Oh that dirty bastard! That simple goddamned bird-brained Mongolian idiot, the principal of a high school! He couldn’t be the principal on a 12.00 mortgage. I should have told him to shove his job where his hemorrhoids are. No wonder the bastard carries a scar. Some teacher probably stabbed him with a razor-sharp Delaney card.
Rick smiled at the absurdity of his own observation, a little ashamed over his I-should-have-said behavior.
He’s not the real bastard, he realized suddenly. The real bastard is whoever dumped the idea into his empty head. Miller, of course, Miller. Goddamn Miller to Hell! Goddamn Miller and his tricky goddamned handsome smile! The little bastard is like a snake; every time he bites, he spreads more venom. I wish I were Max Schaefer. I’d clobber the little bastard until he couldn’t do a pushup if he had four arms.
The hell with them, he thought viciously. The hell with ’em all. All but six. Save them for pallbearers, and the hell with all the rest of them.
And, of course, he knew he didn’t mean this at all.
He made his way up to the second floor after glancing at his wrist watch. It was 1:40, and the seventh period began at 1:50, and he could thank William Small, protector of the minority, for having swiped his free time. It was a good thing he’d eaten his lunch during the fourth period. Suppose he’d waited until the sixth, as he frequently did? Oh, what difference did it make? He wouldn’t have felt like eating anyway, not after that stomach-turning exhibition. This isn’t a school, he reflected, it’s a police state. We ought to wear swastikas on our arms, and we ought to give Small the upraised finger salute whenever we see him. Here’s to Small, long live Small, a damned fine guy, a stupid bastard who doesn’t know his brass from his oboe, a clever chap whose brains leaked out that time they stabbed him in the head. Assuming there were any brains there to begin with. Assuming he’d been stabbed and hadn’t cut himself while shaving and wasn’t just using a fine variation of the slobbering technique, the variation that was similar to the veteran hook. Here’s to Small, who had been appropriately named by a most wise Providence, despite his physical height. Here’s to small Small, and here’s to Miller, the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, the sonofabitch who started it all. And here’s to Eagle-eye Stanley, whose observations were right on the button, who wouldn’t know prejudice if it came up and hit him on the head with an African war club.
He reached the second floor and started down the corridor, and that was when he heard the din coming from Josh Edwards’ room, and he forgot his own troubles immediately. He walked rapidly to Josh’s room, remembering that this was the sixth period, and remembering that this was the class that’d smashed Josh’s records, now liberated from their penmanship exercises in the auditorium. He remembered all this, and he rushed to the door and looked through the glass panels. Josh sat calmly at his desk, and the kids were romping all over the room, shouting, yelling at the tops of their voices. Rick rapped on one glass panel, and Josh looked at him, and then waved.
Rick motioned for him to come outside a moment, and Josh stood, smiled out at the hell-raising kids in his class, and then walked nonchalantly to the door, opening it and stepping outside.
“Hello, Rick,” he said, smiling. He’d got a new pair of glasses, and they changed the appearance of his face, but the sadness in his eyes, behind the new glasses, despite the smile on his mouth, changed the appearance of his face even more.
Rick looked through the glass panels again, anxiously this time, observing the disorderly conduct of the class. “Any trouble, Josh?” he asked, concerned.
“Trouble?” Josh’s eyebrows climbed onto his forehead. “No, no trouble.” He glanced over his shoulder. “You mean the way the bastards are acting up? That’s not trouble.”
“Well, I thought...”
“You thought I should quiet them down, Rick? That it? I would ordinarily. Not today, pal.”
“What do you mean? What’s so special about today?”
“Today... November 24th, isn’t it... today is a very special day, Rick. Mark the date well.”
“What happened, Josh? What is it?”
“Mr. Stanley and I had a delightful little chat earlier today, Rick. Charming. Really quite touching, too, if you look at it a certain way. Tragic, almost.”
“What kind of a chat?” Rick asked.
“A fairly one-sided one, I’m afraid. I did most of the talking. Do you want a blow-by-blow report, or can I sum it up for you?”
“Sum it up,” Rick said.
“It can be summed up in two words, clearly and concisely. I quit.”
“You what?”
“I quit. I tendered my resignation. I am dropping from the roll call. I’m fading into the sunset. I’m leaving. Going, going, gone. I quit.”
“No. No, you didn’t.”
“Ah, but I did. Verily, truthfully. I did indeed quit. So, you see, I don’t give a damn what these little bastards do for the next two days. I’m through then. Off for Thanksgiving, and that’s the last I’ll see of Manual Trades. By God, it’ll be a good Thanksgiving this year.”
“Look, Josh...”
“I really did quit, Rick, I mean it. Stanley was terribly sorry to see me go, but that’s the way it is, and all that sort of crap, you know. It’s the first few months that separate the men from the boys, Rick. I’m just a boy, I guess.” The smile dropped from his mouth, leaving only the sadness in his eyes, and Rick remembered what he’d said about wanting to teach ever since he’d been a kid. He rested his hand on Josh’s arm and said, “Look, let’s talk about this a little more, okay? After school.”
“Sure,” Josh said, “if you want to.”
“Yes, I’d like to. I’ll see you after the eighth, okay?”
“Fine,” Josh said, nodding. The bell sounded, hanging in the empty corridor like the strident shriek of an eagle. “There it is,” Josh said. “Beginning of the seventh period. That cuts it down to one day and two periods. Then liberation.”
The boys were already piling out of Josh’s room, and doors were opening all along the corridor, spewing kids who joined the departmental stream.
“I’ll see you later,” Rick said.
He started down the corridor, and Josh stood in the doorway of his room, smiling at the moving stream, nodding his head at the boys, his eyes never joining in the fun. Like a man on a high rock overlooking a river. From behind him someplace, Rick heard the shouted word “Daddy-oh!” but he did not turn. He was thinking about Josh, and he thought about him all through the seventh and eighth periods, and he almost forgot completely about his brush with Small. And finally it was 3:25, and his day was over. He packed his briefcase, hastily window-poled the windows shut, picked up his coat, and locked the door to 206. Josh was waiting in his room across the hall.
He was sitting at his desk, leaning back in his chair, looking up at the ceiling. He did not notice Rick when he entered the room, did not turn until Rick was standing beside his desk.
“Oh, hello, boy,” he said. He looked down at Rick’s feet and asked, “You wearing sneakers?”
“You seemed lost,” Rick said. “Didn’t want to startle you.”
“Nothing can startle me anymore,” Josh said. “You ready to go?”
“Well, I wanted to talk a little.”
“Do we have to do it here? I’ve got my brother’s car with me. I’ll drive you home, and we can talk then.”
“Well, gee, that’s awfully nice of you,” Rick said.
“My last magnanimous gesture,” Josh said. “Come, let’s go. I get claustrophobia sitting here.”
They punched out, and when they reached the car. Josh asked, “Are you in a hurry to get home?”