The Ancient Nine

by Ian K. Smith, M. D.

“That makes two of us,” I said.

  “They kept going on about how good-looking you were and how much they wished they could go out on a date with you. I was having a hard time keeping my dinner down.”

  “Stop trying to make me feel better.”

  “You said you wanted the truth, right?”

  “More than I want sympathy.”

  I found a rock on the railing of the bridge and threw it side-armed into the water. It was a perfect skimmer, hopping four times on the water’s surface before disappearing. She squeezed my arm tighter, and I felt the anger drain out of my body. We stood like that for a couple of minutes before I said, “Somehow standing here with you makes everything else seem so unimportant.”

  “Do you mean that?” she asked.

  “Of course I do.”

  I grabbed and held her from behind. Then when I looked down at her, I could see that she was crying. “What’s wrong?” I said.

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing? You’re crying.”

  “No, I’m not. It’s just the wind making my eyes water.” She turned away from me, but I could still see the tears sliding down her face.

  “You’re breaking our promise to each other,” I said. “We agreed never to tell lies, regardless of how tough the truth.”

  She turned and faced me. “Okay, fine. There’s something I should tell you, but I don’t want to.”

  The ominous tone of her voice made my stomach tighten. My mind raced through all the bad possibilities. I just knew she was going to say that she was hooking back up with an old boyfriend or she was dying from some incurable disease. I tightened my stomach for the blow. But she kept looking at me without saying anything.

  “Godammit, Ashley, what is it?” I said.

  “I can’t,” she said. “I’m afraid.”

  “Jesus Christ, Ashley. You should know by now that you can tell me anything. I can handle it.”

  “You swear?”

  “Scout’s honor,” I said, crossing my heart.

  That brought a small smile. “But you were never a scout.”

  I wondered how someone could look so beautiful even when they cried. She looked up and closed her eyes. Then when she opened them, she said, “I love you, Spenser Collins.”

  I had a temporary moment of dissociation where I felt like my body and its senses were completely disconnected. A fog passed through my brain. Then the words finally sank in, and I brought her into me. Hard.

  “I’ve loved you since the minute I first saw you,” I said.

  Then I kissed her like I had never kissed anyone before.

  38

  THE DELPHIC NEVER told me that I had been officially cut from the punch, but they didn’t have to bother. Dalton and I were certain that Brathwaite and Jacobs had seen to it that my name was quickly removed from consideration. It felt bittersweet. I knew from the beginning I was a long shot to make it all the way through, but after getting this far, I had actually believed it was possible. I already had visions of what the rooms upstairs looked like, with their antique furniture and polished oak bookcases. I would be the first poor kid from the South Side of Chicago to have his name engraved alongside the chosen progeny of the most elite families in the country. A teenage fantasy swallowed whole by old-world reality. I didn’t want to admit it, but after all that I had been through, the rejection stung. How could I not take it personally?

  For those lucky punchees who remained, the clubs had entered the no-contact period, which meant the clubs couldn’t contact any of the punchees until the entering class had been elected.

  This was also one of the most important weeks on Harvard’s social calendar for reasons that had nothing to do with the final clubs. An entire week of parties and pep rallies would lead up to the 105th installment of the Harvard–Yale football game, which Harvard was hosting. BEAT YALE signs and Harvard banners blanketed the venerable brick buildings in the Yard, while businesses in the Square hung up Harvard posters in their windows and offered special Game-week discounts to college ID holders. Even our curmudgeonly professors showed some school spirit, taking every opportunity during their usually somber, no-nonsense lectures to poke fun at the Yalies and triggering a round of applause amongst those of us unaccustomed to seeing their playful side.

  Major papers across the country ran stories about the Game’s long-standing tradition as the front pages of The Boston Globe, The New York Times, and The Washington Post displayed pictures of successful middle-aged couples wrapped in traditional raccoon fur coats, tailgating behind shiny Range Rovers and long Mercedes-Benzes.

