The Death of a Constant Lover

by Lev Raphael

Mollified, I not only told her the story of last night’s disastrous fax but took her through Stefan’s stuttering career. Each new book had always started off well, with good prepublication reviews in Booklist, Publishers Weekly, and Kirkus. Then there would be enthusiastic reviews in newspapers and magazines, and good crowds at each bookstore where Stefan did a reading, but sales never matched the publisher’s or Stefan’s expectations. Though in the past I’d shared some of Stefan’s disappointments with Sharon, I’d never laid it all out so baldly, and she was surprised.

  “That’s so strange, Nick. I see his books in store windows, I read the reviews, and I think he must be doing great. I bet this is really hard for you, sweetie. It’s bound to change, though,” she said wryly, and I smiled. Sharon had always said to me that nothing turned out the way you planned—it was either better or worse, but always different. As advice went, that pretty much covered every crisis you faced.

  “And then,” I said, “like he needs to be reminded of what he hasn’t accomplished, our neighbor across the street’s a guy who sold a book about being sterile—for half a million dollars!—and I know it’s eating Stefan up—”

  “Wait. Didier Charbonneau is your neighbor?”

  “How do you know his name?”

  “Nick—it’s not a name you’d forget. And besides, he’s in the new Vanity Fair, in Hot Type, the page they do about big forthcoming books. They even had a little picture—he’s cute, if you like baldies.”

  Great. That was definitely a magazine I had to make sure Stefan didn’t read this month. But that wouldn’t help. Lucille would probably mention it, or someone in town or EAR would. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t filter out everything that might depress Stefan further. He had to bear the shocks, the reminders of his failure, himself, and work through them somehow on his own. I had never been faced with that kind of burden; after all, I was the only living Wharton bibliographer, for whatever that was worth, and so in a very, very small way I was a combination of celebrity and guru for several hundred Wharton scholars and maybe a few hundred more die-hard Wharton fans. The rest of the world, Wharton-wild or not, didn’t know I existed and never would.

  “Nick?” Sharon was asking. “What’s Didier like?”

  I was surprised that someone who’d been around the world, met and partied with stars of all kinds, could still be curious about even a very minor celebrity like Didier. Though if the book was made into a film he’d be much more, and even if he only got onto television, Didier could be launched into the media empyrean—for a while. As Robert Hughes acerbically said in his analysis of America, most of us believe that “to be on TV is to be realer than real.”

  I described him to Sharon as a lot heartier than your average ex-high school English teacher. “And he has a brother named Napoleon who’s a fanatic Quebec separatist and who may be sending hate mail to his half-black wife.”

  “Whose wife? Charbonneau’s? Why? Nick, you’re making this up.”

  I assured her I wasn’t, giving her as much information about Lucille’s hate mail as I had.

  “I thought your school started as an agricultural college? What the hell is going on? Hard Copy should open up a permanent office there.”

  She was less obstreperous when I told her that the knife used to kill Jesse Benevento had been found.

  “Sweetie, I am really worried about you. I don’t think that’s such a safe place to be a teacher. You might as well be in the middle of a civil war.”

  “Well, I’m worried about Angie—you remember the wonderful student who helped me last year?” I explained her disappearance as well as I could, realizing as I did so that I could try talking to Angie’s academic adviser, and also Jesse’s. His would be easier to track down because he was an EAR major.

  Sharon and I chatted some more. But I had papers to grade and didn’t want to let more of the morning ooze away.

  Grading papers is the hardest challenge of teaching. It’s not just staying focused, as some people think, it’s continually refocusing. Each time you pick up a new essay, you’re shifting to an intimate dialogue with someone else. Imagine you’re at a party speaking intensely to thirty different people in a row, and you not only have to pay absolute attention to what they’re saying, afterward you have to make trenchant observations about what they said. And your comments have to be helpful, stimulating, and enlightening, so that the next time you two are “together,” the conversation’s moved to another level.

