“It will.”
“Even if I could come to understand this for me, how can you possibly make Moria go along? She is neither the next male in the family lineage, nor is she a girl who needs to leave her father right now.”
“If I didn’t send her,” my father said, “she would run away to be with you at the first opportunity. I know the bond between you two, and so do you. I’m saving us all a lot of heartache and trouble. I think you know that. This family is more than a birthright.”
“It’s a tragedy.” James could be quick-witted when it suited him.
“It’s a responsibility. One we Moriarty men have no choice but to fulfill. Like it or not. Hate it or resent it right now, each of us strives to make things better for the generations to follow. It was born into your blood, James. Many of us before you have tried to outrun it, deny it. My father turned to drink. His father to war. It’s a legacy of pain and suffering over a blood-given position and altruism we not only should never take for granted, but should strive to exploit for the betterment of all. It is who we are. There is no outrunning it.”
“So you became a teacher.”
“A noble profession. I can afford to teach on my own terms, so I teach part time. Not every man is so lucky.”
“And me, am I lucky? Is Moria? Our mother left us. You’ve never explained that to our liking. You tell us we’ll understand when we’re older. How much older? Now, our father wants to be rid of us.”
“I want nothing of the sort!” James saw Father’s color flush red. Our father, who could not be rattled. “I am bound to this decision as you will be to your heirs who follow. It is the most difficult, most repugnant obligation a man can be under: to willfully surrender the one thing—the two things—that mean the most to him.”
“Wait!? You don’t want me to go?”
“Want?” Father challenged incredulously. “Want?” He placed a cherry on top. “WANT?”
The house echoed with it. I heard it upstairs. Possibly, it flew off the cobblestones outside as well. Perhaps it also rumbled down the lane and shook the boathouses on the Charles, the cupola of Faneuil Hall, the Ionic columns of King’s Chapel.
My brother took this as his cue to make for the study doors.
“I don’t want it! It’s required! I have a difficult year ahead, James,” Father said. “More travel than usual.”
James stopped and turned. “We were attacked. You’re scared for our safety here.”
“You were hazed. It will happen again if we don’t confirm your attendance.”
“Then you haven’t confirmed?”
“Do you take me for a monster?” Father asked. “We’ve been having a discussion, you and I.”
“One way,” James said, immediately regretting it. “Sorry, Father. That was unkind of me.”
“Accepted. Now listen, James, attendance at Baskerville is of the utmost importance. I can hardly travel the way I must while leaving you and your sister with only Lois and Ralph to look after you. As it is, you two give Lois nothing but problems. You two are not yet old enough to be left alone. Do you understand?”
“Why all the travel?”
“Don’t be impudent.” Father broke eye contact with James to look out the window somewhat longingly. “It’s not for the university. It’s the family interests. Some things must be done in person.” He turned from the window back to James. “That’s all you need to know. But you raise a point I must address. With any extended travel comes risk. Although Mr. Lowry is in possession of the necessary legal work, should anything happen to me—”
“Father, don’t say such things!”
“Listen up! You will trust your sister in such situations. Do you understand? You are a bright, but often stubborn boy. Should anything happen—and I’m quite confident it won’t—listen to your sister. Promise me that.”
James hesitated, in part because of the shock he was suffering, in part because James never listened to me. “I promise.”
“Now, go along and send Moria in, if you please.”
My turn was next. I was inclined toward timidity when in Father’s presence—translation: he scared me. I loved him, respected him, admired him. I was terrified of him. Think of it like owning a pet lion.
Again, the study’s oily scent filled my nostrils and swelled my chest. The light caught dust in the air like a million silver fireflies. Father studied me as I entered and took a seat across from him, the desk separating us like a measure of the years between us.
“You will be attending Baskerville Academy with your brother.”
“Yes, Father.” My heart fluttered. All the worrying I’d been through for the past several months was for nothing. Ended, with one simple statement.
“How do you feel about that?”
