The Initiation (8 page)

“Don't call me that!”

“‘Dear' or ‘friend'?”

“Both. Either! Neither!”

“Part of that test, I should imagine, is your approach to solutions. The challenge, I'm talking about. It's not just what you accomplish, but how you accomplish it. Or, and I shudder at the thought, you are being set up to fail. In this case, to fall. To hurt yourself. Perhaps badly. I don't think any of us has been here long enough to make such
enemies, but this is the work of either an ally or an enemy, and you seem precious short of allies at the moment, having insulted your sister and this roommate only hours ago.”

“You are so strange,” James said.

“Rather than thinking how to retrieve it, ask yourself this: How was the envelope placed atop that beam in the first place? And before you make some critical or slanderous statement about me or my personality, let it be known Moria was the one who prompted this thought, not I.”

James sat down on the edge of his bed, temporarily without a comeback.

“This is important information, the placement of the second envelope. Did someone actually climb all the way to the middle of the center beam and leave an envelope there? When? It's no easy task. And why require it be at night? I'll tell you why—”

“I never doubted it.”

“Study hall. It had to be when no one would wander into the chapel and catch whoever's behind this while in the act.”

“But we were all in study hall.”

“Interesting, isn't it? Do we suspect a proctor? Perhaps! Given the school-wide study hall, if a student, he or she would have had to work quickly. A bathroom break during study hall? That's what
you'd think, but you'd be wrong. Moria again. The envelope has been there at least since this afternoon, when I discovered it. It didn't have to be found at night; whoever put it there
wanted
it to be found at night, wanted you to miss curfew or get caught. In any event, wanted you in trouble. That leads me to wonder if the envelope contains anything at all. It may not, you know? It may just be there to make you go get it.” He raised his dark eyebrows inquisitively on his chiseled, pinched face. “But again: to the placement! No one went out on that beam, James. It is dust covered, that beam. It would show shoe prints, or might have been wiped clean by someone sliding out there. The envelope was placed there without such an effort, and can be retrieved in like fashion with no risk to life or limb.”

“And of course you have figured out how.” James sounded as disgusted and discouraged as he was at that moment. “Who asked you? What gives you the right?”

Sherlock threw his head back as if slapped. “Is this your gratitude?”

“Shut up! Zip it, don't lip it. Clap your trap! Keep your nose—your beak!—out of my business and stay away from my sister. If you don't, I'm going to smash that beak into your face.”

“Clay Richmond and the skateboard,” Sherlock
said. “You two were passing notes at study hall. That little stunt of his was to help you slip away, correct? Do you think I'm the only one capable of drawing parallels, James? Do you honestly think some proctor was not watching you from the moment you left study hall?” Sherlock saw a spark of understanding or recognition in James's eyes. “What? What is it, James? You saw someone? You were approached? By whom? This is a most important piece of data, James, I assure you!”

“I said . . . shut up!”

“And I shall, for I need to hear something only twice, I assure you. Once can be out of emotion, but twice requires forethought. Consider the matter closed. But if you try to walk out on that beam, James, we will be shoveling what remains of you into a dust bin. So I'd get another plan if I were you. And believe me, that's rhetorical! I have no desire whatsoever to be you.”

M
Y ROOMMATES,
N
ATALIE AND
J
AMALA, ONE A
girl at home on a farm, the other a sleek African American girl from the Upper East Side of Manhattan, accompanied me to the dining room. We were heading there early because there are any number of card games played in the common room before dinner. It was a place to meet people, though none of us admitted that was her reason for going early. The maple, elm, and oak trees on campus were ginormous, their leaves clattering and swaying in the hilltop's constant and often chilly wind. A few were tinged with color,
signifying the premature arrival of a New England autumn that was by far my favorite season. I couldn't wait for it to arrive, and I didn't want it to arrive—because of the cold that followed. I felt caught between the like and dislike that pretty much described my daily sentiment since arriving at Baskerville. I had turned into a bit of an emotional yo-yo, loving the school, hating the school; loving my new friends, being scared of so many kids; overwhelmed by academics, secretly liking what I was learning. In Boston I'd had such a routine, most of it dictated by Father; here, I had to set a routine, find a routine, decide what mattered, and it all felt a bit out of my grasp.

