The Poison Tree (15 page)

Nearly all the teachers at Horace Mann School for Boys cultivated eccentricities at that time, but none was as bizarre as Mr. Herman. We all wore ties and suit jackets to school, and we belonged to a “Form,” like English public schools, rather than to grades. Combs and nail files were mandatory at all times. In this rarified atmosphere, most teachers cultivated odd tics, which would be out of bounds even a decade later when girls were finally admitted, not to mention a later age of political correctness or sexual misconduct. Mr. Reilly threatened to use his blackthorn stick on our bare backsides; Mr. Oliver, a rotund French teacher who channeled Orson Welles' deep baritone, warned of dire consequences looming above those unable to present their combs and nail files on command; Mr. Wooster actually kicked boys in the shins beneath their desks, and if they tried to evade punishment, would literally chase them around the classroom. We called our teachers “Sir,” and they addressed us formally as Mister.

Even among this bizarre group of eccentrics, Mr. Herman was set apart. He alone used an ironic, contemptuous tone towards his students, suggesting he was possessed of esoteric knowledge and spiritual illumination that others were simply not privy to. If you listened closely, you might actually be permitted to kneel at the feet of the master, but never soar to his heights. Because he dwelled in some other world so obviously superior to ours, I never saw the other kids mock him the way they did lesser teachers. Who was this man? Where did he come from? No one knew, but at fourteen it seemed to me like a wonderful and exotic place to live.

Mr. Herman was just as fastidious and authoritarian about his dress and behavior as my father, but his style was monochrome black and white, in contrast to my father's taste for colorful neckwear or flowing pocket handkerchiefs. Instead of trying to obviously control my thoughts, he craved nothing; inscrutable, he seemed to pursue only solitude and enlightenment. His mind
was full of poetry, exotic cultures, and cryptic myths; above all, he seemed to live for and be in tune with the great artistic minds of the ages. He showed us long lists of the greatest painters and writers, lists we were advised to copy down and memorize. Genius—that was it! Around Mr. Herman, genius was something palpable, something I felt I could touch. His class offered me what I wanted—an escape into the magical world of literature, art, and music. There were no screaming parents, no awkward little brother; in fact, there was no one I recognized. Instead, I was able to peer into the entrance of a Prospero's cave where none but the spiritually pure might dwell. One day, if I followed his lead, maybe I would be initiated, be admitted to his sublime monastery of the mind.

Forced to re-take English after getting a D in Mr. Ling's class, I found myself in Mr. Herman's Summer School class amid a group of ten or so weak students who simply needed to somehow pass and move on. I quickly came under his spell, and convinced myself I was different from the others who, Mr. Herman suggested on a daily basis, were merely taking up space and wasting his precious time. He introduced me to Shakespeare and Leonardo, Dostoevsky and Dali, and a host of obscure artists whom he alone seemed to know and admire. These great men were no longer simply names. Now they seemed like fellow travelers; like myself, they were searching for meaning in an obscure world. Perhaps one day, if I dedicated myself, I might even join their pantheon.

Now when I went back to the Cloisters, where once, in second grade, I bent down and kissed Goodie Schuman's Luden's-flavored lips, I submerged myself in the culture of the Middle Ages, imagining the sting of the Crucifixion on my own flesh. I went to the Metropolitan and the Frick museums, to concerts—always alone—but armed with a notebook to scribble down my thoughts, images, ideas. I discovered there might be a place for me, and it had nothing to do with family, friends, grandparents, or anyone else. The door to a strange, exotic cave had been prized open. I began to slowly squeeze myself through its tiny opening.

Mr. Herman mentored by example, rather than instruction. He showed his obvious contempt for the class. When one boy asked who Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello was, Herman replied solemnly that he was a Portuguese astronaut. The boy copied it down, hoping he would be asked
the name on a test. He never spoke that way to me; if he had, I would have been crushed. So oblivious did he seem to what was going on around him, I wasn't even sure he knew my name. One day after a particularly inspiring class on early Renaissance art, I dared approach the master. He sat gazing out the window, hands clasped under his chin, unaware of my existence. I stood at attention beside his desk, trembling and biting my nails, realizing he was immersed in one of his trances. Although the bell rang for my next class, I chose to wait. I told myself not to glance at my watch, since even thinking about being late was a betrayal of the wisdom Mr. Herman might conceivably bestow on me if and when he awoke.

