The Initiation by Ridley Pearson

rare if not nonexistent quality in these hallways.” He sized up James, which James didn’t care for in the least. “I further suspect you were attempting to come up with a solution as to how to reach that center beam, an act that I daresay involved some degree of climbing and balance. Am I correct?” He didn’t wait for James’s answer. “This, I imagine, is part of the challenge—oh, yes, challenge, for had you bothered to get a good look at the center beam you would have not seen a family Bible. You might not have seen anything at all.” He indicated a set of binoculars on his desk. “For bird-watching, but most informative in this case. What you would have seen is yet another envelope. This one also red. You are being led on a scavenger hunt, and therefore: a challenge. You are being tested or hazed, my dear friend—”
    â€œDon’t call me that!”
    â€œâ€˜Dear’ or ‘friend’?”
    â€œBoth. Either! Neither!”
    â€œPart of that test, I should imagine, is your approach to solutions. The challenge, I’m talking about. It’s not just what you accomplish, but how you accomplish it. Or, and I shudder at the thought, you are being set up to fail. In this case, to fall. To hurt yourself. Perhaps badly. I don’t think any of us has been here long enough to make suchenemies, but this is the work of either an ally or an enemy, and you seem precious short of allies at the moment, having insulted your sister and this roommate only hours ago.”
    â€œYou are so strange,” James said.
    â€œRather than thinking how to retrieve it, ask yourself this: How was the envelope placed atop that beam in the first place? And before you make some critical or slanderous statement about me or my personality, let it be known Moria was the one who prompted this thought, not I.”
    James sat down on the edge of his bed, temporarily without a comeback.
    â€œThis is important information, the placement of the second envelope. Did someone actually climb all the way to the middle of the center beam and leave an envelope there? When? It’s no easy task. And why require it be at night? I’ll tell you why—”
    â€œI never doubted it.”
    â€œStudy hall. It had to be when no one would wander into the chapel and catch whoever’s behind this while in the act.”
    â€œBut we were all in study hall.”
    â€œInteresting, isn’t it? Do we suspect a proctor? Perhaps! Given the school-wide study hall, if a student, he or she would have had to work quickly. A bathroom break during study hall? That’s whatyou’d think, but you’d be wrong. Moria again. The envelope has been there at least since this afternoon, when I discovered it. It didn’t have to be found at night; whoever put it there wanted it to be found at night, wanted you to miss curfew or get caught. In any event, wanted you in trouble. That leads me to wonder if the envelope contains anything at all. It may not, you know? It may just be there to make you go get it.” He raised his dark eyebrows inquisitively on his chiseled, pinched face. “But again: to the placement! No one went out on that beam, James. It is dust covered, that beam. It would show shoe prints, or might have been wiped clean by someone sliding out there. The envelope was placed there without such an effort, and can be retrieved in like fashion with no risk to life or limb.”
    â€œAnd of course you have figured out how.” James sounded as disgusted and discouraged as he was at that moment. “Who asked you? What gives you the right?”
    Sherlock threw his head back as if slapped. “Is this your gratitude?”
    â€œShut up! Zip it, don’t lip it. Clap your trap! Keep your nose—your beak!—out of my business and stay away from my sister. If you don’t, I’m going to smash that beak into your face.”
    â€œClay Richmond