Leaving Flat Iron Creek

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The Pullman porter raised his eye brows and with pursed lips sneered at a scruffy farm boy coming into his car. His aloofness broadcast that he was sure I wasn’t in the right place. He curtly asked about my ticket which I handed it to him.

“Sir, you’se in the right car?” his tone apologetic as he returned my ticket. “There’s space in ’partment B.”

I found Compartment B three-quarters of the way down the narrow aisle of New York Central’s Iroquois Limited in route to New York City. The door was half-open and one man reading a newspaper sat in the stuffy compartment with smoke-painted walls. The train jerked and quickly gained speed as I sat down by the window. I peered out into the late afternoon as its light was replaced by the pale light glowing from the tiny bulbs mounted on the car walls. The decor of the roomette was as gray as the outdoors, and the smell of stall cigarette smoke filled the space. I shivered slightly but enough that the man sitting across noticed and offered me a blanket that was lying on the seat. I wrapped it around my shoulder and leaned my head back. My eyes closed. I was propped in the corner when the porter touched my shoulder.

“Master, Mister wan me to mak’up ya bed?” he asked.

I didn’t move or comprehend where I was. My eyes tried to focus on the porter standing in front of me.

“Ya bert; ya’ wan your bert made up?”

I stood up to get out of his way and moved into the hall not knowing where else to go.

The man across from me sat with his back toward the forward motion of the train reading the Chicago Herald. He didn’t move as the porter pulled my bunk down. I noticed for the first time that he was a younger man than I thought. A starched white shirt stretched across his broad chest. He wore an old-fashioned winged collar with a butterfly bow tie like those I had seen on dapper men in magazine advertisements. His dark brown suit jacket hung on a hook swaying rhythmically with the movement of the train. His hair was neatly clipped as was his tiny mustache. His nonchalant manner was distant almost rude. He didn’t speak or acknowledge me when I entered Compartment B just handed me the blanket. I was staring at the man when another porter approached me.

“Sir, you want supper? Better go now. They stop servin’ in twenty minutes.”

He pointed with his white gloved left hand, and I stumbled off in that direction hoping to find a dining car. With my unstable walk I felt drunk. Once in the dining car, I was met with the same indifference that I had encountered when I boarded the train. I sat with a man and his wife from Philadelphia. We exchanged pleasantries until they found out I was on my way to Europe. They began to give me suggestions about what to see. I promptly forgot everything they said. They excused themselves just as the waiter set my food before me. I was still half-asleep and ate slowly, trying to remember details of the last twenty-four hours.

My compartment mate with his jacket on came into the car and stood right over me at the end of my table. He addressed me in precise, French-accented English.

“Young man you appear very tired.”

“Yes sir, I worked with my uncle at the hospital all last night,” I said as courteously as I could.

“May I sit with you?” he asked.

I was captivated by smooth sound of his words. I had never heard the articulation and pinching of vowels.

“Yes, please sit down.”

“I overheard that you are on your way to Europe.

“Yes, on December seventh from New York on the Queen Mary to Southampton. Then to Rotterdam.”

“What is your occupation?”

“I am going to buy breeding stock,” I said.

“Cattle?”

“No Belgian and Percheron horses. I work for Charles Rawlings.” His blank look told me he did not know the circus business. “Mr. Rawlings owns the Rawlings Bros. Circus. We use over three hundred draft horses each year. Mr. Rawlings is concerned that we need new blood to keep the herd strong,”

“I see,” he said in an uninterested, inoffensive manner. “You are rather young for such a job.”

I felt my chest slightly swell as I said, “Mr. Rawlings selected me because of my skill and eye for horse flesh. I will be working with several agents in Holland, Belgium, and France.”

“Please excuse me for not introducing myself earlier, I am Wallace de Wolf Gigot. And may I ask your name?”

“Seth Newman.”

Our conversation continued but halted occasionally as I took bites of my apple pie covered with vanilla ice cream. We were the last guests to leave the dining car. As soon as we returned to the sleeper he pulled the window shade down and the shade on the door. He stepped out of the way as I undressed to my union johns. I was exhausted, and the sleeping berth felt wonderful.

