by John Hersey
Mr. BROADBENT. Your interview with Mr. Owing, when was this?
Mr. JONES. Thursday morning, October seventeenth, of this year, at nine oh four ante meridian.
Mr. BROADBENT. I take it the appointment was for nine o'clock.
Mr. JONES. I am always punctual. I may say I have been kept cooling my heels by certain other superintendents for far more than the four minutes Mr. Owing made me wait. I was ushered in by the receptionist-telephonist.
Senator SKYPACK. Listen, Jones, do you always buy ten-year-old boys?
Mr. JONES. Not at all, sir. Within the past month I have bought two excellent female specimens, eleven and thirteen years of age, respectively. It is true that the majority are males.
Senator MANSFIELD. Please, Jack. We were just getting onto a straight line for once. Kindly go on, sir; you were admitted to the Superintendent's office, and—
Mr. BROADBENT. What took place, Mr. Jones?
Mr. JONES. I was led in there, and I would say he looked satisfied. He was sitting behind his desk in a white-paneled room, a cheerful place, with his back to two big French windows, floor-to-ceiling almost, and their metal Venetian blinds sliced the morning sunlight into layers. Did I say he looked satisfied? Seemed he might bust. Everything about him was too tight: his collar, armpits of his coat, his vest—the buttons and buttonholes on it made a trail of parentheses down his chest and belly. Veins stood inflated on the backs of his hands, on his neck, and in the middle of his forehead. He gave an impression of a man containing a superabundance of oxygen, or maybe helium. He wasn't fat; he was just too well filled, and I vouch that what he was stuffed with was uncertainty. He looks like a naturally healthy animal, but I understand that people around town call him a politician. He's elusive, that's the point. Mr. Cleary, the Guidance Director, told me one of his colleagues once complained to him, after an interview with Mr. Owing, that he
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couldn't make out just what the Superintendent had been driving at, and Mr. Clcary told me he said, 'Nobody ever can. He's never what you think he is. Just when you think you have him pinned down as a worm he flies away as a moth/ It's apparently impossible to hold him to anything he says, because he cither denies having said it or declares on a stack of Bibles that that wasn't what he had meant, i don't intend to cast doubt on his integrity. No, I'm told he brings to everything he does a prodigious sincerity and decency which are crippling. A man just can't put that much cncigy into wanting to do the right thing and do it, too. His indccisivencss shows itself not only on school issues but also in trifles. I took him to lunch the other day, and you should have seen him trying to decide what to cat. He wrestled with the menu as if it had been a two-hundrcd-pound man.
Mr. RROADBF.NT. On the occasion of your first interview— Mr. JONES. Yes. I began by asking Mr. Owing what sort of provisions are made in the Pequot schools for children of the particular kind I buy. He was, at first, very cautious. Tin afraid of anything too special for these clever children,' he said to me. Tin afraid of it for our community. We don't like anything that smacks of privilege. But don't worry/ he said, 'we'll reach these children. We'll take care of 'em with enrichment.' Phoocy! Enrichment! He made it sound as if schools were bakeries and children were loaves. I may as well tell you at the outset, gentlemen, I have nothing but contempt for the wordy soft-hearted-ness, or maybe I should say -hcadedness, of the educational world, in which a simple spade is commonly called an Instrument for Soil Development. Mr. Owing was leaning back in his swivel chair, and he was toying with a pair of binoculars. Through the Venetian blinds behind him I could see, beyond a stretch of lawn, the backs of three white houses, and at first I assumed that Mr. Owing was an office-hour voyeur, but a little
later in our conversation I saw in the yard a feeding station around which a number of birds were playing who had a curious way of clinging to the wood, heads downward, looking out nervously at the dangerous world. He was a Watcher. I asked him what the birds were. 'Nuthatches/ he said. 'White-breasted. I think so anyway. I'm not positive. We have a child/ he said, 'of the kind that interests you. He can tell you the family, genus, species, and subspecies of every bird—every living thing you could imagine. In Latin/ And that was the first I heard of the Rudd boy. But of course the moment I expressed interest in him, Mr. Owing backed off. Began giving me the on-thc-other-hand treatment. Afraid he'd gone too far. Mr. Owing never asked why I was interested, or what my errand was. I guess he assumed I was just another teacher working on a doctoral thesis so as to get ahead. lie said he thought he'd better turn me over to the Guidance Director—a likable young man, he said, certainly a useful man, he said, on what he calls, with a characteristic parsimoniousncss of imagination, his 'educational team.'
