Kindler put his hand up. “Please don’t.”
“All right,” Francis said. He started to stand up. He was surprised to discover how sharp was his regret. No more chances to be what he should have been since the day Fred Kindler came. No chance to rectify!
“There is only one thing I want from you now, Mr. Plummer: that you not repeat this conversation to anyone.”
“I won’t,” Francis said.
“Do I have your word?”
Just a little while ago, that question would have angered Francis. Now it made him sad. “You have my word,” he said.
Halfway to his classroom, Francis thought maybe he should turn around, go back to Kindler’s office, and urge him to reconsider. The idea shocked him. Kindler’s leaving was everything he’d wanted for a year. But he kept on walking. He knew he wouldn’t be urging Kindler to stay for Kindler’s sake or for the school’s, but for his own. To give him another chance to redeem himself. Well, he’d had his chances, and they were gone. Besides, Kindler wouldn’t listen.
Not to him, he wouldn’t.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Fred stared at Plummer’s back as he went through the door. Then he stared at the door, not seeing it, until long after Plummer had disappeared.
How unseemly that Alan Travelers, the chairman of the board, for God’s sake, was not the first to know! How grotesque that Francis Plummer found out first! Before even Milton Perkins, the other board members, before Rachel Bickham, Peggy Plummer, even Lila Smythe!
Nevertheless, he was not surprised that Plummer had figured it out. It was as if Plummer had wanted his resignation so badly he could read his mind and find it there. And then that look of regret when he finally he’d gotten exactly what he’d been hoping for—and wondered if he wanted it after all. That’s what Fred Kindler thought about as he sat very still at his desk, staring at the door.
In fact, Fred realized, Plummer had found out even before Gail did. It wasn’t until Plummer guessed it that Fred realized he had made the decision. Right up until he’d said he was thinking of an alternative strategy, those words were true, and the minute he’d said them he knew he wasn’t merely thinking about resigning anymore. He’d made up his mind.
Last night, he had told Gail he was considering resigning. He wasn’t surprised at her neutral reaction. She’d already lost the place she loved the most, the one that felt like home, when they’d left Mt. Gilead. No other move would hurt that much. “Here I go again,” he’d told her last night, “dragging you around.”
“Please do,” she’d said.
Now in his office, he got up from his desk, went into Margaret Rice’s anteroom, and asked her to cancel his appointments for the day. Then he’d go straight to Alan Traveler’s office to submit his resignation.
“Everything all right?” Margaret asked softly.
“Everything’s fine,” he lied. He was still surprised she wasn’t his enemy anymore.
He reentered his office, closing the door behind him, sat down at his desk, turned on his computer, and wrote his resignation letter. He was surprised at how fast it came. As if he’d already known the words.
Dear Alan,
After much thought [“and much prayer,” he wrote and then erased; what he chose to pray about was his private business] I have regretfully come the conclusion that it is in the best interest of the school that I resign effective at the end of this academic year.
I think you know how much I have always admired this school and how much in my short tenure here I have come to love it in a very personal way. And let me put in writing now what I hope I have conveyed to you in our many conversations: that I am deeply grateful for your leadership and support. While the sadness of leaving will subside in time, my joy and satisfaction in the partnership you and I and other board members have enjoyed will be permanent.
My sense is that the school has made some steps toward maturity during my time here. I’ll leave the judgment of that to others.
I have no doubt, however, that the recent decision to retain the historic commitment to single-sex education for girls, and the inclusion of the alumnae and parents in the drive to bring that commitment to fruition, is precisely the right one. I am just as strongly convinced that this critical initiative requires a school leader who comes fresh to the scene, in no way associated with our recent short-lived consideration of admitting boys.
This is the single reason for my offering you my resignation. It is compelling. Therefore, please accept it.
Sincerely,
Frederick Kindler, Head of School
Then, as he read over his letter, his statement that the school had taken some steps toward maturity under his leadership seemed offkey. He deleted the sentence, and the one after that. For though Alan Travelers would agree with this claim, this letter would be published to the whole school community—which would not agree. Instead the community would take the statement as his ungraciousness in failure and an insult to Marjorie Boyd. No one wanted to hear him imply that Marjorie’s school was immature.
But when he read the revised version, the deletion stuck in his craw.
Being gracious meant he would have to be disgraced; he would have to pretend he hadn’t gotten anything done and just slink away? He couldn’t bring himself to do that. He was the one who had brought the truth out about the finances and forced the board to deal with the realities, instead of drifting. That was something. And then the little interior changes, unrecognized by most—which showed how much they were needed—like sending the message that people needed to be successful or be fired by firing the beloved but incompetent business manager, and resisting the personal agendas of powerful people by not firing Joan Saffire; and insisting that people be on time; and replacing Francis Plummer with Rachel Bickham and Peggy Plummer as wise counselors. If he didn’t make some claim to at least a little success, his resentment would overwhelm him. So he typed the sentence back in, changing steps toward maturity simply to progress, printed the letter, slipped it into an envelope, which he put in his inside sports coat pocket, and headed for his car.