I heard the conductor announcing the Harrisburg stop in the morning and saw Mr. Gigot’s pajama legs extending from the edge of the berth below. He rose shirtless to don a dressing gown and slippers. I couldn’t help noticing his muscled chest covered by soft brown hair. He opened the compartment door and turned left. Minutes passed before I got down from the top berth to consider my limited wardrobe. Sitting on his berth, he intently watched as I put on my Rawlings uniform: white shirt, brown trousers, low cut shoes and a new deep red sweater that Mother had knitted for me. She gave it to me, and told me it was an early Christmas gift.

Aware he was staring at me I started toward the compartment door “Seth Newman may I join you for le petit dejeuner? And please call me Gigot or Wolf”

“If that is breakfast I would like to have company. Shall I go ahead or wait here for you to dress, Gigot?”

“Wait, please.” He stood before me in only his pajama pants.

“Sure, I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

I pushed through the door to use the toilet. When I returned, he was still primping before a small sink in our compartment. He assured me that he would not be long. I sat down and opened the window shades. The intensity of the light made it difficult to discern the landscape that was rushing by. There was snow covering the houses and fence posts close to the tracks, but mud-splattered windows made delineating specific details virtually impossible. I sat patiently even though my hunger had captured my attention. When he finished at the mirror he turned to pull off his pajamas revealing his compact uncut manhood. He was unconcerned as he asked, “Where are you staying in New York?”

“Oh, I’m not staying in New York. I’m on my way to Bridgeport, Connecticut, where the winter quarters for our circus are located.”

“I see,” was his only response as he completed his dressing in suit and bowtie. I am not usually a sensitive guy but to me this man seemed desperate for my company. He apologized for being tardy, and I tried to convince him that I didn’t have anything to do anyway. In the dining car, we sat with two young women who were finishing breakfast. After they left, he leaned forward.

“Seth, I want you to know I am not usually this nervous. Please excuse me but I just buried my only brother in Wyoming a few days ago. I’m out of balance, if you know what I mean. He was my only relative. We haven’t been close since he came over to the United States twenty years ago. My mother died last year of cancer and now my brother died in a hunting accident.”

I just listened as we took bites of poached egg and fried potatoes and sipped the hot coffee.

“Now it’s just me. Alone. No children, juz myself,” he said with his voice slightly shaking. His moss green eyes were crystalline but didn’t overflow. He spoke softly but distinctly, and I listened. “I remember lying on a canvas cot looking skyward into the blackest canopy filled with millions of flickering sparkles on a Belgium Congo savanna.”

I held my mouth closed when he said, “I was supposed to be sleeping, but I could hear the lioness eating her killed prey. I was sure she was no more than a few feet from where I was lying. I could feel the compression of the elephant’s feet as they foraged for food. I was sure I would be squashed before morning. I did not want to move for fear I would wake my brother, Marshall, who was two years older, or my father, the great wild animal hunter. Father wanted us to love the outdoors so he brought his two sons to Africa regularly. Father tried to instruct me in the proper way to load and shoot a gun. I shot one of the bearers in the leg. Father was angry, I was terrified and I have not picked up a gun since.”

I must have had a questioning look because he asked, “Do you have a question?”

“I don’t mean to be rude but I was just wondering how old you are? Your mother and brother must have died young.”

“In deed, too young… I will be thirty-four on New Year’s Eve.”

I felt myself drawn to this handsome man with a full head of light brown hair and silky Mediterranean olive-tone skin. He continuously pulled fine Turkish cigarettes that he had neatly packed in a sculptured, silver cigarette case, and smoked each cigarette through an ivory cigarette holder. Gigot squinted his left eye when he exhaled the acidy smoke.

He continued, “My brother and I were born in Antwerp, Belgium, but our mother and father separated shortly after Marshall’s sixth birthday. We were raised by nannies and private tutors at our estate, Chateau de Lovenjoul, where our maternal grandparents resided. We were sent off to a private academy when Marshall was twelve and I was ten.”

I smiled when he said, “I adored my brother and found every opportunity to emulate him since Marshall, like father, was athletic and tough. I was quiet and studious. I found the physical contact of sport generally unpleasant but complained little so as not to embarrass my brother. In school, he studied diligently and became highly proficient. He was rewarded with honors not only in French but also English and Italian. I studied hard and did well but received only minor recognition for excellence in English and Latin.

