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“Roger did it on purpose?”

“No, no, Ted Wrigley swears it was an accident. He was simply clumsy.” Ruth described what she had heard about the basketball game. Her tone suggested that if headmasters were going to play games with students, then they were asking for trouble. “Dr. Pendergast certainly wouldn’t have played basketball,” she concluded. “He wouldn’t play anything. Not that he was perfect, of course.”

“I’m told he’s writing a book about us.”

“That’s what people are saying—he’s doing one of those psychological dissections, the sort of thing I had to read in graduate school.”

Evings thought of Hawthorne’s visit the previous week with dismay. “He came in here last week with some wild story about a hanged cat. I couldn’t make any sense of it. I thought of course that he came in to see what I was doing. And I wasn’t doing anything. I mean, nothing he’d object to. Like smoking, though I’m not the only one. Who smokes, that is. I expect none of us are safe. He’s already talking about hiring another psychologist.”

“Certainly reevaluations will be in order.”

Ruth’s tone was slightly arch and Evings wondered what she meant by it. But even before she mentioned the other counselor, Evings knew it was coming.

“I know he’s spoken to Bobby several times—purely about students, of course. I don’t know if he’s aware of your . . . relationship.”

Evings gently gnawed the back of his thumb and then puffed on his cigarette without pleasure. He went behind his desk and turned on the air purifier. If he was fired, he wouldn’t know what to do.

Robert Newland was the other mental health counselor and had been hired by Evings two years earlier. The men were a couple, although they didn’t live together. Each was in charge of one of the dormitory cottages, where they had rooms. Mostly, however, they were together. Bobby was a tall, gangly man in his forties whose bland round face displayed a small mustache and goatee. He had a B.A. in psychology from Tufts but no graduate degree. Evings felt sure that if he was dismissed Ruth, who had been at the school longer than Bobby and had a master’s, would take over as head of psychological services. This seemed to be her ambition.

Before Bobby came to the school there had been occasional rumors about a romantic connection between Evings and one gay student or another, although it was no more than speculation. He didn’t think anything could be proven. He hadn’t heard from the students for years, and now, obviously, they were adults. But he knew how things could turn up after you thought they were over and done with. He’d had that sort of experience before. And if anything was said against him and one of those old students suddenly reappeared, well, he could be in a difficult situation.

Evings regretted his confession to Hawthorne. Why on earth had he said he was bad at his job? He imagined Hawthorne scurrying back to his office and writing it all down. Perhaps he had a little tape recorder hidden in his pocket. Evings felt sure that his connection with Bishop’s Hill was about to be severed. Roger Bennett had almost said as much, as had others. Certain reevaluations would be in order—what a nice way of putting it. And had it been entirely ethical for Evings to hire Bobby, who had never worked as a counselor before coming to Bishop’s Hill? When Evings had met him on Martha’s Vineyard, Bobby had been a waiter. Not even a headwaiter, at that. But the next summer Bobby had taken two classes at Plymouth State and then joined the staff. Skander had told them that Bobby’s job was safe, but Skander wasn’t in charge anymore.

“I knew this would happen as soon as I heard that Skander wasn’t going to be named headmaster,” said Evings, stubbing out his cigarette.

“Knew what would happen?” asked Ruth, still with her arch expression.

“Knew that our positions weren’t secure. Wasn’t that what people said? That man is going to turn the whole school upside down. I bet it won’t even be a small book—I’ll probably have a chapter all to myself, me and Bobby. With pictures.”

Ruth patted her hair, which was a rich brown and fell to her shoulders in thick waves. “Well, I don’t feel I’m at risk. I put in a full week and I’m busy on weekends as well. Nobody can make a complaint about me that I can’t defend myself against and, unlike some, I don’t fall asleep at faculty meetings.” She gave a little laugh to show the remark was purely collegial.

In that moment, Evings hated Ruth Standish. She’d never been on his side; indeed, she hardly respected him. If Hawthorne learned about Evings’s relationship with Bobby and if he talked to the wrong people—Ruth, for instance—then Evings would end up just like Chip. But Chip was a relatively young man and Evings was sixty-one. What job could he find at his age? Nothing as comfortable as Bishop’s Hill. Nothing that carried any respect. Briefly, he saw himself working in the men’s department of a large clothing store, but even that was doubtful. More likely he’d have to take a job at Dunkin’ Donuts or McDonald’s. And would Bobby stay with him then? Of course not. And how could he bear the humiliation?

