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Chapters (93)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Prologue
  4. Chapter 1
  5. Part One
  6. Chapter 1
  7. Chapter 2
  8. Chapter 3
  9. Chapter 4
  10. Chapter 5
  11. Chapter 6
  12. Chapter 7
  13. Chapter 8
  14. Chapter 9
  15. Chapter 10
  16. Part Two
  17. Chapter 1
  18. Chapter 2
  19. Chapter 3
  20. Chapter 4
  21. Chapter 5
  22. Chapter 6
  23. Chapter 7
  24. Chapter 8
  25. Chapter 9
  26. Chapter 10
  27. Chapter 11
  28. Chapter 12
  29. Part Three
  30. Chapter 1
  31. Chapter 2
  32. Chapter 3
  33. Chapter 4
  34. Chapter 5
  35. Chapter 6
  36. Chapter 7
  37. Part Four
  38. Chapter 1
  39. Chapter 2
  40. Chapter 3
  41. Chapter 4
  42. Chapter 5
  43. Chapter 6
  44. Chapter 7
  45. Chapter 8
  46. Chapter 9
  47. Part Five
  48. Chapter 1
  49. Chapter 2
  50. Chapter 3
  51. Chapter 4
  52. Chapter 5
  53. Chapter 6
  54. Chapter 7
  55. Chapter 8
  56. Chapter 9
  57. Chapter 10
  58. Chapter 11
  59. Part Six
  60. Chapter 1
  61. Chapter 2
  62. Chapter 3
  63. Chapter 4
  64. Chapter 5
  65. Chapter 6
  66. Chapter 7
  67. Part Seven
  68. Chapter 1
  69. Chapter 2
  70. Chapter 3
  71. Chapter 4
  72. Chapter 5
  73. Chapter 6
  74. Chapter 7
  75. Chapter 8
  76. Chapter 9
  77. Chapter 10
  78. Chapter 11
  79. Part Eight
  80. Chapter 1
  81. Chapter 2
  82. Chapter 3
  83. Chapter 4
  84. Chapter 5
  85. Chapter 6
  86. Chapter 7
  87. Chapter 8
  88. Chapter 9
  89. Epilogue
  90. Acknowledgments
  91. Reading Group Guide
  92. About the Author
  93. Copyright

Harrington gave me a sympathetic look. “I know this must all seem very new,” he said. “But we must face the facts. The dinosaurs have had their day. It’s time for St. Oswald’s to evolve. Survival is our priority now. And we will survive. Well, maybe not all of us”—his smile grew a little more pronounced—“but those who face the future instead of clinging to the past. They’ll survive. We’ll survive. Because we are survivors!”

Once more, the Common Room rose en masse to give him a standing ovation. I remained seated, though Eric stood, clapping furiously with the rest. Harrington accepted their tribute with an air of amusement—and maybe a hint of veiled contempt, which of course only I saw. Once more, I thought his gaze shifted to mine, as if to assess the potential threat. Is this how the snake charmer feels when he locks eyes with the cobra? And if so, I can’t help wondering which is the charmer, and which is the snake?

Chapter 4

4

Michaelmas Term, 2005

In every Common Room in the world, certain well-known tribes are represented. The Suit, brought into the School by chance on a plague ship during the sixties, as exemplified by Bob Strange; the Stickler, by Dr. Devine; the Old Boy, who, like Eric Scoones, can’t seem to keep away from the place; and, of course, the Tweed Jacket, of which I am the prototype. Ladies are either Dragons or, most often, Low-Fat Yogurts, a damp subspecies of female who sits in a corner, discussing by turns the latest diet, or scandal, or episode of Neighbors. And then there is the Snake Charmer, a type that occurs only once or twice in a Master’s lifetime. How strange now to see Johnny Harrington reborn into such a disguise; how strange, and yet I am not surprised. Haven’t I always known he’d come back? Haven’t I known it for twenty years?

He arrived in my life at the age of fourteen, in the autumn of ’81. He was new to St. Oswald’s; a seventh-term boy with an impressive academic report and a flawless behavioral record. Shiny hair of impeccable (though slightly girlish) cut; a face unmarked by adolescent acne; even his uniform looked neater than the other boys’; his shoes polished to an alarming gloss and his School tie knotted in just the right way—