Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the SAT (A Harvest Test Preparation Book)

by Charles Harrington Elster

  Phil’s choice of topic must have been the right one, for Leo, after a thoughtful pause, launched into a mesmerizing tale about his late mentor.

  “Edward Anthony Prospero was the most unusual person I’ve ever known,” he began. “Nothing conventional about him, that’s for sure. He was a gentleman and a scholar, a bit of a poet, and a little bit of a nut, too. He was also deeply mysterious.”

  Phil and his roommates listened as Leo told how Prospero had been a man of eclectic interests and formidable accomplishments. He had escaped the impoverished streets of New York City’s Lower East Side by winning a scholarship to Holyfield, but the First World War soon intervened. After serving in France as a reconnaissance balloonist and in the Intelligence Corps as a cryptanalyst, cracking German codes, he returned to Holyfield to study French, Italian, and English literature.

  After college, in the flourishing economy of the 1920s, Prospero proved himself a resourceful businessman by building a hugely successful import-export company. That was when he developed his penchant for rare books and objets d’art. In his late twenties, however, Prospero came to the realization that he was extremely affluent but unfulfilled. So one day he left the office and never went back. Just before the crash of ’29 and the Great Depression, he sold his company for a small fortune, which he invested wisely. Then he changed course utterly.

  First he tried the literary life. He directed a couple of plays off Broadway, acted a little, wrote poetry, and published a novel that was reasonably well received. Then, yearning for adventure, he toured Europe, Africa, and Asia. He climbed mountains in the Canadian Rockies and led expeditions into the South American jungle. He supervised archaeological excavations at Palenque, Mexico, and Giza in Egypt. Finally, after almost a decade of wandering, he enrolled at Yale, earned his doctorate, and eventually returned to Holyfield College to focus his prodigious energies on teaching and scholarship.

  Always a great collector of facts and artifacts and books, Prospero was often called on to appraise or authenticate rare manuscripts, and in the 1940s he compiled a comprehensive annotated concordance to Shakespeare, a work that made his academic reputation. Some say he even did a little espionage for the army during World War II, and helped them decipher a number of enemy codes.

  Prospero had always had a predilection for creating and solving puzzles. From time to time he would offer rewards for the solution of riddles he had devised or the discovery of a treasure he had planted, and for nearly thirty years he ran an annual literary scavenger hunt on campus that was very popular.

  Throughout his tenure at Holyfield, Prospero was also known as an ingenious but incorrigible practical joker. One time, at a swanky fundraiser for the campus theater, he appeared from a swirling cloud of mist dressed as the ghost of Hamlet’s father. Bartholomew Martext, the theater’s artistic director, nearly fainted when Prospero told all the guests to swear upon his sword that they would make generous donations. But they did!

  Then there was the strange case of Professor Theophilus Bibb’s disappearing desk. Every year the poor fellow would arrive one day at his office to find that his desk—a Louis XVI escritoire of some value—had vanished. It would turn up safely a day or so later in some outrageous place, ensconced in the faculty washroom or in the middle of the old cemetery behind the college chapel. Usually there was a note attached, something to the effect of “A restless desk is a sign of a stagnant mind.”

  The first time it happened, Professor Bibb was outraged and wanted Prospero censured. The college administrators acknowledged the incident was regrettable, but they said Prospero was too beloved a member of Holyfield to receive an official reprimand for an essentially innocuous prank, and they advised Bibb to take Prospero’s antics in stride. Eventually he did, fighting fire with fire by occasionally playing a trick of his own on the old man.

  Sometimes Prospero’s jokes were too cunning and they backfired. In addition to his other talents, Prospero was also a skilled amateur calligrapher, and he once fooled Professor Harold Hargrave, now the chief curator of Tillinghast Library, with an illuminated manuscript he had forged. As the story goes, Hargrave, who back then was just coming into his own as an expert, was so duped by the fake that he wrote a scholarly treatise on it, hoping to advance his career.