I thought it might be a loaded question. I contemplated the right answer, wondering if there was a right answer other than the answer in my heart. “I don’t like the idea of leaving you, Father. Can’t you come with us, maybe teach at the school?”
A slow and meaningful grin overtook him. “What a lovely idea, Moria. I should think not, but I will always thank you for that consideration. You and James, the same school. What do you think?”
“I like it very much, sir. Very much, indeed.”
“And your brother. What do you think of his chances in such a place?”
“I think he’ll do splendidly, don’t you?”
“His temper?”
“Yes, well, there is that. But I’ll be there to . . . temper him.”
“Good for you. You’ve always had the coolest head of the three of us.”
I wasn’t sure Father had ever noticed me much at all, except as his “adorable Moria,” kind of a living toy doll he liked to show off. This comment hit me hard. “Thank you, Father.”
“It’s because of this I have a special assignment for you. Only you. Do you understand?”
“I . . . I guess.”
“I’ve explained to James that I will be doing a lot of travel in the coming year. All over the world. Things happen. We all know that. Not always good things, I’m sorry to say. Should something happen to me, Moria, you will find the key to this drawer,” he said, indicating the top right drawer of his desk, “buried in the fireplace ash, at the back and to the right. You will use it to open this drawer and you will use the benefits of your profoundly curious mind to take it from there. You are perfectly suited for this, Moria. Your brother is not. This is why the task falls to you. The rest will be self-explanatory. If you ever—ever!—open this drawer while I’m living, you will be disowned by me and this family. Do you understand me? I will have nothing to do with you, nor you with me for the remainder of our natural lives. That needs no further explanation. Do we understand one another?”
I nodded, unable to breathe. I’d never experienced such a combination of elation and alarm. Expelled from the family? What could possibly be inside the drawer?
“I need to hear you say it, Moria. And we must shake on it. Man to woman, father to daughter.” Father stood and came around the large desk.
I shied from him as he came up out of the chair. Father had never addressed me so matter-of-factly, had never treated me as an equal. As a grown-up. He offered his hand as a bond of promise. I felt . . . important to him all of a sudden. We shook hands. I promised Father I understood his terms.
“Your brother is temperamental. Only under the most dire of circumstances are you to share this with him.”
I didn’t like the sound of that at all. “Dire, meaning?”
“I will try to mail you both a letter once a week—mail, not email. There may be times they are slow to arrive, but arrive they will. I keep my passport here in the drawer opened by that key. If it’s here, then obviously I haven’t left the country. Let’s say if three weeks should pass without word from me, you will come home and check the drawer.” I shuddered. “If my passport is missing, then by all means give it more time. Overseas mail can be absurdly slow. If four or five week
s pass, and my passport is still not here, then you’re to assume the worst. I will not hold your actions against you!”
“Father! You make it sound so—”
“A bit melodramatic? I know, dear. I’m asking you to grow up quickly. I understand the problem this creates. If there were another way, believe me . . . but I’m afraid there isn’t.”
“What happened to James last night . . . does it have anything to do with all of this?” I felt ice cold and slightly sick to my stomach. It felt as if one girl had started the conversation with Father and another was now speaking.
“You always were a smart girl. I’ve told James it was hazing. You are to do nothing to counter that impression.”
“But it wasn’t hazing.” I tried and failed to sound confident.
“I’m trusting you to keep to the plan, Moria. Any deviation from the plan will have catastrophic consequences, and none of us want that.”
CHAPTER 4
OUR UNEASY ARRIVAL
WHEN RALPH, A STURDY MAN WITH A FULL head of hair, a slight accent, and narrow eyes, pulled the Lincoln to a stop in the circular drive fronting Baskerville Academy’s long line of dormitories, James gave me a terrified look that needed no explanation. No doubt my face reflected the same discontent he was experiencing. Of the twenty or so cars parked tightly together, all delivering a student and his or her possessions—from four-foot teddy bears to camp trunks and Mac computers—only the Moriarty children arrived in a chauffeur-driven black Lincoln. (Later, our arrival would be trumped by a helicopter carrying a retail clothing line heir onto the junior varsity football field, but of course we didn’t know it at the time.) We received looks of “who the heck are you?”, “spoiled brats!”, and both sides of “I want to get to know you.” Mostly, the wrong side.
