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%u00a9Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights ReservedHOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOKWhat They Did to the Kid 153May 31, 1961Three mornings after Mass, which I offered up so I%u2019d score good grades, I carried my school books and suitcase to our rented car. Mike was to drive a Ford with three passengers to Chicago, drop us individually on Randolph at the Greyhound Terminal and for trains at Union Station and LaSalle Street Station. I hung around Mike%u2019s car under the mulberry trees, waiting for him to come unlock the trunk. He had packed everything he owned, finished with Misery and the priesthood, he said. Doc and Julia would have to eat it.I brushed several fallen mulberries from the white car.Hank the Tank stormed up. %u201cHave you heard,%u201d he said, %u201cwhat they%u2019re doing and what they%u2019ve done?%u201d He set his valise on the ground.I tried to look shocked as he spouted old news that was new to him.%u201cThey canned Dryden. Framed and trumped-up. God, they were always jealous. Half the seminary stopped confessing to the old priests. All the best seminarians went to Chris for counseling and Confession. Rector Karg knew that Chris found out more in two years what was going on around here than they knew in two generations.%u201d%u201cConfession is information,%u201d I said. %u201cEven if you can%u2019t break the seal of the Confessional, you can%u2019t help acting on what you know, like if a priest%u2019s mother confessed adultery to him, he%u2019d look at her differently, even though he could never mention he knew.%u201dI tried not to picture the images Mike had conjured of Dryden kneeling before his Danish modern crucifix praying to a half-naked Jesus for dreams of release. Hey, Father, is that a serpent in your cassock or are you just glad to see me? Engorgement, Christopher Dryden had said, was a richness, an overflow like grace, to be attended with no less joy than running naked through goldenrod or drinking cream and feeling full and good and human and like men. Actually, I was incensed that Hank gave the distinct impression he knew more than the rest of us.%u201cWho told you?%u201d I asked him.%u201cIt%u2019s out,%u201d Hank the Tank said. %u201cMy brother, Peter, found it out.%u201d%u201cAnd what is it?%u201d I asked him directly.%u201cWhat it always is,%u201d he said. %u201cS-e-x. Rumors of s-e-x.%u201d%u201cYou say Dryden was framed?%u201d%u201cSome truth to tell. Certain activities were politically reinterpreted for Rector Karg%u2019s convenience in reporting to Rome.%u201d