Joanne Dobson - Karen Pelletier 06 - Death without Tenure (9 page)

I ordered coffee and a doughnut, carried them to the table, made the expected admiring noises over the bald, pudgy baby.

Despite her name, Felicity had never been lighthearted or spontaneous. Now she seemed even heavier in mood. “To tell you the truth, Karen,” she said, “I love this kid to pieces, but I miss the action. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I’m bored out of my gourd. Bad mother, I guess.”

So that was it—Ms. Tough-Mama-Cop was bored. I took a good look at her: more than
bored
, I bet; she looked depressed. I remembered my own post-partum depression, the deep feeling of despair and helplessness, the stark knowledge that I’d gotten myself in far, far over my head. As in fact I had, having been only nineteen when Amanda was born. I put a sympathetic hand on Felicity’s arm. She looked at it coldly, until I pulled it away.

So I got right to the point. “Monica says you told her I’m in deep doo-doo with the homicide squad.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I overstated it, but Lombardi’s worried about Boylan, says he’s got a real hard-on for you.”

I pushed away my chocolate-glazed doughnut. “Lady, watch your language, pul-eeze. The mere thought makes me nauseous.”

“You know what I mean. It’s all about Piotrowski, of course. Those two go way back, used to partner together, I heard. But something happened no one’s talking about. Charlie wrote him up for a breach of procedure or something, and now it’s nothing but cold, hard testosterone twenty-four/seven with those two. You could be in hot water here.”

“Great! Just what I need.” I was genuinely touched by her concern. I’d had nothing to do with the death of Joe Lone Wolf, but everyone knew I had a motive for wanting him out of the way. And Boylan, in his interviews with my colleagues, would hear that more than once. I was grateful for Felicity’s support.

“I tried to call Piotrowski in Iraq last night,” she continued, “but couldn’t get though, so I thought I’d better let you know what’s going on.”

Suddenly I was suspended between one heartbeat and the next. “What do you mean, you couldn’t get through?”

“They’re way out in the provinces, and communications at the local base are down. Dust storm or something. Even National Guard headquarters in Baghdad can’t get through.”

The next heartbeat didn’t come.

“Hey. Karen? You okay? Take a deep breath and let me finish before you freak out.”

She handed me my glass of water. I took a sip.

“Headquarters told me this happens once in a while. One time a computer virus took things down for a couple of weeks. The guy I talked to was spouting all sorts of alphabet soup—”

“Acronyms?”

“Whatever.” The baby stirred in the stroller. She glanced over and gave him a perfunctory pat, then turned back to me. “So, apparently it’s nothing to worry about.”

I’d worry if I wanted to.

“So,” Felicity went on, “I’ve decided to keep an eye on what’s happening in the Lone Wolf case. Lombardi says Boylan was hassling you at the scene. If he ends up giving you grief, Piotrowski’ll have my ass. But I’m on leave, and it’s strictly against regulations for me to get involved, so anything I do I’m gonna hafta do it on the sly.

“So, now tell me, about this Lone Wolf homicide, what does Boylan think he’s got on you.” She’d perked up at the thought of getting back in business.

“Nothing! He called me because the student who found Joe dead asked for me. After that, he was just being obnoxious.”

“With him, that’s par for the course. Is there anything between you and the victim I should know about that Boylan’s likely to uncover?”

“Well, there’s been some departmental friction lately, but it has nothing to do with the murder.”

“I’ll be the judge of that—tell me.”

I told her about our rivalry for the same position, also about our little squabble over Ayesha Ahmed. “But there’s no way Boylan could have known about either of those things until he interviewed my colleagues, which he only this morning began to do.”

“Well, things like workplace friction don’t stay hidden long. You can bet he knows by now.” She wrote something on the Dunkin’ Donuts napkin, and then looked up at me. “Anyone else besides you have it in for him?”

“What do you mean, ‘besides me?’ I didn’t have it in for him.”

“Hmm. Just answer the question.”

I shrugged. “The students liked him, but he was a real loner with his colleagues. I don’t know about anything specific—oh, wait a minute!” I remembered that scene in the college parking lot.

“What?”

“One night a few days ago, I saw a car without lights follow his van from the parking lot. It was strange—after midnight and no lights on.”

