"Son of Sam!"

This shocked me.

Unconsciously or otherwise, the girl had struck a nerve. I said nothing, and did nothing, but a cold shiver passed through my bones. Sissy must have felt it too, because she moved a hand to my knee.

"Listen, I didn't actually mean it like that," she said. "I can see why you're in such sad shape. Her own brother. I mean, that's so ... so sick!"

"And a tycoon too," said I.

The thaw was complete. She leaned closer, her lips now approaching my right ear. It was an oceangoing experience in many ways, but I braved the salty spray of commiseration. "Seriously, I'm really, really sorry," she said. "Nobody ever told me about this in sec school. I don't even know ... Gosh, I'm not sure what to do."

I waited only a moment.

"The Ramada," I said. "Six-thirty sharp."

An essential digression: Son of Sam.

The word serial, I must now submit, is deceptive in the extreme. It smacks of the abstract, the mathematical and mindlessly repetitive, something cold and bloodless, and we would be wise to bear in mind that on a higher spiritual plane the issue of sequence is wholly irrelevant. What counts is quality. In the case of a serial lover, for instance, is it not possible that he (or she) might find each instance entirely and absolutely unique? Each case a universe in itself? Each nimble "target" distinctive and memorable and beyond compare? If number sixteen takes the form of a glorious redhead, should that in any way detract from the lusty, acrobatic humanity of number twenty-seven?

Let us not be ridiculous.

Same-same for Son of Sam.

I rest, for the moment, my case.

At two o'clock Lorna Sue phoned from the Mall of America. She was running late. She was in search of a lace tablecloth.

Given the experience of a long marriage, this explanation made a kind of historical sense, yet even so I had trouble disguising the disappointment in my voice.

"Tablecloth," I murmured. "No wonder you're delayed."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

The challenge was unmistakable; I did not wish to upset her.

"Tablecloth," I repeated casually. "First things first."

"Well, right," she said. "Isn't that the truth?"

Her tone was bouncy and matter-of-fact. Typically selfish, typically inconsiderate, Lorna Sue seemed to care not a whit that matters of the highest import remained on hold while she roamed the Mall of America in search of lace. (Imagine this woman as an air control officer.) Still, thus was her nature, and I responded with phenomenal restraint. If reconciliation was the goal, I explained to her gently, it would be in everyone's best interest to fuck the fucking tablecloth.

Lorna Sue chuckled.

"Tom, don't get snooty," she said. "I'll be there."

"What about the tycoon?"

"Who?"

"Your hairy new husband," I said. "The latest love of your life."

"Oh, right. He's around."

"Which means what?"

"Around," she said briskly. "I'd watch out."

"And Herbie?"

"Sure, Herbie too. I guess they're both sort of upset." It was hard to be certain, but she seemed to release a muffled giggle. "Look, Tom, this is a pay phone. It's costing me money."

"Could you estimate when ...?"

"Soon enough," she said irritably. "Maybe an hour. Probably two. Stop thinking about just yourself."

For each of us, no matter how mentally fit, there comes a point at which the internal wiring begins to smolder. My own such time had now arrived.

I could taste the ions.

The subsequent wait for Lorna Sue was excruciating in itself, enough to cause several hasty excursions to the men's room, but on top of this I had to contend with the possibility of physical violence from at least two different quarters. The wrath of a brother, I realized, could only be exceeded by that of a routed tycoon. Each footstep in the hallway made me freeze. I misspelled the word impediment in my ledger.

It was with some anxiety, therefore, that I eventually departed for my popular three o'clock seminar. (Boldly entitled "Methodologies of Misogyny.") The old Vietnam instincts had awakened.