“Father was an agent of the Belgian government and traveled all over the world. We frequently went to the Congo. While Marshall was ready to shoot everything in sight I just marveled at the beauty of the animals. My brother and I grew apart as we became adults. I became a banker of some note and earned to a high position in one of Belgium’s more respected banks, La Banque du Nationale. I am unmarried and live in a Antwerp townhouse left to me by my father’s estate. After father died, Marshall collected his inheritance and moved to the United States. He bought a cattle ranch in the Wyoming. Even though we were not close Marshall always trusted me to invest his money. His is now mine. This is only the third time I have traveled to his ranch. I buried him in the earth he loved.”

Tears welled in Gigot’s eyes as the train slowed as we approached the congestion of New York City. Waiters had cleared the dishes and linen. We sat, and he talked on.

“I love beautiful things and travel to France and Italy regularly in search of art of the people. I obsess about finding a forgotten Vermeer or Rembrandt in some dingy Dijonasian shop. I have not found one but have found excellent works of students and contemporaries of the great masters.”

We finally walked back to our compartment and gathered our things just before arriving in New York at Grand Central Station. We parted company with a friendly handshake in the rotunda of the magnificent structure. I had an unusual twinge as our acquaintance came to an end.

One week later I rushed to board the Queen Mary because my train was late arriving from Bridgeport. It took me about a day to get comfortable with the floor moving up and down under my feet. On the second afternoon an ivory card embossed with “WdWG” was delivered in my second class cabin. I retrieved the card from the silver tray. On the back, Gigot had scratched “Dinner 8pm. Grand Saloon.” I did not know Gigot was on the ship until then. He had not mentioned the Queen Mary so I suspected he changed his reservation.

That night I dressed in appropriate evening wear for dinner. Rawlings had insisted that wardrobe provide me with two tuxedos. I could not believe I would need one, but I did not argue. I gazed at my admittedly handsome image in the full-length mirror on the back of the cabin door. I left my cabin at seven-fifty and felt light-headed as I ascended mahogany stairs covered with brilliant Oriental runners.

I was abruptly challenged by a white-gloved attendant at the door of the saloon. He read the card and motioned for me to follow him. The stings of the quartet played a Strauss waltz. The older gentlemen stood with one hand militarily propped in the small of their backs as their gloriously bedecked ladies sat and sipped champagne. The crystal tear drops of the chandeliers tinkled as the waves moved the ship up and down ever so slightly.

We drank and slowly ate. The first course was served just as Gigot and I were seated at a table with six other prominent looking men and women. Gigot and I really didn’t speak to them except to join in a champagne toast proposed by a tall, gray-haired man with perfectly waxed mustache.

Waiters, who hovered nearby, served us pears sliced with a strong smelling cheese in the center. That course was followed by dry white wine, fish that had a fantastic clear sauce, and a few vegetables. The cutlet course followed with the red wine and salad, which I thought was served in the wrong order. The head waiter asked Gigot a question about his meal but addressed him as “Baron”.

Dessert and cognac followed with the men retreating to the bar for cigars. Finally, more than two hours later, we retreated to Gigot’s stateroom. The sitting room was magnificently appointed with damask furniture standing on cream-sculpted carpet. I took a seat on a small settee as Gigot hung up his tuxedo jacket in the bedroom. I have never been accused of being sensitive, but I had an overwhelming feeling he wanted to take my hands, position me as his partner, and move with me smoothly and rhythmically to the still audible strains of the string quartet playing the dance music. Instead, he poured brandy and started telling me more about his life.

“I have a small group of close friends in Antwerp, and I know you will like them. Perhaps you’ll meet them when you visit me over New Year’s in the country.” I had not been invited, but I didn’t say anything. “We regularly dine together in Antwerp on Thursday evenings to discuss issues of the day and other world events. Two of the men are lovers but discrete. Do you think that will bother you?”

I raised my eyebrows and started to speak. Sensing my reaction he spoke first, “They are discrete.”

“No problem for me.”

He seemed relieved and continued.

“They are the most interesting members in our group because they are highly educated and articulate. They are constantly squabbling with one another, though they have been lovers for many years. The other bachelor in the group is my physician, a German, Burkhart Gausmann. He is younger, more obnoxious, and unbendingly sure of his opinions. He is beautiful to look at. He has white blond hair and piercing blue eyes. There are married men who are included and different ones attend on various Thursdays. They’re boring, but I like them.”