  That’s a lot of work! Yet I loved it, because I knew I was good at it. I was consistently able to keep from crossing the line between constructive criticism and obliterating someone’s ego. Sledgehammer comments are the easiest thing in the world to come up with, and even though my students are dedicated to acting cool, no amount of tattoos and piercings could cover up the disappointment and sometimes fury if their writing was being trashed. After all, many of them are still just kids.

  I took a short break to call EAR and find out who Jesse’s faculty adviser had been, and got the information right away: Carter Savery. But the Criminal Justice secretary I reached refused to help me about Angie because I wasn’t a faculty member in that college.

  I worked diligently through the morning, with a few breaks to stretch and get some more coffee, and felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment. During one break, I got my lunch ready. I decided to have bruschetta, so I defrosted a loaf of Italian bread and set about making a sun-dried tomato tapenade with capers, fresh basil and oregano, garlic, and red onion that I’d leave to sit out for an hour at room temperature. A perfect reward for hard work, and it was one of Stefan’s favorites, so I thought he might like some when he got back from campus. I briefly considered calling him, but if he was away from his office, I didn’t want to leave a message with any of the secretaries—today that would feel too impersonal.

  When I was done with papers and had eaten my tasty lunch, the doorbell rang. I assumed it was a UPS delivery or the mail carrier bringing up a package that wouldn’t fit in the mailbox by the road.

  It wasn’t either of those. Delaney Kildare stood at the front door, smiling that odd smile of his, looking as lush and shiny as a box of Perugina chocolates.

  “I was nearby,” he said cheerfully, as if this were news I’d welcome, “and there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you.”

  I was too startled to lie and say I was busy, so I waved him inside and followed him into the living room. As soon as I did so, I was furious with myself. I mean, who the hell was I, some royalist British commoner overwhelmed by an expected visit from the Queen Mum?

  I asked Delaney if he wanted Perrier, and his yes bought me a little time in the kitchen to settle down. Maybe someday I would stop being unnerved by men who were so handsome and self-assured, but I didn’t think it’d be any time soon.

  When I brought Delaney his drink, he was standing in the middle of the living room looking as arrogant as those strutting crows I’d seen a few days before, gracefully holding his backpack in one hand. I couldn’t help but wonder how my life would have been different if I had his blistering good looks—what doors would have opened for me? What kind of person would I have become?

  “Beautiful house,” Delaney said quietly as he sat in a chair opposite me, clearly envious. Most graduate students would have made an effort to keep the remark a compliment, an indication that someday they hoped to live like this. But then Delaney Kildare wasn’t like any graduate student I’d ever met. His curly dark hair was too well cut, his clothes too expensive. I knew, because Stefan had a lightweight green-and-brown Jhane Barnes sweater and a Kenneth Cole brown suede shirt just like Delaney’s, though Stefan never wore them together, or wore such tight black jeans and cowboy boots. I wondered where Delaney’s money came from, and why he needed to mow Lucille’s lawn.

  “Thanks,” I said, suddenly alarmed by the suspicion that he might be modeling himself on Stefan. No, that was ridiculous. There weren’t that many places in town where you could get good men’s cloth
ing, so it wasn’t much of a coincidence.

  “I heard you might be teaching a course in the mystery novel next year,” Delaney said without preamble. “And I’d like to be your TA.”

  This was surprising—I had hardly mentioned the possibility to anyone. Like all new courses, this one had made its painful pilgrimage from the EAR curriculum committee to departmental approval, passing on and through a host of college- and university-level committees, reaching the goal of all new courses seeking SUM’s imprimatur: the Academic Council. That body was supposed to be magisterial and wise but was rumored to be as unstable as the Queen of Hearts shouting, “Off with their heads!” After all this effort, the person who’d originally helped design the course was no longer in the department, which left a hole in next year’s schedule and reports of student complaints. I was the only faculty member with any interest in the subject—not to mention some firsthand experience—but of course when Coral Greathouse had raised the possibility with me over the summer, she’d admitted my low status would make it hard to give me a plum. A plum that nobody wanted! That’s the kind of place EAR was: bald men arguing over a comb.