I again made use of the back staircase. Outside, alert to ambush, I took a firm grip on my umbrella, scanned the terrain, then grimly set off on the long march across campus. The afternoon was sunny and warm, deceptively peaceful, yet I proceeded with utmost stealth. (An urban university, one must understand, is not unlike the darkest Asian jungle, dense with peril, and I was in no way fooled by the surface serenity of things.) I watched my back, ignored traffic lights, jaywalked when necessary, sought safety in the bustling afternoon crowds. Only once, as I passed the Chi Omega sorority house, did I pause to take delight in the ripening bounties of springtime. We were late in the school year, final exams barely a week away, and the sorority's lawn had been tastefully decorated with a bevy of swimsuited young coeds, each bronzed and bewitching, each in possession of a Walkman and tanning lotion and a well-thumbed edition of the latest Cliffs Notes. I exchanged greetings with two or three of them; I waved at several others. In virtually any other circumstance I would have responded to their playful salutes and catcalls-my reputation for student-faculty solidarity had clearly preceded me-but with a bittersweet sigh I soon turned and hurried along toward destiny. It occurred to me, however, that even in the most hazardous of moments, with the barbarians at the gate, one can find solace in the timeless repetitions of nature. (Robert Bruce and his spiderweb. Ted Bundy and his watercolors. Brigham Young and his brood.) Despite all odds, the human spirit endures beyond endurance, denying despair, salvaging hope in a rainbow or a birdsong or a simple sunset.

I was contemplating these and related matters as I entered my classroom, amazed at my own capacity for survival, and as a consequence I did not at first take notice of Herbie and the tycoon seated side by side in the third row.

This oversight, I fear, was predictable. While on the job, I like to project a brisk, businesslike, even punctilious image; I eschew small talk; I rarely establish (and never sustain) unnecessary eye contact with my male students, who on the whole seem to be convalescing from the trials of a communal lobotomy-listless, insolent, prelingual. On this particular afternoon, as always, I thus lost myself in the critical minutiae of professorship, logging in absentees, adjusting the fickle lamp on my lectern, shuffling through my notes and papers. (Though "Methodologies of Misogyny" was billed as a seminar, I had little choice but to run the show in a straightforward lecture format. What can be served, after all, in trading opinions with troglodytes? Professors profess. Gum-chewers chew.) Without looking up, therefore, I sharply rapped the lectern and opened with a few broad remarks about the biological function of language in our rituals of courtship: how the sounds we utter carry meanings far beyond anything to be found in a dictionary. (The love cry of a coyote, the rut blare of a moose, the impassioned croak of a bullfrog.) At this point I glanced up. A remedial cliche seemed in order.

"It is not always what we say," I declared, "but how we say it." I paused to let this sink in, gazing in the direction of a perplexed young lady in row one. It was gratifying, I must say, to see the girl slowly nod and scribble down a note or two. We exchanged bashful smiles-again, the how matters-then I took a moment to consult my seating chart and placed a tidy asterisk beside her name.

"As an example," I said, "let us consider the word Beverly."

I turned to the blackboard, preparing to jot down this tantalizingly improper proper noun, only to notice that I had been preempted by a heavy masculine scrawl. The entire blackboard, in fact, was littered with a host of creatively vulgar phrases, each misanthropic in the extreme.

I took an instinctive step backward. I may well have blushed.

There were giggles, I recall, but for the moment I could only gape at this vicious graffiti, some of which was merely abusive, most of which foretold my doom in graphic detail. I was threatened with implausible forms of injury and disfigurement; I was offered instruction in the transfer of body parts to preposterous locations.

The words hockey stick, in particular, rang baleful bells.

I turned swiftly, spotted Herbie and the tycoon, steadied myself against the lectern.

Already they had risen from their seats. They gave the impression, I thought instantly, of a pair of midcareer Treasury agents. Herbie carried a leather briefcase; the tycoon carried what appeared to be a plastic yardstick.

They proceeded briskly up the center aisle, flanked me left and right, gripped me by the arms. I was told to remain silent under penalty of fracture. ("Shut the fuck up," said the tycoon, "or you'll be shaking hands with your lips.") At that instant, I am almost sure, Herbie grinned at me.

His eyes twinkled.

