George

  “William used to be my partner, you know,” Ben said to Mr. Berkowitz. Mr. Berkowitz nodded. “We are sort of good friends,” Ben added. Mr. Berkowitz nodded again.

  George was disgusted. He knew what Ben was doing. Ben was trying to make an impression; he wanted Mr. Berkowitz to be so impressed with him that he would mention him to William. Ben didn’t know about friendship. George did. Friendship came naturally to George. It was always George who understood things that didn’t make sense, and he knew that friendship is the most unreasonable thing in this world. A person can have a hundred reasons for not liking a guy and not a single one for liking him; he just does. Hadn’t he made friends with quarrelsome Howie? But Ben thought that he had to advertise to sell his friendship.

  Mr. Berkowitz, not realizing Ben’s real reasons for asking, explained that William and Cheryl were to make amides, which were a particular kind of chemical the class would study later. He took a shell and wrote in the sand at the edge of the blanket, and Ben nodded yes when he understood and also when he didn’t. He decided that he would look up everything he didn’t know when he returned home. The last thing in the world he wanted to do was to appear stupid. He silently spoke the names of the chemicals that Mr. Berkowitz mentioned hoping that, even though they involved organic chemistry, he could count on George to help him remember what he would need to know.

  But George had first friendship and then something else on his mind: Mr. Berkowitz’s voice was different from the voice he used in the classroom. In class he was patient and matter-of-fact. Today he was patient and eager. Mr. Berkowitz was showing off! Not for Howard who was paying no attention and not for Ben who already knew how smart and nice he was. Not for George—certainly not for George. Mr. Berkowitz was performing for Charlotte Carr; for at the same time that George was noticing Mr. Berkowitz’s voice, Ben was noticing that Mr. Berkowitz’s eyes, if not his head, turned in the direction of his mother. Ben knew that she was just out of range, and that made his teacher’s eyes slide ever more in her direction; something just out of reach is what tantalizing is.

  Mrs. Carr felt those eyes, and she wanted to express interest, so she asked a question. “Is the William you are talking about, the William who has been your partner, Ben?” Mr. Berkowitz answered yes.

  “Who is William’s partner this year, Ben?”

  “Cheryl Vanderver. She has a car and drives him to school every day.”

  “What kind of car?” Howard asked.

  “A Mustang. A red one.”

  “No wonder he changed partners if being Cheryl’s partner means that he gets a ride in a red Mustang every day. Sure beats the dumb school bus.”

  “He doesn’t get a ride because he’s her partner. He gets a ride because she likes him. She comes all the way across town to pick him up.”

  Charlotte Carr laughed. “I wonder how his parents feel about that. They sold their old house last year and bought one in Shadowlawn, one that they could almost afford, so that William wouldn’t have to spend an hour and fifteen minutes of each day of his senior year on the school bus. Shadowlawn is only a twenty minute bus run from Astra, and here he is getting a ride anyway.”

  “Yeah,” said Howard. “If they hadn’t moved, William would have had a longer ride in the Mustang.”

  “That is not the point I was trying to make,” Charlotte Carr said. “But I was wrong to try to make the point that I was trying to make. So, Howard, why don’t you go down to the water and build one of your giant sandcastles?”

  Howard answered, “I was just going to do that anyway.”

  Off he went, and Ben soon joined him. Ben felt uneasy, not quite knowing why, but knowing that the feeling was familiar and happening often lately. George knew what was causing it and didn’t like it. Not at all. Ben had wanted to impress Mr. Berkowitz, and he wasn’t sure if he had succeeded. Ben had always felt that he, George, made him special enough, and he had never felt the need to try to impress anyone before.

  Ben piled up sand for the first of his sand pillars. George knew that Ben had hoped that after a few thoughtful nods of his head, he would be able to offer Mr. Berkowitz some sharp and clever idea of his own or even catch his teacher in a slight error. See, see clever me. Only lately had Ben begun using his special skills to collect attention and buy friends instead of using them so that he and Ben could grow together. Ben started another turret, and Howard moved over to trim the one that Ben had just completed. Ben had to realize that he was only twelve years old and already something of a specialist. Too much of a specialist. Ben began digging the moat around the newest hump of sand that would become another castle tower. He was rushing to build one turret after another. Howard was two behind on the trim jobs. Ben was doing only his part, building more towers and building them faster and faster and never taking time to look at the whole thing. He was doing that with his life, too. And George’s.