Apparently not looking for a response from me he shifted the subject to a New Year’s birthday celebration that he was planning at his country estate near Ghent. “Where will you before New Year?”

“I do not have the slightest idea.”

“Cable me when you know, and I will send a driver.”

“I will, Gigot. Thank you.”

“Please call me Wolf,” he added as he drew paper and fountain pen from an oiled, leather writing case, and wrote “Wallace deWolf Gigot; Columbier; Antwerp, Belgium.” I carefully tucked the linen paper into my coat pocket. We parted company at eleven because Gigot pronounced that our time together was over.

He shook my hand and held it has he placed his left hand on my right shoulder. I momentarily thought he was going to pull me into a hug. He didn’t but said, “We will meet again soon.” Something happened and I pulled him toward me. Our chests touched and cheeks brushed. He released my hand.“Shall we meet for lunch tomorrow here?”

“I will be here. What time?”

“Let’s say 12:30.”

I returned to my cabin wondering why I felt the way I did about this man. He was sophisticated, interesting but nervous all the time. He made me nervous. I was rocked to sleep.

Promptly at 12:30 pm I knocked on Wolf’s cabin door. It was answered by a white jacketed waiter who ushered me in. Wolf was not in the room so I seated myself on the settee and waited as I had done on the train. The waiter offered me a drink and I asked for a Coca Cola. He poured it and returned it to me on a silver tray. It was ten minutes before Wolf entered wearing a tweed jacket over dark brown trousers. Without apology he greeted me, “Seth, how are you enjoying the voyage?”

“It is fine but I have so many things on my mind. I have never been to Europe and never had such a big responsibility. I kinda takes my breath away. But I will get it done.”

“I know you will do just fine. Come join me at the table.” I was helped into my chair before a table set with China and crystal. We started with champagne in tall flute glasses followed by a salad. The conversation returned to the events of the holidays in Belgium. I looked regularly at Wolf wondering what his interest was in this farmboy from Indiana. We finished our lunch and moved to two chairs that shared a small side table as the waiter wheeled the dining table away.

With the brandy snifter in his hand Wolf said, “Seth, here is to you. You are a young man with a great future ahead of you. I hope we can remain friends forever.”

I thought what he said was a bit corny but I smiled and lifted my glass to meet his with a soft clink. I boldly added, “Wolf, I really enjoy being with you. I find you interesting and engaging. For a boy from Indiana on the greatest adventure of his life you are a wonderful stabilizer for me.”

“No, Seth, you are the stabilizer for me. Since we met on the train my life seems better after all the bad that has happened to me. Believe me I don’t think I realized what bad shape I was in. I still have knots in my shoulders.” That was an invitation that I could not refuse. I got up and walked behind his chair and with both hands pressed my fingers into his shoulders. In a few moments Wolf said, “Let me take off my jacket, you feel so good.” I helped him out of his jacket and continued the massage.

Wolf’s gentle sounds suggested he wanted more than a massage I boldly took his hand and led him into the bedroom. I was waiting any moment for him to stop my action. He did not. He stood peering into my eyes as I unbuttoned his shirt, loosened his belt and lowered his trousers. I loosened the garters that held up his socks and pulled off his knee length stockings. He stood before me watching as I stripped to my union johns. I invited him onto his own bed and straddled his butt as I continued my ministrations. He said nothing but could obviously feel the bulge in my underwear that lay in his crack. “Seth, I need to use the loo.”

I suddenly felt we had gone as far as he wanted to go. He got up and seemed unconcerned about the protrusion from his underwear. He returned in a few minutes without any clothes on and moved in front of me and unbuttoned mine so I could slide out of my underwear. He pulled me to him and gently kissed me. I could not resist and kissed him with passion. We held each other feeling the other. When we laid on the bed we cuddled and each rubbed the other holding the sexual touching until much later. When it was finally time we both were so ready that sexual release was quick. We held each other for a long time.

“Seth, being with you is totally wonderful. I have never been with someone like you who is so gentle and young. How old are you?”

“I am twenty years old.”

“Are you concerned about being with someone as old as me?”

“Not at all. I think you are so handsome, so sophisticated. I would like to know you better. Do you have a lover? I don’t want to interfere.”

