which Walter had first noticed when Calvin was 11 and had written a four-page letter to the school principal about a teacher who was grading unfairly, a letter so well-reasoned and so careful and so relentless in its logic that the principal had actually called Walter to ask, in a bewildered voice, whether Calvin had had help writing it.
They got into college, all three of them, on scholarships that they had earned through grades and applications, and, in Marcus’s case, a financial aid package negotiated over the phone with