On the surface, at least, it was hard to believe that this was the Herbie of my youth, or even an adult version of my old backyard playmate, yet there was no mistaking that impish, dangerous, Ritalin grin.

He was twinkling.

I have reached the moral divide of my narrative: the jumped-off cliff, the burning bridge, the stark and sinister sine qua non. Here, if you will, we approach that fatal intersection at which my life took its turn toward chaos and desperation and what others (dimwits) might call madness.

Such amateur diagnostics, of course, are patently foolish, yet I must concede that in the coming pages I may well be cast in a somewhat less than favorable light. The self-righteous will surely jeer and condemn. The squeamish may shudder. Bear in mind, however, that in times of emergency there are scant few of us, sane or otherwise, who cannot be pressed to an extremity of deed. And remember, too, that I have issued fair warning with respect to my capabilities. (I am a decorated war hero. Why do none but my prey take this seriously?) So, yes: we perch on the precarious fulcrum of this intriguing testament.

A lovely springtime afternoon.

Herbie on my left, the tycoon on my right.

Much of what occurred over the next horrific minutes never registered, or has since been eradicated by that faithfully protective mechanism called pride. In another sense, however, the details remain fully alive in my memory, embossed there like a garish nightmare. I can still see that twinkle in Herbie's eyes. I can see the tycoon's dental fillings, the spittle at his lips, the whitish-silver beads of sweat on his forehead.

The facts, I believe, speak for themselves.

I was made to kneel before my lectern.

I was made to remove my bow tie and jacket and shirt and trousers. (My jockey shorts, fortunately, were fresh. Pale blue. Floral pattern.) "Off," said Herbie.

Immediately, the tycoon struck me across the flank with his plastic ruler.

"The underpants," said Herbie. "Pull them down-just the back part. Right now."

Again: that murderous twinkle in his eyes. And thus-impossibly, monstrously-I was compelled to present my pale hindquarters to an assembly of thirty-eight enthralled undergraduates. (You have come to know me in these pages. I am a modest man; the disgrace was beyond words.) "What we have here," Herbie announced, "is a horse's ass." He paused for effect. He tapped my chilly left haunch. "Repeat it for the class, Tommy. Horse's ass."

"Repeat?"

"Loud and clear. Say it. Horse's ass."

There was no alternative. (Bear in mind, this malicious creature had burned down a church or two; he would have maimed me.) And therefore, in a half whisper, I uttered this vile bit of language.

Herbie clucked his tongue.

"Man, we can't hear you," he said. "Volume, Tommy. Turn it up. Wiggle that white ass."

"I certainly will not-"

"Wiggle!"

Again, viciously, the tycoon struck me with his plastic yardstick. I gasped, crabbed sideways, and found myself peering up into young Beverly's vacant blue eyes. The girl seemed to nod in encouragement.

Emboldened, I executed a subtle rearward sway. More a twitch than a wiggle.

"So," I said. "Are we finished?"

"Not even started," said Herbie.

And indeed all this was but prologue. I was brutalized. I was slandered.

Without hurry, taking turns, Herbie and the tycoon proceeded to deliver lectures of their own, meticulously cataloguing my alleged misdeeds of late-wife stalking, harassment, invasion of privacy, marital meddling. With each unjust charge, the tycoon used his plastic yardstick to administer what can be described only as a sadistic spanking.

My students were spellbound. There was applause at one point.

In all such situations, I suspect, the human mind tends to contract upon itself, focusing on the tiniest, most inconsequential details, and in my own case I am left with a collage of trite sensory data: a wad of moist tissue on the floor before me, the frayed hem on young Beverly's plaid skirt. For some ten minutes I was quite literally on my hands and knees, abject and helpless, the object of public castigation and public ridicule. My students, I must report, took positive pleasure in this malignant sideshow. Dull-eyed coeds squealed in delight; farm boys rose from their seats for a better view; all of them urged the sternest possible measures.

My mental processes eventually shut down.

I remember my molars grating. I remember Herbie's twinkling gray eyes, the tycoon's swiftly descending yardstick, Beverly's luscious, elongated tongue as she winced and moistened her lips.

