Was finally where he belonged, at Cambridge. The place that cranked out Nobel Prize winners one after the next. The university that until not too long ago only accepted people who spoke Latin. And who spoke it? Exactly, private school kids. And what did that mean? Exactly, there were no normal people here. Outside of a few scholarship students, everyone here belonged to the same class.

Thome felt as if all the components of his weakly defined sense of self had become congruent with the external conditions. To breathe here in one of the cradles of the Empire was to be part of a grand canvas, something Thome had never experienced before. Thome was a member of the rowing club and lunch club as well as a secret society that was so secret it had yet to hold a single meeting. They grew up here, the future politicians, judges, lawyers, and weapons dealers of the nation, surrounded by marriage material that would never resort to a career. Thome was possessed by the eager restlessness that held sway over people when they did the right thing in the right place. When they followed their purpose. Thome bent over his work after lectures, yes, he could picture himself from above: an ambitious young cadre who, with a furrowed brow, devoted himself to the big IT questions of the future. In the evenings he went to the club, on weekends he rowed. His body was changing for the better along with his mind, that much he could already tell. When he gazed out at the campus it was as if he were looking at the family he’d never had, when he prowled the pubs of the venerable little town he saw people who looked like him. A few interesting women were also around, surely a good match would be made here.

The campus was peaceful on that

Sunday.