While passing below the auditorium I overheard a single sniff of someone's nose. I stutter-stepped. I felt a deep, resonating connection to that sound; it triggered all sorts of images from my childhood.

“I'll catch up,” I told the others. “Deal me in.” I turned and hurried back to the twin doors, scurried up a staircase, and reached the auditorium. It took me nearly a minute to find James in the balcony, slumped down in the second row.

“Hey,” I said, when he refused to acknowledge me.

“Shut up!”

“What's wrong?”

“This is the last time I'll ever cry over him.”

“Father?”

“Nothing. He doesn't answer the phone. No letters. Emails. Nothing.”

“Not true! I got this!” I dug into my backpack and showed him the postcard. He read it and flipped it over several times.

“Atlantic City.”

My brother didn't miss much. “Traveling, like he said.”

“It's like he got rid of us, and that's it.” He wiped off the smeared tears. “I am so sick of this! We've never mattered to him!”

“He said he was traveling and he is,” I reminded him, feeling a knot in my throat. Father, not care? Impossible. “He told me we'd hear from him, and we have.”

“
You
have,” he said, emphasizing it to sting me.

“I would have shared it, but you treat me like I don't exist half the time. The same way you treat Sherlock. What is it with you? Why are you so mean to me and him?”

“He is such a jerk!”

“It's like you're someone else, and not a good someone else. It's me, Jamie. You and me, we're a team, right? We've always been a team. I hate the way you treat me like I'm nothing. And so
randomly! I never know which James Moriarty I'm talking to. Since when?”

“Go away!”

“See what I mean?” I sat down into one of the padded seats across the aisle from him, and began to cry. All my fears I'd kept contained and out of sight from my roommates came pouring out. James was familiar to me. He was comfort. My tears ran of their own accord. I didn't want to be crying.

“Listen, Mo . . .” He reached across the aisle toward me. It was an olive branch, a peace offering. It was my brother, not the James Moriarty of Baskerville.

“Moriarty!?” It was the voice of Bret Thorndyke from down below in the main part of the auditorium, but where we couldn't see him.

“Up here,” James called out, withdrawing the offer of his hand. His eyes darkened and I felt a chill up my spine. If my brother had been connected to that outstretched arm, a different James Moriarty was now looking at me. His entire demeanor had changed—he was another boy; not one you would want to meet in a dark alley.

I gasped his name, but the coldness of his rebuke sent more tears running down my cheeks. I felt isolated and afraid. A number of boys were thundering up the stairs. As yet unseen, Thorndyke
called out, “This meeting was your idea. You didn't have to hide from u—”

There were three boys. Bret, Clay Richmond, and Ryan Eisenower. Despite only a few weeks living here, I knew these were not the best-behaved boys in the school.

“Sorry,” James said to the others. “My sister is sniveling about how homesick she is.” He looked at me so intensely as if daring me to contradict him. I would be punished if I did, of that I had no doubt. “I'm trying to tell her it's going to work out. But look at her! What a child.”

The ache in my heart tore me into pieces, rendered me a blithering mess. My tears came harder than ever. I covered my face, came to my feet and pushed past the snickering boys, nearly fell down the stairs, and found my way outside. The deadness in my brother's eyes, the cold, calculating way he'd threatened me without a word. Me, his sister. I never made it to cards or dinner. I cried myself out in my room, alone, and fell into a poisonous, dreamless sleep.

“H
AVE YOU RECONSIDERED MY OFFER?”
S
HERLOCK
asked James confidentially during a chance encounter in the lunch cafeteria line.

“Shut it.”

“These hooligans you entered with . . .” Sherlock said, indicating the three boys currently kicking other kids out of their seats at one of the dining room's many large circular tables. They shooed the younger classmen away, clearing four seats together. “Is this the group you hope to use to . . . you know . . . go treasure hunting?”

“Don't know what you're talking about. You're
holding up the line. Are you going to eat or not?”

Sherlock moved down the stainless steel bins of hot lunch offerings, avoiding the rubberized chicken and motor oil gravy. He built himself a pita sandwich from lettuce, hummus, and tomatoes. Took hot tea as a beverage.

“You eat like a girl,” James said.

“Do you mean the manner in which I consume my meals, or the portions, or the content?”

