Blake, a teacher who is a part of the Air Force Reserve during the 1960s, grows up in New York City in a wealthy family. He attends Harvard, where he joins a club but was not very successful with his studies. After some time, he drops out and spends a year working at a hospital in Africa that treats people with leprosy. Afterward, he returns to Harvard with a new vigor for learning. He leaves the club he had been a part of and is much more successful academically. As a student, he also attends several protests for peace and civil rights, one of which lands him in an Alabama jail where he was beaten. Following that experience, he develops a fear of imprisonment. Upon graduating, he marries a woman he met at school, he begins teaching, and he enlists in the Air Force Reserves. Blake is in the Reserves for over five years, during which he rises to the rank of sergeant. As an English teacher, he faces the dilemma of teaching his students that war is bad while also knowing that he and many of his students may be forced to fight in the Vietnam War. Despite his convictions that the Vietnam War is unjust, Blake's fear of imprisonment prevents him from breaking any laws, including deserting to Canada. When he reads in the newspaper that his reserve unit was activated, he tells his wife to wait before answering the phone. He lets it ring and makes up his mind. After saying goodbye to his wife, Blake goes into his major's office with a knife and carves a big cross deep into his own chest.