“NO,” SAID ALAN Travelers a half hour later in his office. “I won’t accept it. It’s as simple as that. You’ve got a three-year contract. You’re stuck with us; we’re stuck with you.” Then he crunched the letter into a ball and tossed it in his wastebasket. “That’s that,” he said. “Time for lunch.”
But in the restaurant Fred insisted. “It’s not going to work with me as the head.”
“Shut up and read your menu,” Alan said.
So they ordered and talked of other things, and the waiter brought their meals, and then they tried to eat and couldn’t.
“Suppose we bring Perkins into this?” Fred said after a while.
“Milton? Why?” Though of course Alan Travelers knew. He’d been Perkins’s friend for years.
Because he’s a cynic, Fred wanted to blurt; then, still inside his head, corrected himself: a realist, remembering how unsentimentally Perkins had been willing to close the school rather than surrender its mission. He was sure that Perkins loved Marjorie Boyd, admired her, and was grateful yet had been willing to push her out the door. Out loud he said, “If Milton doesn’t agree with me, I’ll consider changing my mind.”
“Consider? That’s pretty vague, isn’t it? How about tearing up the letter and going back to work?”
“Let’s see what Milton thinks,” Fred said.
“All right,” Alan conceded. “I’ll invite him to lunch tomorrow. Meantime you go back to work, get all excited again, and change your mind.”
“Nope. Call him right now. I don’t want this thing left hanging. Besides, he’s bored as hell sitting around that club. You call him now, he’ll be in your office before we get back.”
Alan threw his napkin down on the table and stood up. “All right, but he’s going to have a fit,” he said. “You better be ready with the CPR.” Then he headed for the phone.
Fred was right: Milton Perkins was waiting
for them in Alan Travelers’s office by the time they got back from lunch. He turned from the window where he’d been standing, watching the river, as Fred and Alan entered. Fred felt Perkins’s eyes on his face and wondered if he’d guessed.
“Let’s sit down,” Alan said, pulling one of the chairs out from a table in the center of his office. “Otherwise you’re going to fall down when you hear the news.”
Perkins sat down, keeping his eyes on Fred.
“Fred here wants to resign,” Alan said.
“Wants isn’t the right word,” Fred said, still standing.
“Sit down, Fred,” Perkins said softly. “Tell us about it.”
Fred sat down, and so did Alan.
“He’s just a little discouraged, that’s all,” Alan said. “Who wouldn’t be?”
“No, Alan,” Fred said. “That’s not the point.”
Without taking his eyes off Perkins, Alan cut Fred off. “We’re not going to give up, do you hear? And I’ll not have this man destroyed. I’m not going to let—”
“Hold it, just hold it for a minute.” Perkins leaned forward. “You just said that Fred wants to quit because he’s discouraged? He wouldn’t do that. You know him better than that.”
“I’ll give you that,” Alan conceded after a pause. “I take that back. You bet. But he can have a dumb idea once in a while, just like the rest of us.”
“Milton, the numbers just aren’t there.” Fred said. “No one’s accepting the invitations.”
“That’s not your fault!” Alan interrupted. But Perkins, sitting very still, didn’t take his eyes off Fred and waited for him to finish.
“The strategy isn’t going to work with me as the headmaster,” Fred said to Perkins. He was weary of this; it already felt as if he’d been over it a thousand times.
“ ’Cause they put you with letting boys in,” Perkins finished.
“That’s right,” Fred said.
“And with them losing Marjorie,” Perkins added.
“That too,” Fred said.
“Well, Jesus! Talk him out of it, Milton!” Alan said.
“I can’t,” Perkins said mildly. “He’s right.”
Alan stared at Perkins, speechless.
Then Milton turned to Fred and said, “You’re a hell of a guy, Fred. Most everybody else would have to be told.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
Even though the light was not on in Julie’s side of the room, Gregory van Buren saw at first glance that that was not Julie in the bed. It was a laundry bag stuffed with clothes under the covers made to look like a person sleeping. He’d seen this many times before on his nightly check and probably been fooled by it once or twice. But he’d never seen it so carelessly done as this. It looked exactly like what it really was: a laundry bag stuffed with clothes under the sheet. He understood right away that Julie wanted to get caught.
“Where is she?” he asked Clarissa, who was studying at her desk on the other side of the room. Her desk lamp was the only light that was on.
Clarissa shook her head. She didn’t want to tell.
“On campus?”
The look Clarissa gave him let him know that Julie was not on campus. She understood the reason for his question: If Julie was on campus, partying probably, doing booze or drugs or both, she was in big-time trouble with the school, but at least she was safe. “All right then, she’s off campus,” he said. “I’m going to call her parents and notify the police.” He turned to leave the room.
“She’s with her brother,” Clarissa blurted.
He turned back. He looked at his watch. “Well, then, I’ll wait one hour. If she comes back before that, tell her I want to see her right away.”
Gregory was surprised at himself. He’d always been a stickler for the rules. But then there was another thing he was a stickler for: not giving youngsters what they wanted just because they wanted it. The child obviously wanted to be expelled. So that’s exactly what wouldn’t happen. Just the same, he was nervous as he waited in his apartment. Who knew what she was doing? He looked at his watch again. The hour was almost up.
