do homework or watch Jackie Gleason and Art Carney in The Honeymooners.
On the day of the game the football field had been freshly limed, and the yard lines shone chalky white. Under an utterly cloudless sky, in air only beginning to carry autumn's snap, a crowd of parents in crew-neck sweaters and chino pants, plaid skirts and blazers, streamed from the visitors' parking lot toward the bleachers. It was obvious that most of these casual fathers in their blue sweaters and brown Weejuns had been Carson students; none of them had the weathered, experienced faces I thought of as typically 'Arizona.' They had grown up here, but they could have come from anywhere urban and knowing.
While Sherman and Howie Stern and Morris Fielding and I sat on the bench, our junior-varsity team lost by three touchdowns. We had managed only a single field goal. The varsity team ran out to cheers and school yells — most of the parents had flasks — and cheerleaders from anearby girls' school flounced and cartwheeled and spelled out the school's name. The Larch School made two touchdowns in the first half, one more in the second. We made none. Ridpath had committed an elementary error and worn us out.
22
I saw something anomalous during the varsity game. Most of our JV team was seated in the last row of the stands, and from there we could look across the field to the grassy rise on its opposite side. When the visitors' lot outside Laker Broome's private entrance had filled, the parents had driven past it over the grass and parked their cars all along the yellow-green length of lawn which we often took as our way down to the Junior School for lunch. The snouts of Buicks and Lincolns and a few MG's pointed across and above the field toward the stands. Toward the end of the first half of the varsity game, I looked up at the row of grilles and bumpers facing us from the rise and saw a man standing between two of the cars.
He did not look like a Carson School parent. No chinos, no lamb's-wool Paul Stuart sweater, no Weejuns. The man was dressed in a long belted raincoat and an old-fashioned brown fedora hat pulled down low on his forehead. His hands were deep in his pockets. At first he reminded me of Sheldon Leonard in the television series Foreign Intrigue — inthe fifties, way out there in the dry West, belted trench coats carried a whiff of glamour; they stood for spies, travel, Europe. Nothing about this exotic character suggested an interest in prep-school athletics.
Then I saw Del Nightingale's reaction to the man. Del was sitting beside Tom Flanagan three rows beneath me, and he looked up toward the rise a moment after I did. The effect on Del of the man dressed like Sheldon Leonard was startling: he froze like a bird before a snake, and I was sure that if you touched him you'd feel him quiver. He uttered a wordless noise — almost like an electronic beep. It was purely the sound of astonishment.
Skeleton Ridpath, seated on the bench in uniform, alsoappeared to be affected by the man's appearance on the rise. I thought he nearly fell off the bench. The man retreated backward between the cars and disappeared. Skeleton turned around and glared back at the stands. His head looked fleshless, the size of a grape above his shoulderpads.
23
'Sometimes I'm Happy'
Streamers hung from the auditorium ceiling, tied up around the dim colored spots; in place of the metal chairs was a vast — empty space for dancing, ringed by tables covered by dark blue cloths. At ten minutes to eight the only people in the room were the freshman waiters and the chaperons, Mr. and Mrs. Robbin. Mr. Robbin taught physics and chemistry, and was slight and gray-haired, with thick inquisitive glasses. His wife was taller than he, and her own hair was screwed up into a bun. The Robbins were
On the day of the game the football field had been freshly limed, and the yard lines shone chalky white. Under an utterly cloudless sky, in air only beginning to carry autumn's snap, a crowd of parents in crew-neck sweaters and chino pants, plaid skirts and blazers, streamed from the visitors' parking lot toward the bleachers. It was obvious that most of these casual fathers in their blue sweaters and brown Weejuns had been Carson students; none of them had the weathered, experienced faces I thought of as typically 'Arizona.' They had grown up here, but they could have come from anywhere urban and knowing.
While Sherman and Howie Stern and Morris Fielding and I sat on the bench, our junior-varsity team lost by three touchdowns. We had managed only a single field goal. The varsity team ran out to cheers and school yells — most of the parents had flasks — and cheerleaders from anearby girls' school flounced and cartwheeled and spelled out the school's name. The Larch School made two touchdowns in the first half, one more in the second. We made none. Ridpath had committed an elementary error and worn us out.
22
I saw something anomalous during the varsity game. Most of our JV team was seated in the last row of the stands, and from there we could look across the field to the grassy rise on its opposite side. When the visitors' lot outside Laker Broome's private entrance had filled, the parents had driven past it over the grass and parked their cars all along the yellow-green length of lawn which we often took as our way down to the Junior School for lunch. The snouts of Buicks and Lincolns and a few MG's pointed across and above the field toward the stands. Toward the end of the first half of the varsity game, I looked up at the row of grilles and bumpers facing us from the rise and saw a man standing between two of the cars.
He did not look like a Carson School parent. No chinos, no lamb's-wool Paul Stuart sweater, no Weejuns. The man was dressed in a long belted raincoat and an old-fashioned brown fedora hat pulled down low on his forehead. His hands were deep in his pockets. At first he reminded me of Sheldon Leonard in the television series Foreign Intrigue — inthe fifties, way out there in the dry West, belted trench coats carried a whiff of glamour; they stood for spies, travel, Europe. Nothing about this exotic character suggested an interest in prep-school athletics.
Then I saw Del Nightingale's reaction to the man. Del was sitting beside Tom Flanagan three rows beneath me, and he looked up toward the rise a moment after I did. The effect on Del of the man dressed like Sheldon Leonard was startling: he froze like a bird before a snake, and I was sure that if you touched him you'd feel him quiver. He uttered a wordless noise — almost like an electronic beep. It was purely the sound of astonishment.
Skeleton Ridpath, seated on the bench in uniform, alsoappeared to be affected by the man's appearance on the rise. I thought he nearly fell off the bench. The man retreated backward between the cars and disappeared. Skeleton turned around and glared back at the stands. His head looked fleshless, the size of a grape above his shoulderpads.
23
'Sometimes I'm Happy'
Streamers hung from the auditorium ceiling, tied up around the dim colored spots; in place of the metal chairs was a vast — empty space for dancing, ringed by tables covered by dark blue cloths. At ten minutes to eight the only people in the room were the freshman waiters and the chaperons, Mr. and Mrs. Robbin. Mr. Robbin taught physics and chemistry, and was slight and gray-haired, with thick inquisitive glasses. His wife was taller than he, and her own hair was screwed up into a bun. The Robbins were
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