  But I’d only talked about the possibility of the class with Coral, Stefan, and—Lucille, I thought. Lucille must have told him.

  “It’s not definite,” I said. “And how did you hear about it?”

  Delaney shrugged. “I thought everyone knew.”

  “And why would I need a teaching assistant? The class won’t be that big.”

  Delaney grinned and leaned forward. “When I talk the class up, you’ll be swamped with students.” He sounded like an agent assuring his client he could make him a star. Why was he so adamant?

  “Okay,” I said. “Suppose the class is crowded—there still won’t be any money budgeted for a TA.”

  Delaney leaned back, worldly, confident—all he needed was a glass of eighteen-year-old The Macallan single malt and a fine cigar. “I’ve already talked to Dean Bullerschmidt about it.” I didn’t know what to say for a moment, and Delaney went on: “Administrators can always find money if they want to, whatever the budget.”

  I knew he was right about that, but how had he learned so much about the way SUM functioned? It really bugged me that Delaney presented himself as an insider. And that he’d gone to see the dean before even speaking to me. “Well, whatever you do,” I said, producing my trump card, “the dean hates me for creating PR problems for SUM. I don’t think he’d give me a dime.”

  Delaney shook his head. “The dean was favorable. Besides, technically the money would be for the department.”

  “That’s even worse,” I said. “He and Coral Greathouse are rivals for the provost’s job.”

  Delaney didn’t look at all fazed. Jeez, I thought, how could he be so cocky, so certain? This whole conversation was getting weirder and weirder. But there was more than one piece missing, and I asked Delaney what his interest was in the course.

  Sitting there with his meaty thighs spread, he lit up. “I love mysteries!” he said. And if we’d been sitting closer, I’m sure he would have grabbed my shoulders to shake me into understanding the depth of his feeling. “I’ve been reading them for years. Everything. Agatha Christie—Lawrence Block—Sue Grafton—Martha Grimes—P. D. James. You name a writer. There isn’t anyone I haven’t read at least one book of.”

  I wanted to quiz him on something to make sure he wasn’t bullshitting me, but couldn’t think of a single question. And it seemed churlish to suspect another mystery fan. The reverential way he said those authors’ names made it clear how passionate he was about each one.

  “Have you thought about how you want to structure the class?” he asked.

  I nodded, but the last thing I was going to do was share my indecision with him. I had no idea at all how to organize the class. A survey from Edgar Allan Poe to Georges Simenon, with a few contemporaries thrown in? British vs. American? Focus on sub-genres like locked-room or academic mysteries? Do women and minority detectives so I could work in favorites like Michael Nava, Lucille Kallen, and Walter Mosley?

  When I didn’t say anything, Delaney sipped his Perrier and nodded as convivially as if I had answered his question. “I’d be happy to prepare a syllabus for you. When I heard about your course, I thought it was something I had to get in on. I was born to teach it.”

  His brazenness dumbfounded me. “Why?”

  “Well, first, I think you’d be great to work for. Work with.” He looked down as if a little shy, and I recalled how I’d criticized Detective Valley for being rude to Delaney. I wasn’t any better right now. I forced myself to shape up. After all, it was a compliment, wasn’t it, that he wanted to be my TA? Even if all this was only about Delaney needing the assistantship and hoping to use it to advance in the department and outpace the other graduate students, it was still flattering, because it would be my course that was his stepping-stone.

  “What really attracts you to mysteries?” I asked, trying to be polite, sensing that there was something more going on here and wanting to understand Delaney better.

