10
Tuition at the College-on-the-Hill is fourteen thousand dollars, Sunday brunch included. I sense there is a connection between this powerful number and the way the students arrange themselves physically in the reading areas of the library. They sit on broad cushioned seats in various kinds of ungainly posture, clearly calculated to be the identifying signs of some kinship group or secret organization. They are fetal, splayed, knock-kneed, arched, square-knotted, sometimes almost upside-down. The positions are so studied they amount to a classical mime. There is an element of overrefinement and inbreeding. Sometimes I feel I've wandered into a Far Eastern dream, too remote to be interpreted. But it is only the language of economic class they are speaking, in one of its allowable outward forms, like the convocation of station wagons at the start of the year.
Denise watched her mother pull the little cellophane ribbon on a bonus pack of sixteen individually wrapped units of chewing gum. Her eyes narrowed as she turned back to the address books on the kitchen table before her. The eleven-year-old face was an expert mask of restrained exasperation.
She waited a long moment, then said evenly, 'That stuff causes cancer in laboratory animals in case you didn't know.'
'You wanted me to chew sugarless gum, Denise. It was your idea.'
'There was no warning on the pack then. They put a warning, which I would have a hard time believing you didn't see.'
She was transcribing names and phone numbers from an old book to a new one. There were no addresses. Her friends had phone numbers only, a race of people with a seven-bit analog consciousness.
'I'm happy to do it either way,' Babette said. 'It's totally up to you. Either I chew gum with sugar and artificial coloring or I chew sugarless and colorless gum that's harmful to rats.'
Steffie got off the phone. 'Don't chew at all,' she said. 'Did you ever think of that?'
Babette was breaking eggs into a wooden salad bowl. She gave me a look that wondered how the girl could talk on the phone and listen to us at the same time. I wanted to say because she finds us interesting.
Babette said to the girls, 'Look, either I chew gum or I smoke. If you want me to start smoking again, take away my chewing gum and my Mentho-Lyptus.'
'Why do you have to do one or the other?' Steffie said. 'Why not do neither one?'
'Why not do both?' Denise said, the face carefully emptying itself of expression. 'That's what you want, isn't it? We all get to do what we want, don't we? Except if we want to go to school tomorrow we can't because they're fumigating the place or whatever.'
The phone rang; Steffie grabbed it.
'I'm not a criminal,' Babette said. 'All I want to do is chew a pathetic little tasteless chunk of gum now and then.'
'Well it's not that simple,' Denise said.
'It's not a crime either. I chew about two of those little chunks a day.'
'Well you can't anymore.'
'Well I can, Denise. I want to. Chewing happens to relax me. You're making a fuss over nothing.'
Steffie managed to get our attention by the sheer pleading force of the look on her face. Her hand was over the mouthpiece of the phone. She did not speak but only formed the words.
'Parents or children?' Babette said.
My daughter shrugged.
'We don't want them,' Babette said.
'Keep them out,' Denise said.
'Say anything you want.'
'Just keep them out of here.'
'They're boring.'
'Tell them to stay home.'
Steffie retreated with the phone, appearing to shield it with her body, her eyes full of fear and excitement.
'A little gum can't possibly hurt,' Babette said.
'I guess you're right. Never mind. Just a warning on the pack.'
Steffie hung up. 'Just hazardous to your health,' she said.
'Just rats,' Denise said. 'I guess you're right. Never mind.'
'Maybe she thinks they died in their sleep.'
'Just useless rodents, so what's the difference?'
'What's the difference, what's the fuss?' Steffie said.
'Plus I'd like to believe she chews only two pieces a day, the way she forgets things.'
'What do I forget?' Babette said.
'It's all right,' Denise said. 'Never mind.'
'What do I forget?'
'Go ahead and chew. Never mind the warning. I don't care.'
I scooped Wilder off a chair and gave him a noisy kiss on the ear and he shrank away in delight. Then I put him on the counter and went upstairs to find Heinrich. He was in his room studying the deployment of plastic chessmen.
'Still playing with the fellow in prison? How's it going?'
'Pretty good. I think I got him cornered.'
'What do you know about this fellow? I've been meaning to ask.'
'Like who did he kill? That's the big thing today. Concern for the victim.'
'You've been playing chess with the man for months. What do you know about him except that he's in jail for life, for murder? Is he young, old, black, white? Do you communicate at all except for chess moves?'
'We send notes sometimes.'
'Who did he kill?'
'He was under pressure.'
'And what happened?'
'It kept building and building.'
'So he went out and shot someone. Who did he shoot?'
'Some people in Iron City.'
'How many?'
'Five.'
'Five people.'
'Not counting the state trooper, which was later.'
'Six people. Did he care for his weapons obsessively? Did he have an arsenal stashed in his shabby little room off a six-story concrete car park?'
'Some handguns and a bolt-action rifle with a scope.'
'A telescopic sight. Did he fire from a highway overpass, a rented room? Did he walk into a bar, a washette, his former place of employment and start firing indiscriminately? People scattering, taking cover under tables. People out on the street thinking they heard firecrackers. 'I was just waiting for the bus when I heard this little popping noise like firecrackers going off.''
'He went up to a roof.'
'A rooftop sniper. Did he write in his diary before he went up to the roof? Did he make tapes of his voice, go to the movies, read books about other mass murderers to refresh his memory?'
'Made tapes.'
'Made tapes. What did he do with them?'
'Sent them to people he loved, asking for forgiveness.'
''I can't help myself, folks.' Were the victims total strangers? Was it a grudge killing? Did he get fired from his job? Had he been hearing voices?'
