Beyond the Chocolate War

by Robert Cormier

  And now, gentlemen, step to the center of the ring.…

  There was no ring, of course, except in Archie’s mind. He often thought about Brother Leon as he strolled the grounds of Trinity and stopped at the far end of the parking lot, from which point he could inspect the rear of the brothers’ residence. Leon’s private study, to which students were summoned occasionally, looked out on the parking lot. Archie enjoyed standing there, sensing that Leon was hidden behind the stiff white curtain drawn across the window pane. In his mind he was the champion and Leon the challenger, although on the surface one would suppose that Leon had the upper hand. Archie, a student; Leon, the Headmaster. In any contest, the Headmaster would be sure to emerge victorious, wouldn’t he? Wouldn’t he? Ah, but not according to Archie. Not according to the gospel of Trinity as written by Archie Costello.

  Now he stood at that particular spot, glancing up at the residence, not knowing what he was looking for. Certainly not a confrontation with Leon. Archie realized that he and Leon had not talked or even run into each other for weeks. Leon was famous for surprise visits to classrooms, but he either avoided or did not happen to enter any of Archie’s classes. Once in a while Archie saw Leon at a distance, across the campus or on the stage of the assembly hall or getting into a car. But their paths never crossed. Accident or design? Archie didn’t know and didn’t care. He kept his emotions under control, in cold storage, in neutral. He allowed himself measures of enjoyment—for instance, in the car with one of the girls from Miss Jerome’s School across town—but always holding a part of himself aloof, never letting go completely. He enjoyed what he saw in the eyes of the other students when he directed his attention to them—fear, apprehension, resentment. He was aware of how others felt about him, but frankly, he paid only passing attention, preferred not to think about other people. People thought too much, anyway. Or talked too much.

  Once in a while he expressed his thoughts to Obie. Obie was the only person he allowed into his privacy. But not recently. He and Obie had grown apart. No, that was wrong, not grown apart. They had been pulled apart by that girl, all that nonsense of Obie being in love. Love, for crissakes. Obie of all people. Although he hated to admit it to himself, Archie missed the talks with Obie. He could bounce ideas off Obie although Obie was unaware of what Archie was doing. Obie was so normal, so regular, so average, so typical of what a high school guy was like, that Archie, by being close to Obie, knew all the time what the school was thinking. Okay, so he used Obie. But wasn’t that what life was all about? Using? Just as Obie, no doubt, used him, used his proximity to the Assigner of the Vigils to set him apart from, probably above, the other students.

  The afternoon was dying, turning the campus into long shadows, hidden doorways, bushes and shrubbery hugging the residence, many places now for people to hide. Archie always envisioned lurkers, predators, watchers in the shadows or around corners, peeking out of windows, waiting behind closed doors. That was why he always stood tense, alert, at the ready, keen, eyes shifting, on guard under his exterior of coolness. It was a rotten world, full of treachery and evil, and you had to be on your toes at all times, ready for combat, to outfox, outwit, outdeal everybody else. Archie endorsed the graffiti he had once seen scrawled on a downtown brick wall: Do Unto Others, Then Split.

  He heard the footsteps behind him at the same moment the voice reached his ears.

  “Are you expecting an apparition, Costello?”

  Archie didn’t turn but winced slightly, instantly humiliated by allowing Brother Leon to creep up and surprise him. He didn’t like to be surprised, particularly by Leon. He remained still, waiting for Leon to swing around and come into his view. Which Leon did, a satisfied look on his face, as if he had gained some kind of advantage. Leon was dressed in his black and whites, black suit, stiff white collar.

  The campus was still. A car with a ruptured muffler violated the air far down the street.

  “You’re lurking late here, aren’t you, Costello?” Leon asked.

  Lurking and Costello. Leon had a trick of choosing certain words and pronouncing them so as to make them seem sinister, unsavory. As if Archie by lurking here was doing something illegal, dirty, shameful. And Costello. Since assuming the authority of Headmaster, Brother Leon called all students by their last names, kept a strict formality with them. He had never been the buddy-buddy type anyway; now he treated the students as if they were underlings, mere subjects in the kingdom of his royal highness, Leon the First.

