Chapter 2

Avenue of the Giants is a long stretch of the San Francisco-Eureka Freeway, beginning several hours driving time north of the Bay City, on which the redwood trees visible from the road have never been timbered. Thousands of years old and hundreds of feet high, they appear an endless dense forest of giant wooden towers that, in their enormity and their abundance, defy the imagination of modern man. The trunks of the older trees have a diameter at the base of some twenty or thirty feet; the highway running through them is like a dark, shaded and endless-seeming tunnel.

Though she'd lived most of her life in the San Francisco area Barbara had never taken this drive north before and she was enthralled as she peered out the window of the speeding Greyhound. She felt as if she had entered a magic forest and the sheer beauty of the giant phalli of the trees made her feel a small and insignificant creature in the universe. But still, she thought, the most astonishing thing about this beautiful and unique little piece of land could only be appreciated if one were aware of the fact that it was a freak of nature that had occurred. This was Northern California in its natural state, one of the few places that still remained untouched, unravished, by man.

But in all her exhilaration her joy at the experience of visiting this little stronghold of nature was tempered by the memory and the lingering guilt that had obsessed both her waking hours and dreams during the week that had elapsed since Greg had left for the Middle East.

That night lying in his arms she'd slept hardly a wink. After her assertion that she was not going to leave with him he had become violently angry. They had argued, at last made-up. Greg had slept fitfully for a while, snoring loudly, while Barbara lay awake staring up wide-eyed into the dark. It was only after her stubborn insistence that she was not going to change her mind that Greg had finally staggered, enraged, onto his plane and gone. Standing in the airport lounge with tears streaming down her face, Barbara had faced the fact she'd only sensed, unverbalized, the night before: She and Greg would never be married. And in her remorseful self-flagellating state it seemed to her that was a most poetic bit of justice. She had broken her vow and given her body to the man she loved; in doing so, she had lost him.

Since that bitter morning her mood had hardly improved, though oddly it was not her feeling that, though their engagement still hadn't officially been terminated, she had relinquished her dream of someday being Greg's wife that bothered her most. It was something else, something she still couldn't quite pin down. Of course she was guilty and angry with herself for having given in to temptation, and yet she couldn't deny the exquisite little thrills that coursed through her loins and breasts every time she thought of that wonderful/terrible sensation she had derived from her cruel rape by her fianc'.

Every time she thought of it she experienced a certain carnal excitement that now filled her with shame; it was a strange blend of revulsion and desire. And, she supposed now with reflection, what really troubled her was the future. In spite of all her remorse, she knew that her appetite had only been whetted. What she still didn't know was how she could live with the memory of what she had experienced without the promise she would soon experience it again.

But in spite of the troubles that had occupied her the last week Barbara had at least managed to function and she had the feeling now that, even if she did not know what the future held, it had at least begun. She was moving into the next phase of her life and this troubling week had been a time of limbo between the new phase and the phase that had just passed away. She felt in a sense that she was starting over, alone. Within another few hours she would be arriving in Hatfieldville, the small farming and logging town where she would take her first English teaching post. She would be meeting with her superior, Superintendent Johnson; she would move into the small duplex apartment she'd rented by phone, sight-unseen; and tomorrow she would teach her first classes of English Grammar and American Literature.

Barbara spent the last two hours of the trip trying to concentrate on pragmatic matters that would keep her mind off her guilt and her lingering excitement over the salacious act of sexual intercourse she had performed the night before Greg left. For a few minutes she even dozed off to sleep, and though it was but the briefest nap, it did wonders toward refreshing her. By the time the Greyhound pulled up before the curio shop that served as the Hatfieldville bus station, her mood had become almost optimistic.

Clad in a modest white lace blouse and navy blue skirt that served to accent the classic beauty of her face rather than the mischievous sexuality of her supple young body, Barbara descended into the warm afternoon sunlight and moved around to the side of the bus where the driver unloaded her two heavy bags. He was kind enough to carry the largest of them into the shop for her, where she explained to an elderly woman behind the cash desk that she had rented the duplex apartment that belonged to a Mr. Gladstone.

"You're the new English teacher then," the woman asked, looking Barbara over curiously.

"That's right," the beautiful young blonde said with a smile.

She was given directions to the Gladstone residence. Then the gray-headed woman hesitated, turned toward the back of the store and called: "Hey Sonny, come up here for a minute, would you."

From behind a display of redwood curios a cute blond-headed teenager appeared. He looked at first annoyed, then on seeing Barbara he stopped dead in his tracks, gaping at he with open-mouthed surprise, his eyes descending slowly down the length of her modestly clad body. Feeling half-embarrassed, half-pleased, Barbara allowed herself to be subjected to the young boy's eager scrutiny. Then he was startled from astonishment to red-faced embarrassment by the shop owner's sharp exclamation:

"Sonny! Don't stare at the lady like that. This is the new English teacher, Miss . . . ? "

"Halperin. Barbara Halperin."