“Yes, I have been with men. But I do not and really never had anyone that I was regularly intimate with. I don’t like the idea of sex only for sex. Don’t get me wrong our sex was great but I want to love someone.”

“I don’t know what I am to you. I am afraid I can’t be what you want because of my job.”

“Seth, I know. But I would just like to be together as long as we can. I am sure we can find a way if it is meant to be.”

“I suppose so.” We kissed again and stayed together until 4pm. “I guess I should get going.”

“Seth, where will you be at Christmas?”

“My plans have not finalized, but I hope to be with friends in Hamburg.”

After I dressed we kissed once more. I was so happy. I did not see Wolf again until we docked in Rotterdam. We traveled by train together to Antwerp. He and I were saying “Good bye” when a man in a long overcoat approached us. He said, “I am Arthur LeFevre and you are Seth Newman, correct?” After I nodded he told me Rawlings had assigned him to work with me to serve as my interpreter. Wolf reluctantly released my hand and turned to leave. I walked toward a taxi with LaFevre.

After seeing that I was comfortable in a small pensione he left on other circus business. Arthur LaFevre was a short, stout man who continuously clinched a short wet cigar between his brown teeth and who by his own admission knew nothing about horses. He looked for new talent in the multitude of European circuses.

Two days later LaFevre and I were in a railway coach with highly polished brass door handles and sparkling windows making our first trip to look at horses. The train jerked nervously as it picked up speed behind a hissing, squealing sleek green locomotive with giant silver wheels. The compartment was more Spartan than the first-class space I shared with Wolf from Rotterdam to Antwerp. The Belgian train was much tighter than the New York Central Pullman Wolf and I shared when we had traveled to New York. The seats in our compartment could have accommodated ten people but luckily there were only five seats occupied when we left the Antwerp station. Clean windows initially displayed an industrial scene followed by pleasant rolling countryside. The European war had been over a little more than five years, but there was little evidence of it from my window.

Wolf had reluctantly driven with us to the great cavernous train station in Antwerp. He seemed despondent at my leaving. I think he would have joined us if I had invited him. He insisted repeatedly that I come to Chateau de Lovenjoul as soon as I returned and insisted that I arrive before a grand New Years Eve birthday party he was hosting. I promised I would try to come not knowing if I could fulfill the promise.

I knew the next two weeks would be fully utilized. I put my head back against the slightly soiled white linen covering the top of the seat and closed my eyes. My eyes opened when the conductor opened our compartment door and announced that Lennik was the next stop. The train rolled to a stop in front of a tiny station house. As we stepped off the train, I was struck by green grass that was already visible around nearby houses. It was December seventeenth.

“Mr. LaFevre, does spring come this early every year?”

He seemed surprised himself. “Guess so!”

A man wearing a full length black overcoat and a navy beret approached us. “Messieurs LaFevre and Newman, je m’appelle Savant.”

He gave me a wary look, stepped forward, and brusquely grasped the handles of our bags before we had time to respond.

“Je suis charme de faire votre connaissance,” LaFevre responded.

Our host beckoned that we should follow him to a carriage hitched to two beautiful dark Belgian colts that could not have been more than two years old. Standing in front of the colts was another man, perhaps ten years older than Monsieur Savant. He held the colt’s bits.

When we were seated, LaFevre spoke to me as the young team quickly stepped out.

“Seth,” Mr. Savant said, “We are going to a farm about three kilometers outside of this village. Our driver apologized because he is the hired man not the owner. Apparently there are foals due momentarily and the owner couldn’t leave.”

The visit to the farm near Lennik was the first of three visits our first day. The farms were tidy, small, and out of portion to the size of the horses. We saw Belgians. The last words I had heard Williams say as I left Bridgeport were “take notes everyday all the time.” I did, and we examined horses, talked horses, and investigated blood lines--all in French. It was exhausting. The respective farm owner always wanted to feed us, and there was plenty of wine to drink.

The reason we looked at Belgians was unclear to me since Rawlings spoke of his preference for gray Percherons. The broker, Monsieur LeBeau, met us at the first farm. He stayed with us and continued to praise the Belgians in stumbling English. I appreciated his attempt to speak to me in English. He was difficult to understand.