To Father’s credit, the campus was everything he’d made it out to be, from the towering sugar maples that shadowed the deep green lawns, to the classic simplicity of brick buildings with white trim. If the Ivy League had a high school, this would be it. A twenty-foot-tall marble sundial stood between us and an ancient-looking chapel, the only structure made of stone instead of brick.
“Wow,” I said. “It’s like the country club on steroids.”
“I promise you,” James said, “it won’t be as fun.”
Father’s insistence—i.e., requirement—that I wear a dress had an immediate impact on me, as none—not one—of the other girls was wearing anything with a hem. Thankfully, James didn’t wear a dress, but he wore gray slacks, a blue blazer and coat and tie, which is to say he too was miserable. We looked like rich idiots when compared with the blue jeans, running shoes, and Vineyard Vines worn by all the other arrivals. Self-important, condescending, spoiled Bostonians. Father was lucky he had not made the trip with us—not that either of us had ever expected he might see his children off on the next stage of their lives—because James might have taken a tire iron to him if he had.
Ralph was accommodating and wholly embarrassing as he carefully unpacked the back of the Lincoln and then joined us in delivering James to his dorm. Neither James nor I possessed the necessary constitution to tell the man to leave us be and drive off as quickly as possible. Instead, we endured the torture of his accompaniment and assistance with fake smiles plastered onto our unwilling faces. I looked, no doubt, like an American Girl Doll, while James took on a kind of X-Men action figure vibe. It was clear from our first ten minutes at Baskerville Academy we were doomed.
I was delivered to a sorry-looking double room that had been converted into a triple. It possessed all the charm of a coat closet. Its bare gray walls and three bare mattresses, two of them stacked as bunk beds, reminded me of a reality television prison show. Throw in identical maple-veneered desks fronted by formed black-plastic-and-aluminum chairs to complete the joy of my first impression. My name was taped to the top bunk. Ralph sighed as he set down my bags.
“You okay, Mo?” he asked, as if there was anything he or I could do about my situation, good or bad.
“Come back in five years and I’ll tell you.” I found ten dollars in my purse. I was not the idiot the others thought me to be; I’d been raised in the best city in America. I extended it toward him and he held up his hand as a sign of refusal.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Moria! We’re family. I delivered your father to this school. Brought him home from graduation as well.”
I knew Lois, Ralph, and others were loyal to Father, but I’d never known for how long.
I’d heard an expression once, so I tried it on him. “So you know where all the skeletons are buried!” It meant that a person knew intimate secrets about another. Ralph didn’t seem to appreciate it.
He smiled through slit eyes, looking distraught. “You have no idea how much I will miss you both.”
“It’s all right, Ralph,” I told him. “I suppose Father’s been preparing us for this for years. It just came a little sudden, at least for me. For James . . . well, if you deny something long enough you begin to believe it yourself. You know? Not that that makes any sense, but it does to me.”
“May I?” He opened his arms. We shared a brief, considerate hug, not at all awkward, and I thanked him while holding on just a little too long. He patted my head and, as we separated, said, “You get yourself in any kind of trouble in this place, you call me. Your father doesn’t need to know everything.” He winked.
I looked at him curiously, having no idea why he would think Baskerville would give me trouble. “O . . . K,” I said. With our final good-bye I found my throat tightening. He left. I wanted to call him back. I wanted to run to James and bury my head in his chest and cry. My friend. Maybe my only friend for a long time to come.
