As Skander had been talking, Hawthorne gathered some files remaining on his desk.

Skander raised his eyebrows. “Surely you’re not taking all those home to read?”

“Some are for the meeting and others I’ll take home,” said Hawthorne, smiling. “It’s got to be done.”

Skander made a clucking noise. “I wish you’d get more rest. A shock such as you had in San Diego could take years to get over. I expect you still dream of them every night.”

Hawthorne opened his mouth to speak, then said nothing.

“Don’t worry about it, but I want you to feel free to talk if you wish. I’m glad you’ll be coming over tomorrow night, if only to drop in. Hilda and I had such a good time when we had dinner together on Saturday.”

Skander had invited the faculty to his house on Friday evening for coffee and apple cobbler around eight o’clock to give them the opportunity to socialize with the new headmaster. “With adult refreshment as well,” he had said with a wink.

“Someone told you about the fire?” asked Hawthorne.

“Friends in San Diego happened to mention it. I can’t tell you how upset I was. And Hilda, too. Of course you must torment yourself with questions. How could you not?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know, whether you did the right thing. What would have happened if you had done this instead of that. Letting that boy into your home.”

Hawthorne moved to the door with the files under his arm. “It’s hard not to think of it.” He didn’t want to talk about San Diego but the subject seemed always near at hand.

Skander followed Hawthorne to the door. “What if you’d never spoken to that boy? That’s what I mean. Those thoughts must be very difficult. We’ve all done things that we’ve regretted afterward, but your experience is particularly awful.”

“Time can do a lot. I suppose I try to move forward.” Hawthorne despised the banalities he heard coming out of his mouth.

“How true, how true,” said Skander, looking suddenly philosophical. “But you know, I was also impressed by your prominence. Certainly I knew from your curriculum vitae that you were an important figure in your field, but my friends’ remarks . . . Well, they couldn’t say enough. I can’t tell you how fortunate I feel that you’ve decided to make Bishop’s Hill your home. You’re planning to write a book, I imagine.”

“A book? You mean a sort of memoir?”

“No, no, an analysis of our little community. What was that book I read in college? The Village in the Vaucluse, something like that. Perhaps that’s what you’re intending for us. Bishop’s Hill will be your very own Vaucluse.”

Hawthorne stared at Skander, trying to determine if he was serious. “Believe me, nothing is farther from my thoughts.”

“Oh, you say that now, but in five or ten years, who can say what you’ll be up to. I only hope they spell my name right. You know how those editors can be.”

Hawthorne made himself change the subject. “Fritz, I want you to check upstairs to see that everything is ready for the faculty meeting. I’ve asked the kitchen to bring refreshments of some kind, just so the occasion doesn’t seem so onerous. But if you could make sure the room is set up . . .”

“I’d be delighted. Just let me have a word with Mrs. Hayes about those computers.”

Five minutes later, Skander had opened one of the boxes containing a computer and was spreading the instruction booklets out on Mrs. Hayes’s desk as the secretary sighed.

“What do you think?” he said. “Exciting, isn’t it.”

“I’ll never be able to do it.”

“Don’t be silly. I’m sure it’s very user-friendly.” He opened three of the manuals and set them in front of Mrs. Hayes. “In six months, you’ll be a regular champ, surfing the Internet with the best. Mind you stay away from the more lubricious Web sites. I’d hate to see you corrupted. My son is particularly fond of chat rooms. And games—really, his room is full of electronic explosions. By the way, has Dr. Hawthorne been quizzing you about Dr. Pendergast?”

Mrs. Hayes stared down at the manuals. “Not really, no.”

Skander chuckled soothingly. “A wonderful old fellow in his way and sorely missed by quite a few. I suggest you take these books home and start getting into them. There’s a computer class at Plymouth State that meets a couple of nights each week. The school will pay, of course.”

“My bridge group meets tonight,” said Mrs. Hayes, slightly embarrassed.

“Ah, I’m afraid you won’t have much time for that anymore. Just promise you won’t turn the machine on till you’ve fully mastered the manuals. It’s expensive equipment and we’d hate to see it go up in smoke.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Much the wisest course. Oh yes, if you hear them make any noise in their boxes—you know, hum or click—just ignore it. These things have internal batteries, fans and suchlike. They can be unnerving if you don’t know they’re there. Mr. Dolittle has one in the library. He says the hard drive is always thinking even when the machine’s been turned off for the night. The fans can be especially distracting. Ta-ta!”

Skander disappeared into the hall. Mrs. Hayes stared at the computer, waiting for it to do something. Its hindquarters seemed to require dozens of wires or connections, she wasn’t sure what they were called. If she listened carefully she thought she could hear something from inside the machine, but she wasn’t positive. From a classroom several doors away, she heard the Bishop’s Hill cheerleaders practicing their cheers: “Bishop’s Hill, we aim to kill! Bishop’s Hill, we aim to kill!” Their high voices echoed down the empty hall.

—

Kate found the Xerox copies of the news clippings from the San Diego Union-Tribune in her mailbox just before she left for home Friday afternoon. She meant to look at them later but instead she read them while sitting in her small Honda in the lot behind Douglas Hall. By now she had heard that Hawthorne’s wife and daughter had died in a fire and she had seen the scars on his wrist, though she didn’t know any details. The articles described how Hawthorne, as director at Wyndham School, a San Diego residential treatment center, had befriended a boy who had grown jealous of Hawthorne’s wife and daughter and had started the fire. Hawthorne had been out for the evening with a psychologist from Boston, a woman named Claire Sunderlin. They had had dinner and stayed for an hour at a jazz bar. When he returned, he found the building burning and his wife and daughter trapped inside.

A month after the fire, hearings were held by a panel that included representatives from the San Diego County Department of Social Services, the California Association of Services for Children, and the regional branch of the Child Welfare League. Much discussion focused on Hawthorne’s theories that children at risk could benefit from being given increasing degrees of responsibility, tasks like tutoring other children, helping in the kitchen, and working with the grounds crew—even, in some cases, keeping pets. A woman from the Child Welfare League had especially criticized Hawthorne for giving the boy, Stanley Carpasso, privileges enabling him to move freely about the school. Although Hawthorne had not been faulted for being away from Wyndham the night of the fire, it had received a lot of attention, especially in the newspaper. There were pictures of the burning school and of Hawthorne’s wife and daughter, as well as a picture of the psychologist from Boston, who was quite pretty. The hearings had exonerated Hawthorne of any responsibility. But the reporter’s tone implied that the committee members had been swayed by their sympathy for Hawthorne’s personal loss and the fact that he had been burned while attempting to rescue his family. And there was the suggestion that as psychologists investigating another psychologist the committee had been protecting one of their own. Because of the arson, the fire marshal had also conducted an investigation, but Hawthorne had been exonerated there as well.