  Game day was ideal football weather—chilly but not too cold, overcast but no real threat of rain. As the sun climbed higher, thicker waves of fans flooded the narrow streets of Cambridge. This was more than a football game; it was an absolute spectacle. More than seventy thousand people, not all of them planning on actually watching the Game, took over the streets running from the Square all the way down to the river and over into the Soldiers Field. I met up with a couple of my teammates, and we joined the march of bodies to the stadium. A walk that normally took ten minutes took almost half an hour. We arrived to find ourselves in the midst of one massive fall picnic. Millionaire alumni sipped champagne and vintage Bordeaux as their argyle-sweater-wearing classmates tossed footballs and Frisbees on the freshly cut lawn.

  The luminaries had already claimed their real estate. Senator Ted Kennedy, class of ’54, and his clan held down a prominent position in the first parking lot, eating on linen-covered tables while being served by two women in dark uniforms. I couldn’t help but think of Bickerstaff and that Spanish A final exam.

  Ninety-eight-year-old and onetime political scion Hamilton Fish III, class of 1910, sat in a wicker chair in the south parking lot, bundled in several layers that included a hand-sewn Harvard quilt from another era. He patiently received a long line of well-wishers waiting to kiss the ring. There had even been sightings of Vice President George Bush, now President-elect Bush, Yale ’48, and his army of Secret Service agents. He had been positioned east of the stadium under a tent that had been secured with a ring of state trooper cruisers and long black SUVs with multiple antennae sticking out from the hood. An ambulance, a requisite part of the vice-presidential motorcade, idled nearby.

  The actual outcome of the Game itself was of little consequence, except the bragging rights it brought the victor. I quickly learned that this was not Alabama versus Ohio State. For this contest, the numbers on the scoreboard would always take a backseat to the numbers that really mattered—like how many presidents the colleges had put into the White House or how many justices they sat on the Supreme Court. Harvard was far ahead on this score: 6–3, thanks to Bush’s recent win over Dukakis. Many people never even bothered leaving the tailgates, and most of those who did only entered the stadium at halftime, when their champagne had run dry or their canisters of caviar were empty. This crowd even cheered differently. They didn’t yell and clap like most football fans. Rather they spoke complete, grammatically correct sentences, saying things like, “What a magnificent play!” and “Thrash them, Harvard!” Sometimes it was difficult to tell if they were watching a football game or croquet match.

  My most enduring image of the crowded stadium came after a second-quarter touchdown by running back Tony Hinz which cut Yale’s lead to three points. When the Harvard side of the stadium rose in unison, it was not to clap, but to jingle car keys in a massive show of approval. I watched in awe as thousands of Jaguar, Mercedes, and Rolls-Royce keys dangled in the air as the band ripped into an exuberant rendition of “Ten Thousand Men of Harvard.”

  For those interested enough to keep score, we lost the Game that year by nine points after the Harvard offense failed to convert a defensive fumble recovery into a score. The stadium emptied after the final whistle, and the real parties began as alumni flooded back across the river into the Yard and upperclassmen houses sprawled along the winding banks of the Charles. They roamed nostalgically with their
children and grandchildren in tow, pointing out where they had roomed and promising the younger generations that they too would fulfill their destiny on these hallowed grounds.

  By Monday, the expensive European cars and limousines had vacated campus, and those of us who remained took our time to recuperate from the long weekend. Most of us skipped classes that morning in a post-Game tradition, not rolling out of bed until late that afternoon. Thanksgiving break started on Wednesday and most of campus was already getting a jump on the holiday and heading out of town. That night, Dalton and I were back behind the locked door of the study room in the Lowell House tunnels. He had the enlarged photograph of the Ancient Nine and a copy of Moss Sampson’s old police file.

  “It’s still hard to tell if it’s him,” Dalton said over my shoulder as we compared the blown-up photograph that had the man’s reflection in the window with Sampson’s prison photograph.

  Dalton held up a paper full of handwritten notes from the police file. “It says here that he came from Beulah, Mississippi, then he moved to a town called Rosedale, where he worked as a short-order cook at the White Dog Tavern.”

