Desperate Measures

by M. Glenn Graves

  “Mr. Novak will see you now,” she said as she pointed to the door bearing his name. Fred Novak.

  He stood when we entered, pointed to the chairs in front of his wooden desk, and we sat down.

  “Now, what is it you two want?” he said with a casualness that belied his importance.

  “I’m Clancy Evans and I am investigating the death of one of your former students, Melody Legrand.”

  He swiveled his wooden chair abruptly so that he was now positioned in front of his computer. Rapidly he hit some keys and seemed to be searching for something. Presumably he was looking for some record on Melody Legrand. I’m a detective and sometimes I detect stuff. I even have a license to think this way.

  “Yes, Melody Mace Legrand was indeed a former student here. She is no longer connected to our college. She did not graduate.”

  “Probably won’t be reading the alumni magazine either,” I said.

  He turned and stared at me. I smiled.

  “We were hoping that you could help us locate some of her classmates, some friends of hers. We would like to talk with them about Melody.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I was puzzled. I thought my request was clear enough. Perhaps he was still bewildered by the word graduate. I was a little too simple for this educated man.

  “We request an interview of a few of Melody’s colleagues, people who knew her when she was still studying in the academic setting.”

  “Okay. What is it you need from our office?”

  “Help us locate her friends.”

  “You have names?” Novak said.

  “Sandra Chatterworth, Rebecca Lewinsky, and Stacey Sanderson,” I said.

  He typed something on his keyboard and waited for the computer to catch up with his rapid pace.

  “Yes, they are currently enrolled here at Regis.”

  Wow. We established some pertinent information to confirm what we had been told. I was beginning to believe that progress was possible in an academic administrative setting.

  “We need their schedules, addresses, and anything else you have that might help us locate them,” I said.

  “We can’t give out that information.”

  “We simply want to speak with them.”

  “You have made that clear enough, I think. But, we have a campus to protect. Our students and their parents demand a certain ambience of privacy to guard their personal data.”

  I secretly wished that Rogers was here with me to talk to this man-machine sitting across from me. I was getting nowhere.

  “We promise to be discreet in your ambience of privacy.”

  “I am sure you do. I still cannot divulge the class schedules or addresses of these students. If there is nothing else, I am extremely busy. Thank you for stopping by.”

  Summarily dismissed. And done so with great efficiency.

  Uncle Walters closed Novak’s office door. I would have slammed it.

  I stopped in front of the desk of the woman with dark rimmed glasses. She was busy shuffling papers. She seemed to be searching for something.

  “Could you direct us to the campus hangout?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Where do most of the students go when they are between classes or simply want to sit and talk and drink whatever they drink?” I clarified.

  “Try Alumnae Hall. You might wander into the College Café. Students hang out there,” she said with emphasis.

  “Thank you.”

  “You didn’t hear it from me,” she said.

  “Mum’s the word.”

  We found a table near a wall that provided us with a view of the College Café area. We bought coffee and sat down to watch.

  “What are watching for?”

  “Students.”

  “I think I see lots of students,” Uncle Walters said.

  “You’re on your way.”

  “Good. On my way to what?”

  “Being an ace detective like me.”

  “Do we simply wait here to see if Sandra, Rebecca, and Stacy show up?” he said.

  “In a perfect world,” I said.

  “You have a plan B.”

  “You bet.”

  He sipped his coffee.

  “Care to share?”

  “It’s a small college. Enrollment less than two thousand. I figure just about everybody knows just about everybody. These three girls are seniors. Maybe they are highly involved in some of the activities on campus. So, maybe we will get lucky.”

  “Lucky would be the word.”

  “Great detectives count on some luck.”

  “And you are a great detective?” he said.

  “Working my way in that direction.”

  12

  A young man walked past our table. He appeared to be erudite. I have a sense about such things. I also do a lot of type-casting. It’s a form of racial profiling, except in this instance race had nothing to do with it. He happened to be African-American and the girls for whom we were searching were of unknown ethnicity to us. It was a place to begin.

  “Excuse me,” I said as he skirted our table. “Would you happen to know Sandra Chatterworth?”

  He turned in our direction. Tall, average looking except for his hair, and he was definitely dressed for academia – blue jeans with holes in the knees, a colorful shirt that resembled an art project more than clothing, sandals, and a backpack that appeared heavy enough to stop a train going full-tilt. His hair was desperately searching for a place to land. His face showed signs of intelligent life.

  “No.”

  He started to move on.

  “How about Rebecca Lewinsky?”

  “Yeah, I know her.”

  “Is she here in this room?”

  He searched the area for a minute or so.

  “I don’t see her.”

  “You know Stacey Sanderson?”

  “Why are you asking me about these people?”

  “Investigating a death of a former student?”

