Charlie sat enraptured by her. As Ginny and Lysander played their scene, Neil stood in the wings looking out. Suddenly, he spotted his father enter the rear of the auditorium and stand at the back. His pulse quickened but his expression remained calm.
On stage, Lysander and Ginny completed their scene. “‘Here is my bed. Sleep give thee all his rest!’” Lysander said.
“‘With half that wish the wisher’s eyes be pressed!’” Hermia returned.
The pair lay down on the stage, and their characters went to sleep. A musical interlude signaled Puck’s re-entry to the scene.
Neil moved in the wordless lyrical revelry uninhibited, joyful, magical. The other characters appeared in the slow motion interlude as well. Hermia, glowing brightly, held Charlie spellbound. Mr. Keating, Todd, and the other boys sat awed and delighted by the whole production. Knox missed most of the show because he stared at Chris in complete rapture, and trying hard not to show it, Chris found herself becoming infatuated with Knox as well.
As the musical interlude ended, Neil stood alone on the stage as Puck. He addressed the entire audience but directed his words toward his father, who had remained standing at the rear of the auditorium.
“If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumbered here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,
Gentles, do not reprehend;
If you pardon, we will mend.
And as I am an honest Puck,
If we have unearnèd luck
Now to scape the serpent’s tongue,
We will make amends ere long;
Else the Puck a liar call.
So, good night unto you all.
Give me your hands, if we be friends,
And Robin shall restore amends.”
The curtain fell on Neil’s closing monologue, and the audience burst into enthusiastic applause. The boys had dispelled all doubt of Neil’s talent as an actor, and as they rose to a standing ovation, the entire audience followed suit, cheering Neil and the cast through extra curtain calls.
The actors took their bows one by one. Ginny received great applause, and she smiled at Charlie, who applauded and shouted bravos extra loudly. Knox smiled at Chris and stopped clapping to take her hand. Chris did not resist.
When Neil came out and took his bows, his friends cheered wildly. After the applause, the members of the cast came out into the auditorium and mingled with the audience. Several people rushed to the stage to offer their congratulations.
“Family and friends may meet cast members in the lobby, please!” the director called over the microphone.
“Neil!” Todd and the others called. “We’ll meet you in the lobby. You were great!”
Onstage, Ginny Danburry was mobbed by well-wishers. Charlie ignored the director’s announcement and leapt onto the stage. “You were great!” he heard another boy tell her. He noticed that Lysander had his arm around Ginny.
“Congratulations, Ginny!” Lysander said, hugging her. Undaunted, Charlie pushed his way over to Ginny.
“Bright light shines from your eyes,” he said with total sincerity. Ginny saw that he meant it and smiled back. They stared into each other’s eyes until finally Lysander smiled awkwardly and moved away.
Backstage, in the boys’ dressing room, the jubilant cast carried Neil on their shoulders in praise of his performance. After a moment of celebration, the director entered the dressing room, a worried look on her face.
“Neil,” she whispered in a hushed tone. “Your father.” Neil hopped off the shoulders of his friends and followed her out, stopping in the wings to put on his coat. He saw his father standing at the back of the auditorium and paused. Neil stepped off the stage, and, taking off the headpiece as he walked, he slowly approached his father.
Charlie spotted Neil. “Neil?” he called. But Neil did not answer. Then Charlie saw Neil join his father, and sensing that something was wrong, he grabbed Ginny’s hand and led her off the stage.
Keating and the gang were waiting for Neil in the lobby. “Hey everybody, this is Chris,” Knox said, joining them.
“Whoa, we’ve heard a lot about you!” Meeks said as Knox stared him down. “I mean … you know … I mean …” Meeks stammered.
Suddenly, the door to the lobby burst open, and Mr. Perry led Neil like a prisoner out of the auditorium toward the front door. Charlie and Ginny came out behind them. People in the crowds yelled congratulations at Neil. Stuck behind the throng, Todd tried to reach his friend.