"Miss Halperin. You take her biggest bag there and walk her over to Ernest's place."

"Yes Ma'am," the youngster nodded. He swallowed, cast another quick furtive glance at Barbara, and came forward and took the larger of her two suitcases.

Barbara picked up the other and followed him out the door to the street, where the Greyhound was just pulling away. There she paused, gazing around for her first real look at the town. She'd noted on the sign at the city limits that the population, as of the last census, was something just over seven thousand. She doubted from the looks of the place that it had grown much since then. There were several blocks of small businesses, grocery stores, real estate and insurance offices, a pharmacy, a number of bars; beyond that in either direction there were a few more blocks of residential area, plus a couple of service stations. It was not, she had to admit, an especially inspiring place to think of living for the next nine months, but then she hadn't come here looking for inspiration. She'd come here to work, to teach, and at least there was the consolation of the fresh clean air, the sunshine, and the redwoods spread over the low hills that surrounded the community in almost every direction.

Barbara sighed and again lifted her bag, which she'd set down momentarily. Out of the corner of her eye she noted that the teenager, Sonny as the woman in the shop had called him, was staring at her again. But when she turned toward him he again looked embarrassedly away. They walked silently to the corner, then turned at the first side street down to the left. Barbara was acutely aware of the curious interest in her body the boy had displayed, and she realized for the first time that might be a problem she would encounter in dealing with her male students that she hadn't even anticipated. She could admit without being immodest that she was probably younger and more attractive than the run of the mill high school teacher, and she would be teaching kids just at the age where they were beginning to be curious about sex. It was strange, Barbara thought to herself. A week and a half ago this consideration would have completely eluded her.

"I guess you'll probably be in some of my classes won't you . . . Sonny?" Barbara asked to break the silence.

"I think so. I'm a sophomore."

"Then I'll have you in grammar and composition."

"Yeah, right."

They walked a block and a half farther in silence. Up ahead Barbara noted a one-story duplex, plain, white-painted, but not unpleasant looking, that she presumed would be the place she had rented. Then, again becoming aware out of the corner of her eye that Sonny was literally gawking at her, she turned suddenly toward him with a reserved and courageous smile, and as he again blushed she asked softly:

"What's the matter, Sonny?"

"I dunno," the kid muttered, casting his gaze toward the ground.

"You don't have to be so nervous, I'm not going to bite you."

"That wasn't what I was worried about."

"Then what were you worried about?"

"I wasn't worried, I was just thinking." He paused, then continued: "I was just thinking about Miss Priddy, the English teacher last year."

"And what about her?" Barbara coaxed. "She wasn't nearly as good looking as you are."

"Oh Sonny, I certainly wouldn't know about that."

"I was just thinking what it would have been like if it had been you . . . who.. . . "

"Who what?"

"Who did all that."

"All what?" Barbara asked.

"See, Miss Priddy got herself run out of town. She . . . almost the whole football team . . . uh.. . . "

Barbara stopped, turning to stare with genuine concern and curiosity down at the cute youngster. But his voice had trailed off and he was staring intently up the street. Turning to follow his gaze the young blonde saw a blue, customized pick-up truck barreling full-speed toward them. As it drew closer she distinguished the four boys loaded into the cab. She started at the sudden loud blaring of the horn, and as the vehicle thundered by her ears picked up only vague sketches of a couple of obscene remarks that were shouted at them through the window. Then the driver hit the brakes, the vehicle skidded to a halt some paces back up the street. He put it into reverse and, tires squealing, backed up to where they were. Her face flushed with anger and embarrassment, Barbara faced the eager, leering gazes of the four boys who stared out of the cab.

"Hey Sonny," the driver, a curly headed teenager who looked older, or at least more mature than her young companion, called through the window. "Who's that hot lookin' little piece you got there?"

"I bet that's the new teacher who's gonna be living in old Gladstone's duplex," another boy put forth.

"An' I bet she can teach us some things we couldda never learned from Miss Priddy," a third youngster added.

"What's the matter, Sonny?" the driver asked. "Forget how to talk?"

Barbara realized Sonny was gazing desperately at her for some sign as to how to react. "Say nothing to them," she whispered through gritted teeth, lifting her suitcase, which she'd again set down, and continuing swiftly down the sidewalk. "That must be Mr. Gladstone's duplex there?" she added stiffly as Sonny came back abreast of her. Then she sighed and again put the suitcase down as she heard the pick-up pull away, the echo of several final obscene catcalls almost lost in the roar of the engine. "Now who was that?"

"The Four Horsemen," Sonny said bitterly.