  “Melody Legrand?”

  The word wow raced through my brain. I looked at Walters and could see that a synonym of wow passed through his mind as well. His sophistication level was a tad higher than mine.

  “Good guess.”

  “No guess. She’s the only death we’ve had related, halfway, to us since I’ve been here. Small college, you know.”

  “So how about Stacey?”

  “Yeah, I know her.”

  He looked around without waiting for me to ask.

  “Don’t see her. Sorry. You gonna be in here for a while?”

  “For the duration,” I said.

  “If I see them, I’ll let you know.”

  “Appreciated.”

  He started to walk away.

  “Why are you investigating a suicide?”

  “Looking for reasons,” I said.

  “Good luck with that.”

  “You know Melody?”

  “As well as anyone could. Like, you know, she was a strange bird.”

  “What’s your name?” I said.

  “Raney Goforth.”

  “Raney, tell me about the strange bird.”

  “Mind if I sit?” he said.

  “Not at all,” I moved the chair out with my foot for him. He smiled.

  “You’re not like most adult women I know,” he said.

  “Thanks for the compliment. Now tell me what you remember about Melody.”

  “Talented artist and weird female.”

  “Talented in what expertise?”

  “Painting, acting, whatever she did. Had the gene, I suppose you could say. Gifted. Loved to watch her work on stage.”

  “Had possibilities?”

  “To say the least. In fact, there were some New York theatre people once talking with her.”

  “And the weird female part?”

  “Like this strange religion she had.”

  “Religion does not necessarily make one weird,” I said.

  “If the reli
gion itself is weird, then it’s like, you know, weird by association.”

  “Granted. So what weird religion did she flow with?”

  “Church of the Real End,” he said.

  “You making this up for me,” I said.

  “Well, like, I am a writer and all, but, no, I am not making this up. It’s a church not far from campus.”

  “Appeals to some students?”

  “Are you kidding me? No way. Melody was the only one I knew of that even went there. Those birds are too strange even for college students. Stacey and Rebecca tried to talk her out of going there, but they couldn’t make any headway with her. Like, she was convinced that the idiot who led the group was God himself.”

  “Strong personality.”

  “Yeah, like if you buy into the lunatic fringe.”

  “But you have no firsthand experience with the lunatic fringe,” I said.

  “No, just rumors, stories we hear on campus. Some guys went over to one of the sessions just to have a look-see, you know, curious and all.”

  “Sessions?” I said.

  “Teaching or worship or whatever they called that. Like, it was wild stuff. You know, end of the world and all that kind of crap.”

  “You don’t think the world is going to end?”

  “Like, yeah, really. Some day. But who knows when? And I certainly don’t want to sit around and listen to some ego-maniac talk about it.”

  “So why would Melody be so interested in this?”

  “Got me. I think she was depressed much of the time.”

  “You have support for this?”

  “Like evidence?”

  “Yeah, like evidence,” I said.

  “She wore black most days.”

  “Goth?”

  “I don’t think she went for that so much. Like, black was her color.”

  “Like Johnny Cash.”

  “Who?”

  “Never mind. What else made you think she was depressed?”

  “Stacey and Rebecca stopped her from killing herself once.”

  13

  “I noticed you were silent during our interview with that young man,” I said.

  “Absorbing it all,” Uncle Walters said as we walked towards his car. “That would be luck, correct?”

  “If you mean running into Raney, then, yeah, that would be classified as luck.”

  “We finished here?”

  “Not completely, but we can leave. I’ll come back and find the friends.”

  “At least you will come back and try.”

  “Undaunted,” I said.

  “That would be one word for it,” he said.

  “If I worry people long enough, they often come through.”

  “Is that the best strategy you can manifest?”

  “It works more than it fails,” I said.

  Two young coeds approached us as we turned the corner of a building and headed to the parking lot where Uncle Walters had left his car.

  “You’re the detective needing information about Melody Legrand,” the brunette said to me. It was more of a statement than a question.

  “Impressive,” I said.

  “What’s impressive?”

  “You could have selected him,” I said and pointed to Uncle Walters standing beside me.

  “He doesn’t look like a detective,” the brunette said.

  I smiled at Walters.

  “Oh, and I look like one?”

  “Not so much,” the blond answered, “but Raney said a female detective was asking a lot of questions about Melody.”

  “You have time to talk?” I said.

  They looked at each other and shrugged.

  “Yeah,” the blond said and the brunette nodded agreement.

  I looked around for a place out of the sun. I spotted a small grove of trees.

  “How about over there?” I said and pointed to the trees.

  All four of us headed in that direction.

  “Which of you is Stacey?” I said.

  “That’s me,” the blond said.

  “May I assume you to be Rebecca?” I said to the brunette.