In hindsight, it was not so much a question of physical pain, but rather the dark certainty that my entire life, my very being, was undergoing a hideous and irreversible mutation. The spanking itself, while it carried a sting, seemed almost irrelevant in comparison to the torment of disgrace.* Never again would I enter a classroom with my head high, my credentials beyond reproach.

At one point I glanced up at Herbie, who smiled and winked at me-a mocking, lordly wink-and in that instant something froze in my heart. Here was the final straw: my bloody and rubescent Rubicon. The alliterative nickname Son of Sam sprang to mind. I now understood Sam's chosen vocation, his special calling, and even with my buttocks bared and bruised I had begun thinking in strictly serial terms. No mercy. No remorse. No going back. I knew my own future.

Curious, is it not, how the mind works? A wink-that simple-and all was decided.

For the next several minutes I actually took satisfaction in each cruel stroke of the tycoon's yardstick. Near the end I must have risen to a higher plane, utterly disengaged from the here and now, and when I blinked and looked up, it was no surprise to find Lorna Sue standing at my side.

How it happened I cannot be sure; no doubt she had been hovering nearby all along. She was simply there. Icy, beautiful, pitiless.

Incommoded, still on my hands and knees, I hailed my ex-wife with a smile.

Her response was null.

Stiff as concrete, dead silent, Lorna Sue studied me with the same nerveless stare she had summoned up on the day she strolled out of our marriage. "Don't be an eighteen-year-old," she had said, and now, with her eyes, she was saying it again: that I had behaved as a juvenile; that she had not been deceived by my pranks down in Tampa; that I was receiving precisely the punishment I deserved-the brisk, heartless paddling one gives a child. She was saying, too, I am quite certain, that this degrading encounter had been a setup from the start; that she had not for an instant planned on returning to me; that I should grow up; that I should accept reality and rise to my feet and square my shoulders and cease being an eighteen-year-old.

(Ironically, here was the gist of my little lecture that day: how language flows not only off the tongue but from the entire human being-eyes, lungs, bones, stomach, heart.) Nothing was said. Nothing had to be said.

Lorna Sue looped an arm around the tycoon's waist. Quietly, she turned away, and this alone conveyed a simple, awesome truth: the girl of my dreams no longer cared.

Yet I was a man of words. I had to ask.

"Do you love me?" I yelled as Lorna Sue walked away with her hairy new husband, and as my students filed out, and as young Beverly bent down to hand me my trousers.

"Yes or no?" I cried.

The subsequent silence was its own answer.

"Come on, man, be real," said my blue-eyed Beverly, very tenderly. "She hates you."

* How could I-or anyone-recover? I had become the impeached Andrew Johnson, the caned Charles Sumner, the branded Hester Prynne, the disgraced Clifford Irving, the red-faced and far-fallen Richard M. Nixon.

I am not ignorant. I know what correct is. Though out of touch in some respects, I am fully cognizant of the stern and strident politics that sweep through our modern epoch like the very winds of hell. And I realize, therefore, that there are those who will stand and cheer at my humbling comeuppance. Right now, for that matter, I can hear the feminist flies buzzing at my buttocks, those jackbooted squads of Amazon storm troopers denouncing my indefatigable masculinity. Oh, yes, I can see the sorry spectacle-thousands of ill-mannered, cement-headed, shrill-voiced, holier-than-thou guardians of ovarian rectitude, each squealing with delight at my public humiliation. They condemn my ardent (and nonpartisan) sensuality; they point accusing fingers at my lifelong parade of scrumptious young lovelies; they find fault in my bluntly animated terms of discourse (the word lovely, for instance, when used as a noun).

Inevitable, I suppose.

But to all such demagogues of gender I hereby respond with a phrase borrowed from my very first honors student, a gorgeous, quick-witted bonbon who went on to become Miss Saint Paul in a year of savagely competitive mudslinging.

I quote from memory: Tough fucking noogies!