1776 come back and walk all over the place, with their wives and children and

  everybody. You should've seen this one old guy that was about fifty. What he did was, he

  came in our room and knocked on the door and asked us if we'd mind if he used the

  bathroom. The bathroom was at the end of the corridor--I don't know why the hell he

  asked us. You know what he said? He said he wanted to see if his initials were still in one

  of the can doors. What he did, he carved his goddam stupid sad old initials in one of the

  can doors about ninety years ago, and he wanted to see if they were still there. So my

  roommate and I walked him down to the bathroom and all, and we had to stand there

  while he looked for his initials in all the can doors. He kept talking to us the whole time,

  telling us how when he was at Pencey they were the happiest days of his life, and giving

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  us a lot of advice for the future and all. Boy, did he depress me! I don't mean he was a

  bad guy--he wasn't. But you don't have to be a bad guy to depress somebody--you can be

  a good guy and do it. All you have to do to depress somebody is give them a lot of phony

  advice while you're looking for your initials in some can door--that's all you have to do. I

  don't know. Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if he hadn't been all out of breath. He

  was all out of breath from just climbing up the stairs, and the whole time he was looking

  for his initials he kept breathing hard, with his nostrils all funny and sad, while he kept

  telling Stradlater and I to get all we could out of Pencey. God, Phoebe! I can't explain. I

  just didn't like anything that was happening at Pencey. I can't explain."

  Old Phoebe said something then, but I couldn't hear her. She had the side of her

  mouth right smack on the pillow, and I couldn't hear her.

  "What?" I said. "Take your mouth away. I can't hear you with your mouth that

  way."

  "You don't like anything that's happening."

  It made me even more depressed when she said that.

  "Yes I do. Yes I do. Sure I do. Don't say that. Why the hell do you say that?"

  "Because you don't. You don't like any schools. You don't like a million things.

  You don't."

  "I do! That's where you're wrong--that's exactly where you're wrong! Why the

  hell do you have to say that?" I said. Boy, was she depressing me.

  "Because you don't," she said. "Name one thing."

  "One thing? One thing I like?" I said. "Okay."

  The trouble was, I couldn't concentrate too hot. Sometimes it's hard to

  concentrate.

  "One thing I like a lot you mean?" I asked her.

  She didn't answer me, though. She was in a cockeyed position way the hell over

  the other side of the bed. She was about a thousand miles away. "C'mon answer me," I

  said. "One thing I like a lot, or one thing I just like?"

  "You like a lot."

  "All right," I said. But the trouble was, I couldn't concentrate. About all I could

  think of were those two nuns that went around collecting dough in those beatup old straw

  baskets. Especially the one with the glasses with those iron rims. And this boy I knew at

  Elkton Hills. There was this one boy at Elkton Hills, named James Castle, that wouldn't

  take back something he said about this very conceited boy, Phil Stabile. James Castle

  called him a very conceited guy, and one of Stabile's lousy friends went and squealed on

  him to Stabile. So Stabile, with about six other dirty bastards, went down to James

  Castle's room and went in and locked the goddam door and tried to make him take back

  what he said, but he wouldn't do it. So they started in on him. I won't even tell you what

  they did to him--it's too repulsive--but he still wouldn't take it back, old James Castle.

  And you should've seen him. He was a skinny little weak-looking guy, with wrists about

  as big as pencils. Finally, what he did, instead of taking back what he said, he jumped out

  the window. I was in the shower and all, and even I could hear him land outside. But I

  just thought something fell out the window, a radio or a desk or something, not a boy or

  anything. Then I heard everybody running through the corridor and down the stairs, so I

  put on my bathrobe and I ran downstairs too, and there was old James Castle laying right

  on the stone steps and all. He was dead, and his teeth, and blood, were all over the place,

  

  and nobody would even go near him. He had on this turtleneck sweater I'd lent him. All

  they did with the guys that were in the room with him was expel them. They didn't even

  go to jail.

  That was about all I could think of, though. Those two nuns I saw at breakfast and

  this boy James Castle I knew at Elkton Hills. The funny part is, I hardly even know

  James Castle, if you want to know the truth. He was one of these very quiet guys. He was

  in my math class, but he was way over on the other side of the room, and he hardly ever

  got up to recite or go to the blackboard or anything. Some guys in school hardly ever get

  up to recite or go to the blackboard. I think the only time I ever even had a conversation

  with him was that time he asked me if he could borrow this turtleneck sweater I had. I

  damn near dropped dead when he asked me, I was so surprised and all. I remember I was

  brushing my teeth, in the can, when he asked me. He said his cousin was coming in to

  take him for a drive and all. I didn't even know he knew I had a turtleneck sweater. All I

  knew about him was that his name was always right ahead of me at roll call. Cabel, R.,

  Cabel, W., Castle, Caulfield--I can still remember it. If you want to know the truth, I

  almost didn't lend him my sweater. Just because I didn't know him too well.