Chip Campbell’s suspension was discussed by many people at Bishop’s Hill that Friday. Scott McKinnon described what had happened again and again—how Hawthorne had stood up for him and how Campbell had been given the boot. He liked being the center of attention. He showed the scarcely visible bruises on his arm to whoever would look at them and boldly smoked a cigarette in his room, even though Mr. Newland had already given him several warnings. But Scott felt he had a friend in high places. He could say and do what he wanted and Hawthorne would be there to look out for him. Consequently, he said a lot.

Throughout Friday the faculty continued to worry about what had happened. Roger Bennett, Ted Wrigley, and Tom Hastings sat in the Dugout drinking coffee and wondering if they themselves might be in danger. In the basement of Douglas Hall, the Dugout was a small snack bar run by students. It was shortly after three o’clock and classes had recently ended. About fifteen students were scattered at half a dozen tables, and the three teachers sat in a corner booth so they wouldn’t be overheard. A video game of cars racing through a mountain landscape boomed and twittered against the wall.

“What amazes me,” said Hastings, “is his p-power. He can fire anyone at any time. How long we’ve taught means nothing.” Hastings taught general science and biology, and from time to time some of his students liked to tease him and provoke his stutter. He was small and dapper with light curly hair and delicate features. He liked to wear expensive boots and black silk shirts with black ties. On the little finger of his left hand was a silver ring with a large bluish amethyst.

“You think he’d do that?” asked Wrigley, ladling sugar into his cup. He had given a quiz in his first-year German class during the last period and had a stack of papers beside him.

“What’s to stop him? P-plainly, he has big plans for Bishop’s Hill. If we don’t fit in, then we’re out.” And Hastings thought how foolish he had been to disagree with Hawthorne about the demerit system during the initial meeting.

“Pendergast never interfered with us in any way,” said Bennett. “It’s a real shame that Fritz wasn’t named headmaster.”

Wrigley blew on his coffee, then sipped it carefully. “Pendergast was hopeless and Fritz wasn’t much better. Now the school’s broke.”

“According to Hawthorne, anyway,” said Hastings. “And what’s this business about a book? Are we just some kind of p-perverse experiment for him?”

“That’s what Chip’s been saying,” said Wrigley. “Roger, too, for that matter.”

Bennett leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I bet he fired Chip just to make his damn book a little more interesting. You know, conflict and confrontation.”

“I don’t believe it,” said Wrigley. “It’s too deceitful. He doesn’t seem like that.”

“Well, look at the t-trouble he had in San Diego,” said Hastings, his stutter increasing. “How do you explain what happened there?”

“What’s Dolittle been sucking up to him about?” asked Bennett.

Hastings picked a fleck of lint from his black silk tie. “D-D-Dolittle wants something. He always wants s-something.”

“He’s probably after a raise when no one else is getting one,” suggested Wrigley.

They discussed the school’s money problem and whether it was exaggerated. They complained about how they had had to return shovels and garden shears. They talked about the faculty meetings and the additional demands on their time. They wondered about Hawthorne’s book. Bennett had been at Bishop’s Hill for ten years, Wrigley and Hastings for eight. The three were close acquaintances rather than friends. In fact, they had little respect for one another. Yet they formed a united front against these new changes.

“Those news articles were a shock for him,” said Wrigley. “I wonder who put them in the mailboxes. When your wife told him, I thought he was going to bolt.”

“You think he’ll hold it against her?” Bennett looked worried.

“I’d love to have been there,” said Hastings. “I can’t imagine Chip mentioning that woman and how pretty she was.” He began stuttering again. The others watched him, waiting for him to stop, already knowing what he would say. “W-w-was he sober?”

“Barely,” said Wrigley. “Fritz says he’s going to beard Hawthorne in his den and make him change his mind. But it was a dumb thing for Chip to do—that and missing those meetings. It was almost as dumb as Roger knocking Hawthorne down in the basketball game. Pretty clumsy, Rog. I hope he doesn’t blame me because I was on your team. I was afraid Tank was going to tackle you.”