  Archie shrugged, didn’t bother to answer Leon’s question; it didn’t require an answer, in fact. To Leon, the question itself was important, not the answer. The question and how he asked it, with that faint smirk, the suggestive curl of his lips. But Archie knew Leon’s methods—and Leon knew he knew—so Archie permitted himself a smile at Leon, a smile that told Leon exactly how he felt about it all. And then Archie decided to answer, seeing an opportunity to level his own shaft at Leon.

  “Just checking the premises,” Archie said. “Some of the neighbors have been complaining about a child molester—wearing a white collar—lurking in the area.”

  A glitter in Leon’s eyes, a quickening, like a sudden touch of cold sunlight on the surface of a lake. His face was expressionless, but Archie sensed a tension in the flesh of Leon’s cheeks. He and Leon had always dueled this way, tossing veiled barbs at each other, in a game that wasn’t quite a game.

  Leon waved his right hand, almost limply, dismissing Archie’s barb, showing that he recognized it for what it was, verbal retaliation.

  “The campus has been quiet for some time,” Leon said, his tone now more conversational, as if some prologue had ended and he could get on with the business at hand. “You have been holding them in check.”

  Archie knew who he meant by them.

  “I must express my admiration, Costello. For you. Your methods. I know that your odd activities go on, but you have been discreet. And life has been kind, hasn’t it?”

  They had made a pact months ago, after the chocolates and immediately after Leon had assumed the Headmastership of Trinity. “Life at Trinity can be very pleasant, Costello, for both of us,” Leon had said. “My desire is to continue the fine traditions of Trinity, to make it the best preparatory school in New England. And this takes faculty working together with the student body. Our dear retired Headmaster was a wonderful man but did not comprehend the ways of students, Costello. He was not vigilant.” Vigilant. Leon had caressed the word with his tongue, his lips, his voice, giving it a special meaning, the word leaping into the air and hanging there. Archie had nodded. Knew Leon’s meaning. “I, however, am vigilant. Will continue to be. I also know that boys must be allowed their games, their sports, must indulge their idiosyncrasies on occasion. This I understand and allow. But within limitations. Without obstructions to the lofty goals and purposes of Trinity. And its administration.”

  Words, of course. Bullshit. The administration of the school was under the strict control of Brother Leon. In fact, he had arranged a transfer for Brother Jacques, the only member of the faculty who had ever showed signs of independence—Jacques had objected to the events surrounding the chocolate skirmish last fall—and Jacques was no longer on the scene at Trinity. So much for Leon’s pretensions. But even though Leon’s words were bullshit, the meaning came through straight and true to Archie. He and Leon spoke the same language, not the verbal language of ordinary communication but the between-the-lines language of conspirators and plotters. What Leon meant: Play your tricks, Archie, carry out the assignments, let the Vigils have their fun. But keep your distance from me. Don’t do anything to embarrass me as Headmaster of the school. Otherwise …

  “Incidentally, Costello, I have some bad news.”

  Not so incidentally, Archie figured. He knew now the reason Brother Leon had sought him out, confronted him here on the campus as the sun began to droop. I have some bad news. He had never known Leon to bring good news.

  “It’s news from provincial headq
uarters. In Manchester, New Hampshire.”

  Get to the point, Brother Leon, and spare the geography.

  “Brother Eugene—remember him?” Leon asked, guilelessly, innocently. But not so guileless, not so innocent.

  Archie nodded, glad that he seldom perspired, whether under pressure or during heat waves, glad that beads of moisture on his forehead would not betray him.

  “He is dead, Brother Eugene. He died yesterday in the infirmary at Manchester.”

  For a moment, in the shadows, Archie saw the soft, quizzical face of Brother Eugene superimposed on Leon’s features, then shrugged it away.

  “He never fully recovered,” Leon said.

  Archie knew what Leon wanted him to ask: Recovered from what? But Archie wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. And, anyway, they both knew.