  By the time Prospero got wind of what Hargrave was up to, it was too late; the article had been published. Prospero apologized publicly, but as far as Hargrave was concerned, the damage had been done. Apparently it was a sore point between the two men for a long time, until Prospero offered to bankroll the new library wing and donate his collection to it after his death.

  Though he was rich, Prospero was no miser. His lifestyle was modest, never lavish or extravagant, and he was widely hailed as a great philanthropist and a man of staunch principles and integrity. He gave generously to many worthy causes and of course donated a great deal to the college, including money for a much-needed renovation of the theater and a substantial gift to establish an endowment for scholarships in the humanities.

  Some, however, thought Prospero eccentric, for although he could be gregarious when the occasion warranted, he enjoyed solitude and carefully guarded his privacy. And while he abhorred dishonesty, he delighted in secrecy. Indeed, this was a man who, paradoxically, seemed to have found life’s meaning in its mystery.

  When Leo finished his story, nearly an hour had passed and the dining hall was almost empty. As they got up to dispose of their trays, he looked at his watch.

  “If you guys are still planning to see Romeo and Juliet tonight, you’d better get a move on. It starts in ten minutes.”

  Chapter 7

  Fair Play or Foul?

  Phil, Jimmy, and Chris ran up the steps to the balcony, taking them three at a time. Phil led the charge. “C’mon guys. Hurry up! We can make it.”

  They reached the top. Chris’s watch emitted several piercing beeps. Eight o’clock.

  “Great,” Jimmy said. “We’re going to miss the curtain, and then they won’t let us in till intermission.”

  “Don’t worry,” Chris said. “My watch is three minutes fast.”

  Jimmy made a face. “I hope that obnoxious piece of hardware isn’t going to beep and squawk through the whole play.”

  Chris shrugged. “Sorry, but I think it is.”

  “Can’t you turn it off?” Phil asked.

  “I lost the instruction manual, and now I can’t figure out how to program it. The thing’s incredibly complex. It’s got a calculator, a stopwatch, a calendar—”

  “I don’t care what it has,” Jimmy said. “That idiotic beeping is distracting. Can’t you stick the thing in your pocket?”

  “Okay, okay, chill out,” Chris said.

  The usher looked at their ticket stubs and waved them inside. “You’re just in time. Curtain in two minutes. To the left, row P, seats 4, [>], and 6.”

  “I can’t believe we got the last seats in the house,” Phil said. “It’s amazing. What a lucky break.”

  Jimmy frowned. “The last and worst seats, I might add. Look. We’re in the back row, stuffed in the corner.”

  He pointed. There were six seats in the row. Three young women occupied the ones nearest the aisle.

  “Those seats are terrible,” Jimmy complained. “We won’t be able to see or hear anything.”

  “Hey, why don’t we just forget it and go to the Student Center and shoot some pool,” Chris suggested. “We could come back tomorrow night or maybe find some dates to take on Friday.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Jimmy said. “The play’s running all week.”

  Phil held up his hands in protest. “Wait a minute. We just ran our butts off to get here and now you guys want to leave?”

  “I didn’t say I wanted to leave,” Jimmy said. “I’d just rather not sit in those crummy seats.”

  “Excuse me,” said the young woman in seat P-3. “The play’s about to start. Would you mind sitting down, please?”

  Caitlin’s polite request
fell on deaf ears.

  “Listen,” Phil told his roommates. “We made it on time and the tickets are paid for. There’s no point in wasting money.”

  “Excuse me. The play’s about to start,” Caitlin said again.

  The three young men continued to disregard the interruption.

  “What’s a few bucks lost when we can all go somewhere else and have a good time?” Chris said with a shrug.

  “You might not mind squandering your money,” Phil said, “but I certainly do.”