  "What?" I said to old Phoebe. She said something to me, but I didn't hear her.

  "You can't even think of one thing."

  "Yes, I can. Yes, I can."

  "Well, do it, then."

  "I like Allie," I said. "And I like doing what I'm doing right now. Sitting here with

  you, and talking, and thinking about stuff, and--"

  "Allie's dead--You always say that! If somebody's dead and everything, and in

  Heaven, then it isn't really--"

  "I know he's dead! Don't you think I know that? I can still like him, though, can't

  I? Just because somebody's dead, you don't just stop liking them, for God's sake--

  especially if they were about a thousand times nicer than the people you know that're

  alive and all."

  Old Phoebe didn't say anything. When she can't think of anything to say, she

  doesn't say a goddam word.

  "Anyway, I like it now," I said. "I mean right now. Sitting here with you and just

  chewing the fat and horsing--"

  "That isn't anything really!"

  "It is so something really! Certainly it is! Why the hell isn't it? People never think

  anything is anything really. I'm getting goddam sick of it,"

  "Stop swearing. All right, name something else. Name something you'd like to be.

  Like a scientist. Or a lawyer or something."

  "I couldn't be a scientist. I'm no good in science."

  "Well, a lawyer--like Daddy and all."

  "Lawyers are all right, I guess--but it doesn't appeal to me," I said. "I mean they're

  all right if they go around saving innocent guys' lives all the time, and like that, but you

  don't do that kind of stuff if you're a lawyer. All you do is make a lot of dough and play

  golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot. And

  besides. Even if you did go around saving guys' lives and all, how would you know if you

  did it because you really wanted to save guys' lives, or because you did it because what

  you really wanted to do was be a terrific lawyer, with everybody slapping you on the

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  back and congratulating you in court when the goddam trial was over, the reporters and

  everybody, the way it is in the dirty movies? How would you know you weren't being a

  phony? The trouble is, you wouldn't."

  I'm not too sure old Phoebe knew what the hell I was talking about. I mean she's

  only a little child and all. But she was listening, at least. If somebody at least listens, it's

  not too bad.

  "Daddy's going to kill you. He's going to kill you," she said.

  I wasn't listening, though. I was thinking about something else--something crazy.

  "You know what I'd like to be?" I said. "You know what I'd like to be? I mean if I had my

  goddam choice?"

  "What? Stop swearing."

  "You know that song 'If a body catch a body comin' through the rye'? I'd like--"

  "It's 'If a body meet a body coming through the rye'!" old Phoebe said. "It's a

  poem. By Robert Burns."

  "I know it's a poem by Robert Burns."

  She was right, though. It is "If a body meet a body coming through the rye." I

  didn't know it then, though.

  "I thought it was 'If a body catch a body,'" I said. "Anyway, I keep picturing all

  these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little

  kids, and nobody's around--nobody big, I mean--except me. And I'm standing on the edge

  of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over

  the cliff--I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come

  out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the

  rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's

  crazy."

  Old Phoebe didn't say anything for a long time. Then, when she said something,

  all she said was, "Daddy's going to kill you."

  "I don't give a damn if he does," I said. I got up from the bed then, because what I

  wanted to do, I wanted to phone up this guy that was my English teacher at Elkton Hills,

  Mr. Antolini. He lived in New York now. He quit Elkton Hills. He took this job teaching

  English at N.Y.U. "I have to make a phone call," I told Phoebe. "I'll be right back. Don't

  go to sleep." I didn't want her to go to sleep while I was in the living room. I knew she

  wouldn't but I said it anyway, just to make sure.

  While I was walking toward the door, old Phoebe said, "Holden!" and I turned

  around.

  She was sitting way up in bed. She looked so pretty. "I'm taking belching lessons

  from this girl, Phyllis Margulies," she said. "Listen."

  I listened, and I heard something, but it wasn't much. "Good," I said. Then I went

  out in the living room and called up this teacher I had, Mr. Antolini.

  

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