"The Four Horsemen?" The words beat like drums in her mind. Death. Incest. Pestilence. Famine. But that wasn't right. Where on earth did she get incest? And what was he talking about. "Of the Apocalypse?"

"No. Notre Dame. Those were the first Four Horsemen. And these guys are the backfield here at Hatfieldville High. But that's what they call them in the papers.

They're unstoppable---If you don't play football here in Hatfieldville," Sonny added after a brief hesitation, "then you're nobody." He paused again. "I'm just the assistant trainer. The guys are always giving me crap. Oh, sorry."

Looking at the youngster, Barbara realized he was talking about something he felt very deeply, something which hurt him very deeply. And she felt the almost motherly compulsion to say something consoling. "But, the assistant trainer must be very important to a good football team. I mean, that's almost like the coach, isn't it."

"The assistant trainer is only the water boy," Sonny said dryly, lifting the heavier suitcase and stalking away ahead of her just as a skinny old man in khakis and a straw hat emerged from the large old house next to the duplex.

By five-thirty that afternoon Barbara was unpacked and comfortably settled into her new place. Though by no means luxurious, the small four-room house was certainly adequate to her needs. Considering that the other half of the duplex was empty and considering that for the last six years of her life she'd lived constantly with girl roommates, she looked forward to enjoying a privacy and independence she'd never really known. Ernest Gladstone was a widower, a nice enough old country man who talked as though he might well have come from the mountains of Tennessee, and she was sure she would have nothing to worry about from him. The only thing that did worry her now was the incident with the boys in the pick-up truck which had triggered that almost surreal thought process in her mind in which some still unrecalled evil of man had become incest and in which Notre Dame (Our Lady if you translated it) had become the Apocalypse, or vice versa, depending on the view from which it was perceived. And of course she was curious and slightly ill at ease about Sonny's reference to her predecessor, Miss Priddy, and something that had happened with the football team that had gotten her run out of town.

That little mystery she wanted to clear up right away, and after her unpacking was completed and she washed her face and brushed her long golden hair and made sure her blouse and skirt still looked tidy and not excessively wrinkled from her trip, she took only a few brief moments to lounge on the couch in her cozy little living room before going out. She found Mr. Gladstone sitting on his front porch smoking a pipe, told him she was quite happy with the place and asked him directions to the school, which he assured her was within easy walking distance.

"In fact, 'bout any place you want to get to here 'n Hatfieldville, from wherever you happen to be when you start, 's gonna be easy walkin' distance for a healthy young gal like yourself."

"And . . . do you suppose I'll be able to find Superintendent Johnson there this time of the afternoon."

"Let's see.. . . " He pondered the question as though seeking a mathematical equation. "They finished football camp yesterday so today's just a short work-out with no pads. Shouldda finished up a few minutes ago. You'll catch Coach Johnson in the dressin' room, back door of the gymnasium. That's the big red-brick building behind the school."

"Thank you very much," Barbara said as she started away, slightly troubled at the thought of having to seek out the Superintendent at the dressing room of the football team, which included those dreadful "four horsemen". Nor was she particularly encouraged to learn that the man who would be her superior for the next nine months was known here in town not as Superintendent Johnson but as Coach Johnson. It occurred to her that the football coach in a small school like this would probably be the man his team members were most likely to emulate, and if the superintendent of Hatfieldville High was the model for the kind of behavior she'd witnessed from several of his players earlier this afternoon, then the situation with which she found herself confronted was a sorry one indeed.

Following the directions old Mr. Gladstone had given her Barbara crossed the main street, acutely conscious of the lecherous stares of a group of loggers standing outside the nearest bar, then took the opposite side street the four blocks to the two one-story sand-colored buildings joined by an arcade, which she recognized from her new landlord's description as the grade school and high school respectively. She passed through the arcade alongside a hidden structure, situated behind the arcade and between the two school buildings, which appeared to be an auditorium. Behind this she recognized the big red-brick gymnasium. The front door was indeed closed; she moved alongside it toward the back. She was halfway there when the boy she'd seen driving the pick-up before came around the corner, flanked by a tall athletic looking man with receding blond hair and broad muscled shoulders.

"Hey Coach," the boy said, his eyes fixing on Barbara's slender body. "That's the new teach we saw with Sonny this afternoon."

Wavering slightly under the tall man's interested scrutiny, Barbara waited where she was as he and the leering youngster walked toward her. Then the man turned and said something to the boy, who frowned, nodded, then turned and went back in the direction he had come.

Barbara remained in her place as the man came toward her, alternately studying her face and her body and looking slightly as if he did not like, or did not approve, of what he saw. Or maybe, she tried to tell herself, that was just her own paranoia. And in any event, she wasn't going to let this overgrown college boy, which was exactly what the man looked like in spite of the fact that he was obviously in his forties, get the best of her right away. When he was upon her she smiled warmly and extended her hand:

"I'm Barbara Halperin. I presume you must be Superintendent Johnson."