“Forget it.”

“Oh! You simply meant it as a disparaging comment. I understand. Sticks and stones, and all that, James. You should know better.” He added cream to his tea, while James poured himself a fountain soda. “My offer, James, precludes the necessity for the . . . present company you are keeping. It involves,” he said, lowering his voice further, “a distraction such as flooding the girls' washroom, thereby removing our hall master, Mr. Cantell, and buying us time to investigate this properly.”

“You can't go into the girls' dorm,” James said, suddenly sounding interested.

“It's a matter of negative water pressure, my dear frerrrr—” Sherlock caught himself from using the term of endearment that his roommate abhorred. “If my calculations are correct—and when are they not?—a simultaneous flushing of
the boys' toilets and urinals, from the upper-level restroom, should result in an expulsion of sewage on the floor below. It's a venting problem. With too little vent air available, the downstairs plumbing will pull from the drains, and thus . . . Disgusting, but effective, I should think.”

“I don't need your help. I didn't ask for your help. You are strange to the point of annoying, Sherlock. Keep to yourself and stop bothering me. And change your socks or do something about your feet. I can hardly enter our room without gagging.”

“I didn't expect a personal attack,” Sherlock said, dismayed. “I'll forget I heard that.”

“Please don't,” said James, bumping Sherlock intentionally and spilling the boy's tea, soaking and disintegrating his pita sandwich.

A
SECOND DAY PASSED WITHOUT THE
B
IBLE'S
recovery, meaning a second night of all-school study hall and curfew. The gods of the Main House had extended the curfew by thirty minutes, allowing us to check mail or phone home before returning to our rooms. This was intended as a form of leniency when in fact it only served to remind us students that we remained on a tight leash.

Somewhat friendless, expecting no mail, and having no one to call, I headed to Samantha's room to borrow her calculator. Samantha and I shared math and science. (My calculator had disappeared
into my backpack, which at times resembled a fabric beast with a constant appetite; it remained unfound.) The stop included a sample of something called gooey butter cake, sent to her by an aunt from St. Louis, which lived up to its name by coating my fingers in a layer of a viscous, sugary substance that no matter how many times I licked, would not leave. I headed to the girls' room. I ran into a field hockey teammate, Latisha. Her dark, creamy complexion was the envy of all the girls, including me.

“You know,” I said, the two of us engaged in our mirrored reflections, “if I were Hannibal Lecter I'd just skin you and wear your face around so I could be seen with skin like that.”

“Who? That's gross.” Latisha looked at me and I realized I'd frightened her. I was learning the hard way that conversations James and I might have had did not work at Baskerville. It turned out that one's sense of humor is a personal thing; James and I shared a love of the grotesque. Not so apparently with Latisha.

“A serial killer.
The Silence of the Lambs
?”

“I've heard of it. Never saw it. You can have my skin.”

“I wish.”

“No, you don't. It's black, in case you didn't notice.”

“It's gorgeous.”

“If you are black at this school you are considered either a charity case, or the daughter of a professional athlete.”

“You can't be serious?”

“Believe it or not, my father is not a rapper, nor is he an artist. He happens to be a three-star general in the army. He's at the Pentagon now, but my parents and I chose Baskerville to get me away from our home in Virginia. My father's mother is living with us and she's out of her mind—like, literally,
stark raving mad
—and I just couldn't handle it anymore.”

“That's hard.” I considered bringing up my lack of a mother, my lack of any contact with grandparents, but kept it to myself.

“My father went here. So did my uncle. My father's on the board or something. He comes here a couple times a year.”

“Mine, too. I think.”

“I thought you owned the place.”

“Not hardly.”

“How many names of people of color at this school do you know, Moria?”

“I . . . ah . . .”

“It's ‘the Chinese chick' or ‘the black guy,' or ‘the skinny Indian kid,' right?” She didn't give me
time to answer. “But you don't say ‘the white kid with the big head,' when you're describing Robby Knight, do you? Of course you don't. See? It's like that.”

I laughed. “Robby Knight's head looks like a pumpkin, it's so big!” She laughed. I liked her.

“How long have you played field hockey?”

“Two years. You?”

“You're way better than I am,” I admitted. “You should be JV.”

