After the hymn closed, there was a long pause. Usually this was when some student would give a speech about study abroad or an a cappella group would perform, but now it was just empty. Ben got impatient and felt foolish for being up here. Would it be so hard to hear this news next to other people? Was his tiny act of rebellion so urgent? The long building stayed quiet.

He saw the top of Aston’s blond head shift and move the two paces to his podium. His voice came from so far away that it sounded delayed, as if it had spoken some time ago.

“  do not take discipline lightly.    student admitted to St. James deserves to be here and each offers     unique and valuable. Never   ess a student proves him or    self     adhering to the school’s contract.     student tears the fabric that binds   school     must    consequences.    term health of the whole must prevail    the short-term    of any individual student.    not easy decisions      necessary.”

Aston didn’t speak for several seconds.

“  using drugs    bringing    campus, Graham Lasseter asked    leave the school.”

“For    drugs and bringing drugs   campus, Thomas Landon has   asked   the school.”

“For    in presence of     drug use,   Ahmed Al-Khaled    probation   one year and will      days work duty.”

Aston paused. Ben rolled over and lay back on the gangway again. It seemed that whatever had laid itself over him would press his body down through the gridding. He wanted the roar of the carillon. He wanted the school to apply its rigor, to enact some bracing justice. But, too, he was relieved for his friend. He saw Ahmed savoring the forest walk to Seated Meal. And maybe the sheik still had some patience left for him.

But the school. The school’s ethics were a scrim over its animal need to survive. Just manners over its unforgiving appetite.

“  us pray.”

*  *  *

Ben waited for everyone to leave before he came down. He locked the door behind him, walked out across the chapel lawn in the first-period quiet under a flat overcast sky. He couldn’t bring himself to go to class, to go to lunch, to practice, to do homework, to sleep, any of it. He regretted locking the door to the chapel tower, so dutifully following the little rules of schoolboy mischief.

Across the chapel lawn Ben saw the small brick PO, so appealing still, and from force of habit he went in to check his little window there. An L.L.Bean catalogue with a thoughtful couple in shorts walking across a sand dune.

Ahmed was on the couch with his eyes closed when Ben came back to the room.

“Are you all right?”

“All right,” said Ahmed. Mr. Dennett had relayed the news to him.