Instead, I sat on the edge of the hard mattress. I liked soft mattresses. And spaghetti with no bay leaves, and a television on my wall, not a bunch of old tape-removal scars shadowing another’s decorations. I felt like I’d arrived at the party late—like everything nice had just come down.
And me along with it.
James’s experience proved altogether different than mine. He arrived to a decently proportioned dorm room, one bed neatly made with a dark gray Pendleton blanket as its top cover and a crisp white pillowcase neatly placed at an inviting slight angle. One of the two desks held a blue ceramic cup with pens and pencils, a magnetic paper clip holder, a stapler, a Post-It dispenser, and a cheap but effective desk lamp that clamped to the desktop and looked like a shipping crane.
As to the shared closet, one half of which held all of two pairs of pants, a single blue blazer, two ties, a worn pair of hiking boots, and an unworn pair of dress shoes, James was able to stuff his shelves, fill his hangers, and borrow a foot of empty hanger space that technically belonged to his roommate. He hoped the boy wouldn’t mind him also putting his large suitcase in the adjoining space as he, James, had too many shoes to leave room for the bag. It was too thick to stow under his bed with his three duffels. It was while dispensing with the under-the-bed duffel bags that he caught a glimpse beneath the Pendleton. He saw only a single overnight bag—cracked leather—and, alongside it, a long and narrow box that might have contained a shotgun or telescope. Curious to the point of agitation, James nearly allowed himself to investigate its contents, but swore off starting a year-long residency with his roommate by committing a criminal act. Still, the temptation proved mighty enough that the only solution was to leave the room immediately and pace the dormitory hall while awaiting the boy’s return.
It wasn’t long before a slender silhouette of an unnaturally tall boy appeared at the end of the hall, backlit by the window in the dormitory’s door. The hem of his sport coat floated behind him like a cape, the light distorting his limbs into the thickness of pipe cleaners. He was something of a specter. James had no doubt—none—that this was his roommate. He would wonder for months—years—how he could have been so certain. The boy walked in long, confident strides, though with all the grace of a freshly born colt. He wasn’t comfortable in his body and
was working hard to appear otherwise. James understood the pressures of this arrival day to Baskerville; he felt them himself. Every new boy and girl was on display, both to each other and, more importantly, to the returning students who quickly judged them on appearance alone. There was nothing fair about such things. Middle school had been the failed testing ground for many of them—the cliques, prejudices, abilities, attitudes, insecurities all fueled by strange changes to their bodies, and moods that came and went as quickly as changes in the weather. James had no taste for being on display, wanted nothing to do with it. The boy came toward him, strutting with overconfidence. James found his stride and posture off-putting.
The boy walked past James without a glance and turned into their shared room, stopping abruptly. He turned with a deliberateness and appraised James. Looked back into the room. Back at James.
“Aha!” the boy said. “So you are James Moriarty!”
“You’re English!”
“British. Isn’t everyone? You may try to hide behind that American accent, but I reckon if we were to pluck a hair out of your head and run its DNA you would find you and your people were once cradled in Great Britain yourselves. It’s not shameful to be an outcast. I forgive you, although others of my ilk still find it trying to do so.” While James struggled for words, the other boy continued. “You’re from Boston, someplace impressive, I assume. Beacon Hill? North Shore? You have a sister.” He looked back into the room. “She’s a year younger than you. You’re the only son, or at least the oldest. You play lacrosse; you’re quite good at it, bravo! You came in from the front of the school, a mistake you won’t make next year, and one I avoided, I’m pleased to say. Much faster to park in back and use the stairs. You’ve been engaged in a wrestling . . . uhhh!” He stepped back and bumped into the doorjamb. “A struggle. Not wrestling. Was it life-threatening? You’ve flushed just now and—”
“Shut up!” James roared, pressing his hands to his ears, then catching himself and yanking them down. He walked past his roommate and into their shared space, which suddenly felt much smaller. “How could you possibly . . . ? Who are you?”
The Initiation Page 3