The Human Stain

There was no one there whom I could identify as the person responsible for the on-line eulogy for Faunia that I'd found the evening before, posted on the Athena fac.discuss news group. The posting was headed: From: clytemnestra@houseofatreus.com To: fac.discuss Subject: death of a faunia Date: Thur 12 Nov 1998 I'd come upon it accidentally when, out of curiosity, I was checking the fac.discuss calendar to see if Dean Silk's funeral might show up under coming events. Why this scurrilous posting? Intended as a gag, as a lark? Did it signify no more (or less) than the perverse indulgence of a sadistic whim, or was it a calculated act of treachery?

Could it have been posted by Delphine Roux? Another of her unascribable indictments? I didn't think so. There was nothing to be gained by her going any further with her ingenuity than the breakin story, and much to be lost if "clytemnestra@houseofatreus.com" were somehow discovered to be her brainchild. Besides, from the evidence at hand, there was nothing so crafty or contrived about a typical Delphinian intrigue—hers smacked of hasty improvisation, of hysterical pettiness, of the overexcited unthinking of the amateur that produces the kind of wacky act that seems improbable afterward even to its perpetrator: the counterattack that lacks both provocation and the refined calculation of the acidic master, however nasty its consequences may be.

No, this was mischief, more than likely, prompted by Delphine's mischief, but more artful, more confident, more professionally demonic by far—a major upgrade of the venom. And what would it now inspire? Where would this public stoning stop? Where would the gullibility stop? How can these people be repeating to one another this story told to Security by Delphine Roux—so transparently phony, so obviously a lie, how can any of them believe this thing? And how can any connection to Coleman be proved? It can't be. But they believe it anyway. Screwy as it is—that he broke in there, that he broke open the files, that he broke into her computer, e-mailed her colleagues—they believe it, they want to believe it, they can't wait to repeat it. A story that makes no sense, that is im-plausible, and yet nobody—certainly not publicly—raises the simplest questions. Why would the man tear apart her office and call attention to the fact that he'd broken in if he wanted to perpetrate a hoax? Why would he compose that particular ad when ninety percent of the people who saw it couldn't possibly think of it as having anything to do with him? Who, other than Delphine Roux, would read that ad and think of him? To do what she claimed he'd done, he would have had to be crazy. But where is the evidence that he was crazy? Where is the history of crazy behavior? Coleman Silk, who single-handedly turned this college around—that man is crazy? Embittered, angry, isolated, yes—but crazy? People in Athena know perfectly well that this is not the case and yet, as in the spooks incident, they willingly act as if they don't. Simply to make the accusation is to prove it. To hear the allegation is to believe it.

No motive for the perpetrator is necessary, no logic or rationale is required. Only a label is required. The label is the motive. The label is the evidence. The label is the logic. Why did Coleman Silk do this? Because he is an x, because he is a y, because he is both. First a racist and now a misogynist. It is too late in the century to call him a Communist, though that is the way it used to be done. A misogynistic act committed by a man who already proved himself capable of a vicious racist comment at the expense of a vulnerable student. That explains everything. That and the craziness.

The Devil of the Little Place—the gossip, the jealousy, the acrimony, the boredom, the lies. No, the provincial poisons do not help. People are bored here, they are envious, their life is as it is and as it will be, and so, without seriously questioning the story, they repeat it—on the phone, in the street, in the cafeteria, in the classroom.

They repeat it at home to their husbands and wives. It isn't just that because of the accident there isn't time to prove it's a ridiculous lie—if it weren't for the accident, she wouldn't have been able to tell the lie in the first place. But his death is her good fortune. His death is her salvation. Death intervenes to simplify everything. Every doubt, every misgiving, every uncertainty is swept aside by the greatest belittler of them all, which is death.