A Separate Peace.pdf - Southwest High School

100"Here! Go get him," said Brinker immediately to the two boys who had come with us. "Hemust be in Carhart's rooms if he hasn't gone back home."I kept quiet. To myself, however, I made a number of swift, automatic calculations: thatLeper was no threat, no one would ever believe Leper; Leper was deranged, he was not ofsound mind and if people couldn't make out their own wills when not in sound mind certainlythey couldn't testify in something like this.The two boys left and the atmosphere immediately cleared. Action had been taken, so thewhole issue was dropped for now. Someone began making fun of "Captain Marvel," the headof the football team, saying how girlish he looked in his graduation gown. Captain Marvelminced for us in his size 12 shoes, the sides of his gown swaying drunkenly back and forthfrom his big hips. Someone wound himself in the folds of the red velvet curtain and peered outfrom it like an exotic spy. Someone made a long speech listing every infraction of the rules wewere committing that night. Someone else made a speech showing how by careful planning wecould break all the others before dawn.But although the acoustics in the Assembly Hall were poor, those outside the room wereadmirable. All the talk and horseplay ended within a few seconds of the instant when the firstperson, that is myself, heard the footsteps returning along the marble stairway and corridorstoward us. I knew with absolute certainty moments before they came in that there were threesets of footsteps coming.Leper entered ahead of the other two. He looked unusually well; his face was glowing, hiseyes were bright, his manner was all energy. "Yes?" he said in a clear voice, resonant even inthis room, "what can I do for you?" He made this confident remark almost but not quite toPhineas, who was still sitting alone in the middle of the room. Finny muttered something whichwas too indecisive for Leper, who turned with a cleanly energetic gesture toward Brinker.Brinker began talking to him in the elaborately casual manner of someone being watched.Gradually the noise in the room, which had revived when the three of them came in, subsidedagain.Brinker managed it. He never raised his voice, but instead he let the noise surrounding itgradually sink so that his voice emerged in the ensuing silence without any emphasis on hispart—"so that you were standing next to the river bank, watching Phineas climb the tree?" hewas saying, and had waited, I knew, until this silence to say."Sure. Right there by the trunk of the tree. I was looking up. It was almost sunset, and Iremember the way the sun was shining in my eyes.""So you couldn't . . ." I began before I could stop myself.There was a short pause during which every ear and no eyes were directed toward me, andthen Brinker went on. "And what did you see? Could you see anything with the sun in youreyes?""Oh sure," said Leper in his new, confident, false voice. "I just shaded my eyes a little, like