Just in time, she knocked at his door. He felt a huge relief. She was here! She was safe! He’d been imagining terrible things. Drunken sex with some friend of her brother she didn’t even know, or bleeding to death in a mangled car her brother crashed into a tree. Now Gregory was angry at her for making him so worried, and he didn’t stand up. He’d be the king on his throne, she the frightened subject. “Come in, Julie,” he told her through the door.
He saw right away she was perfectly sober, another relief. “You’re home early,” he said sarcastically. And yet it was only midnight. She could have stayed out till dawn.
“Come in and sit down,” he said, pointing to a chair facing his. He could tell by the way she held her shoulders and by the calm look on her face that she was not the least bit afraid of him, not at all ashamed of what she’d done. She thought she’d gotten exactly what she wanted by getting caught.
“Have you called my parents yet?” she challenged.
“No. Should I have?”
“You haven’t?”
“No, Julie, and I probably won’t.”
“What, then?”
“What would you like to happen?”
She didn’t answer.
“Do you want to go home?”
She looked surprised. “You haven’t even asked me where I went,” she complained.
“Forgive me if I’m not curious. You’re here now,” he said. “And safe. That’s what I care about.”
Oh, I thought all you cared about was books, she started to say, and stopped herself. She wouldn’t have said it as an insult, merely as a statement of fact. But she was surprised he cared about her. She didn’t believe he didn’t want to know where she’d gone that night. “We went to a rock concert. My brother drove. He had a date,” she said. “He got me one too with a guy I danced with another time I snuck out,” she added to make sure he knew that tonight was not the first night she should have been expelled. She didn’t say how bored with each other she and the boy who’d been so great to dance with were.
“Tell me about your brother,” Gregory said.
That stopped her for a minute. “He goes to Trinity,” she said at last.
“I know he does,” Gregory said. “It’s in your folder.”
“He’s not really my brother,” she said. “I’m adopted, and he’s not.”
Gregory nodded his head. He knew that too. Julie started to cry, and Gregory understood that Julie’s problem was over his head. “I think you should go see Ms. Rugoff in the morning,” he said as gently as he could.
She shook her head, still crying.
“All right, see someone at home.”
“How can I do that if you don’t kick me out?”
“Julie, this is a school, not a prison,” he said, but she shook her head, so once again he tried another tack. “What do your parents expect?”
She was frowning now. Why is he asking me that? “They expect me to finish this year and come back next year and graduate.”
“I see,” Gregory murmured. “And do you plan to spend all next year attempting to get yourself expelled?”
She gave him a little grin through her tears.
“Well, then?” he said.
“Well, then, what?” she said, feeling stubborn.
“Julie, please, fill in the blank. When you don’t want to attend a certain school, the alternative to being expelled from it is—”
“You mean I should just quit?”
“Resign might be a more appropriate word. But either word would indicate you’re not a victim, and you’re not being devious.”
Julie thought about that for a little while. “I’m sorry if you think I was being devious,” she said.
“Oh, I don’t know if you should be sorry,” Gregory mused. “You thought you didn’t have a choice, and now you think you do. That’s hardly an occasion for regret.”
“Well, a
ll right,” she said. “Maybe I’ll call my parents and ask them.”
Gregory gave her a questioning look.
“All right, I’ll tell them,” Julie said tentatively. She saw that he was not satisfied and realized she wasn’t either. “Yes, I will. I’ll tell them!” she said again, firmly this time. She’d stopped crying by now.
“A wise decision,” Gregory said. “Will you finish this year?”
“Of course! I’m not crazy enough to waste the credits. There’s only another week of classes, and then I’ll go, and I won’t come back next year. I’ll graduate from my high school at home.”
“Another wise decision,” he said.
“I’ll call my parents tomorrow. Thanks for not turning me in.”
He shook his head.
“I mean thanks for helping me make my decision.”
Gregory smiled and stood up “I think you’ve had a very productive evening, and I’ve enjoyed our conversation.”
She stood too, amazed at this teacher. He’d seemed so pompous and stuffy before, and boring. She stepped forward, put her arms around him, gave him a hug, and felt his body stiffen. How shy he was, how scared of his feelings! She stepped back, thinking she’d made a mistake. Then she saw he was glad she had hugged him. She felt a rush of compassion and knew she trusted him. Except for Clarissa, he was the only person she’d made a connection with at Miss Oliver’s.
A few minutes later as Gregory lay in bed, it came to him that in Marjorie’s time he wouldn’t have made the decision he’d made tonight. He would have turned Julie in to Marjorie, and she would have decided her punishment. That punishment would not have been expulsion. Marjorie would have persuaded Julie to stay. Well, Gregory said to himself, Marjorie was wrong about a lot of things.
TWENTY-NINE
In the last week of May, Francis got a message from Alan Travelers’s secretary: He needed to drop whatever he was doing and come to Travelers’s office right away to meet with the executive committee. She didn’t tell him why, and Francis didn’t ask.
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