“Oh, right, you’re a squash player too,” Markson said, and Ben almost wished he hadn’t known. “I played a tiny bit in college. My roommate junior and senior year was a phenomenal player, though, an Indian guy. It’s a great game.”

Ben suddenly understood it was Markson’s first semester as a teacher.

“Did you go here too?” Ben asked.

“Yeah, it’s taking a little time to adjust, actually. I’m still looking at all the teachers and wondering if they’re going to find me doing something wrong.”

Ben wanted to tell him he was going to do fine, but instead they came back around to the Schoolhouse, where Markson said Ben would know where to find him. Ben nodded and was about to head inside when Markson held up his hand and said, “Hey, Ben, please feel free to come talk to me. Obviously I’m faculty, but it’s not hard for me to remember what it’s like here. And if you need to talk about home stuff”—Markson stalled here, smiling—“just, whatever, I’m happy to talk.”

Ben nodded again, hoping he looked sincere, and Markson released him with another wave.

Ahmed turned out to be in Ben’s Approaches to History section, and he seemed untouched by the night before, quietly delighted to be in class, nodding along with the cadence of the teacher’s words. Hutch and Ahmed were in bio with Ben, Evan in geometry, no one in Latin. Harry made his boys take Latin because it was a prerequisite for being a Western man.

Ben was shocked by how much work each class immediately assigned. He pinched the total pages he was supposed to read by Wednesday for Approaches; it was as thick as the side of his hand. He had to read half of Oedipus Rex and he had a twenty-question problem set for geometry. Conceptually he had known that St. James would have classes on Saturdays, but now the reality of it bore down on him. He left his last class at three thirty and thought he was going to have to work for the rest of the day and night.

But Hutch and Evan said they were going out to the boat docks with some guys because afternoon sports started Tuesday and everyone was going to the docks today. St. James was entirely traversed by water, and almost anywhere on campus a stretch of water reflected the surrounding buildings, trees, and sky. Even after the crew team had moved to Long Pond, a mile off campus, the school kept a dock on Sluice Pond, which extended directly away from the chapel, to give students a place to swim. From the back of the Dish you could make out the hunter-green boathouse, decommissioned now, and the plain wood dock extending down over the water.