"Call me Coach," the superintendent said, a faint smile now flickering on his lips. "I'm . . . uh . . . slightly surprised to . . . "

"To what, Coach?" Barbara asked, her hand still resting in his.

"I'll explain. Come on. We'll got to my office to talk."

Coach Johnson's office, situated just inside the high school building, looked more like the trophy room of a sports club. There was a case full of bronze statuettes, footballs, both bronze and real, ribbons, plaques and medallions. The walls were lined with photographs of teenager's posing in uniform or actually playing. There were also several conference pennants and the picture was completed by a photograph of the coach himself, looking twenty years younger but hardly more fit then he looked today, in a college uniform she recognized as her own alma mater San Francisco State's. There was not, she noticed, a book to be seen in the place.

"Well, Miss.. . Halperin. Would you have a seat," the coach asked, taking his own place behind his desk.

Barbara sat down and carefully smoothed her skirt over her slender shapely thighs. "And what did you say you were surprised about?" she asked, fixing another fabricated smile on her face.

The coach looked at her thoughtfully. "Frankly, you're a very good-looking young woman." Barbara maintained her smile, saying nothing. "Much better looking than I had expected. I suppose, from your record-high school graduation at sixteen, scholarship, B.A. in three and a half years and masters in another year and a half-I had surmised you would be somewhat of a female egghead." He chuckled. "I was thinking of someone pale and skinny with short hair and thick goggle-eye glasses. Instead.. . . "

Barbara crossed her legs. "I'm sorry if I disappoint you Superintendent . . . Coach Johnson. But I can assure you that if I'm not quite as . . . studious looking as you had expected it will not interfere with my abilities to teach the subjects I've specialized in. At least, I trust not."

"I'm sure you're very capable. It's not that. I just hope your . . . how should I say . . . sex appeal won't present a problem."

"What kind of problem?" Barbara asked matter-of-factly, then when the coach didn't reply she immediately added: "Sonny . . . whatever his name is . . . made some reference to a Miss Priddy. Could that be what you were referring to."

"Yes . . . uh . . . I'm afraid it is."

"Perhaps you could fill me in."

"Miss Priddy . . . or perhaps I should explain first: I believe the purpose of a high school education is to teach and to invest the young people who attend it with a certain moral fiber. As you may have noticed, or heard, Hatfieldville High places a particular emphasis on athletics, and-"

"I have noticed," Barbara couldn't resist interrupting. "In fact, I almost have the feeling I'm in an athletic club instead of an institute of learning."

"What do you mean by that?" the coach said with a scowl.

"I meant nothing more than exactly what I said. It was simply an observation. But, about that former teacher, you were saying . . . ? "

"Dorothy Priddy was not possessed of the moral standards to fit her for a teaching position here. To make a long story short, she seduced several of the male students, members of the football team in fact."

"Your 'Four Horsemen'? "

Coach Johnson scowled again. "She did it, the last time at least, the night before an important game. As a result of their exhaustion, the boys did not perform up to par and we almost lost that game because of her. Now perhaps you can see what I'm getting at?"

"If you think I'm going to start seducing your football players for the purpose of ruining your team, or for any other purpose, then I can assure you, you are wrong. I came here to teach, not serve in a pep squad and certainly not to do anything like that and I resent the implication you . . . you . . . "

"I meant to imply nothing like that. I meant only that boys will be boys. Because of the immorality of one of the women teachers to whom their education and training was entrusted, they have had an . . . experience that can only challenge them to try again if they think-and mark you I said think, even if they are entirely mistaken-that the opportunity is being presented to them. I simply wanted to warn you to be especially on your guard not to be anything that might give any of my boys the wrong idea. And keep in mind that you are a very much more inviting conquest than Dorothy was. There will be overtures, and I'm afraid that after everything that has happened that is only natural.

"I might add, in summing up, that I do not mean to imply that our male students here are bad, I mean, hoodlums or anything. They are just good healthy boys. I want to see that they grow up to be good healthy men. That is why in addition to my duties as coach and superintendent here I also teach a Sunday School class at the local church, and I try to be a friend, to understand them and hold their confidence. If it weren't for that relationship I've established with boys like Bobby Lane, my quarterback, who you saw with me a few moments ago, Dorothy Priddy might still be on our faculty, corrupting our youth."

"Then you are to be congratulated I'm sure," Barbara said with a hint of sarcasm in her voice. She thought briefly about referring to this afternoon's incident, then decided to let it drop. She would put the "Four Horsemen" in their place without the intervention of this pious old windbag.

Shortly afterwards the interview was terminated. Barbara left the school with the most distinct impression that she and Coach Johnson were not going to get along.