“Neil, that was great! Neil!” Todd shouted.
“We’re having a party!” Knox called.
Neil turned around. “It’s no use,” he said sadly. Mr. Keating reached Neil and took him by the shoulders.
“Neil, you were brilliant!” Keating beamed.
Mr. Perry pushed Keating’s hands away. “You! Keep away from him!” Mr. Perry shouted. A stunned silence followed his harsh words. He led Neil outside to his car and pushed him in. Charlie started to follow them outside, but Keating held him back.
“Don’t make it any worse than it is,” he said sadly.
Mr. Perry started the car and pulled off. Through the car window, Neil looked like a prisoner being taken to his execution.
“Neil!” Todd screamed as the car drove away.
Stunned, the members of the Dead Poets Society stood silently in the lobby. Charlie walked over to Mr. Keating. “Is it okay if we walk back?” he asked.
“Sure,” Keating said, chilled with sympathy, as he watched the “Dead Poets,” along with Chris and Ginny, leave the lobby and walk out into the cold, dark night.
CHAPTER 13
Neil’s mother sat in the corner of the small, stuffy study, her eyes swollen with tears. Mr. Perry sat rigidly at his desk.
The door opened and Neil walked in, still wearing his Puck costume, his eyes also red from crying. He looked toward his mother and started to speak, but his father quickly interrupted.
“Son, I am trying very hard to understand why you insist on defying us, but whatever the reason, I am not going to let you ruin your life. Tomorrow I am withdrawing you from Welton and enrolling you in Braden Military School. You are going to Harvard and you are going to be a doctor.”
Fresh tears welled in Neil’s bloodshot eyes. “Father,” he pleaded, “that’s ten more years. Don’t you see, that’s a lifetime!”
“You have opportunities I never dreamed of!” Mr. Perry shouted. “I won’t let you squander them.” He stalked out of the room.
Neil’s mother looked like she wanted to say something, but she remained silent and followed her husband out of the room.
Neil stood alone, completely drained of emotion, trying not to think about the future his father had just laid out for him.
Rather than walking directly back to Welton, the pledges of the Dead Poets Society decided to go to the cave. Todd, Meeks, Pitts, Charlie and Ginny, and Knox and Chris sat huddled around the blazing candle of the cave god for warmth. Charlie held a half-empty glass of wine, and the empty bottle sat on the ground nearby. The boys stared morosely into the flame, aware that it was a symbol of Neil, who had brought it to the cave.
“Knox,” Chris said. “I have to go home now. Chet might call.”
“It’s just for a little while,” Knox said, squeezing her hand. “You promised.”
“You’re so infuriating!” She half-smiled.
“Where’s Cameron?” Meeks asked.
Charlie took a sip of wine. “Who knows; who cares?”
Todd suddenly jumped up and pounded the walls with his fists. “Next time I see Neil’s father I’m gonna smash him. I don’t care what happens to me!”
“Don’t be stupid,” Pitts said.
Todd paced up and down the cave. Suddenly, Mr. Keating poked his head in, illuminated from behind by the moonlight.
“Mr.
Keating!” the boys cried in surprise.
Charlie hid the bottle of wine and the glass. “I thought I’d find you here,” Keating said. “Now we mustn’t be glum. Neil wouldn’t want it that way.”
“Why don’t we have a meeting in his honor!” Charlie suggested. “Captain, will you lead it?” The other boys seconded the motion.
“Fellows, I don’t know …” Keating hesitated.
“Come on, Mr. Keating, please …” Meeks urged.
Keating looked around at the pleading faces. “Okay, but only a short one,” Keating relented. He thought for a moment, then began: “‘I went to the woods because I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life! To put to rout all that was not life. And not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.’” He paused. “From Mr. e.e. cummings:
“dive for dreams
or a slogan may topple you
(trees are their roots
and wind is wind)
trust your heart
if the seas catch fire
(and live by love
though the stars walk backward)
honour the past
but welcome the future
(and dance your death
away at this wedding)
never mind a world
with its villains or heroes
(for god likes girls
and tomorrow and the earth)”
Keating paused and looked around. “Now, who else wants to read?” No one spoke. “Come on boys, don’t be shy,” he urged.
