John Barth - Giles Goat-Boy

Yet I paused a moment before committing suicide, for it was Hedwig Sear instead of Anastasia who shrieked round from the alley. Dressed in a thin infirmary-gown and clutching a rag-doll, she was pursued not by Peter Greene but by Croaker, whose cure had apparently not taken before Rexford's amnesty freed them both. And clinging to Croaker's trouser-top, half running, half dragging, was Dr. Sear himself, identifiable by his white tunic and gauze-bound head. He it was who cried "Rape! Rape!" At sight of the crowd Mrs. Sear stopped short, and as if smitten by modesty, pressed the rag-doll to the bosom of her gown and put a finger in her mouth. At once Croaker overtook her; to my further surprise, Dr. Sear fought — heroically! — in her behalf, but alas, succeeded only in facilitating the assault. For as the three tumbled campuswards his tugging brought down Croaker's detention-pants. Even so the doctor was not done; he picked himself up, and heedless of the difference in their strength and of his own safety, struck Croaker with both fists. The dread Frumentian had fetched up his quarry's gown and aimed his weapon; propped on one elbow, Mrs. Sear began to play with the doll, oblivious to her peril. One backhand swat felled the plucky doctor; he lay unconscious. Bucklike then, with a grunt and single slam that the tardy guards could not arrest, Croaker studded Mrs. Sear — back into awareness, one gathered from her cry.

I closed my eyes. No matter that accessory features of the denouement were changed; it was the same old plot. As Croaker croaked and Hedwig wailed, I shrugged and swung myself off the sidecar, to make an end of it. No such luck: even before my death-wrench could sound the horn, I was hoist on mighty shoulders. The shophar flew; the rope went slack. I opened my eyes and found myself astride Croaker's neck, as once in the Living Room. A swath of tumbled undergraduates marked his path from me to Hedwig, who now embraced upon the ground her comatose if not deceased spouse.

"Everybody keep your shirts on!" ex-Chancellor Hector cried over the loudspeakers. But the unfelled bystanders clambered over one another to safety. Several sooty guards had drawn their pistols and were advancing towards us; armed with my stick, which he must have espied near the side-car, Croaker growled and made ready for combat. A young man whose dress and forelock suggested administrative responsibility stepped between us to warn the guards about intercollegiate repercussions and New Tammany's varsity image. My mother, to perfect the scene, found her way at last onto the porch from somewhere inside the Old Chancellor's Mansion, took one look about, and swooned; a ball of blue yarn rolled from her knitting-bag almost to Grandfather's feet.

"For pete's sake give me a hand, somebody!" he shouted, still in possession of the public-address system, if not his composure. "Flunk this arm of mine! Give me something to tie it up with!" This last, though broadcast, was snarled at his receptionist, who, despite the cold, at once began unbuttoning her uniform-blouse. The P.-G. snatched it from her before she could offer it, and ordered the doorguard to tie the sleeves behind his neck in the fashion of a sling. The fore-locked vice-chancellor or administrative assistant, meanwhile, had commandeered a megaphone left behind by the fled cruel co-eds, and having begged the guards to hold their fire yet a minute, now implored me to check Croaker if I could: emissaries of his Frumentian alma mater were to fetch him next day, I was told, and with the University on the verge of C.R. III (if not already beyond it!), New Tammany needed all the colleagues it could get. Reports had it, he said, that Dr. Eierkopf was at the Powerhouse with Chancellor Rexford: would I guide Croaker thither, escorted by the guards, and arrange with Eierkopf to manage him until his recall?

"I'm busy being lynched," I reminded him. The aide apologized for that miscarriage of justice, acknowledging that even New Tammany had its imperfections, and promised that if I'd steer Croaker safely off Great Mall and retire myself to the goat-barn for the time being, he'd do everything he could to get me reinstated, appealing Bray's decision if necessary to the highest committees in Tower Hall.

The mob had retreated to a safe distance. Croaker croaked and handed me my stick, as if inviting governance; the guards stood ready to pistol him at the first threatening move. A white infirmary-vehicle with flashing headlight had swung into the dooryard, and medical-school functionaries hurried to attend the Sears and my mother. Reginald Hector had gone into the Mansion with his receptionist, but the latter now reappeared, an ROTC overcoat cloaking her bare shoulders; she flung in our direction her employer's former wrapper, and pertly withdrew.

Forelock's diplomacy gave way at last; fetching up the wrapper, he either tossed it to me or threw it at me, and cried, "Won't this day ever end? Flunk everything!"

The wrapper was of fine Angora, but ill-cut and worse-stitched. I smiled despite all at Granddad's goatsmanship and Forelock's distress — then put the noose from my neck, slipped into the familiar hide, and with a farewell glance at my swooned mom, slicked Croaker homewards.

In fact — so our driver guessed as we sped in convoy from Great Mall — it was probably no later than half-past six. He hoped not, anyhow, for his detail was to go off duty at seven, and riot or no riot, he'd heard that the maddest party in the history of the Powerhouse was in progress, and he wanted not to miss the fun. Croaker I'd induced to ride in the sidecar, but I was obliged to remain on his shoulders. The streets and public buildings were dark, owing to the power-failure, and almost vacant because of the general emergency; despite the ragged navigation of the guards we made good time. My neck was sore, my stomach empty, my bladder full, and the wind of that longest night in the year chilled me through; but my heart was so entirely spent, my spirit sunk, that their despair was indistinguishable from peace. I felt no further pain at abandoning Max, Mother, and my hopes, nor chagrin at being spared yet again from lynching, nor pleasure at the thought of rejoining the herd. I felt concern no more for studentdom's predicament, or my own. I felt nothing; was full of that positive sensation.

In perhaps an hour, so rapidly we traveled, we came to the top of that gorge where G. Herrold had expired — decades ago, it seemed. The moon shone cold on the beach and stream (which ran still now) and reflected upon a new span built on the old one's piers. Its design was different, its termini the same — and so for all I knew or cared might be its fate, come next spring's torrents. At the intersection where a right turn led down over it and thence to the barns, a left to the Powerhouse, pistol-shots rang out ahead. Our troop made a ragged halt and answered in kind, firing into the air. Then other shots sounded on the left, and almost simultaneously three headlights jiggled into view, one from before us and two from the left: motorcycles racing full-throttle. Nowise alarmed, the guards fell to wagering: their odds favored "the boss" (some called him "der Hauptmann"), who approached from the front, to reach the crossroads first, although the pair coming up on our left seemed rather nearer. And they knew their man, for with a recklessness that bespoke Maurice Stoker, "the boss" suddenly began shooting not into the air but at his competition — at the road ahead of them, in any case, where dust-puffs rose in their headlamp-beams and bullets rang from stones. The lead cyclist of the pair swerved for his life and spun into a shallow ditch, as Herman Hermann must once have done; the other slowed his pace appreciably, with the result that Maurice Stoker skidded into the crossroads, lit by our headlights, three or four seconds before his rival, another Powerhouse guard. Our detachment applauded their leader and hooted at their colleague's timidity.