  “Talk about a weird coincidence,” I said. “My father was from Beulah, Mississippi. The name stuck with me. My mother once joked that we had more people living on our block in Chicago than the entire population of Beulah.”

  “Maybe your father knew Moss Sampson,” Dalton said.

  I shrugged my shoulders. “I doubt it. Sampson was probably much older than my father. They probably didn’t live in Beulah at the same time.”

  “Do you ever speak to your father?”

  “Never. But my mother said they were a small family. She met them once when my father took her home, then didn’t see them again until his funeral. His parents died young. One of his relatives let him some money. That’s about all I know.”

  Dalton looked down at his notes. “It says that Sampson spent time in the Mississippi State Penitentiary for murdering two people. The governor granted him clemency in 1923 after the ACLU argued he had been coerced into a confession. He moved up here to Dorchester, leaving his girlfriend and son back in Beulah.”

  “Makes you wonder if the members knew his history before they hired him to work at the Delphic.”

  “Unlikely. It was the early 1900s. They didn’t have computers or fax machines. Everything was in paper files. It was easy back then to just pack up, move away, and start a new.”

  I thought about the last line of the poem. Now stands as our protector with loyalty and pride. Then there were those letters RMS. “Could the poem be talking about Sampson?” I said. “‘Our protector with loyalty and pride.’”

  “But the second line doesn’t fit him,” Dalton said. “‘Brother in the Gas of standing quite fine.’ He wasn’t a member.”

  “Maybe we’re reading it too literally,” I said. “He could’ve been a brother in a figurative way. He was the only other person who knew their secrets. Look at those initials. RMS. Moss Sampson.”

  “What about the R?”

  “Maybe he didn’t use his first name, like G. Gordon Liddy or H. Ross Perot. He could’ve gone by R. Moss Sampson.”

  “I still like Robert Meade Swigert, down on Park Avenue,” Dalton said. “It makes more sense for the poem to talk about one of the members. Besides, how would Sampson get up to Newfoundland, and why would he go there?”

  Swigert still seemed too convenient. Were we willing to accept him as the answer because we had grown tired of running into dead ends?

  “Everything doesn’t have to fit so easily,” I said. “This is a code created by a group of extremely intelligent men. They wouldn’t make it easy.”

  “My vote is still with Swigert over Sampson,” Dalton said. “In order for all of the lines to make sense, it must be a Delphic brother.”

  I looked down at the photographs. Sampson looked like a brawler. He had a shaved head with big black eyes and a boxer’s jawline. His neck was long and thick, and even though he was wearing a jumpsuit in the picture, you could see the mounds of knotted muscles in his shoulders.

  “Last night I snuck into the Bureau of Study Counsel building,” Dalton said. “Don’t ask me how. Anyway, I found one window that had a decent view of the Delphic courtyard. That picture was definitely taken behind the mansion.”

  “Which means it’s most likely the chamber is somewhere inside.”

  39

  BAM! BAM! BAM! It sounded like someone was attacking my door with a battering ram. I jumped out of bed, realizing that it wasn’t a dream, but someone actually pounding on the front door. The clock read 3:00 A.M. I turned on my lamp and ran into the common room. Percy’s bedroom door was still closed. He must’ve taken his anxiety pills before he went to sleep, or the racket would have woken him too. A cold gust of wind swept in as I opened the door. Several red faces sat atop big, puffy ski jackets. “What’s going on?” I said. I recognized Hutch, Duke, and Pollack. Before I could register the other faces, they rushed me to the couch and piled on top of me. Graydon Brimmer pushed his way through the mass of bodies and freed me enough so that I could breathe.

  “Spenser, on behalf of the Delphic Club, I take honor in announcing your election into the hundred and third neophyte class of the Gas.”

  Another round of cheers went up, and they piled on me again in a crushing heap. Then after we had rolled around on the floor for a few minutes, they lifted me up and Brimmer handed me a small envelope. “This makes it official,” he said.

