Apt Pupil

Originally published in 1982 as part of Stephen King's novella collection Different Seasons, this story follows a bright, all-American teenager whose obsessive fascination with Nazi atrocities draws him into a destructive relationship with a fugitive war criminal hiding in suburban California.

In the summer of 1974, 13-year-old Todd Bowden rides his bicycle to a small bungalow at 963 Claremont Street in Santo Donato, California. The old man who answers the door calls himself Arthur Denker, but Todd knows his real name: Kurt Dussander, a former SS Unterkommandant (deputy commandant) who ran the Patin concentration camp, once dubbed "The Blood-Fiend of Patin" (6) by a lurid magazine. Todd recites Dussander's history of flight through Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Cuba, and West Berlin, and presents fingerprint evidence he gathered himself. Dussander tries to bluff, begins dialing the police, but stops after four numbers. Todd's fascination with the camps began when he found old war magazines in a friend's garage. He researched obsessively, built a scrapbook, and when he spotted Dussander on a city bus, spent weeks shadowing and photographing the old man. What Todd wants is not money or blackmail but stories: the gas chambers, the ovens, and the experiments. Dussander calls Todd a monster. Todd points out that Dussander is the real one. Stung, Dussander begins to talk.

Over the following months, Todd tells his parents, Dick and Monica Bowden, that he is reading books aloud to the nearly blind Mr. Denker, a cover story they find admirably selfless. Meanwhile, he presses Dussander for increasingly gruesome details about life and death in the camps. By November, Todd's grades plummet to one B, four C's, and a D. In December, he gives Dussander a Christmas present: an SS uniform purchased from a costume shop for over 80 dollars. When Todd forces Dussander to put it on and march, the old man begins goose-stepping across the kitchen, and the reality of the death camps becomes vivid and terrifying to Todd. He shouts for Dussander to stop. Later, Dussander voluntarily puts the uniform on and discovers it wards off his nightmares of dead inmates pursuing him through a jungle.

Todd's second-quarter grades worsen to two F's and a D. He buys ink eradicator and forges his report card. Both he and Dussander are now plagued by nightmares. Todd dreams of being selected for Dussander's laboratories, of wearing an SS uniform in public and being denounced, of being led to an execution chamber by guards resembling his parents. In February 1975, Dussander dines at the Bowden home and charms Todd's parents, then coolly reminds Todd of their mutual entrapment: if Todd exposes him, Dussander will reveal that Todd concealed a fugitive Nazi for months. In March, Dussander discovers that killing stray cats in his gas oven calms his nightmares. He recognizes that his psychological stability depends on embracing, not rejecting, his past.

When Todd's third-quarter grades show he has passed only two subjects, guidance counselor Edward French requests a parent conference. Dussander proposes to impersonate Todd's grandfather, Victor Bowden, and visits the school in his best suit, spinning a convincing story of domestic turmoil. French is persuaded but sets a condition: if Todd receives even one failing grade notice in May, the parents must seek counseling. Dussander forces Todd to study at his kitchen table every afternoon. Todd's hatred deepens. Walking home one day, he spots an injured bird on the sidewalk and slowly crushes it with his bicycle tire.

By May, Todd has clawed his grades back and receives no failing notices. He goes to Dussander's house intending to push the old man down the steep cellar stairs and make the death look accidental. But Dussander speaks aloud as he descends, letting Todd know he heard Todd stand up and knew what Todd was planning. He reveals his countermove: a 12-page document detailing Todd's involvement, deposited in a bank safety deposit box. If Dussander dies, the document will be found. Todd is stunned. Dussander pours him bourbon and toasts: "Long life to both of us!" (103). In June, Todd offers to destroy his own protective letter, which does not actually exist, if Dussander will destroy the document. Dussander refuses, explaining that even if both were burned, each would suspect the other of having made copies. Their mutual entrapment is permanent.

Two days before a family trip to Hawaii, Todd murders a transient sleeping in an abandoned trainyard, stabbing the man 37 times with a butcher knife. The nightmares stop. Over the next three years, both Todd and Dussander settle into parallel lives of secret violence. Dussander lures transients home with promises of a drink and a bed, kills them, and buries them in his dirt-floor cellar. Todd hunts near the Salvation Army and the Santo Donato Mission, kills with knives and hammers, and discovers that murder produces the same nightmare-free calm. Publicly, Todd excels: he plays varsity football, wins essay contests, is named Athlete of the Year, qualifies as a marksman in the Rifle Club, and is accepted to the University of California, Berkeley. Privately, he fantasizes about taking his .30-.30 rifle to a slope overlooking the freeway and shooting at cars.

In 1978, Dussander has a heart attack while burying a victim in his cellar. Todd rushes to the house, buries the body, scrubs the blood from the kitchen, and fabricates a cover story before calling for help. At the hospital, Dussander shares a room with Morris Heisel, a Holocaust survivor who lost his first wife and daughters at Patin. Morris feels a nagging recognition he cannot place until one evening, when Dussander tells a young candy striper, "You must sit down and tell us all about it. Tell us everything. Omit nothing" (165). The phrasing triggers a flood of suppressed memory: Morris recalls those exact words spoken in Patin's interrogation room. He contacts Israeli authorities.

Events converge rapidly. A young Israeli operative named Weiskopf confronts Dussander, who knows extradition awaits. Dussander steals sleeping pills from the hospital drug closet and takes his own life. The next morning, Todd sees the headline: FUGITIVE NAZI COMMITS SUICIDE IN SANTO DONATO HOSPITAL. He realizes police have already searched Dussander's house, where six bodies lie buried in the cellar, and faints.

A police detective named Richler interviews Todd, who maintains his composure but makes telling slips: he inadvertently reveals knowledge about what was taken from Dussander's house, and he agrees to a fabricated detail Richler plants about regular phone calls, not knowing police records show the phone was rarely used. Richler and Weiskopf begin to suspect Todd may be responsible for the unsolved transient murders around Santo Donato. A witness comes forward identifying Todd's photograph as the young man he saw with one of the victims.

Separately, guidance counselor Ed French discovers by chance that Todd's real grandfather never visited the school. French examines Todd's old report cards and finds the doctored grades obvious. He drives to the Bowden house while Todd's parents are out and confronts Todd with the evidence. Todd picks up his loaded .30-.30 rifle and shoots French dead. After a moment of blankness, he feels better than he has in months. He fills a knapsack with over 400 rounds of ammunition, shouts "I'm king of the world!" (216), and walks toward the slope overlooking the freeway. It takes the police five hours to bring him down.