“Really?” The word had at least four syllables. More writing on the napkin. The baby jerked awake in the stroller and started to whimper. Felicity unstrapped him, and then discreetly lifted her shirt. “Anything else?” Little Buster latched on to his mother’s nipple and began to suck.

My coffee cup was empty and the donut was gone.
Anything else
? I thought hard. “The only other thing is that…You’re going to laugh.”

“Tell me.”

“Well, he has absolutely no Internet presence. In this day and age—”

“Now, that is interesting. Sounds almost like he was working undercover.”

***

All the way back to campus I was thinking about what Felicity had said: Charlie’s base was out of touch. I wasn’t worried. Not really. I knew communication glitches happened now and then. It was just that being completely cut off from him made me feel sick to my stomach. But perhaps it was just as well: I really didn’t need Charlie to know about all this trouble when he was too far away to help.

Chapter 11

Still Wednesday

With Joe’s death, things had become so chaotic I’d almost forgotten that the deadline for submitting my tenure file was only two days away. From Greenfield I sped back to campus. Indian Summer had passed, and the brilliant blue skies had turned cold and gray.

Dodging colleagues and students, I made it to Dickinson Hall without being waylaid, a minor miracle. A uniformed officer was walking down the hall, knocking on doors. Miles Jewell peered out of his office at the far end of the hall, gave the officer a glare, but let him in, allowing the door to close behind them with a thunk.

***

Standing in the open door of my own office, I glanced around at my little realm. Everything was there that was supposed to be—desk, computer and printer on desk, conference table, chairs, overflowing bookcases, coat rack. And yet, as I closed the door behind me, I felt a vacancy in the room: something that was supposed to be there was gone. I’d been in a state of disorientation to begin with, and my sugar-and-caffeine lunch at Dunkin’ Donuts hadn’t helped.
You’re imagining things
, I chided myself, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing.

Okay, Pelletier: time to get this dog-and-pony-show on the road
. I called up the essay on the computer, clicked the proper function buttons and sat in the green vinyl chair, watching the pages accumulate in the printer’s tray. When it was done I could pack it in the tenure box, heft the whole thing into the chairman’s office. Then my tenure petition would be official and final—all I’d have to do was to wait.

And remember to breathe.

But Felicity’s comment about Joe was haunting me:
Sounds almost like he was working undercover
. My automatic internal grammarian automatically corrected her grammar:
almost as if he were working undercover
. While I was waiting for the document to finish printing, I typed Joe’s name into the Internet search engine, as I had done the day Miles had informed me of the chairman’s ardent support for my
professeur-sans-doctorat
colleague. Perhaps I’d missed something then. This time I did find a few more mentions, but they were all brand-new, journalistic reports of his death.

Then I called up the Enfield College website and clicked on English Department Faculty. Each of us had our own page on the department site, listing whatever we thought would be of interest to current and prospective students. My webpage, for instance, featured my scholarly credentials, a brief paragraph each for research and teaching interests, a list of courses taught, and a deer-in-the-headlights photo taken by the student photographer for the radical alternative campus paper, the
Hatchet
. You couldn’t miss Sally Chenille’s photo, which had somehow navigated to the department home page. It was a glamour shot, with cleavage, bronze hair, and multiple piercings. I couldn’t help it—I clicked on her webpage. It was replete with her culture-maven TV appearances. But Professor Joe Lone Wolf’s home page offered only a blank spot where the photo should be and a list of courses offered, past and present. Felicity was right—it
was
as if he were undercover. I closed the college website. Joe was distinguished by his absence; how can you read what isn’t there?

The printer stopped. My essay was complete. I gathered the pages, evened up the edges, clipped the printout together with a heavy-duty paper clasp, and looked toward the box. It wasn’t there.

Abruptly I sat up straight in my chair: Oh, God! My tenure box!
That’s
what was missing from the office! The god-damned
tenure box
! It was gone!

I saw then, in the corner of the office, the box-shaped emptiness. That sturdy black-and-white speckled cardboard file box I’d packed so very carefully, a months-long preparation of the records of my entire academic career. The box that held everything I was submitting to the department except for the one final essay sitting snug in my printer tray. Gone. Vanished. Disappeared.

An emptiness in the shape of the rest of my life.

