The Secret History

Francis's snide expression faded. 'You're mad, aren't you?' he said anxiously.

'No.'

'Yes you are.'

'No, I'm not,' I said. These sudden, panicky attempts at conciliation a

'I'm sorry. Don't listen to me. I'm drunk, I'm sick, I didn't mean it.'

Without warning I had a vision of Francis – twenty years later, fifty years, in a wheelchair. And of myself – older, too, sitting around with him in some smoky room, the two of us repeating this exchange for the thousandth time. At one time I had liked the idea, that the act, at least, had bound us together; we were not ordinary friends, but friends till-death-do-us-part. This thought had been my only comfort in the aftermath of Bu

On the walk home from Francis's – head down, sunk in a black, inarticulate tangle of anxiety and gloom – I heard Julian's voice saying my name.

I turned. He was just coming out of the Lyceum. At the sight of his quizzical, kindly face – so sweet, so agreeable, so glad to see me – something wrenched deep in my chest.

'Richard,' he said again, as if there were no one on earth he could possibly be so delighted to see. 'How are you?'

'Fine.'

'I'm just going over to North Hampden. Will you walk with me?'

I looked at the i

'Julian, I'd love to, thanks,' I said. 'But I have to be getting home.'

He looked at me closely. The concern in his eyes made me nearly sick with self-loathing.

'I see so little of you these days, Richard,' he said. 'I feel that you're becoming just a shadow in my life.'

The benevolence, the spiritual calm, that radiated from him seemed so clear and true that, for a dizzying moment, I felt the darkness lift almost palpably from my heart. The relief was such 5i9 that I almost broke down sobbing; but then, looking at him again, 1 felt the whole poisonous weight come crashing back down, full force.

'Are you sure you're all right?'

He can never know. We can never tell him.

'Oh. Sure I am,' I said. 'I'm fine.'

Though the fuss about Bu

Long gone. I had watched grim security men dismantling the underground laboratory, hauling out cartons of beakers and copper piping, while Durbinstall's head chemist – a small, pimple faced boy from Akron named Cal Clarken – stood by and wept, still in his trademark high-top sneakers and lab coat. The anthropology teacher who for twenty years had taught 'Voices and Visions: The Thought of Carlos Castaneda' (a course which featured, at its conclusion, a mandatory campfire ritual at which pot was smoked) a

As part of the new 'Drug Awareness' policy, Hampden was hosting an intercollege tournament, in game-show format, which tested students' knowledge about drugs and alcohol. The questions were developed by the National Council for Alcoholism and Substance Abuse. The shows were moderated by a local TV personality (Liz Ocavello) and were broadcast live on Cha

Unexpectedly, the quizzes proved wildly popular, though not in the spirit the sponsors might have hoped. Hampden had assembled a crack team which – like one of those commando forces in the movies, made up of desperate fugitives, men with freedom to gain and nothing to lose – proved virtually invincible.

It was an all-star lineup: Cloke Rayburn; Bram Guernsey; Jack Teitelbaum; Laura Stora; none other than the legendary Cal Clarken heading the team. Cal was participating in hopes of being allowed back into school next term; Cloke and Bram and Laura as part of their required hours of community service; Jack was merely along for the ride. Their combined expertise was nothing short of stu

But – even though business had been seriously curtailed – I was not surprised to find that Cloke was still plying his trade, though a good bit more discreetly than he had used to in the old days. One Thursday night before a party I went down to Judy's room to ask for an aspirin and, after a brief but mysterious inquisition from behind the locked door, found Cloke inside, shades pulled, busy with her mirror and her druggist's scales.

'Hi,' he said, ushering me quickly inside and locking the door behind me again. 'What can I do for you tonight?'

'Uh, nothing, thanks,' I said. 'I'm just looking for Judy. Where is she?'

'Oh,' he said, crossing back to his work. 'She's in the costume shop. I thought she probably sent you over. I like Judy but she's got to make such a big production of everything, which is definitely not cool. Not cool' – carefully, he tapped a measure of powder into an open fold of paper – 'at all.' His hands trembled; it was evident that he had been dipping pretty freely into his own wares. 'But I had to toss my own scales, you know, after all that shit happened and what the fuck am I supposed to do? Go up to the infirmary? She was ru

'Fine,' I said.1 didn't want to think about Camilla. I didn't want to think of anything having to do with Greek or Greek J class, either one. *

'How's she liking her new place?' said Cloke.

'What?'

He laughed. 'Don't you know?' he said. 'She moved.'

'What? Where to?'

'Don't know. Down the street, probably. Stopped by to see the twins – hand me that blade, would you? – stopped by to see them yesterday and Henry was helping her put her stuff in boxes.'

He had abandoned his work at the scales and was now cutting out lines on the mirror. 'Charles is going to Boston for the summer and she's staying here. Said she didn't want to stay there alone and it was too much of a pain to sublet. Sounds like there are going to be a lot of us here this summer.' He offered me the mirror and a rolled-up twenty. 'Bram and I are looking for a place right now.'

'This is very good,' I said, half a minute or so later, just as the first euphoric sparkle was starting to hit my synapses.

'Yeah. It's excellent, isn't it? Especially after that awful shit of Laura's that was going around. Those FBI guys analyzed it and said it was about eighty percent talcum powder or something.'

He wiped his nose. 'Did they ever come talk to you, by the way?'

The FBI? No.'