  “The Order has lost a wonderful, sensitive teacher,” Leon said. “Have you anything to say, Costello? Perhaps a tribute of your own? You had Brother Eugene in class, didn’t you?”

  “History,” Archie said. “One semester.”

  “Room Nineteen?” Brother Leon asked, malice in his voice as he shifted his body suddenly so that the last flash of the sun’s rays struck Archie’s eyes, causing him to blink, to look away. Room Nineteen and its beautiful debris, a legend now at Trinity.

  “I never had Brother Eugene in Room Nineteen,” Archie said, holding his voice steady. “It was some other room in my freshman year.” He squared off, changed position so that he could look Leon in the eye again.

  Their gazes held for a moment, and it was Leon who broke the contact this time. Casting his eyes downward, he said: “We shall have a special memorial mass for Brother Eugene at assembly. But I think you should make a special visit to your church and offer up prayers for the repose of his soul.”

  Archie said nothing. He had not prayed for years. Went through the motions during the masses in assembly hall on special occasions. Attended mass with his parents when they insisted, and followed the rituals that pleased them. He didn’t care whether he pleased them or not, but peace reigned in the house when he played the role of dutiful son.

  “Have you nothing to say, Costello?” Leon said, anger showing through the words.

  “Brother Eugene was a nice guy,” Archie said. “I liked him.” Having to say something. He spoke the truth, really. There had been nothing personal in the Room Nineteen assignment. There was never anything personal in the assignments.

  “I don’t want to dwell on the past, Costello,” Leon said. “But prayer is always good for the soul. Your own, for instance.”

  Archie remained silent, and Leon seemed willing to accept his silence as acceptance, because he sighed expansively, as if he had just done his good deed for the day and could go on with his usual routine. He glanced around the darkening campus, the buildings shrouded in silence, the white clapboards of the residence gleaming like dinosaur bones.

  “I love this school, Costello,” Leon said.

  Like a criminal loves his crime, Archie thought. That was the secret of the world’s agony, and the reason crime—and, yes, sin—would always prevail. Because the criminal, whether a rapist or a burglar, loves his crime. That’s why rehabilitation was impossible. You had to get rid of the love, the passion, first. And that would never happen.

  Leon looked at Archie again, seemed about to speak, and then changed his mind.

  “Carry on, Costello,” he said, and padded away, in those short mincing steps the guys imitated so easily and frequently.

  Archie allowed himself a moment of loathing as he watched Leon disappearing into the gloom. What a fake he was. All that phony concern about Brother Eugene. Leon had done nothing about Room Nineteen, too worried about his own career. Archie had always been able to depend on that. And that’s what had made him and Leon allies. Which always bothered Archie, being linked with someone like Brother Leon. Then he remembered a surprise that awaited Leon—the day of the Bishop’s visit. And maybe some others.

  Walking toward his car at the parking space nearest the entrance, the choice space in the lot that no one else dared occupy, Archie sought the surge of satisfaction that usually filled him when he contemplated assignments.

  The wind came up, trembling the limbs of trees, rattling a shutter on the residence. Archie was suddenly elated, knew he was apart from other people. It was a dark and beautiful secret he shared with no one.

  Halting near his car, he pivoted, lifted his face to the rising wind, and whispered: “I am Archie.” Heard his voice withering away in the darkness. No response, no echo. Which was what he wanted: to be alone, separate from the others, untouchable except by the knowing hands and mouths of the girls at Miss Jerome’s.

  “Too far.”

  “No it isn’t.”

  “Yes it is.”

  “Just once. Just this once.”

  “Once won’t be enough.”

  “Yes it will.”

  “No it won’t. It never is.”

  It was a game they played, a delicious delightful game that made every nerve end and something else stand up at attention. A cat-and-mouse game. An inch-here-and-inch-there game. Give a little, take a little. Squeeze here and caress there. A daring, terrific game that never moved beyond a certain agonizing point which, crazy, only made him love Laurie Gundarson more and more each time they played.

