Ceremonies

examples may give you some notion of what sin really is.' '

Finally he looked up from the book, face oddly transfigured, almost ecstatic. 'Marvelous!' he said, all but smacking his lips. 'What do you suppose the man is driving at?'

Freirs shook his head, reluctant to involve himself in a discussion, yet drawn to the game. Around them several readers looked up with curiosity or annoyance. 'Obviously it's a kind of moral metaphor,' he said. 'Evil as a violation of normal physical law, an aberration – something like a disease. But the symbols he's dreamed up are unusual, to say the least.'

The old man nodded. 'Yes. Yes, I'm sure you're right. I can see that you're a very bright young man.' He smiled slyly. 'But then again, of course, they may not be symbols after all. For all we know, Machen may have meant them quite literally.'

Freirs had been glad when, at last, he'd wandered away, no doubt to bother some other unsuspecting soul. But now the damned book was gone too; the man must have walked off with it. Freirs looked around the room but didn't see him; nor, despite the lost book, was he especially sure that he wanted to.

Anyway, the day was almost over. He had his final class to teach at eight and wanted to get home first to prepare for it, to go over his students' papers and brush up on his Cahiers and Film Comments. Celluloid, swish pans, mises en scene. Another world, that one, far from gloomy monastics and their Gothic battlements, farther still from flowering stones and singing flowers. Beyond the window several seats behind him, shadows were lengthening in the garden, doggedly climbing the bricks. He checked his watch: almost five o'clock. He'd press on to the end of the chapter, then get the hell out of this place.

Sunlight still streamed freely through the second-story windows, but suddenly the old man's eyes narrowed as if he'd seen a shadow cross the sky. Frowning, he glanced quickly at his watch.

Across the room, summoned by an impatient gesture from Mrs Schumann (now reimmersed contentedly in the catalogues that covered her desk), Carol was leafing through a stack of books on dinosaurs for the benefit of a small boy and his mother, while a daughter awaited her turn. 'He just can't get enough of 'em,' the woman explained proudly, as her son studied pictures of steaming primeval swamps where monstrous reptiles preyed upon the weak, jaws tore flesh, and giant serpents struggled against batlike things with sharp-clawed wings and impossibly long beaks. None of it was real, Carol told herself; none of it had ever been real. Later, searching through Perrault and Andersen to find a fairy tale for the daughter, she stole a glance at the little man across the room. He was leaning against the windowsill, gazing idly at the book he'd carried upstairs. The sunlight from behind him made a nimbus of his hair. Suddenly, as if aware that she was watching him, he looked up and winked at her. His smile was radiant; even from the other side of the room it made her feel good.

So this, then, was to be her future employer. She still couldn't believe it was true. Nor could she believe that, for the duration of the summer, she would more than double her income. How could he afford to pay so much? He certainly didn't look rich; Carol recognized a cheap suit when she saw it. Was he a liar or a lunatic, and the job a hoax? Somehow she felt inclined to trust him. Perhaps he'd saved his money all his life, and now, reaching the end, found himself with no one else to give it to. She wondered how he'd made his living.

For her part, she reminded herself that she hadn't been entirely truthful with him. Thank God he didn't know that she was only an assistant here. As she read a page aloud, more to mother than daughter, she prayed she looked professional.' 'Whenever a good child dies, an angel of God comes down from heaven, takes the dead child in his arms, spreads out his great white wings, and flies with him over all the places which the child has loved during his life. Then he gathers a large handful of flowers-' ' Lord, no! So depressing. She handed the woman a Disney Cinderella and made sure the little girl approved.

Over by the window, the old man was staring at her. He nodded reassuringly. 'I see you have your hands full,' he said, when she'd returned to his side.

She laughed. 'Oh, today's one of our slow ones. You should come up here on a rainy afternoon. It's like a playground!' She smoothed back her hair. 'I'm used to that, though. I grew up with three sisters and a brother.'

'Ah, really.' His smile was a trifle vacant. 'I'm sure they're all very proud of you, coming to the big city like this.'

'Well, I – I do hope to make something of myself,' she said.

Perhaps she should try to impress him, lest he change his mind about the job. 'As a matter of fact, I'm planning to take some psychology courses next fall. In dance therapy.' If, she added mentally, I find the money. 'I may take night courses once or twice a week, up at Hunter.'

He gave a courtly nod. 'A fine institution. I know it well. This job should help you meet some of the expenses.' He began to turn away.

'Speaking of expenses,' she began, then regretted it.

'Yes?' His look was guarded.

'Well, you mentioned something about 'twelve dollars an hour plus expenses,' and I was just wondering' – she hoped she didn't sound greedy – 'not that it makes the least bit of difference, of course, but I was wondering what expenses you meant.'

He shrugged. 'The usual. Paper, photocopying, typewriter ribbon. .. You do own a typewriter, don't you?'

'Oh, yes, of course. That is, I have access to one. It's my roommate's. She's almost never home.' Some residual bitterness from the morning made her add, 'And when she is, she's in no position to use it.'

'A roommate, you say?' The little man pursed his lips. 'Hmmm. A bit of a free spirit, is she?'

Carol nodded. 'She thinks so, anyway. But-' She stopped herself; she really didn't mean to be unfair. 'It's not that she does anything wrong. We just come from totally different backgrounds. She went to a big state university; I went to a little Catholic school. Girls only.'

'And where might that be?' He didn't sound very interested. The shadows in the room shifted as a cloud passed in front of the sun.

'St Mary's, in Ambridge.' The little man blinked reflectively. 'I'm sure you've never heard of it,' she added. 'There are at least twenty others with the same name.' She looked past him, out the window. The fronds were tossing in the breeze.

He moved slightly, blocking her view. 'Indeed I have. It's just above the highway, am I right? At the top of a hill?'

'You're thinking of the high school,' she said. 'I went there too.' It was spooky, how much he seemed to know. 'You have nothing against parochial schools, I hope.'

'No, no, quite the contrary. They're the only places left that still teach proper English.' He moved away from the window. 'So you stayed within the fold, then. From St Mary's to St Mary's.'

She nodded. 'And then to St Agnes's, here in New York.'

'Another college?'

'It's a convent, actually. Over on West Forty-eighth Street.' She waited to see his reaction. 'I spent around six months there. I've only been out since January.'

'You – a nun? Why, I never would have guessed it!' His eyes twinkled merrily.

'Well, not really a nun. I only got as far as my novitiate, in fact. I never even put on a habit.' She noticed that, for all his professed astonishment, he didn't look particularly surprised. 'It was just something I felt I had to try,' she added. 'I realize now that I joined for the wrong reasons -1 mean, selfish reasons – but at the time there just seemed no place else to go. Things were really bad at home. My father was sick, and somehow I got it into my head that if I went and took the vows… well, that things might get better. Maybe my father would recover.'

He nodded. He seemed to understand. 'A kind of sacrifice,' he said. 'You made a very difficult choice.'

'Yes, I suppose so. But for a while I had the feeling that it wasn't really my choice at all. I felt as if somehow I'd been chosen.' She shrugged. 'I guess everybody feels that way at times: that they've been singled out for something special. I thought so, at any rate. It was a chance to give some direction to my life – which I thought I needed.'

'Direction, yes.' He appeared to consider this. 'But you didn't stay very long.'

'Well, you see… my father died.'

'Oh, how sad.’

'And anyway, the whole thing just wasn't for me. I began to think about all I'd be giving up – meeting someone, falling in love, getting married – and when you start having doubts like that, you know you're in the wrong place.' The memories returned. 'Still, I was so sure that I'd been-'