  George knew that he must not permit Ben to give up having time in his life for looking at the trimmings and looking at the whole. Especially now, now at this tender age George worried about losing touch with Ben. He wanted to help Ben know things. Except for organic chemistry, hadn’t he always helped? He wanted Ben to be deep in one field, but he also wanted to help Ben not-know. He wanted, oh! he wanted, Ben to think clearly about everything, especially about himself, but he also wanted to help Ben to not-know. To not-know gracefully. There were times when great truth could come from the not knowing part. Ben had to allow room, allow time for not knowing. But he couldn’t if all he wanted was to be clever instead of real.

  George thought all these things, but all he said was, “I don’t give a damn about William’s project.”

  And Ben answered, “Well, I do.”

  Their sandcastle was enormous, elaborate and fancy; it gave a nice appearance; it made a good impression. It was polished, the work of specialists. Children and wandering adults expressed amazement. Ben and Howard listened to the praises of the people. Respect for sandcastles comes cheap and lasts only as long as the tide allows. George realized then that it would take a quiet revolution to keep Ben from making a sandcastle of his life, building turrets of science surrounded by moats of silence and from wanting praise and friendship instead of growth for his skills.

  The tide was beginning to move in, so they returned to the Navy blanket and saw that everything was packed up, ready. Mrs. Carr and Mr. Berkowitz shook hands and said how much they had enjoyed the afternoon. They mentioned how they ought to get together again soon. Neither of them had gone into the water.

  Mrs. Carr looked in the mirror after they got home. She next looked in the refrigerator, then back in the mirror and announced that she was going on a diet. Although Ben had had the same thought just a few hours earlier, he did not enjoy hearing his mother say it.

  George remarked, “The Pillsbury Princess is getting programmed for romance.” That, too, annoyed Ben. He didn’t like having George tell him things that he didn’t want to hear and that were correct.

  The next evening Mr. Berkowitz appeared at the Carr home carrying a bottle of acetone. He happened to remember that he had some at home, and he happened to think why wait until Ben came back to school to get the Vaseline out of the pillowcases. He paused and added, “And I happened to think that if I gave you the acetone, you might give me a cup of coffee.”

  “One taste of her coffee, and he’ll happen to want to soak the pillowcases in it and drink the acetone,” George said.

  four

  The weeks of school from Thanksgiving until Christmas are stretched thin by the pull of vacation at either end. There is the tug of dontgetgoing, dontgetgoing and the countertug of finishup, finishup. Monday of any week needs a shove towards Tuesday. Monday is no time for beginning, and yet it was on the Monday, that tug-owar Monday, that the mysterious disappearances began. Trouble. It appeared like a pimple on the stretched skin of time between the holidays.

  That Monday Ben and Karen divided their lab work as usual. Ben had finished putting all hi
s leftover chemicals into envelopes he had brought from home: He had done his homework, had studied the lab procedure, and had known that there would be extras. William appeared at their table bringing his and Cheryl’s. “Still collecting?” he asked Ben. And Ben, who thought that William was trying to make up for having taken his benzene during the distillation experiment, said yes. He had felt shy with William lately; George could have made him feel more at ease, but George wouldn’t. As William presented Ben with his leftovers, he announced to the class, or at least to those who were close enough to hear, which included Mr. Berkowitz, “I hear, Ben, that if we mixed together all the chemicals in your house, threw in your brother and the kitchen sink, we’d have …”

  “… chemicals, a mess in the sink, and a furious little brother,” George finished.

  William thought that Ben laughed at him. Later Ben heard William repeating to Cheryl what he had said to Ben. William had said a giraffe, which was not funny. Certainly not funny enough to bother repeating, George thought.

