"I know what I know about what happened in the library on October 12, 1990, from what Thomas told me and from the newspaper stories that ran alongside the news about Operation Desert Shield. After Mrs. Fenneck's reprimand by the study carrel, Thomas resumed his praying in silence, reciting over and over Saint Matthew's gospel, chapter 5, verses 29 and 30: 'And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from he... and if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee: For it is profitable for thee that one of they members should perish and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.' Thomas removed from his sweatshirt jacket the ceremonial Gurkha knife our stepfather had brought back as a souvenir from World War II. Until the afternoon before, it had hung sheathed and forgotten on an upstairs bedroom wall...