  The game had become a ritual. They would drive to the Chasm and park in their favorite spot, an apron of land jutting out from the hillside. The lights of Monument winked below them like neon fireflies. Obie ignored the lights, Monument, Trinity, the Vigils, as he immersed himself in the marvel of Laurie’s presence here in the car, in his life.

  As he kissed her she moaned softly, low, husky, a slight tremor of her body betraying her own horniness. No, not horniness. He didn’t want to think of her in those terms. She was more than a body to him, more than a girl to fondle and caress. Even this game was more than a game: it was a ritual in which they expressed their love, their desire for each other, the sweet, aching longing. But Laurie would let them go only so far. So far and no further. And he always complied. He complied because he had to proceed cautiously with Laurie, never knowing when she might turn away for good. Because of Trinity, for one thing.

  The night they first met, at a dance, instantly attracted to each other, coming together beautifully in a slow number, she had stiffened and drawn away when she had learned he was a student at Trinity.

  “What’s the matter?” he had asked.

  “That place is creepy,” she said, wrinkling her nose.

  “All schools are creepy,” he retorted, trying to pull her against him again.

  “I always hear weird things about it,” she said, against the music, resisting his body.

  “Rumors. Don’t judge me by my school.” He felt as though he was betraying Trinity but realized this girl in his arms was suddenly more important than Trinity. “Judge me by what I am.”

  “What are you?” she asked, looking directly into his eyes.

  “One of the good guys,” Obie said.

  And she smiled.

  But Trinity always stood between them. More than Trinity, of course: the Vigils. Actually they seldom spoke of the school, continually skirting the subject, which often left gaps in their conversations. As a result, Obie was constantly on his guard with Laurie, fearful of losing her, of doing anything to make her draw away and grow distant as she had that first night on the dance floor.

  She was not distant from him now, in the car, close to him in this delicious game, responding, throbbing until, breathless, she drew back.

  “Obie, please …”

  “One more minute,” he whispered.

  “It’s for your own good,” she said, but he could hear the huskiness in her voice that always betrayed her own desire.

  “Let me count to sixty.”

  As he spoke he squeezed tenderly and delicately, his thumb and index finger moving as if he were playing some precious instrument.

&nbs
p; After a few moments she put on the brakes again, wrenched her mouth from his, pulled away. “Too much, and too fast,” she said. Strangely enough, he was relieved. Obie had always been terrified of going all the way. He had a feeling that he would somehow fail at the last minute, botch it all up, and leave himself humiliated in her eyes. He couldn’t risk that. Thus, despite his passionate protests, he was grateful for Laurie’s caution, the limits she had drawn.

  Holding her tenderly, he whispered: “I love you.…” She cupped his cheek in her hand, an endearing gesture that almost brought tears to his eyes.

  A sudden slash of headlights illuminated the interior of the car. Instinctively Obie and Laurie ducked their heads. As the favorite spot in town for parkers—fellows and girls making out, caressing, or maybe just shyly talking—the Chasm was also a target for bushwhackers, wise guys who got their kicks out of driving into the area with swiveling spotlights and squealing tires, scaring hell out of everybody. Obie and Laurie clutched each other as the intruding car swept past, the spotlights spraying the air with brilliance. The only compensation was that Laurie was close to him again, her warm and pulsing body melting into his. Darkness enveloped them completely as the car roared away and his mouth sought hers. His hand also moved in the dark, feeling the soft flesh he loved.

  The delicious game again.

  “Now, Obie …” Warningly.

  “Once more.”

  “Obie …”

  “Please. A ten count.”

  “Obie.”

  God, how he loved her. Wanted her. Needed her.

  “No,” she said, finality in her voice, removing his hand in a swift, impatient motion.

  It was at moments like this that doubts riddled him. Did she really love him? Was she really doing this for his own good? Theirs had been a whirlwind romance, four weeks of movies and burgers at McDonald’s and these sweet tortures here at the Chasm. But he realized he knew very little about Laurie Gundarson. Had never met her mother and father, few of her friends. As if he was a secret part of her life. Plenty of time later for introductions, she’d said. Or was she afraid to bring him into her life? Obie drew comfort by telling himself that she wanted him exclusively for her own.