The Chocolate War

Janza had been too shocked and surprised to react quickly. By the time he had recovered, Archie was at the doorway, poised to flee if Janza made a move.

'Better hand over that camera,' Janza called.

'If you're going to jack off in a toilet, at least lock your door,' Archie taunted.

'The lock's broken,' Emile,replied. 'All the locks are broken.'

'Well, don't worry, Emile. Your secret is safe with me.'

Now Janza turned from Archie and spotted a freshman hurrying across the street, evidently worried because he was afraid of being late for classes. It took a year or two to develop the timing that allowed you to linger until the last possible moment at the doorway.

'Hey, freshman,' Janza called.

The kid looked up, panic-stricken, when he saw Janza.

'Afraid you're going to be late?'

The kid gulped, nodding his head.

'Have no fear, freshman.'

The final whistle blew. Exactly forty-five seconds to make it to homerooms.

'I'm all out of cigarettes,' Emile declared, patting his pockets.

Archie smiled, knowing what Janza planned. Janza considered himself a candidate for The Vigils and he was always trying to impress Archie.

'What I'd like, kid, is for you to run over to Baker's and buy me a pack of cigarettes.'

'I haven't got any money,' the boy protested. 'And I'll be late for school.'

'That's life, kid. That's the way it goes. Heads I win, tails you lose. If you haven't got the money, steal the smokes. Or borrow the money. Just meet me at lunch with the cigarettes. Any brand. Emile Janza's not fussy.' Tossing in his name so that the kid would know who he was dealing with in the event he hadn't been tipped off about Emile Janza.

Archie lingered, knowing he was flirting with a tardy rap. But he was fascinated by Janza, crude and gross as he was. The world was made up of two kinds of people — those who were victims and those who victimized. There was no doubt about Janza's category. No doubt about himself, either. And no doubt about the kid, taking off down the hill, tears spilling onto his cheeks as he turned away.

'He's got the money, Archie,' Emile said. 'Don't you figure he's got the money and was lying through his teeth?'

'I'll bet you also kick old ladies down the stairs and trip cripples on the street,' Archie said.

Janza giggled.

The giggle chilled Archie who himself was considered capable of hurting little old ladies and tripping cripples.

Chapter Sixteen

Such a terrible mark, Caroni.'

'I know, I know.'

'And you are usually such a splendid scholar.'

'Thank you, Brother Leon.'

'How are your other marks?'

'Fine, Brother, fine. In fact, I thought… I mean, I was aiming for high honors this term. But now, this F…'

'I know,' the teacher said, shaking his head sorrowfully, in commiseration.

Caroni was confused. He had never received an F before in his life. In fact, he had seldom received a mark lower than an A. In the seventh and eighth grades at St. Jude's, he had received straight A's for two years except for a B-plus one term. He had scored so high on the Trinity entrance exam that he had been awarded one of the rare Trinity scholarships — one hundred dollars contributed toward his tuition, and his picture in the paper. And then this terrible F, a routine test turning into a nightmare.

'The F surprised me as well,' Brother Leon said. 'Because you are such an excellent student, David.'

Caroni looked up in sudden wonder and hope. Brother Leon seldom called a student by his first name. He always kept a distance between himself and his pupils. 'There is an invisible line between teacher and student,' he always said, 'and it must not be crossed.' But, now, hearing him pronounce 'David' in such friendly fashion and with such gentleness and understanding, Caroni allowed himself to hope — but for what? Had the F been a mistake, after all?

'This was a difficult test for several reasons,' the teacher went on. 'One of those exams where the wrong, subtle interpretation of the facts made the difference between pass and fail. In fact, that was it exactly — a pass- fail test. And when I read your answer, David, for a moment I thought it was possible that you had passed. In many respects you were correct in your assertions. But, on the other hand…' His voice trailed away, he seemed deep in thought, troubled.

Caroni waited. A horn blew outside — the school bus lumbering away. He thought of his father and mother and what they would do when they learned of the F. It would drag down his average — it was almost impossible to overcome an F no matter how many other A's he managed to make.

'One thing students don't always realize, David,' Brother Leon went on, speaking softly, intimately, as if there were no one in the world except them, as if he had never talked to anyone in the world the way he was talking to David at this moment, 'one thing they don't grasp is that teachers are human too. Human like other people.' Brother Leon smiled as if he had made a joke. Caroni allowed himself a small smile, unsure of himself, not wanting to do the wrong thing. The classroom was suddenly warm, it seemed crowded although there were just the two of them there. 'Yes, yes, we are all too human. We have our good days and our bad days. We get tired. Our judgment sometimes becomes impaired. We sometimes — as the boys say — goof. It's possible even for us to make mistakes correcting papers, especially when the answers are not cut and dried, not one thing or another, not all black nor all white…'

Caroni was all ears now, alert — what was Brother Leon driving at? He looked sharply at Brother Leon. The teacher looked as he always did — the moist eyes that reminded Caroni of boiled onions, the pale damp skin, and the cool talk, always under control. He held a piece of white chalk in his hand like a cigarette. Or maybe like a miniature pointer.

'Did you ever hear a teacher admit that it's possible for him to make a mistake, David? Ever hear that before?' Brother Leon asked, laughing.

'Like an umpire saying he made the wrong call,' Caroni said, joining in the teacher's little joke. But why the joke? Why all this talk of mistakes?

'Yes, yes,' Leon agreed. 'No one is without error. And it's understandable. We all have our duties and we must discharge them. The Headmaster is still in the hospital and I take it as a privilege to act in his behalf. Besides this, there are the extra-curricular activities. The chocolate sale, for instance…'

Brother Leon's grip was tight on the piece of chalk. Caroni noticed how his knuckles were almost as white as the chalk itself. He waited for the teacher to continue. But there was only silence. Caroni watched the chalk in Brother Leon's hands, the way the teacher pressed it, rolled it, his fingers like the legs of pale spiders with a victim in their clutch.

'But it's all rewarding,' Leon went on. How was it that his voice was so cool when the hand holding the chalk was so tense, the veins sticking out, as if threatening to burst through the flesh?

'Rewarding?' Caroni had lost the thread of Brother Leon's thought.

'The chocolate sale,' Leon said.

And the chalk split in his hand.

'For instance,' Leon said, dropping the pieces and opening the ledger that was so familiar to everyone at