I don’t remember collapsing into the green vinyl chair, but I must have. It wasn’t that I passed out; it was just that my entire consciousness riveted itself on that vacant corner where I’d last placed the box of materials. My focused vision was cold, like my brain and my heart. My box of tenure materials was gone. As usual, Emily Dickinson gave me the words I needed: “As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow—/ First-Chill—then Stupor— then the letting go—”

I took a deep breath and let it out. The room was dim, and I shivered as the cold of shock released me. I was left to the wintery chill of late October and the small mean rain dripping down the windows.

***

When I barged into the department office, Monica stopped typing and gazed at me with unconcealed curiosity. “So, you’re not in the hoosegow, yet?”

“Not yet. Listen, I have a question for you.”

“Shoot.” Today I was in her good books; after all, Felicity Schultz, her former downstairs neighbor’s kid, liked me.

My query was a long shot, but I had to ask. “Monica, by any chance,” my voice was shaky, “did you collect that box of tenure materials that was in my office? Maybe you thought it was all ready for submission?”

The English Department secretary controls the cookie key, the passkey for all English department doors. It had gotten its name from a plastic key ring in the shape of an outsized chocolate-chip cookie, cumbersome so absent-minded professors wouldn’t pocket it. Therefore Monica has access to everything in the department and can wander in and out of faculty offices at will.

She ran a stubby hand through her chopped-off hair and frowned at me. “So, your tenure file’s missing, huh? Whoa! You sure you didn’t take it home?”

“You think I’d forget something like that? Have you given the cookie key to anyone today?”

She shrugged. “Nobody’s asked for it. That’s not to say someone didn’t come in when I was gone and take it from the desk drawer.” She opened the drawer and, dangling the key before me, said, “It’s here, now.”

I swallowed hard, and went to call Earlene. “Help! What am I going to do?”

“Maybe you took it home last night and forgot about it.”

Not her, too. “You’ve got to be kidding—I’ve been working on this all semester. It hasn’t left this office. I know it was here this morning—I…I
dusted
it.”

She laughed, but it wasn’t funny, and she realized it. “Are you okay?”

I had no answer for that. “Do you think someone has it in for me? Who would steal my tenure file? And why?”

There was a long pause on Earlene’s end of the line. Then she asked, “Are you absolutely certain you saw it today—this very morning?”

“Ye-e-e-s.” But my head was spinning.
Was
it this morning I’d dusted the box? Or was it yesterday? Or the day before? I was no longer absolutely certain. “Why does that matter?”

A huge sigh from the other end of the line. “Because…well, you know…if it was there, say, Monday, but not today…well, maybe Joe Lone Wolf had motive to hamper your tenure process…I’m not making an accusation, you understand. I’m just saying…Are you still there, Karen?”

She’d stunned me into silence.
That. Son. Of. A. Bitch
. “I’m here,” I breathed. A thought consumed me—a possibility so outrageous that I instantly convinced myself it was true. If I‘d been suffering the hellish pangs of tenure agony, Joe Lone Wolf must have been, too. He had American history on his side, but still…I had quality and quantity. He must have known that. I hadn’t even thought what it would be like to be in his position.

“Earlene, do you think…?”

“What?”

“Is it possible…?”

“Is
what
possible?”

I jumped up from the chair. “Do you think Joe Lone Wolf actually
did
steal my tenure box?”

When she spoke again, she was extremely somber. “That was irresponsible of me. Forget I implied it. I was just thinking off the top of my head. Don’t repeat it—you hear me? Not to anyone. Especially not to the cops. You understand?”

I was slow in getting her point, but I finally did. “Oh, right,” I said. If Boylan thought that I thought Joe had sabotaged my tenure case, he’d have good reason to consider me a suspect. “Right. Mum’s the word. But, listen, Earlene, the tenure file’s due on Friday. What am I going to do? I’ll never get a new one ready in two days.”

“Talk to Ned about it. Ask for an extension. There must be provisions—”

“Ne-e-e-ed?” I wailed.

“Well, okay. Not Ned. But talk to the academic dean. He’ll tell you what to do about a delayed submission. Life is full of complications. Don’t think you’re the only one who’s ever faced a last-minute problem. Tenure policy must make exceptions for extraordinary circumstances.”

