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131 They each had their own room and all. They were both around seventy years old,
132 or even more than that. They got a bang out of things, though--in a haif-assed way, of
133 course. I know that sounds mean to say, but I don't mean it mean. I just mean that I used
134 to think about old Spencer quite a lot, and if you thought about him too much, you
135 wondered what the heck he was still living for. I mean he was all stooped over, and he
136 had very terrible posture, and in class, whenever he dropped a piece of chalk at the
137 blackboard, some guy in the first row always had to get up and pick it up and hand it to
138 him. That's awful, in my opinion. But if you thought about him just enough and not too
139 much, you could figure it out that he wasn't doing too bad for himself. For instance, one
140 Sunday when some other guys and I were over there for hot chocolate, he showed us this
141 old beat-up Navajo blanket that he and Mrs. Spencer'd bought off some Indian in
142 Yellowstone Park. You could tell old Spencer'd got a big bang out of buying it. That's
143 what I mean. You take somebody old as hell, like old Spencer, and they can get a big
144 bang out of buying a blanket.
145 His door was open, but I sort of knocked on it anyway, just to be polite and all. I
146 could see where he was sitting. He was sitting in a big leather chair, all wrapped up in
147 that blanket I just told you about. He looked over at me when I knocked. "Who's that?" he
148 yelled. "Caulfield? Come in, boy." He was always yelling, outside class. It got on your
149 nerves sometimes.
150 The minute I went in, I was sort of sorry I'd come. He was reading the Atlantic
151 Monthly, and there were pills and medicine all over the place, and everything smelled
152 like Vicks Nose Drops. It was pretty depressing. I'm not too crazy about sick people,
153 anyway. What made it even more depressing, old Spencer had on this very sad, ratty old
154 bathrobe that he was probably born in or something. I don't much like to see old guys in
155 their pajamas and bathrobes anyway. Their bumpy old chests are always showing. And
156 their legs. Old guys' legs, at beaches and places, always look so white and unhairy.
157 "Hello, sir," I said. "I got your note. Thanks a lot." He'd written me this note asking me to
158 stop by and say good-by before vacation started, on account of I wasn't coming back.
159 "You didn't have to do all that. I'd have come over to say good-by anyway."
160 "Have a seat there, boy," old Spencer said. He meant the bed.
161 I sat down on it. "How's your grippe, sir?"
162 "M'boy, if I felt any better I'd have to send for the doctor," old Spencer said. That
163 knocked him out. He started chuckling like a madman. Then he finally straightened
164 himself out and said, "Why aren't you down at the game? I thought this was the day of the
165 big game."
166 "It is. I was. Only, I just got back from New York with the fencing team," I said.
167 Boy, his bed was like a rock.
168 He started getting serious as hell. I knew he would. "So you're leaving us, eh?" he
169 said.
170 "Yes, sir. I guess I am."
171 He started going into this nodding routine. You never saw anybody nod as much
172 in your life as old Spencer did. You never knew if he was nodding a lot because he was
173 thinking and all, or just because he was a nice old guy that didn't know his ass from his
174 elbow.
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