“Not as a middle. Never going to happen.”

“How many kids have parents who went here?” I asked. “Like us?”

“Legacies?” Latisha said. “A lot. A very lot. An extreme, very lot. This place is like an exclusive club or something. My dad acts like he still goes here sometimes. It's kinda weird. It's like even after all the time in the army, this place is more important to him, you know? But his friends, a whole bunch of his besties, are from his time here at Baskerville. They're thick as thieves.”

“You know . . . now that you mention it, my father has friends like that, too. From here. I wonder if they know each other, our fathers?”

“Probably. My dad is totally dedicated to this place.”

“Let me ask you this: Does your father happen
to have these group meetings with businessmen and lawyer-types late at night?”

“How could you know that?”

Memories flooded me. “Like, four or five at a time? Expensive suits? Your dad all secretive about it?”

“My dad is in the army. He's secretive about what he eats for breakfast. It's just the way he is.”

“How long do the meetings last?”

“I don't know. I'm never awake when they leave.”

“Never? Never once were you curious?” She looked as if I'd caught her shoplifting. “Latisha?”

“Maybe. What about you?”

“Of course! Always! My brother and I are secret agents. We spy on Father constantly!”

“What about your mom?”

“I don't have one,” I said. “At least I don't think so. It's complicated.”

“That's awful.”

“You?”

“My mom might as well be in the army, too. She does everything my dad wants. All the time.”

“That's good, right?”

“It's too much, if you ask me. She says I know nothing about marriage and that when it's my turn I can have the marriage I want.”

“Snap!”

“Yeah, you got that right.”

“I kinda feel like—”

I was interrupted by what sounded like a burp, or something you'd hear from one of the stalls, except it was only Latisha and me. We both looked at the drain as a second, throaty belch emanated from below—a dragon fart, maybe? The toilets gurgled like boiling teapots. Something happened in the three showers that sounded like snakes hissing. Then the sinks chimed in, spinning the two of us around. We moved toward the door instinctively, but too late. The room's central drain erupted like Old Faithful spewing raw sewage in a blast of brown mist quickly followed by a stream of the unmentionable. Gobs of it. The drain itself broke free under the pressure and danced atop the vertical column of sludge like a tin hat. It splashed to the floor, which was already an inch deep and rising for our ankles. The stuff was filling the sinks, gushing over the rims of the toilets, and shooting from the shower drains.

It stopped. Latisha and I were brown and wet all the way through. We stumbled into the hall, where curious girls screamed at the sight and smell of us. Revolted, they hollered as a mob and pointed us back into the bathroom, where the tide
of excrement was already subsiding, though with the speed of cold honey at the bottom of the jar. We headed for the showers, disgusted by the slop under our shoes, and soon were standing beneath streams of warm water, washing the goop off our faces and out of our hair. I was so beyond disgusted that I threw up. My clothes were maybe 50 percent free of the stuff, but I could feel a layer of it between my clothes and skin and so I undressed right there in the shower. Hearing Latisha's clothes slap to the tile, I realized she'd had the same idea.

“Towels and robes!” she called out loudly to the girls in the hallway.

I lifted and lowered first one foot, then the other, unable to face the swirling goop I stood in. I heard proctors and a hall mistress and all kinds of adults shouting for the right to come in, but Latisha and I let them know only the women could enter and we needed robes and towels. I think half the school was in the dormitory by the time Latisha and I finally emerged, our hair up in towels, our feet still icky. Some teachers took us away and moved us along to a neighboring dorm and got us into clean showers there. I stayed under the water for over half an hour, washed my hair five times. Then twice more. The whole time, I thought about what Latisha and I had discovered about our
fathers. I was haunted especially by her telling me how many legacies were at the school. How many of them, I wondered, had fathers or mothers who visited late at night, making trips to places they disguised with postcards, warning their children what to do if they disappeared? What was going on at Baskerville, and how were the Moriartys involved?

What I remembered more than anything was this: Sherlock standing halfway down the stairs where one dorm connected to the other, his face serious, his eyes locked onto me. What he lacked was any look of surprise, any curiosity—his hallmark. As I'd been shuttled between dorms, Sherlock had stood there above me, knowing and purposeful.

It was, I thought, almost as if he'd expected this.