The Secret History - Donna Tartt [226]
Unexpectedly, the quizzes proved wildly popular, though not in the spirit the sponsors might have hoped. Hampden had assembled a crack team which—like one of those commando forces in the movies, made up of desperate fugitives, men with freedom to gain and nothing to lose—proved virtually invincible. It was an all-star lineup: Cloke Rayburn; Bram Guernsey; Jack Teitelbaum; Laura Stora; none other than the legendary Cal Clarken heading the team. Cal was participating in hopes of being allowed back into school next term; Cloke and Bram and Laura as part of their required hours of community service; Jack was merely along for the ride. Their combined expertise was nothing short of stunning. Together, they led Hampden to victory after crashing victory over Williams, Vassar, Sarah Lawrence, fielding with dazzling speed and skill such questions as: Name five drugs in the Thorazine family, or: What are the effects of PCP?
But—even though business had been seriously curtailed—I was not surprised to find that Cloke was still plying his trade, though a good bit more discreetly than he had used to in the old days. One Thursday night before a party I went down to Judy’s room to ask for an aspirin and, after a brief but mysterious inquisition from behind the locked door, found Cloke inside, shades pulled, busy with her mirror and her druggist’s scales.
“Hi,” he said, ushering me quickly inside and locking the door behind me again. “What can I do for you tonight?”
“Uh, nothing, thanks,” I said. “I’m just looking for Judy. Where is she?”
“Oh,” he said, crossing back to his work. “She’s in the costume shop. I thought she probably sent you over. I like Judy but she’s got to make such a big production of everything, which is definitely not cool. Not cool—” carefully, he tapped a measure of powder into an open fold of paper—“at all.” His hands trembled; it was evident that he had been dipping pretty freely into his own wares. “But I had to toss my own scales, you know, after all that shit happened and what the fuck am I supposed to do? Go up to the infirmary? She was running around all day, at lunch and stuff, rubbing her nose and saying, ‘Gramma’s here, Gramma’s here,’ lucky nobody knew what the fuck she was talking about, but still.” He nodded at the open book beside him—Janson’s History of Art, which was cut practically to tatters. “Even these fucking bindles. She got fixated on the idea that I had to make these fancy ones, Jesus, open them up and there’s a fucking Tintoretto on the inside. And gets pissed if I cut them out so that the cupid’s butt or whatever isn’t, like, right in the center. How’s Camilla?” he said, glancing up.
“Fine,” I said. I didn’t want to think about Camilla. I didn’t want to think of anything having to do with Greek or Greek class, either one.
“How’s she liking her new place?” said Cloke.
“What?”
He laughed. “Don’t you know?” he said. “She moved.”
“What? Where to?”
“Don’t know. Down the street, probably. Stopped by to see the twins—hand me that blade, would you?—stopped by to see them yesterday and Henry was helping her put her stuff in boxes.” He had abandoned his work at the scales and was now cutting out lines on the mirror. “Charles is going to Boston for the summer and she’s staying here. Said she didn’t want to stay there alone and it was too much of a pain to sublet. Sounds like there are going to be a lot of us here this summer.” He offered me the mirror and a rolled-up twenty. “Bram and I are looking for a place right now.”
“This is very good,” I said, half a minute or so later, just as the first euphoric sparkle was starting to hit my synapses.
“Yeah. It’s excellent, isn’t it? Especially after that awful shit of Laura’s that was going around. Those FBI guys analyzed it and said it was about eighty percent talcum powder or something.