Mr. BROADBENT. You mean to say he at no time asked you the actual purpose of your visit?
Mr. JONES. Not at that interview.
Mr. BROADBENT. And it did not occur to you to force this information on him?
Mr. JONKS. Indeed it did. At the end of our talk I expressed interest in buying one or more of a certain category of children. I didn't tell him the whole story then. I had measured Mr. Owing—as a matter of fact, I had had some briefing information beforehand, tabbing him—as a vacillator. He was liable to turn to all sides for help if a difficult problem was thrown at him, and to talk indiscriminately. And what I wanted least of all was talk, until I'd had time to look around and be ready to jump. Later, of course, I gave Mr. Owing the full picture, but by then complications had set in.
27
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Senator MANSFIELD. When you say 'buy/ I suppose you mean that you actually buy the child from its parents?
Mr. JONES. It's not quite that simple, sir. Everyone who has the slightest hold on a child that I begin to dicker for asks—and usually gets— a price.
Mr. BROADBENT. So Mr. Owing sent you down the line to Mr. Cleary.
Mr. JONES. What I needed most at that starting point was an ally, and Mr. Cleary—
Senator SKYPACK. Was willing to do your dirty work for you?
Mr. JONES. At the beginning Mr. Cleary was rather interfering. He took it upon himself, without my knowledge, to meddle with the Rudd family. Later he was more co-operative. Much more.
Mr. BROADBENT. You told Mr. Cleary your whole story?
Mr. JONES. I saw in Mr. Cleary a man more interested in advancement than in ideas. He's the sort of man you can trust.
Mr. BROADBENT. You saw this right away?
Mr. JONES. My business is sizing people up.
Mr. BROADBENT. And Mr. Cleary?
Mr. JONES. Is a realist. He distrusts emotion of any kind. Explains exuberance in himself by the keenness of the weather, the lack of humidity in the air; depression or a feeling of shame he can attribute to a pork chop he ate for lunch. He wants to get ahead—to be boss. Once he got the idea that I, too, am a pretty hardheaded fellow, he opened up to me all the way— told me all about how to 'get along' in Pequot, about his 'system/ He does people great favors; he's solicitous; he helps people plan their futures; he drags confessions out of them; he terrifies them with psychiatric 'insights'; he lends them money, serves them cocktails, tells them secrets, flatters them with intellectual argument. He also knows how to manage people by getting the goods on them.
Senator MANSFIELD. Dear me! This was to be your ally, Mr. Jones?
Mr. JONES. Absolutely dependable, Senator. No idealism whatsoever.
Senator SKYPACK. Listen, Jones. We understand you arrived in Pequot on a foreign motorcycle. Is that right?
Mr. JONES. That's correct. Yes, sir. I ride it everywhere.
Senator SKYPACK. Why?
Mr. JONES. Why? Because it gives me extreme pleasure. I have a sensation of flying, skimming along over the highways on those thin whirling wire spokes.
Senator SKYPACK. Sir, Mr. Broadbent tells me that our investigator down in Pequot reports that three motorcycles were involved in the gang attack on the Rudd home. Was yours one of them?
Mr. JONES. I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about, Senator.
Senator SKYPACK. You say that like somebody who knows exactly what I'm talking about. I want to know—
Senator VOYOLKO. This kid, now. You the guy's buying the kid?
Mr. JONES. I am, sir, if I am successful in—
Senator VOYOLKO. O.K. So you're the guy's buying the kid. Now we're getting someplace. What's with the kid? This boy.
Mr. JONES. What about him, sir?
Senator VOYOLKO. You tell me, mister. How about him?