  Jimmy nodded. “Phil’s not only frugal, Chris. He’s right. It’s stupid to be a spendthrift. I suppose we’ll just have to accept the consequences of our actions.”

  Chris was persistent. “I still think we should play pool.”

  “C’mon, man,” Phil said. “Let’s just sit down and try to enjoy it, okay?”

  The house lights dimmed slightly.

  Caitlin decided it was time for serious action. “Hey,” she called out in a strident voice. “Are you bozos going to sit down, or are you going to stand there blabbing in the aisle all night?”

  “Pardon me, mademoiselle,” Jimmy replied, bowing obsequiously. “We’ll be there in a moment.” He turned and whispered to Phil. “Since you’re the one who persuaded us to stay, I think you should sit next to the querulous shrew. Maybe you can tame her,” he added with a grin.

  “Yeah, and next week you can go to The Taming of the Shrew and pick up a few dating tips,” Chris teased.

  Phil glanced at the young woman who had upbraided them. She was casting malicious looks in their direction. He couldn’t believe it. She was the same one with the dark hair he’d seen at Prospero Gate, the one who’d come up to Bill Berkowitz while they were in line at Steinbach Commons, the one who’d commented on his shirt. What had she told Bill her name was? Cathy? Kate? No, Caitlin. That was it. Maybe these seats wouldn’t be so bad after all, he thought.

  The house lights faded, flickered momentarily, and then went out. The theater was completely dark.

  Caitlin felt a chill run down her spine, and a lump began forming in her throat. She had been to the theater many times, but no matter how often she went, she was always overcome with a profound excitement when the play began. It was like the time she’d stayed up all night finishing an English paper and gone up to the roof of her father’s apartment building to watch the dawn. The huge city, so frantic and filthy in the hard light of day, had seemed strangely hushed and serene, like an empty cathedral.

  A brassy flourish of music swelled from powerful speakers hidden offstage. A cymbal crashed, and there was a long, low drum roll. Caitlin’s heart pounded with expectation. She swallowed hard and clutched the armrests.

  “Oh my God, excuse me,” she mumbled, releasing her grip on Phil’s arm.

  “Hey, no problem. You can have the armrest.”

  “That’s okay, really,” she whispered. “You take it. I’ve got the one on the other side.”

  She was so close Phil could smell her breath—a faint scent of licorice, or was it peppermint? Suddenly the theater felt like a boiler room and Phil wished he had taken off his jacket before sitting down. He could feel the sweat breaking out on his forehead. He tried to ignore it and focus on the stage, which was still dark.

  A man’s deep, resonant voice came over the sound system, filling the theater. As he spoke, the lights came up slightly and the curtain rose, revealing a dozen or so shadowy, obscure figures scattered around the stage. They seemed frozen in various awkward positions. The sonorous voice went on:

  From forth the fatal loins of these two foes

  A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life

  Phil leaned toward Caitlin and whispered, “So that’s where that phrase comes from.”

  Caitlin looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “What phrase?”

  “‘Star-crossed lovers.’”

  “Oh, sure. A lot of common expressions come from Shakespeare.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll tell you later. The first scene’s about to start.”

  “Okay. Sorry.”

  The voice finished speaking and the lights came up quickly, fully illuminating the stage. The frozen figures all suddenly began to move as though nothing had ever interrupted their actions. It was a strange scene, Phil thought. Though the actors were dressed in modern clothing and the set looked like a modern city street, something about the whole thing seemed faintly archaic. Phil couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

  Two large, scruffy-looking men wearing overalls, hard-hats, and heavy leather tool belts swaggered downstage and began talking to each other. Phil had expected the actors to speak with British accents, but the men’s gruff voices sounded American. In fact, they sounded just like the carpenters and drywall hangers Phil had worked with the summer after eleventh grade, when his father, who was a field supervisor for a big construction company, got him a job as a laborer with a crew building tract homes in a new development. Except the actors weren’t talking like the guys he’d worked with, saying things he could never have repeated to his mother or his English teacher. They were speaking florid Elizabethan English. Was this how they did Shakespeare’s plays now? Phil was perplexed.