Bennett set his coffee cup on the table, making a clinking noise. “I slipped.”

When Hawthorne had gone up for the layup, Bennett hadn’t meant to hit him so hard, but he’d been off balance and slipped. Had Hawthorne believed him? Bennett wasn’t sure. If that damn cook had stayed out of it, he’d have been all right. Saying he had done it on purpose. “You must have been mad,” the reverend had said. Even in bed, Bennett called his wife the reverend.

“It was an accident. Anyway, we were playing a game.”

“Some game,” she said. “You think he’ll forget it? I know men like that.”

Everyone was talking about what Hawthorne had done and what he might do next: the staff, the students, the housekeepers, people in the kitchen, even the night watchman.

Betty Sherman, the art teacher, had called Mrs. Hayes on the telephone.

“I’m not perfect,” said Betty. “I’ve made mistakes. Look at that money that was missing from the budget for art supplies last June. I can’t imagine what happened to it.”

“It’s awful, simply awful,” said Mrs. Hayes. “I’ve been in a state all week.”

For several hours each day Mrs. Hayes had been reading about computers and the Internet—
Windows 98, Excel, Netscape Communicator.
She had studied the books but hadn’t yet turned on the machine. “These things can have internal monitors,” Skander had told her. She had trouble sleeping and when she dozed off her dreams were full of flickering screens and hundreds of keys, buttons, obscure commands, cryptic terms—anchoring callouts and case-sensitive passwords, macros and spikes. And nothing she read stayed in her mind for over five minutes.

—

First thing Monday morning Skander had an appointment to see the headmaster.

“I just wish you’d reconsider.” Skander stood with his hands folded in front of him. He wore a blue blazer flecked with light-colored dog hairs from Hilda’s toy poodle and he spoke quietly, as if in church. “Really . . . for the good of the school.”

Hawthorne leaned against his desk. He was no longer using a cane but his knees still hurt. And he felt uneasy; his anxiety was like a noise in his head and Hawthorne felt it interfering with what he regarded as his customary presence of mind. Now he was trying to understand Skander’s mood but Skander seemed his usual self, at once businesslike and affable, a mixture of charm and artlessness. Even so, Hawthorne couldn’t make out what lay behind Skander’s words. It seemed more complicated than standing up for a colleague.

Hawthorne felt certain that he had been correct in dismissing Chip. He had done the same thing in residential treatment centers when a child-care worker had used too much force in subduing one of the kids. But, as he had told himself several times, Bishop’s Hill wasn’t a treatment center. He couldn’t tolerate Chip’s abuse of students, however, since it destroyed not only Chip’s effectiveness but also his own. But over the weekend Hamilton Burke had called, asking him to reconsider, and now here was Fritz.

Hawthorne thought back to Ambrose Stark’s appearance in the window of Adams Hall; he didn’t believe he’d seen a ghost but he couldn’t help feeling that the dead headmaster embodied all the anger of everyone whose life was being changed at the school. Then there were the news clippings that someone had put in the faculty mailboxes and the anonymous letter to Kate’s ex-husband. Surely the anger would surface again. Hawthorne hadn’t discussed these incidents with anyone, for the reason that almost anyone could have done it. The unfortunate result was to further separate him from the people at Bishop’s Hill. So even though Hawthorne trusted Skander, he listened to him with an extra ear, as it were, the ear of his suspicion.

“I’m afraid it can’t be done,” said Hawthorne. “If I changed my position, the students would feel betrayed. I know this is hard for you and the faculty, but the students must think this is their school. They must believe that they and their actions matter.”

“Doesn’t there need to be discipline?”

“What I object to is punishment. What does the victim learn except fear?”

“People say you were angry at Chip because he hasn’t attended your meetings and also because he had made that remark at my little party.” Skander looked embarrassed. “About that woman, I mean. Obviously, it was in bad taste.”

“I would have reprimanded him about the meetings, but I wouldn’t have dismissed him. As for his remark, it hardly registered.” Not entirely true, Hawthorne reminded himself.

“Several people have also suggested that you overreacted because of your injury. I must say I’m surprised that you were out there playing a game with the students.”