Mr. JONES. Barry Rudd is fifty-six and three eighths inches tall, medium height for his age. Weighs ninety-eight pounds, nine ounces, compared with a norm for the age of seventy-seven pounds. Twenty-two pounds overweight, other words. Lung capacity one hundred twenty-eight inches, where the standard is one twenty-five. Shoulders twelve and one half inches across, average for the age. Strength of grip thirty-six point four pounds
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compared with a norm of fifty point four. Right shoulder slightly lower than the left.
Senator MANSFIELD. You make him sound like a cut of veal, Mr. Jones.
Mr. JONES. Not at all. There's a flame. . . . Let me tell you: The face belongs to a beardless old man. It is round, ruddy, and impassive, and when words that stand for strong feelings pass the short, tight lips, only a flicker of expression, like distant heat lightning, can be seen around the eyes, which are star-tlingly clear, direct, and alert.
Mr. BROADBENT. Is this boy of the kind and caliber that you want?
Mr. JONES. He definitely is.
Mr. BROADBENT. Can you tell us why you want him?
Mr. JONES. One of his former teachers put it better than I could. Or I think perhaps it was Dr. Gozar, his principal, you know. 'Why is he outstanding?' she said. 'Because he has this mood of intensity. That you don't teach. You don't say, "Flex. Tighten your mind. Have desire." Barry,' she said, 'makes this mood about science more than any child I've ever seen. He creates a certain tension out of nothing—a sense of excitement. That comes from within—and the funny thing is, you can't really see it on the surface.' That's what she said, and that's why I want him.
Mr. BROADBENT. What do you think of his misbehavior with the Renzulli girl? Would you—
Mr. JONES. That has nothing to do with me.
Mr. BROADBENT. To the contrary, Mr. Jones. Barry Rudd, when asked by our investigator what had caused him to get in that particular pickle, said, and these were his words, 'I did it on account of Mr. Jones.' And that is all he would say. How do you explain . . . ?
Senator SKYPACK. Broadbent, let's us subordinates hold back on that angle till the proper time.
Mr. BROADBENT. Very good, Senator. I withdraw the question. On another point, Mr. Jones, you think very highly of Miss Perrin, the Rudd boy's teacher, don't you?
Mr. JONES. She's a perfectly adequate old-fashioned teacher; she has the knack to a fair degree. I'd say that.
Mr. BROADBENT. You're sure you wouldn't go farther?
Mr. JONES. Not much. Miss Perrin teaches not by the book but by an instinctive anecdotal method. She's warm and loving, and mostly she's loved by the children, though dark and dangerous images keep creeping into her stories in class. She tends to buck at newfangled pedagoguery, but she's always mild and never sure. She seems to have a lot of the vagueness, the uncertainty as to exactly what's going on around her, of Nikolai Dmitrievitch Levin in Anna Karenina. Do you have time to read, Mr. Counsel?
Mr. BROADBENT. In college—
Mr. JONES. She's not hideously ugly, but she's not very good-looking, either. During my visits I noted a number of mistakes, slips, some absent-mindedness. I must say she treats her pupils as adults, though she speaks in a sing-song syllabic voice, as if she's reading out of a primer.
Mr. BROADBENT. You speak of her pretty coolly, sir, but I put it to you, sir, did you not buy her an expensive gift last week?
Mr. JONES. Mr. Chairman, is this sort of question—
Senator MANSFIELD. It may be. It may not be. What are you developing, Mr. Broadbent?
Mr. BROADBENT. I am going to step over there by you, Mr. Jones, and I am going to ask you to identify this booklet. I lay before you now this notebook, or booklet, and ask you to identify it. What is it?
Mr. JONES. Where did you get that?
Mr. BROADBENT. It is a small notebook, of thin blue paper, navy-blue leatherette cover with gold impressed markings. Please simply identify it.
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Mr. JONES. You know perfectly well what that is: It's my expense-account book. It says Expense Account right there on the front, with my initials. When did you steal that off me?
Mr. BROADBENT. I would point out, Mr. Jones, that there is an item entered here—'Gift, Miss Perrin, $125.' That's a substantial gift, sir.
Senator MANSFIELD. What are you trying to suggest, Mr. Counsel? Miss Perrin's getting on. Mr. Wairy pointed that out. She's a gray-haired lady.
