After the Keating debacle, Richard Cameron threw himself into academic pursuit as he never had done before. He studied every minute possible: Before class. After class. While changing for rowing. While eating.
This last meant holding index cards in his lap, lest Dr. Hager see them. It was strictly forbidden to bring books or papers into the dining hall. Frankly, Cameron had had enough of rule-breaking, thank you, but the alternative was to sit silent through a meal, or to be ignored by his peers so completely that he felt invisible. He wasn't sure which was worse.
You could sit where you wanted, but the tablemates Cameron was accustomed to were the elite students and their hangers-on. Knox Overstreet was no academic slouch, at least when he wasn't tongue-out slavering over some ditzy blonde townie. But nobody in their right mind would call Gerard Pitts an elite student; he was definitely a hanger-on. And nobody in their right mind could have ever called Charlie Dalton an elite student, either, but he was so well-connected and so popular (and so funny, at least sometimes) that Cameron hadn't minded associating with him. Steven Meeks? A decent student, to be sure, though without any panache. Plus, he'd been Charlie Dalton's lapdog.
Todd Anderson was nothing at all like his older brother, former Welton valedictorian. Now there was a fellow Cameron would have been proud to call friend.
But Cameron knew where he stood with academics and honors: at the top of the senior class. If he concentrated on his standing, on his chase for perfection, he could feel worthy. If he ignored the reason he was the sole holder of the highest grade point average, he could almost forget that three weeks ago, it had been someone else.
It had been Neil Perry.
Cameron had liked Neil – had admired him, to be honest. Neil was a leader in the best possible ways, and as iron sharpens iron, it was good to have the pressure to excel. You worked harder when there was someone to beat.
Neil's suicide was only explainable by Keating's influence. Why would someone who had everything go and waste it? Neil had been uncommonly bright, and diligent to go along with it. He was popular, handsome, friendly, and kind. His hair fell just right; his clothes fit him elegantly. He had influence with other students. He was the best kind of example. Cameron could only understand Neil's giving up his considerable assets and advantages if, somehow, Keating had put the idea of suicide in Neil's head.
Which he had to have done! It was the only way it made sense! There were plenty of things Cameron had never thought about before hearing Keating mention them – and a lot of those things were dangerously weird. Cameron had never approved of the man anyway. He said such peculiar things. And his class structure was nonexistent.
Cameron needed structure. Everyone needed structure, really. Make fun of structure if you want, John Keating! If you were going to be all loosey-goosey with a bunch of teenagers in your class, you couldn't be surprised by the chaos that would surely ensue. Let one student stand on his desk, and they'd all do it. It would be anarchy.
No, Cameron couldn't actually be 100% certain that Keating had suggested the idea of suicide to Neil Perry. He hadn't been there every time the two of them talked, of course. But who else? Why else?
Anderson Minor had the goofy idea it was Mr. Perry who had made Neil want to kill himself. Which was ridiculous. Fathers only wanted the best for you. They were sensible, wise, and cautious. As Davy Crockett would say, "Be sure you're right, then go ahead." Of course this silly idea that Neil Perry could abandon his respected position at Welton – the springboard to a respected college and from there to a respected career – for acting, of all things! was literally unthinkable, except by cretins and idiots. Of course Dr. Nolan was right. Of course it was that weirdo Keating who had encouraged Neil to break the rules, to flout his father's wishes, to pursue unsuitable avenues. Of course Keating had to go.
Of course the other boys were smart enough to listen to Cameron's advice to sign Dr. Nolan's paper, too – well, except for Dalton, whose impulsiveness was one day likely to land him in jail. (And where would Dalton go now? Balinhurst, or St. Andrew's? Probably military school, and he'd be lucky to get that. Dalton might even be stuck with his public high school in New York City, which would be a disaster for his career. Well, Dalton had made his bed, and he could lie in it.)
Of course Cameron had been right to take the only sensible course.
It seemed, though, that the other boys disagreed – well, now they did, after he'd saved all their bacon by recommending that they 'fess up to authority about their childish rule-breaking. None of them were speaking to him. Not one of the others who'd been involved in that ridiculous "society" would say a word to him. Not a word! It was unconscionable.
Overstreet went out of his way not to be where Cameron was a lot of the time, and he kept his face turned the other way during classes they had in common. Meeks wouldn't look at him. Neither would Pitts. Anderson, though, was almost worse: he would look at Cameron with silent reproach. Wouldn't say anything, not even to answer a question, but he'd look, and his eyes were so sad.
It made Cameron feel small. And, somehow, as if he'd been wrong about the whole thing. (Not possible!)
The last time he'd looked forward to Christmas holidays so much had been his first year at Welton, when he'd been homesick for his dog and his mother's cooking. He tried telling himself that it wasn't all bad: these days, Dalton's bed was empty and there was no morass of dirty laundry in the bottom of the closet, nobody bothering him when he was studying. Nobody playing practical jokes or bugging him to share his Latin homework or dragging him out to the stupid woods to sit in a stupid cave and read stupid poetry.
Still, the silence was starting to get to him.
At least twice he'd had trouble going to sleep, with the remembered chant about the Congo reverberating in his head. And once he'd had a misty dream in which Neil Perry, wearing his crown of branches as Puck, was saying, "I'll follow you, I'll lead you about a round/Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier…" and Cameron had woken in a cold sweat, afraid of Neil's bloody face in the dream.
It had still been the right thing to do. It had. Richard Cameron wasn't to blame. If Neil had looked at his future, the one Cameron was pursuing as hard as ever he could, and decided it wasn't worth it, that was sheer madness. Madness! Keating-induced madness, quite obviously.
It wasn't Cameron's fault. It couldn't be.
Not possible.