. Kate only spent a few years in an orphanage after her father left, since when she was seven she ran away to join the circus.
Sticky is consistently evasive about his home life, which foreshadows the secret he is hiding and raises the issue of deception by omission––Sticky avoids lying by avoiding the truth. Kate is more open. She reveals her past with a shrug, a gesture of nonchalance, though her remark about her father suggests that his abandonment has impacted her more than she lets on. His absence has shaped her understanding of morality and truth: because he seemed like a good man, and he did a cruel thing, she has become wary of deception.
Themes
Reynie asks if Kate ever misses her parents. He doesn’t miss his, since he never knew them, but at lonely moments he does wish that he had parents. Kate “breezily” claims that she doesn’t miss them, since she doesn’t remember her mother and she wouldn’t miss a man who abandons his daughter. As they discuss this, Sticky becomes more dejected, but he says he is only upset because he feels bad for Kate. Kate changes the subject and starts telling the boys about life in the circus.
Kate continues to hide the impact that her parents’ absence has had on her. She insists “breezily” that she doesn’t miss them in order to give the impression that her cheerful confidence comes naturally. She quickly changes the subject when Sticky mentions feeling bad for her, indicating that she projects false confidence to avoid being pitied or seen as weak. Sticky claims to pity Kate to deflect attention from himself, but he also feels some loneliness that he wants to hide. Reynie reacts to his loneliness differently; instead of hiding it, he acknowledges his solitude and his wish for a family.
Themes
After about an hour, Rhonda comes out and greets the children. The children realize she is not a child at all, but a short, young adult. She has lost her green hair and strange clothes, which she explains were to distract from her age, and she tells the children they must complete one final test: they must each find their way through a maze and ring a bronze bell. Kate asks if the test will be difficult, and Rhonda says they should be able to do it with their eyes closed. Sticky asks if it will be scary, and Rhonda says it might be, but it is not dangerous. Reynie asks who goes first, and Rhonda tells him that he will.
The fact that Rhonda is an adult marks her as the third strange adult affiliated with the test, and the second one to be in disguise. The continued peculiarity of the adults indicates that the children are entering a world unfamiliar to them, but it also characterizes a divide between children and adults—even adults on the side of good. The three questions the children ask also hint at their various personalities. Kate asks if the test will be difficult, which suits her desire to independently overcome challenges in creative ways. Sticky asks if the test will be scary, which speaks to his fearfulness. Reynie asks which child will take the test first, which highlights his practicality, and the fact that he goes first foreshadows his status as a leader.
Themes
Reynie goes into the maze full of confidence, certain that he will figure out the trick to this test. He quickly loses this confidence, though, when he starts walking and realizes that he is in a maze of identical rooms and has already lost his bearings. Reynie inspects a panel near the doorway, which is decorated with four differently colored arrows pointing in different directions. He wonders which one he should follow, before remembering Rhonda’s advice that the children could complete the maze “with their eyes closed.” There is only arrow on the panel that he can feel with his eyes closed, so he follows that one. With this strategy, he makes his way through the maze, until he finally finds the bronze bell and rings it.
Despite his pervasive self-doubt, Reynie is able to feel confident when he thinks he has earned it. The maze proves more challenging than he anticipated, which undermines his newfound confidence, but he persists. He reassesses his past experiences and recalls a clue, which he is able to apply to the test. Reynie’s problem-solving abilities continue to manifest in unique ways, demonstrating that he can adapt to almost any situation.
Themes
The pencil-like test administrator blindfolds Reynie and has him run the maze again, to prove that he has figured out the secret. He runs the maze in half the time as his first trial, but he asks the administrator why she didn’t just ask him the secret. She winks and says that very few children ever point that out. Reynie waits for his friends, and soon Kate arrives. She completed the test by unscrewing a grate and crawling through a heating duct, avoiding the maze entirely. The two of them wait nearly half an hour without any sign of Sticky. While they wait, Kate reveals that her kaleidoscope is actually a spyglass “in disguise.”
The test administrator again seems to be more friendly than she initially lets on, as she winks at Reynie and implicitly compliments him for being observant. The fact that even questioning the tests is a test in itself highlights the reflexive nature of these challenges––in other words, the tests examine and challenge themselves. It also suggests that the test is seeking children who can think for themselves and question authority. Kate revealing her spyglass “in disguise” continues the motif of disguises that has run through the tests. Though the children were expected to be honest when it came to cheating on the test, the reoccurrence of disguises hints that deception can occasionally be useful.
Themes
Finally, Reynie and Kate hear the bell ring, very softly, indicating that Sticky has made it through the maze. They wait for him to go through a second time, but he is not as fast as Reynie expects––in fact, it takes Sticky nearly 15 minutes. At last, though, the children are reunited, and Sticky is relieved to be with them again. He explains that he found the bell the first time through sheer luck. The second time, he remembered exactly the path he took, and retread his steps precisely.
Sticky’s actions continue to highlight his anxiety and low self-esteem. He rings the bell softly, implying that he does not want to call attention to himself. He also again demonstrates that his intelligence differs from Reynie’s. Unlike Reynie, Sticky does not solve the puzzle of the arrows. He uses his unique ability––his memory––to help him through the maze the second time. He finds his way through the first time by persisting through adversity––this is another hint that Sticky is not as meek as he believes.
Themes