“I have something,” Todd said.
“The thing you’ve been writing?” Charlie asked.
Todd nodded. “Yeah.”
The boys were really surprised that Todd had volunteered. He stepped forward and took some crumpled papers from his pocket, passing slips of paper to each of the others.
“Everybody read this between verses,” he said, holding up the slips of paper.
Todd opened his poem and read:
“We are dreaming of tomorrow, and tomorrow isn’t coming;
we are dreaming of a glory that we
don’t really want.
We are dreaming of a new day when the new day’s here already.
We are running from the battle when it’s one that must be
fought.”
Todd nodded. Everyone read, “And still we sleep.” Todd continued:
“We are listening for the calling but
never really heeding,
Hoping for the future when the future’s only plans.
Dreaming of the wisdom that we are
dodging daily,
Praying for a savior when salvation’s in our hands.
“And still we sleep.
“And still we sleep.
And still we pray.
And still we fear …”
He paused sadly, “‘And still we sleep.’” He folded up the poem. Everyone in the cave applauded.
“That was great!” Meeks cheered. Todd beamed, modestly taking in all the praise and the congratulatory slaps on the back. Keating smiled with great pride at his student’s enormous progress. He plucked a spherical icicle hanging from the roof of the cave and peered into it.
“I hold in my hand a crystal ball. In it I see great things for Todd Anderson,” he intoned. Todd faced Mr. Keating, then suddenly, powerfully, they hugged. When they drew apart, Keating turned to the others.
“And now,” Keating continued, “‘General William Booth Enters Into Heaven,’ by Vachel Lindsay. When I pause, you ask, ‘Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?’”
Keating recited: “‘Booth led boldly with his big bass drum.... ’” The others answered, “‘Are you washed in the blood of the lamb?’” Keating headed out of the cave, followed by the boys and girls, reciting poetry all the way home.
As his friends paid him homage in the cave, Neil sat alone in his darkened room at home, gazing out the window. The passion had dried up and left his body. All feeling was drained from his face and limbs. He believed he was a brittle empty shell that would soon be crushed by the weight of the falling snow.
CHAPTER 14
The moon was full. The stars were out in abundance. The night was clear and cold. The trees hung heavy with icicles as the boys, Ginny, and Chris followed Mr. Keating out into the night. The freeze had turned the barren forest into a world of sparkling diamonds. The group walked through the woods behind Keating as he recited: “‘The Saints smiled gravely and they said, “He’s come …” ’”
“‘Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?’” they chorused.
“‘Walking lepers followed rank on rank, lurching bravos from the ditches dank, drabs from the alleyways and drug fiends pale,/Minds still passion ridden, soul-powers frail …’”
“‘Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?’” they repeated.
As the Society marched through the still of the night, an ominous silence settled over the Perry home. Mr. and Mrs. Perry got into bed and turned off their bedroom light. They did not hear the door to another room open. Neil walked into the hall. He turned a corner and slipped quietly downstairs.
Moonlight illuminated Mr. Perry’s study. Neil walked to his father’s desk, opened the top drawer and reached way in the back. He pulled out a key and with it, he unlocked the bottom drawer of the desk. Neil sat in the leather desk chair and, reaching across the desk, he picked up the crown of flowers he’d worn as Puck and put it on his head.
The group stopped beside the waterfall, which had frozen. The icy sculpture seemed to defy the laws of gravity as the students looked at its remarkable form. The sky was incredibly clear. Moonlight bouncing off the snow cast a strange bluish glow on the group as Keating continued the poem:
“Christ came gently with a robe and crown,
For Booth the soldier, while the throng knelt down.