  He tapped Caitlin’s arm. “What’s going on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why are they dressed in contemporary clothes and speaking with American accents?”

  “Haven’t you ever seen a modern interpretation before?”

  Phil was about to say no, he hadn’t, but decided against it. He slumped back in his seat and listened to the two men.

  SAMPSON: I will take the wall of any man or maid of Montague’s.

  GREGORY: That shows thee a weak slave; for the weakest goes to the wall.

  SAMPSON: ’Tis true; and therefore women, being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall. Therefore I will push Montague’s men from the wall and thrust his maids to the wall.

  GREGORY: The quarrel is between our masters and us their men.

  SAMPSON: ’Tis all one. I will show myself a tyrant. When I have fought with the men, I will be civil with the maids—I will cut off their heads.

  GREGORY: The heads of the maids?

  SAMPSON: Ay, the heads of the maids or their maidenheads. Take it in what sense thou wilt.

  What sense should he take that in? Phil wondered. It was Shakespeare’s flamboyant English, but it sounded like a dirty joke. Maybe Elizabethan construction workers were just as ribald and belligerent as the ones he’d worked with—the same sort of coarseness and vulgarity, only in a different dialect, time, and place. Was that the message the director was trying to get across by using contemporary clothing and sets?

  The play continued and Phil tried hard to find deeper meanings, but after concentrating for several scenes he grew tired and more confused than ever. From reading the play in tenth-grade English he knew that Romeo and Juliet were from feuding families and that against all odds they would fall, in love and die tragically. He also knew that their deaths would be precipitated by Romeo’s killing Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin, in revenge for Tybalt’s killing Mercutio, Romeo’s friend. Beyond that meager synopsis, Phil’s recollection ceased.

  Phil leaned toward Caitlin again. “Can you understand what they’re saying?”

  “Most of it, but it’s hard to hear way back here. Why?”

  “I was trying to figure out what Romeo and Juliet meant by all that stuff about prayer and sin—you know, when they first met and he kissed her in that last scene?”

  “Look, can we talk about it at intermission? I can’t explain now. I’m trying to watch the play.”

  “I was just wondering what Shakespeare meant by that.”

  Caitlin gave him a reproachful look. “I guess you’ll just have to learn to read between the lines.”

  Phil felt stupid, like a little kid chastised by his mother. He bit his lip and stewed in his resentment for a few minutes. Then he decided that was stupid too, so he
gave up feeling morose and tried to focus on the play again.

  As the scenery changed for the second act, Phil stole a furtive look at Caitlin. She was watching the play intently and scowling, not unattractively but in a way that made her look serious and intelligent.

  A clamor of voices rose from the stage. Phil saw Caitlin’s lips part as if to speak, then come together in a reflective pout. After a while she sighed, put her elbow on the armrest, and rested her cheek on her palm.

  Suddenly she looked at him. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing. What do you mean?”

  “You’re staring at me.”

  “No I’m not. I was just stretching my neck.”

  “Well cut it out,” she snapped. “It’s distracting.”

  “Yeah, sure, fine,” Phil mumbled. Jimmy was right, he thought. The woman was a shrew. He crossed his arms and stared glumly at the stage.

  There he saw Juliet leaning on the railing of a small balcony, her dark, flowing hair bathed in soft light. Romeo stood in semidarkness on the other side of the stage. Turning toward the audience, he began to speak:

  But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?

  It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! . . .

  It is my lady! O, it is my love!

  O, that she knew she were!

  She speaks, yet she says nothing. What of that?

  Her eye discourses; I will answer it.

  I am too bold; ’tis not to me she speaks. . . .

  See how she leans her cheek upon her hand!

  O, that I were a glove upon that hand,

  That I might touch that cheek!