  I opened the envelope and read the letter.

  The President and Members of the Delphic Club are proud to announce the official election of Spenser Q. Collins, this day, November 29, 1988. We would be pleased to receive a written notification of membership acceptance in the lounge of the Hasty Pudding Club at 12 Holyoke Street between 9:00 A.M. and 12:00 noon today.

  I went numb. How did this happen? None of it seemed real. I could feel the beginning of tears forming behind my eyes, and I hoped like hell I could hold them back till the guys left.

  Someone produced a shot glass and bottle of blue alcohol.

  “Delphic tradition,” Hutch said, handing me the glass. “Down in one.”

  I threw it back to more cheers as the alcohol burned the back of my throat. I was given a firm round of handshakes before they headed to the door to go wake the next elected neophyte. Hutch was the last to leave.

  “Listen, Spenser,” he said. “I told you before that everyone really likes you. The club has a lot of cool guys, and you’d fit right in. I know this is a really big decision, but we hope you’ll deliver an acceptance later today. You’ll make a great Gas brother.”

  “Why does the notification have to be written?” I asked, pointing to the line in the election letter.

  “It’s not a big deal,” he said. “We do this because some punchees get elected into more than one club, so the acceptance letter is the official documentation of their selection. But remember, you have to be there by twelve. That’s an interclub council rule. A minute late, and your election is automatically nullified.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll be there.”

  He reached out and gave me a bear hug before he left. I went back to my room and called Dalton, who was in equal disbelief. After an hour of staring up at the stars through my window, I fell asleep with the election letter safely tucked under my pillow.

  * * *

  I WOKE UP later that morning to the chiming of the ten o’clock bells. I sat down to my computer and started typing my acceptance letter. I wasn’t sure what to write, but an hour and seven drafts later, I came up with something I thought was adequate.

  I, Spenser Q. Collins, do hereby accept election into the Delphic Club on this day, November 29, 1988. I am aware that my acceptance forfeits the possibility of joining any other final club. I also accept the responsibilities and privileges attached to my acceptance.

  Sincerely,

  Spenser Q. Collins

  Satisfied, I threw on my
sweats and left my room in more than enough time to arrive at the Hasty before the noon deadline.

  * * *

  BY SEVEN O’CLOCK that night, the newest class of Delphic members had already packed the basement. Drinks and hors d’oeuvres covered the long, narrow table, and a raging fire popped in the fireplace, thawing our frozen limbs. I was happy to see Jon Carderro and Buzz, but I was equally happy not to see Satch Washington, who had obviously been cut. After almost half an hour of somewhat giddy mingling, Graydon Brimmer and Oscar LaValle turned off the TV and called the meeting to order. Brimmer gave us a short introduction, and then Oscar pulled out a small, tattered book and began reading a long list of club rules. The first dealt with women’s access to the clubhouse. He called it the “No Women Rule,” which had a long list of specifications of when women could enter, which door they had to use, and which rooms they couldn’t access. Any member breaking this rule would be expelled on the third violation.

  Oscar continued reading the long list of rules and their corresponding fines, mandatory meetings, and the dress code for Wednesday-night dinners. Nonmember males who attended the college were allowed access to the basement only if accompanied by a member. Harvard male graduates were allowed into the main rooms of the clubhouse only after their ten-year reunion. Servants were never to address us by our first names, and socializing with them was strictly prohibited. No photographs by nonmembers were ever allowed in the clubhouse.

  Oscar then turned the program over to Carlyle Emmerson, the treasurer.

  “I’m sure most of you know by now how wealthy this organization is,” Emmerson began. “So, let’s start right out with the big-ticket items. What I’m about to tell you is for your ears only. If it is discovered that you’ve shared this information with anyone, you’ll forfeit your participation. It’s a Delphic tradition that dates back to the early 1900s. Due to the generosity of living and deceased alumni, a special endowment has been created that calls for a one-million-dollar gift to each member upon graduation, paid out in installments.”