He saw King Jesus. They were face to face,
and he knelt a-weeping in that holy place.”
“‘Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?’” they recited again.
The moonlight and the mystical wonder of the frozen waterfall combined with the magical poetry to set the group dancing and playing in the snow. They worked themselves into a joyful, frantic revelry.
Knox and Chris drifted away from the group and embraced. They kissed, soft and warm, under the frozen moon.
Mr. and Mrs. Perry were fast asleep when the quick, short sound broke the night’s silence. “What was that?” Mr. Perry sat up.
“What?” his wife asked, half-asleep.
“That sound? Didn’t you hear it?”
“What sound?”
Mr. Perry climbed out of bed and walked into the hallway. He walked up and down the hall, finally entering Neil’s room. He ran out and down the stairs as Mrs. Perry followed, trying to get her robe on over her flailing arms.
Mr. Perry walked into the study and turned on the light. He looked around. Everything seemed normal, but just as he turned to leave, he spotted the glistening black object lying on the carpet—his revolver. Panicked, he moved around the desk until he saw the pale white hand. He gasped.
Neil lay on the floor, bathed in his own blood. Mr. Perry knelt down and embraced his son while his wife let out an anguished scream.
“No!” Mr. Perry cried. “No!”
Mr. Keating and the boys took the girls home and returned to Welton in the early-morning hours.
“I’m wiped, drained,” Todd said as he headed to his room. “I’m going to sleep until noon.”
But early the next morning, Charlie, Knox, and Meeks walked into Todd’s room. The boys’ faces were ashen. They looked down at Todd, who snored peacefully.
“Todd, Todd,” Charlie called softly.
Todd opened his eyes and sat up, looking exhausted. After a few moments, his eyes adjusted to the light. He closed them and lay back down. Then, feeling for his clock, he picked it up and squinted.
“It’s only eight. I gotta sleep,” he said, pulling the co
vers over his head. He sat up suddenly, his eyes wide open. His friends were still standing there, silent, and he sensed that something was wrong.
“Todd, Neil’s dead. He shot himself,” Charlie said.
Todd felt his head spin. “Oh, my God! Oh, Neil!” he wailed as he jumped from his bed and ran down the hall, screaming, to the bathroom. He sat on his knees in the stall and vomited until he thought his guts would come out. His friends waited helplessly outside.
Todd came out of the stall, wiping his mouth. Tears streamed down his face. He walked back and forth in the bathroom. “Someone has to know it was his father! Neil wouldn’t kill himself! He loved living!” he cried.
“You don’t seriously think his father …” Knox said.
“Not with the gun!” Todd shouted. “Damn it, even if the bastard didn’t pull the trigger, he …” Todd’s sobs drowned his words until, finally, he controlled himself. “Even if Mr. Perry didn’t shoot him,” Todd said calmly, “he killed him. They have to know that!” He ran across the room, screaming painfully, “Neil! Neil!” Falling against the wall, he started sobbing again, and the boys left him alone, sitting on the floor, to cry out his grief.
Not knowing that the boys even knew, Mr. Keating sat at his desk in his empty classroom, struggling to control his emotion. He stood and walked slowly to Neil’s desk. He picked up a book, his own battered and worn poetry anthology, and, as he opened it, his eyes focused on his own writing: “Dead Poets.” He slumped heavily into Neil’s chair, unable to hold back a cry of anguish and grief.
The following morning was cold and somber, a bleak winter’s day with bitter gusts of wind that whipped around the procession led by the haunting lament of the school bagpiper.
Neil was buried in the town of Welton. The Dead Poets carried his coffin on their shoulders. His mother, veiled in black, watched the procession with his father, both of them stunned by their grief. Mr. Nolan, Mr. Keating, and other teachers and students watched solemnly as Neil was laid to rest.
After the burial, the entire school assembled in the Welton chapel. The teachers, including Mr. Keating, stood along the walls. The assembly sang a hymn before the chaplain spoke.
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