Behind him was Butchie Saylor, the custodian's nephew, a sophomore wrestler with red hair and a round face, holding a stack of chairs against his chest. Butchie looked at the board and then at Mick and then at the floor.
Mick walked down the row. He walked slowly. He stopped in front of the table and looked at the left panel, and Calvert watched his eyes go down the Herald front page, and he saw the exact moment Mick got to the smaller headline, FOREMAN'S ORDER QUESTIONED, because the muscle in his jaw came up under the skin like a knuckle.
"Where'd you get this," Mick said.
"The library in Pottsville. It's on microfilm."
"I know where it is." Mick looked at him. His eyes were very light, gray almost, and Calvert had never been this close to them. "I'm asking why you got it."
"It's my project. It's about Bear Ridge. My grandfather was the fire boss there."
"I don't care who your grandfather was." Mick's voice was low, which was worse than loud. People at the next table, the Amelia Earhart girl and her mother, had gone very quiet. "Everybody in this town knows what happened at Bear Ridge. You want to put it up on a board with glitter on it so some judges from Allentown can give you a blue ribbon?"
"There's no glitter."
Mick made a sound, almost a laugh. He looked up at the title again, the black letters, and then down at the subtitle. What the Town Remembers, and What the Logbook Says. He read it twice. Calvert could see his lips move very slightly on the second time.