Dead Poets Society

said.
    “But...” Charlie
stammered.
    “Please! It’s so
wonderful to be appreciated for... you know... what you have inside.” Charlie
groaned and put his hand over his face. Gloria turned and looked at him.
“Nuwanda? Please... ?”
    “All right! I’m
thinking!” He paused for a moment, then recited:
     
    “Let me not to the
marriage of true minds
    Admit impediments.
Love is not love
    Which alters when it
alteration finds,
    Or bends with the
remover to remove.”
     
    Gloria moaned with
satisfaction. “Don’t stop!” Charlie continued to recite as Gloria’s moans grew
louder.
     
    “O, no, it is an
ever-fixéd mark
    That looks on
tempests and is never shaken;
    It is the star to
every wandering bark,
    Whose worth’s
unknown, although his height be taken...”
     
    “This is better than sex any day,” Gloria cried. “This is ROMANCE!”
    Charlie’s eyes
rolled in frustration, but he continued to recite poems well into the night.
     
    The next day, the
entire student body was summoned to the Welton Academy Chapel. A buzz droned
among the boys as they moved into their seats, passing copies of school
newspapers among themselves.
    Knox Overstreet sat
down trying to hide his bruised and swollen face. Neil, Todd, Pitts, Meeks,
Cameron, and especially Charlie wore faces drawn with exhaustion. Pitts stifled
a yawn as he handed Charlie a briefcase.
    “All set,” Pitts
whispered. Charlie nodded.
    Dean Nolan entered
the chapel as the students quickly put away all the newspapers and stood. Nolan
took long strides to the podium and motioned for the boys to sit down. He
cleared his throat loudly.
    “In this week’s
issue of WELTON HONORS there appeared an unauthorized and profane article about
the need for girls at Welton. Rather than spend my valuable time ferreting out
the guilty parties—and let me assure you I will find them—I am asking any and
all students who know anything about this article to make themselves known here
and now. Whoever the guilty persons are, this is your only chance to avoid
expulsion from this school.”
    Nolan stood
silently, waiting for a response. Suddenly, the sound of a telephone ringing
broke the heavy silence. Charlie briskly lifted the briefcase into his lap and
opened it. Inside was the ringing telephone. The students whispered in hushed
astonishment. No one had ever done something this outrageous at Welton! Undaunted,
Charlie answered the phone.
    “Welton Academy,
hello?” he said for all to hear. “Yes, he is, just a moment. Mr. Nolan, it’s
for you,” Charlie said with mock seriousness.
    The dean’s face
turned beet-red. “What?” Nolan screeched.
    Charlie held the
receiver out to Nolan. “It’s God. He said we should have girls at Welton,”
Charlie said into the phone as a blast of laughter from the students filled the
old stone chapel.
    The dean did not
hesitate to react to the stunt. Before he knew it, Charlie found himself
standing in the middle of Nolan’s office as the dean paced furiously. “Wipe
that smirk off your face,” Nolan hissed. “Who else was involved in this?“
    “No one, sir,”
Charlie said. “It was just me. I do the proofing for the paper, so I inserted
my article instead of Rob Crane’s. ”
    “Mr. Dalton,” Nolan
said, “if you think you’re the first one to try to get thrown out of this
school, think again. Others have had similar notions and they have failed just
as surely as you will fail. Assume the position.”
    Charlie obeyed, and
Nolan pulled out a huge, old paddle. The paddle had holes drilled in it to
speed its progress. Nolan took off his jacket and moved behind Charlie.
    “Count aloud, Mr.
Dalton,” Nolan instructed as he slammed the paddle into Charlie’s buttocks.
    “One.” Nolan swung
the paddle again, this time putting more power into it. Charlie winced. “Two.”
Nolan delivered, and Charlie counted. By the fourth lick, Charlie’s voice was
barely audible and his face was contorted with pain.
    Mrs. Nolan, the
dean’s wife and secretary, sat in the outer office trying not to listen as the
punishment proceeded. In the adjacent honor room, three students, including
Cameron, worked at easels, sketching the moose heads on the wall. They heard
the paddle hitting Charlie and were filled with fear and awe. Cameron couldn’t
draw the moose.
    By the seventh lick,
tears flowed freely down Charlie’s cheeks. “Count!” Nolan shouted.
    By the ninth and
tenth licks, Charlie choked on the words. Nolan