  Their equipment had been put away, their table had been wiped with the roll of paper towels they had been asked to bring from home, and Ben and Karen were checking their results when Mr. Berkowitz announced that Ron was missing his condenser. Everyone was asked to check his desk to see if by some chance the condenser was misplaced. There followed a whoosh of drawers opening and a rattle as they were searched. Then a hard clap as cupboard doors were opened, and still the condenser was missing. Everyone was mystified but convinced that it would turn up eventually. Someone thought of checking the trash containers; it was not there either. Drawers and cupboards were closed with shrugs and without concern.

  On Wednesday William missed a small spatula and Cheryl missed an entire set of beakers, sizes 400 ml to 25 ml. After that, there was never a day in that tarpaulin of time from Thanksgiving recess until Christmas that something was not missing. Something as unimportant as two test tubes, which someone might have thrown away rather than wash, or something like three-hole rubber stoppers or glass tubing that someone could possibly have miscounted. Cork stoppers and rubber tubing and Erlenmeyer flasks and a separating funnel, the only one in the whole science department. Mr. Berkowitz had lent it to Lacey, one of the seniors.

  As the weeks tapered toward Christmas, the tumult in the classroom grew. At first it was just a thin wind of excited disturbance, but the climate changed. By the third week everyone felt that he was working in a thick, class-bound fog. No one wanted to take the problem to the school principal; the future of the science program should not be determined by something as unreasonable as a list of thefts. The class became anxious for vacation to begin because they all wanted to leave the problem; perhaps a break in the routine would break the chain of thefts. Mr. Berkowitz walked around the room more and more; he was monitoring. On the last Monday he discovered that an electric heater was missing from the stockroom; he announced to the class that he was going to the principal. He looked sad and tired, and everyone wanted to help him. Almost everyone.

  William suggested that they get an actual count of what was missing. He said that he knew that no one could buy his way out of trouble; but perhaps if they replaced everything that was missing by contributing some of the Christmas money that they were bound to get, they could start fresh with the new year. He announced that he had discussed the problem with his parents, and they had consented to his working in the drugstore to help pay for the equipment.

  Mr. Berkowitz said that the thefts bothered him less than the idea of the thefts. It was hateful to think that his students would take advantage of the freedom that he felt they should have. He told William to make the list anyway.

  So William took a clipboard and pen and approached everyone in the class and asked him to write down everything that he was missing. “Be it little or be it big, write it down,” he said. Everyone did. The seniors were missing the most. Making lists is one way to get things out of your system. Which is all right if it is used to start and not to finish.

  Ben and Karen were missing four test tubes and one small evaporating dish. William raised his eyebrows. Ben didn’t know what to make of that, and since George could not see it, George at that moment didn’t bother to make anything of it.

  Messenger-Flash-William took the paper to Mr. Berkowitz and hinted that he would find it interesting. Mr. Berkowitz glanced at it, folded it, and put it in the inside pocket of his jacket. He said that he would look it over later, but he already knew what William meant.

  The Carrs were just finished with supper when the doorbell rang. Mrs. Carr was sitting at the table doing the crossword puzzle, and she walked to the door carrying the paper. She looked through the small diamond-shaped window on the door, said “Omigosh,” squatted down so that none of her showed out of the window and made a backwards squatting retreat calling, “Howard! Howard, answer the door.” Then she stooped to pick up her shoes by the door and scooted into the bathroom and was not heard from again until she clattered out of the bathroom, made up from top to bottom—from lipstick to shoes—and said, “Why, Mr. Berkowitz, how nice to see you.”

  Mr. Berkowitz smiled; his teeth looked like a row of Chiclets beneath his moustache. His smile did not last. He asked Mrs. Carr if she would like to have a cup of coffee with him. In private. Mrs. Carr hesitated as she reviewed the mental picture of the congealed mess in the kitchen. She always did the crossword puzzle after supper. Mr. Berkowitz, noticing her hesitation, suggested that he would like to take her out for coffee if she wouldn’t mind leaving the boys alone for about an hour.

  The hour was an hour and forty-five minutes long.

  Ben was pleased at Mr. Berkowitz’s interest in his mother as long as he didn’t have to watch it happening. George told him, though, “He’s more interested in what is going on in the classroom than he is in what’s going on in this house at the moment.”

  “You. You were the first one to say that Mother was interested in Mr. Berkowitz as a date.”

