in my face. I was aware that I had shifted my gaze to him and.
I did not feel at all like myself. 'Have some fun?' I asked. He was studying me. He nodded. Worry in his face. 'Is that what you said. Have some fun?' I asked. He waited. 'I want an exception made, Richard,' I said. 'Elliott Slater. I want him reprieved and brought to my quarters tomorrow afternoon.' 'Hmmmmm, you are not yourself, as you said. You'll have the young man in three days.' 'No,' I said. 'You made your little stand for the rules in front of everyone. Now make the private exception. I want Slater tomorrow afternoon. They aren't to touch him in the morning; bath and rest by ten. My room at one p.m. Put the order through now. No one is going to know the difference. The other postulants are too damn busy, and the trainers are overworked as we well know, and I don't give a damn.' He didn't say anything for a moment. Then he said: 'You're the boss.' 'Yes, the boss and the mastermind ...' I said. 'But of course,' he said quietly. 'If you feel that strongly about it. Tomorrow, after lunch.' I rose and started towards the door. 'Something's really wrong, isn't it?' he asked. 'What?' 'And it didn't start on your vacation,' he said softly. 'It's been brewing for a while.' 'No,' I said. I shook my head. 'Just tired. Make sure they send Slater to me at one o'clock. Will you do that?' 'Very well, my dear. Hope it does the trick.'
Chapter Eleven
11 -- Lisa
Welcome to The House
Something wrong, something brewing for a long time? Regrets about those teenage years? There had to be some reason for this ambush of memories, didn't there? Hope it does the trick. I stood in the garden outside the administration building, and I looked up at the stars, always so brilliantly clear when there were no clouds, as if the sky were sliding down to the sea. Japanese lanterns gave off their low flicker in the flower beds. Lilies under the dark lace of the crepe myrtle were as white as the moon. My mouth started tingling as if I were kissing him again. And he was only steps away, wasn't he? Do you know there are three thousand members here tonight, Elliott Slater? Oh, we are such a success. Distant sound of the plane from the far side of the island. Miss Teenage America already taking off, back to the hypocrisy and the absurdities of adolescence. Sorry and good luck. But I hadn't any regrets, it wasn't that. Richard was wrong, at least on that score. It would be a terrible lie to say I hadn't done what I wanted from the beginning with those early lovers, and in fighting Jean Paul finally, refusing to go on.
Something was brewing maybe, something I didn't understand, but I had made my own choices always. And certainly I made my own choice on the night when Martin Halifax had first called. Of course I'd heard of him, the mysterious owner of the place they called The House. In a moment of exquisite ambivalence I'd almost put down the phone. 'No, I have a different sort of opportunity for you, Lisa,' he had said. 'Something you might find easier just now. You might try it from the other side, you see.' American voice. Like the older priests in childhood, the ones who didn't sound like Protestant ministers, the ones who were real old-guard Irish-Catholic priests. 'Other side?' 'The finest slaves make the finest mistresses and masters,' he said. 'I would so love to talk to you, Lisa.
About your becoming, shall we say, a part of The House? If you're afraid for any reason to come here, I'll meet you wherever you like.' The basement den of the Victorian that they call The House. Strangely, amusingly, like my father's library except it was filled with more expensive things, more cut off from the noise of the world outside. None of the Catholic books on the walls. No dust. Martin himself. That wonderful voice connected at last with the friendliest face I'd ever seen. Simple, unaffected, amazingly straightforward. 'It was strictly a belief, a suspicion the way that it began,' he said, with his fingertips touching for an instant before he folded his arms on the desk. 'That out there, caught in the web of modern life there were hundreds of other men like me, maybe