The silence lasted many minutes, until out of weakness and fatigue I rested my palm lightly on the corner of his desk. Still, he continued to gaze imperturbably into the distance while I waited patiently for him to descend from whichever mountain top he was standing upon, hoping sometime before the last subway train departed from 242nd Street, that he might acknowledge my existence. I had apparently chosen a poor time for my pilgrimage. As time passed, I thought how wonderful it would be to dwell in the spiritual palace he inhabited rather than the squalid hut I lived in with my mother and brother. To be present, yet remain absent, to the things of this world. This was what genius was—pure genius.

“Yeth? What ith it?” (the great man had a slight lisp). My body was slouched, bent over his desk—and I knew the magic moment had come and gone. But I ventured a word.

“I'm sorry, sir. I … umm … just wanted to tell you how much I am enjoying your class.” There was only silence, but I bravely took things a step further. “I've know I've done badly in all my other classes … but in yours … I … umm, I would like to do better … I've never felt—er, experienced anything like … I just wanted you to know that … in spite of everything … I'm sorry… .”

“The fool who persists in his folly will become—what?” These magical words wafted up toward me as our eyes met for a split second. I shivered. “Listen closely to me now, Henry.” He continued in a whisper so soft I had to bend my body almost at a forty-five degree angle. He was telling me something, but it was delivered in a kind of secret code, or a riddle like the Sphinx offers the Thebans in
Oedipus
. Damn it, I thought in a panic, I can't understand what he's saying.

What if I don't give the right answer, then what? He'll think I'm stupid, like everyone else. Why else would I be in summer school? He'll lose interest. All the teachers know what kind of a crappy student I am—word gets around. What if I make something up and it sounds ridiculous? What if I pretend to understand what he's saying when I obviously don't? Oh, God! That would be the unforgivable sin. It was best to confess my ignorance. So, raising back up, I said, “I don't know, sir.”

“The fool who persists in his folly will become … wise!” he shouted grandly.

What can he be talking about? I wondered. But it was too late; his gaze had gone and he was out the window again. This was going slowly, it was true, but at least I had determined that Mr. Herman knew my name, my first name. That was something; no, more than something—it was an enormous validation.

Then he spoke again. “‘Everything possible to be believed is an image of truth.' This is one of the ‘Proverbs of Hell' by William Blake. Have you heard of him? Of course you haven't. How could you? Go, go and read
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
. Immediately! Then come back and see me.” He waved me off. “Now go!”

“Yes sir, I will sir. Thank you, sir.”

As I moved toward the exit, he jumped up from behind his desk, startling me. I stopped and turned around. He began to recite—shouting the words—as though the words were printed in flaming letters at the back of the classroom:

Hear the voice of the Bard!

Who present, past and future sees

Whose ears have heard,

The Holy Word

That walk'd among the ancient trees.

“Blake, sir?” I asked from the doorway.

“Of course, William Blake. Think about those divine words, my dear.”

“I will, sir. Thank you, sir. I'll go to the library right now, and read everything I can about Blake, sir. Thank you very much!”

I was drenched in sweat, head spinning as I closed the door. The Great Man had spoken, knew my name, even called me “dear.” Maybe he had given me some sort of blessing. In any case, it was something to hold on to.

I cut my next class and took the subway downtown to the Donnell Library on 53rd and 6th to find out who this Blake fellow was. But while I was sitting there staring, trying to make sense of Blake's weird prophecies, the thought kept pounding in my ears: Mr. Herman knows my name. He called me Henry. Mr. Herman said “dear” to me.

It was a revelation.

Looking back now, that crazy moment probably salvaged high school for me. It gave me a sense of burgeoning self-worth. It made me think that maybe, just maybe, someone could see in me something beyond failure, something beyond a D- student without skill or prospects, who bit his nails and couldn't keep his laces tied, who lived with a mother who lived in a locked bedroom filled with boxes of garbage, and a father for whom money and power were paramount.