In the evening, LeBeau and I compared notes. LaFevre sometimes translated and other times clarified LeBeau’s thoughts. His translation of what he heard was an important verification of what I saw. Several days later, we met another Rawlings agent. We were in Regecq, south of Antwerp. Clyde Wilson was a man about LaFevre’s age but taller. He sported a bushy mustache and sideburns. He reminded me of McCann, whom I thought of frequently as we traveled from one farm to the next. Wilson had worked for the Adams Forepaugh circus for years before moving to Europe to scout talent for Rawlings. He knew his horses better than LaFevre, but he was not as easy to be around. He was a nervous man who always smoked. Wilson, LeBeau, and I discussed what I had found during my first few days. He seemed more relaxed when he became convinced that I knew what I was talking about. After a few more days together, he bluntly told me that he had been skeptical that someone my age knew horses. I must have changed his mind because he complimented my observations and suggestions. He followed my lead increasingly as the week progressed.

We finished our first trip on December 29 and returned to Antwerp. Wolf was there with the carriage when I disembarked. Even though invited Wilson and LaFevre declined Wolf’s invitation to join us for the New Year’s party at the estate outside of Ghent, we agreed to meet in the second week of January to continue our work.

Wolf told Marcel, the chauffeur, to drive to the chateau.

“Seth, we must go immediately to the country. My guests are arriving for the party.”

Marcel opened the glass window that separated the driver from the passengers.

“Baron, do you wish to stop at Columbier or go directly to Lovenjoul?”

“The country, Marcel, quickly.”

“Wolf, please tell why people refer to you as Baron.”

“Young friend, I have the title of Baron inherited from an ancestor named Frederick de Wolf, a Baron of the Holy Roman Empire in 1535. This should not be a concern of yours because these things mean nothing in America. And they mean little here, except to a few. Continue to call me Wolf or Gigot. I will tell you more about my family, if you are interested, but later after the party.”

The polished limousine negotiated tight corners and close hedges to reach the outer gates of the estate.

# # # # #

The three of us sat in a small café in a small Belgian village near Rebecq on January 9, 1924. The afternoon sun was warm but the temperature was cold. As we sipped from the tiny cups half-filled with terrible burned coffee that the Belgians drink, we tentatively agreed to have our decisions about horses made by January 30. That would mean we would have about three weeks to get export papers through the authorities before shipping at the end of February. Quarantine period for the horses would be ending about the time the circus opened in New York. Even though some of the horses would be sent to Indiana, we thought it would be best to have the horses taken care of before the show moved onto the rails.

I had one new experience after another. The work was hard but fun. We ate and slept horses throughout Belgium and France. We were treated graciously wherever we went. We represented real money and prestige to many farmers. When we were with the breeders, they became excited about the prospect of breeding their horses in the United States.

They needed money to help them recover from the war. In certain places, we saw war damage that had not been repaired as well as severe injury and mental damage to members of many families. We met sons in wheel chairs and on crutches. It was sad seeing young men my age with their lives permanently and negatively altered.

Cables arrived regularly from Rawlings in Florida or Evans in Bridgeport, and we replied promptly to each one. We also sent one to Evans asking permission to go over the price limit on a per horse basis. We found a seven-year-old Percheron stallion named Fauceur du Regecq that was magnificent. He had sired many colts. The owner wanted the equivalent of three thousand dollars, but our limit per horse was two thousand.

We received a prompt reply.

“Expensive! But, go ahead. C. Rawlings.”

By late January, we settled contracts on all horse except the Percheron stallion. LaFevre was anxious to get back to his talent search, but I convinced him that we delay taking possession of the horses for at least four days while I went to Hamburg to visit Raina and Rudi. I had learned from Wilson that the von Leuvenfelds were performing in a German circus called Nouveau Cirque. The name was French, but ownership of the circus was German.

Wilson told me that the show was not playing under canvas, which rarely happened in Europe until much later in the season. I was told to look for a coliseum, but he didn’t have a name. I promised LaFevre and Wilson that I would return by Monday evening. They told me they planned on visiting cabarets and relaxing in Antwerp. We also concluded that the best option for us was to gather the stock at Wolf’s country estate rather than on a breeder’s farm or at Monsieur LeBeau’s. When I telephoned Wolf, he graciously gave permission for us to use his grounds. Gathering the stock at Wolf’s estate had a definite purpose. The breeders would be intimidated by the magnificent estate and be less likely to try to cheat us.

NEXT CHAPTER