  “I was the first one to say it, but we were both the first ones to think it. Together, Ben, we thought it. But tonight your mother and Mr. Berkowitz have different reasons for wanting coffee.”

  “He likes her. I can tell. And if you were honest about it, you could tell, too.”

  “Benjamin Body, I am never anything but honest; you don’t always choose to recognize that, but I am honest, and really rather charming. You don’t always choose to recognize that either. But right now, I would say that Mr. Berkowitz is discussing with your mother all those thefts in the lab. He likes our Chef Burn-Ar-Dee all right, but he likes order in the classroom also.”

  “Are you talking about the lab? About those thefts in the lab?”

  “The lab. The organic chemistry class; it’s all the same. I haven’t noticed you skating me down the hallway to go from one to the other. Yes, I am talking about the thefts in your lab.”

  “What do you know about them that I don’t?”

  “I know, dear Benjamin, that you are Prime Suspect One. And that Karen is suspect one prime.”

  “How come you know that?”

  “Because I’m here and you’re there, and I don’t get confused by a lot of outside happenings. I can come to conclusions faster than you can.”

  George was right.

  Mr. Berkowitz did not stay long after he brought Mrs. Carr home, and she sent Howard to bed right after that. She wanted to talk to Ben alone. They went into the kitchen and as they talked, they cleared up the storm damage, which is what George always called the aftermath of one of Mrs. Carr’s meals. Mrs. Carr was washing dishes as she asked, “Is there anything you want to tell me, Ben?”

  “I told you so. I told you so,” George chanted inside of Ben.

  “If you mean all that equipment that is missing from the chem lab, Mom, I had nothing to do with it.”

  “I didn’t even mention the lab equipment, Ben. What makes you bring that up first thing?”

  “Listen, Mom, with Mr. Berkowitz coming over and all tha
t has been going on in class and that list being passed around today, it doesn’t take a powerful brain to figure that out.”

  George said, “Humphf.”

  Mrs. Carr said, “That’s true, I guess. Anyone could have figured that out.”

  “But not as fast,” said George. “You know that without me, Ben, you’d be only half as smart as you are.”

  “Anyone only one-fourth as smart as me could have figured that out,” Ben said to his mother (and to George).

  Mrs. Carr continued. She spoke slowly. “You have that whole big collection of stuff in your room, Ben. We mentioned it to Mr. B. during our post-Thanksgiving picnic, remember? You know, I felt that I didn’t want to show it to him. I think that it would be hard for someone to believe that everything in there was leftover from class this year.”

  “It wasn’t. I saved stuff last year and the year before, too. Chipped test tubes and odds and ends of glass tubing. You don’t doubt me, do you, Mom?”

  “I believe in you, Ben.”

  “But do you believe me? Believing in me means that you think that if I took the stuff from the lab, I had a good reason for doing it. Believing me means that you know that I didn’t do it at all if I tell you that I didn’t do it at all. I need to feel that you do both—believe me and believe in me.”

  “Sometimes, Ben, we do things that we aren’t completely in charge of. Sometimes, Ben, our inner self is a very different person from our outer self, and the one loses contact with the other and acts irresponsibly.”

  “I am on excellent speaking terms with my inner self, Mother. I didn’t take the lab equipment, and my inner self didn’t tell me to do it without letting me know about it. Now, do you believe me?”

  “Yes. But a little too late. Ben, I got carried away by seeing that list. You and Karen were missing just enough. Just enough to try to throw suspicion off. Karen swore that she took nothing but said that she wasn’t sure about you. And Mr. Berkowitz wondered if you resented not being allowed to do research. He was really concerned about you, Ben. I respect him so much. I was too ready to jump to conclusions.” Mrs. Carr pulled Ben toward her. “I told him that I would talk to you about stopping all this.” Ben stiffened. Mrs. Carr continued, “I told him that I was certain that if you were responsible for all the trouble in the lab, that if you were unconsciously stealing, I was sure that you could bring those urges under control. Ben, I told him that without talking to you.” Mrs. Carr shook her head, dropped her hands from Ben’s shoulders, and said softly, “I sure get a D minus in motherhood today.”