Maybe I could become an artist. Mr. Herman had said: “Hear the voice of the Bard!” Why had he said that to me? Someday I might write something that would live on, even if whatever I wrote would be less incomprehensible than William Blake's. I read
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
, and tried to read
The Book of Urizen
. It made no sense at all to me, but that didn't matter—the book's prophetic tone was proof of its profundity! I had been chosen. Delivered from slavery. Of course, I would work to become an artist.

I began to read everything I could get my hands on, and spent my evenings reading far more than I was capable of understanding. But had I not been given a sign? A promise? Yes, the great man intimated that one day I might evolve into a different sort of human being from the abject failure I knew myself to be. My mother chastised me for “escaping” into literature and taunted me with the name “Holden Caulfield” in reference to Salinger's hero. I had asked him, and Mr. Herman told me that there was nothing wrong with escape. Escaping into a world of books, he suggested, was far better
than the “reality” of one's miserable life, wasn't it? True greatness involved relinquishing lesser concerns, removing lesser people.

“Why did Hamlet feel no remorse about the deaths of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?” he asked. I did not know. “The elect need not concern themselves with such things,” he said.

It was rumored among the boys in the Upper School that Mr. Herman had inappropriately close relationships with a few of his favorites. Why wasn't I selected as one of the chosen? Some, I had heard, had even gone to visit him at his home—an unimaginable honor! I was never included in this elite group and remember how envious I was of those strange, brilliant boys whom Herman singled out for special attention. Many of them were from broken homes like me, and I started to notice that they even began to talk, walk, dress, and cut their hair like him! They even fell into trances just as he did! I would have given anything to have been invited into this tiny circle, to worship at the feet of this high priest. He mentioned that he planned to lead a trip of boys to Perugia, Italy, to study Italian Renaissance art. I saw my father and begged him to let me go. I cried when he refused.

Decades later, reading about the serial pedophilia that took place at Horace Mann during the 60s and 70s, it occured to me that my father's refusal to let me go may have saved my life. Who knows what happened to those “lucky” boys who went with him to Perugia? Numerous stories of Herman's emotional abuse of his students over decades have now been documented. They suggest that he deliberately crossed the line separating pedagogy and pedophilia; his need to control young minds grew indistinguishable from the actions of a predator. Now in his eighties, he still lives in a lavish home in California bought for him by grateful former students. Some of these acolytes still apparently live with him decades after they graduated. It is said that they support “Daddy's” every whim; dressing like him, drinking special cocktails, and taking their meals together. Herman's home is called “Satis House,” after Miss Havisham's splendid residence in
Great Expectations
. Like its model in Dickens, this latter-day Satis House is a place where time has stopped.

After coming under Mr. Herman's influence, I chose to be alone. I avoided my friends after school, then stopped seeing them altogether. Instead of living people, I discovered companionship in a pantheon of literary figures who were more real and more interesting than anyone I actually knew. Foremost among these was Holden Caulfield, of course, whom I began to imitate by popping up the collar of my jacket, and flinging a long muffler over my shoulder. But in addition to Holden, each week brought on some new, fantastic identity. I copied down Mr. Herman's eclectic suggestions of what I should read in a special notebook. While I now avoided homework as mundane and beneath me, I scrupulously embraced these titles, and saw in their heroes more interesting versions of myself. I took these treasures with me to the wooden benches of Grand Central Station, where I sat among bums and drunks, reading
Crime and Punishment
or
The Castle
until late into the night. Then I walked home to my mother's apartment to sleep.

Due to my new feverish interest in literature and art, I started doing better in English classes and was able to pull up my average to a C. I didn't have to repeat classes at summer school as I had in previous years. I wanted to be as far away as possible from my parents and Horace Mann until I had to return next fall. My father found me a job as an assistant camp counselor upstate in Cold Spring, New York, sixty miles from the city. I would have time to read, be far from home, and even earn some money. I had no idea how it would change my whole life.