The next day in school, when the story got around, Rick didn’t correct the misapprehension either. Between classes and during the lunch period, he met many other members of the Prospectors. All had heard of the incident, and all had admiring comments to make.
The story grew in passage. By the close of school the version was that Rick had stood his ground even after the police arrived, and had straight-facedly described the victim’s assailants, giving totally wrong descriptions. Rick found himself the hero of a living legend.
Heroism to this new group, he gradually realized, consisted of outmaneuvering constituted authority. He saw evidence of this all around him. Daring little bits of misbehavior were performed all day long, right under the noses of teachers. There was no purpose in them other than to run the deliberate risk of apprehension and punishment. Boys who succeeded in harassing their teachers most, yet managed to go undetected, drew the most admiration.
The commonest trick was a bit of mild vandalism known as “flashing,” which was breaking light bulbs in their sockets. The usual weapon was a rubber band and a paper clip. Generally this was practiced in the halls between classes rather than in class, for then the corridors were so full of students, it was impossible to tell from which direction a missile came.
A bulb would explode just as a teacher passed beneath it, often showering him with glass. When he glared around, most students would be moving sedately along the hall, engrossed in conversation with companions, others would be bending over drinking fountains or reading the bulletin board. None, apparently, ever saw or heard a bulb burst.
Max was particularly expert at flashing. He could hit a bulb at fifteen paces without breaking stride.
No one Rick talked to seemed concerned at how badly the victim of the beating had been hurt. When he continued to get non-committal and indifferent replies to his questions as to whether anyone had heard, he stopped asking. It wasn’t until that evening, when he found a brief mention of the incident on an inside page of the paper, that Rick learned the injuries hadn’t been serious. The victim was described as having a broken nose and facial lacerations. The only description of his assailants he had been able to give was that they were all teen-agers.
At eight-thirty that evening Junior again met Rick in front of the latter’s apartment building. Together they walked to Grand Army Plaza and picked up Pat Quincy.
When Rick asked what she’d like to do, she said, “Let’s drop by the Cardinal Shop.”
“Will it be all right?” Rick asked. “I mean, Max didn’t say anything at school today.”
“After the way the bunch took to you today, you’re practically a Prospector,” she assured him. “It’s just a matter of formality to vote you in at the next meeting.”
“When’s that?” Junior asked.
“Thursday’s meeting night. Meantime, you don’t have to be outcasts. We’ll have to ask Max if it’s all right to come in, of course. But nobody’s likely to make a big thing of it.”
Pat proved to be right. At the Cardinal Shop Rick and Junior stood self-effacingly just inside the doorway while Pat went to get permission from Max for them to join the group. Max came over and clapped both boys on the shoulders in a gesture of welcome.
“Draw up a Coke and sit down, studs,” he said.
The evening was a repetition of the first. Inside the Cardinal Shop there was no sign of the constant show-off behavior the group engaged in outside of it. Possibly this was because here there was no constituted authority to revolt against.
The bald-headed Pop was more in the status of a tolerated servant than a proprietor. The Prospectors had so taken over the Cardinal Shop that they, not Pop, ran the place. He had no authority either to order anyone out, or to permit in anyone not approved by his clientele. Max settled any disorders, and there was a remarkable lack of disorder. It occurred to Rick that if the teachers at school operated on the same psychology Pop used, their discipline problem would be solved.
During the evening Max called Rick and Junior aside for a private conference. “The guys and I have been talking you men over,” he said. “I’m planning to put you up for citizenship Thursday night.”
Rick said, “Swell, Max,” and Junior said, “We sure appreciate that.”
“You got to be voted in, of course, but nobody’s been talking against you.”
“How about Artie?” Rick asked.
“He’ll be all right. Maybe he’s a little peeved about you taking over his witch and beating him in a fight, but you got to give a reason for a blackball. This is a democratic organization. You can’t give a personal reason like that. It has to be something really against the candidate, like being chicken or squealing on a member.”
Rick said, “I see.”
“Of course you’ll have to do a chore before you get in.”
“What’s that mean?” Junior asked.
“Just something the club picks for you to do. To prove you’re worthy to belong. Sort of an initiation stunt.”
“Like what?” Rick inquired.
Max waved a vague hand. “Might be anything. But don’t worry. When we really want a stud in, we don’t pick something so hard he can’t make it. It’s only when some of the guys are a little against him that we really make it tough.”
Rick went to bed with mixed feelings that night. He was proud of having been chosen for membership in the Prospectors so quickly after arriving in the neighborhood. But he was a little disturbed by the members’ pattern of behavior. It was so totally different from that of his Philadelphia fraternity crowd.
He also wondered a little uneasily what his chore was going to be.
5
The next morning at breakfast Rick announced rather proudly that he’d been asked to join the Prospectors. His mother smiled vaguely and said, “That’s nice, dear.”
His father said, “What in the devil is the Prospectors?”
“A club,” Rick told him. “The top organization around here. All the important guys belong.”
“Yeah?” Big Sam Henderson said. “Connected with the school, is it?”
“Well, not exactly. Most of the fellows are in school. But it’s not sponsored by a school adviser or anything.”
“Who is it sponsored by?”
“By itself,” Rick said. “It’s just a club. Sort of like an unchartered fraternity.”
“What are the dues?”
Rick creased his forehead. “Gee, I never asked. I don’t know if there are any.”
“What does the club do?” his father asked.
“Do?”
“What’s its purpose?” Big Sam asked. “Every club has some purpose. Rotary’s a community service, for instance.”
“It’s not like Rotary,” Rick said impatiently. “It’s just a club.”
His father said, “You don’t seem to know much about the organization.”
“I know it’s the biggest thing around here,” Rick told him. “You don’t understand. It’s really something to be asked in so soon after moving here.”
Big Sam merely grunted and dropped the subject. But that evening after dinner he had more to say on the matter. He called Rick into the front room for a discussion. “I asked around at the shop about this Prospectors Club you want to join,” he told Rick. “You know what it really is?”
“What you mean?” Rick asked.
“It’s a kid gang,” Big Sam said bluntly. “Half the kids in it have juvenile records. The cops are after them all the time.”
Rick stared at him. “Who told you that?”
“Men at the shop who have lived in this neighborhood all their lives. It’s about the toughest bunch in this whole section. They’re nothing but a bunch of juvenile hoods.”