Mr. BROADBENT. I'm suggesting that that's a rather large gift, Mr. Jones.
Mr. JONES. I needed her on my side.
Mr. BROADBENT. I see here that on last Friday's date you entered in your expense account an item of six dollars for an office visit to a doctor.
Mr. JONES. I had a headache after my conversation with the Guidance Director. I think you would have, too.
Mr. BROADBENT. What doctor did you visit?
Mr. JONES. I didn't actually see a doctor.
Mr. BROADBENT. But you entered an item in your expense account.
Mr. JONES. As a lawyer, sir, and a rather young one, if I may be forgiven for saying so, you might not realize that with tax laws the way they are, the corporation executive—
Mr. BROADBENT. I get it. Did your headache clear up all right?
Mr. JONES. Thank you, it did. Immediately after making the entry in my expense-account book.
Mr. BROADBENT. Fiscal therapy?
Mr. JONES. Never knew it to do any harm.
Mr. BROADBENT. I jfee here another item. 'Entertaining parents —$78.93.' Can you spend that much out on the town in Pequot, sir?
Mr. JONES. Again, it was a matter of wanting—
Friday, October 25
Mr. BROADBENT. Of bribery, sir?
Mr. JONES. Mr. Chairman, I submit to you that this young gentleman—
Senator SKYPACK. Is no gentleman? No, sir, nor is this a tea-and-ladyfingers party, sir. Just what was to be the purpose of your buying this boy, Mr. Jones? I think it's time you came clean.
Mr. BROADBENT. Excuse me, Senator Skypack, before you get into that. I respectfully suggest to the Chairman that this document, or book, which I have laid before Mr. Jones, which he has identified, be admitted into the record.
Senator MANSFIELD. It will be entered into the record.
(The document referred to was marked 'Jones Exhibit No. i* and filed.)
Senator SKYPACK. And now, Mr. Jones,
Mr. JONES. My purpose? I buy brains. When a commodity that you need falls in short supply, you have to get out and hustle. I buy brains. About eighteen months ago my company, United Lymphomilloid of America, Incorporated, was faced with an extremely difficult problem, a project, a long-range government contract, fifty years, highly specialized and top secret, and we needed some of the best minds in the country, and we looked around, and we found some minds that had certainly been excellent at one time, but they'd been spoiled by education. By what passes for education. Our schools, particularly at the elementary and secondary levels, speak with great confidence of their 'solutions' for what they call the 'gifted'— though there seems to be little or no agreement as to the exact nature of this category. There's a great deal of time spent on these so-called solutions, which are for tht most part based on psychological and sociological theories and data between twenty and fifty years old, but no one seems to know what really works. One school says special classes, another says acceleration, an-
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&n
bsp; other says enrichment. No one knows. They argue back and forth. Well, we have the answer at United Lymphomilloid.
Senator SKYPACK. And it is?
Mr. JONES. Do you think I'm insane, Senator? In front of this gallery? And the press?
Senator MANSFIELD. We will go into Executive Session. We will reconvene in my inner office, Room 4iyA, in five minutes, gentlemen.
(The committee retired to the designated room and came to order, in Executive Session, at 11:18 a.m.)
Senator MANSFIELD. We will be in order. Now, Mr. Jones, perhaps you will feel able—
Mr. JONES. I will say this much. The reason U. Lympho— that's what we who work there call the company for short—the reason U. Lympho wants to get brains early is connected with a basic difficulty a brilliant youngster has in this country. At an astonishingly early age he goes through a quest for meaning, for values, for the significance of life, and this quest turns, also early, into a struggle to make a place in society and to find values in it that will meet his particular needs. I hardly have to tell you that the culture in which we live is riddled with inconsistencies, from the point of view of a child with a quick mind, who sees that he is punished more than he is rewarded for his brilliance. A bitter inner inharmony results. The individual expends so much emotional energy trying to resolve this inharmony that, having started out in primary and elementary school years the most normal and well adjusted of all his peers, he winds up, before very long, the least so. Our system at United Lymphomilloid is to get the brains early and eliminate this conflict altogether.
