It was said that Schwilk sometimes walked to the house on Bayberry Avenue where he rented a small apartment by way of the old canal—cutting through the weedy fields behind the school property, carrying his heavy briefcase, a solitary figure, rather comical when he wasn’t dominating a classroom. He worked late at his desk and rarely left school before four, four-thirty: long after most of the other teachers had gone home and the faculty parking lot was nearly empty.

What, precisely, was so amusing about Mr. Schwilk?—or so disturbing?

“Jesus,” Lester Hughey said, peering at him from behind one of the rocks, “you think there’s something wrong with him?”

“He’s thinking about something,” Kyle Roemischer said, poking Lester in the shoulder, “he can’t shut his brain off like you.”

“He’s talking to himself,” Erma Dietz said.

“Just don’t let him hear you, for God’s sake,” Marya whispered.

“He wouldn’t hear anything outside his own fucking head,” Lester said. “ ‘Mr. Schwilk!’ ‘Mr. Schwilk, sir!’ ”

They watched him, swallowing their laughter. Of course he was totally oblivious of them—they could probably have spoken in their normal voices and he wouldn’t have heard.

Only two or three hours before, they had been intimidated by him in room 110: Schwilk pacing dramatically about, telling his anecdotes—which were always designed to “prove” something they should have known all along—covering the milky-gray blackboard with his eager sloping scrawl, quick to call on students who were inattentive or frankly daydreaming or who gave nervous signs of being unprepared. He had his allies, of course—even two or three clear favorites—but there were days when he seemed impatient with correct answers, strangely greedy for mistakes, for students who might make fools of themselves and provide an occasion for raucous laughter. Hence he frequently called upon louts like Bob Bannerman, who was taking eighth-grade English for the second time, or Ron Jelinski, who rarely spoke above a frightened whisper. No, no! And again—no! Mr. Schwilk cried in a high perturbed voice, as if he were deeply insulted: and half turning on his heel, whipping about so that his silky hair flashed, he gazed expectantly out over the thirty-odd faces to call on someone who knew the right answer. Ah yes!—yes. And he would smile a sudden happy smile as if nothing on earth could delight him more.

His teeth were small, childlike, perfectly white, and perfectly even; his cheeks dimpled when they were exposed.