No, he's just wondering what happened too. Waiting for Ed to reach him, Mike felt a moment's warmth for the man. Wish he'd been the principal when I was in school. Might not have gotten into so much trouble. Good-humored, Ed is.

"I know they're gonna drink in the parking lot, Mike," Piazza had told him the day before. Snort. "Bunch of coal miners at a wedding reception? But puh-leese keep 'em from waving the bottles under my nose. I'd feel downright stupid, all five and a half feet of me, marching out there to whack 'em with a ruler."

Ed was at his side now. "What happened?" The principal glanced at the ceiling. "The lights are out too."

Mike hadn't noticed until Ed mentioned it. It was still broad daylight, and the plate-glass windows lining the entire side of the cafeteria made the room's fluorescent lighting almost redundant.

"I don't know, Ed." Mike set his cup of punch-unspiked; he hadn't felt he could break the rules himself-on the table nearby. Dr. Nichols was starting to rise. Mike lent him a hand.

"Lord, do I feel stupid," muttered the doctor, brushing his clothes. Fortunately for his finery, the cafeteria floor had been mopped and waxed to a shine. "For a moment there, I thought I was back at Khe Sanh." He, too, asked the inevitable question. "What the hell was that?"

The large and crowded room was now in a muted uproar, everyone asking the same thing. But there was no panic. Whatever that was, nothing immediately disastrous seemed to have occurred.

"Let's get outside," said Mike, heading toward the cafeteria's door. "Maybe we'll get a better idea." He glanced around the room, looking for his sister. He spotted Rita almost at once, clutching Tom's arm. She seemed a bit alarmed, but was obviously unhurt.