  Delaney’s face seemed to flick closed and then open like a camera shutter. “I’ve never told this to anyone before, but when I was fifteen, though maybe it was earlier than that, I mean it could have been going on a lot earlier—” He stopped and seemed to quiet himself a little. “I noticed that my mother was always a little strange after she’d get certain letters—once a month, less than that. Personal letters, from an address in Florida. I was reading Sherlock Holmes back then, and when she was out shopping one afternoon, I went through her stuff to look for the letters. I really had to dig,” he said ruefully, but with admiration for his adolescent self. “She’d folded them up and slipped them inside old pairs of shoes at the back of her closet.” Delaney’s eyes were staring off to the side somewhere. “I guess I was made to be a detective.” He shifted in his chair, spreading his legs wide and resting his hands on his thighs. I tried not to stare at the keystone of his arch.

  It was a creepy story, but I was hooked. “What was in the letters?”

  “She was actually still married to another man in Florida, not my father, and he had tracked her down and wanted her to come back. He wasn’t threatening her or anything. They were very tender letters. Love letters.” Delaney fell appropriately silent.

  I didn’t know if I was shocked by the story itself or by his telling it to me.

  “What did you do?”

  “I told my father. I had to. We were too close for me to hide it. He freaked out, and she disappeared. I never saw her again. She may even have been married more than twice—that’s what the letters implied.”

  “Wow.”

  Delaney smiled almost demurely, as if not wanting to make any dramatic claims for himself or his past.

  “Listen, Delaney, I don’t know if I’m going to get permission to do the course, and everything else is up in the air.”

  Delaney drew his legs together and folded his hands in his lap. “I really need to TA more than one class next year. I’ve got a lot of debt, and my father can’t loan me any more money. Since I’m a new graduate student in EAR, I won’t be allowed to teach more than one class a semester unless there’s a special arrangement—and you’d have to say yes first. I’m really good in the classroom.”

  I stood up and headed for the door. Delaney followed reluctantly, slinging his backpack over a suede-draped shoulder. Then he stopped and asked me to show him the rest of the house. “It’s so beautiful,” he said, grinning rather seductively.

  Opening the door, I said, “I can’t promise you anything about the class.” Frankly, I didn’t want a TA, and if I were forced to have one, Delaney would not be my first choice.

  Delaney nodded soberly as if he’d picked up what I was thinking. On his way out, he threw off, “I’d work my butt off to help you make the course a success. And it would be a chance for you to shine. It can’t be easy always being in Stefan’s shadow.”

  I closed the door very car
efully, marveling at the guy’s chutzpah, and just as quickly thinking that he knew what he wanted and went right for it. Was that so wrong? Then the last thing he’d said sank in, and I felt insulted and stung. Putting Delaney’s glass in the dishwasher, I felt profoundly uncomfortable, as prickly as if I were having some kind of allergic reaction. Who the hell did he think he was, bringing up Stefan that way?

  I wandered back into the living room as if searching for traces of Delaney’s visit that I could eliminate, but of course there weren’t any. And suddenly the warm bright room was very alien and I was as vulnerable as the gladiator in an arena waiting for the emperor’s thumb to go up or down.

  Stefan’s shadow.

  Delaney didn’t even know me, know us. So how could he have picked up on something I had barely let myself think about over these past years?

  I sunk onto the couch, suddenly weighted down by all the times I’d felt eclipsed by Stefan. No, not by him, but by his career, his reputation, such as it was. We’d always supported and encouraged each other, but the differences between us as professionals were enormous. I remembered all the conferences, the writer’s meetings, the bookstores, where if people asked who I was and what I did, they seldom paid attention to the answer. It was something Stefan and I often joked about, but was painful nevertheless. And yet I’d buried that pain, ignored it. Because Stefan’s suffering over his career—and over his past—was so enormous it had become the chronically sick child we nursed and worried about. It’s not that Stefan didn’t take my Wharton bibliography or my teaching seriously, and it’s not that I myself slighted my own work. But despite my declining status at EAR, despite the murders I’d been involved in, my own life crises had not really dominated our lives the way Stefan’s career anxieties had.

  Perhaps that was because my status at EAR had been low from the start. Stefan was the writer-in-residence with the good salary, the attention, the large corner office, the easy schedule, the perks—in academia, his sales figures didn’t count. And me, I was just a lowly assistant professor teaching the most despised course possible: writing.