“I don’t knoooow.” I wasn’t ready to let go of the trauma. Then I pulled myself together. “You think?”

“Now, that’s a good girl,” she said, Dean of students talking to some dimwit freshman.

I hung up knowing she was right about what I should do next. But…

But the box
had
been in my office this morning. I was certain. Well, almost certain. And Joe Lone Wolf had been dead at least since Monday. There was no way he could have taken it. Who else could have and would have? And why?

***

Dean Sanjay Patel sat me down in the spacious office in Emerson Hall with its large Oriental carpets in rich tones of blue and crimson spread across an oak-parquet floor. He made me a cup of tea and talked me through my panic. Sanjay reminded me that most of the tenure materials—my letter, C.V., activity report—were on my computer and could be printed out again, that books and magazine articles could be replaced, that the college was not inflexible about deadlines. All I had to do, he summed up, was to begin to print everything out—one more time—submit it when it was ready, and then gather up copies of books, etc. He would see that the English Department knew to waive the Friday deadline. But, for right now, this was his advice: go home, put my feet up, relax, have a glass or two of wine, watch a Jane Austen video, get a good night’s sleep, and come back to my office in the morning with renewed energy and an extra printer cartridge.

I resisted the impulse to kiss his feet and drove home through the late afternoon dusk. Tomorrow I would cancel all my obligations so I could begin the work of replacing my tenure portfolio. I don’t have classes on Thursdays, so I could single-mindedly concentrate on printing everything out again and gathering copies of books and essays. For the first time I thanked whatever stars rule my life for leaving me so totally unencumbered with family this semester; I might be as lonely as hell, but at least I could focus on this one vital project without having to worry about anyone else’s needs.

Well, Amanda. I knew I’d lie awake and worry about my daughter. Traveling in Nepal with a man she’s only known for a handful of months! What if they were attacked by Maoist thugs? Or what if they came down with hepatitis? Or what if…

***

It was rush hour, so it wasn’t until I turned onto my country road that I noticed the car following me. It was fully dark now and raining harder. A few late leaves, red and brown, splattered onto my wet windshield, the wipers sweeping them back and forth. The air circulation system of my aging Subaru was shot, plus I needed new wipers, so between the fog and the smears, my visibility was not what it should have been. Anytime an oncoming car approached, I had to hunker over the wheel, wipe the windshield with a tissue and squint. The market for condos and McMansions hasn’t reached this far into hicksville yet, so the road was isolated and dark, passing through played-out and abandoned onion farms. Having to pay so much attention to what was ahead, I ignored the rear-view mirror. Passing a darkened farm stand with heaps of Halloween pumpkins, I happened to look behind me: a car with odd cats-eye lights. A minute or two later I glanced in the mirror again. Cats-eye was still behind me—closer now.

I felt a sudden chill, and my hands began to shake. Was someone following me? Who? Oh, no, not Lieutenant Neil Boylan? Felicity’s warning echoed in my mind:
Lombardi says Boylan’s already hassling you
. As I signaled to turn right into my driveway, I kept my eyes on the mirror. If it was Boylan, he wasn’t driving a squad car—the headlights were all wrong. I slowed down to begin the turn. Cat’s-eye followed suit, turning on its right blinker. Oh, God, maybe I should have kept going straight ahead until I came to a more populated area. But it was too late; I was already into the turn. Cat’s-eye began flashing its lights.

Damn, damn, damn. I pulled right up to the kitchen door. The other car followed me into the narrow driveway and stopped. There went my escape route. What was wrong with me? Why hadn’t I kept going—found a police station or something? Too late now. I yanked the keys from the ignition, snatched up the big magnesium flashlight that Charlie insists I carry in the car at all times, squared my shoulders, and stepped out of the car. My feet sank in the soft leaf-loam.

The other car was an old maroon Dodge. Familiar? Maybe, but I couldn’t quite place it. The driver’s door opened. I clutched the mag light. I would use its heft to brain the Dodge’s driver. Yes. But what if it was Boylan? Assaulting a police officer was not a criminal charge the college administration would be happy about tenuring the perpetrator of. Or, whatever. Okay, whoever it was, I wouldn’t hit him. I’d use the big flashlight’s glare to blind him while I made a dash for the house, door key extended.