  “Becky,” she said.

  “Thanks for finding us,” I said to both of them as we all sat down on the ground in the shade of the trees. “Tell me about Melody.”

  “We were all close friends, including Sandy … the other girl you asked Raney about,” Stacey said.

  “Yeah, like, you know, BFF’s, the best ever our first two years. Did everything together. Talked and shared stuff. Like real close, you know,” Becky added.

  “So what happened to the forever part of BFF?”

  “Melody was humiliated in that beauty pageant,” Stacey said.

  “How so?”

  “Some jerk of a judge told her she was homely and had no business even being in the pageant. That was uncalled for, if you ask me. I mean, she wasn’t no raving beauty or anything, but she was okay. Anyhow, it crushed her, like a heavy boulder falling on top of her. Know what I mean?” Stacey said.

  “I can imagine,” I said.

  “It was her mother’s fault,” Becky said. “She forced her into the beauty pageant stuff. We tried to tell her to just quit. She hated it. Absolutely detested the whole charade.”

  “Why didn’t she listen to your advice and quit?”

  “She kept telling us, you don’t know my mother,” Becky said. “She said that all of the time, like a mantra, you know. Constantly telling us you don’t know my mother, you don’t know my mother. Honestly, we got tired of hearing it. She described her mother as something of an ogre.”

  “You ever meet her mother?”

  “In person?” Becky said.

  “That’s the general idea,” I said.

  “Never,” Stacey answered. “We spoke on the phone a few times. She would call and one of us would answer. She sounded pleasant enough, you know, distantly pleasant. Formal like, never overly friendly or anything.”

  “You’re being too kind,” Becky said to Stacey. “Her mother was a condescending bitch, and that’s the good side.”

  “Don’t hold back,” I said, “tell me how you really feel.”

  “I ain’t holding back,” Becky said.

  “Do tell,” Uncle Walters said under his breath.

  “So, when Melody was devastated by the judge in the beauty contest, she went into a tailspin?” I said.

  “You mean, like depressed and all?” Stacey said.

  “Yeah, like that.”

  “For two months or more. She stopped going to classes, stopped eating, stopped doing just about everything. It took us a long time to get her out of that depression,” Becky said.

  “She talk to anyone?”

  “Besides us?” Stacey said.

  “Professional.”

  “You mean like a college counselor or something?” Stacey said.

  “Yeah, like that.”

  “Are you kidding? Those jerks here are awful. No one in their right mind would go and talk with any of them. Bunch of idiots, if you ask me,” Becky said.

  “So you two stayed with her and talked and tried your best to get her to shake her depression,” I said.

  “And Sandy, too,” they both same simultaneously.

  “Oh, yes, Sandra Chatterworth. I forgot about her. Was she much help?” I said.

  “She thought she was helping,” Becky said.

  “What did she do?”

  “She took her to that weird church place a few miles from here,” Stacey said.

  “Sandy took Melody to the church place. The one Raney mentioned to us earlier? The Church of the Real End?” I said.

  “Omygosh, yes, that’s the weirdest church I have ever heard of. I’d be a Buddhist before I would believe anything they teach,” Becky said.

  “That’s how Melody got involved with this religious group?” I said.

  “Yeah, Sandy said it would be good for her,” Stacey said. “She’d get her mind off of the stupid judge and that god-awful beauty p
ageant crap.”

  “Sandy into this religious group still?”

  “As far as I know she is. We don’t see her much anymore. We don’t talk or text or email or facebook or anything,” Stacey said.

  “She is,” Becky said. “She sent me a message on Facebook, wrote on my wall, you know, and told me that her church would not allow any more communications with non-believers. She defriended me on Facebook several months back.”

  “Omygosh, you didn’t tell me that,” Stacey said. “Like, she truly de-friended you?”

  “There wasn’t anything to tell. You know how Sandy is, religious and all. It was no big deal. I didn’t give much thought to it,” Becky said.

  “Did Sandy give you a reason why she was dropping you as a friend on Facebook?” I said.

  “Yeah, she said since the world was coming to an end, their church had to break all ties with those of us on the other side,” Becky said.

  “The other side of what?” I asked.

  “Sandy said that there are two groups – one right, one wrong. Everyone in the church is right. That must mean that the rest of us are wrong.”

  “Imagine that,” I said.

  14

  Uncle Walters parked his car in the massive parking lot across from the church structure located on Glen Road in Wellesley. It was a short ride from the campus. According to my trusty map and GPS, we were still in Middlesex County, but just barely. The church structure didn’t resemble anything like a church that I was used to coming out of Clancyville. Postmodern might be an apt description to identify the edifice Uncle Walters and I were looking at as we crossed the street in search of an entrance.

  “Reckon there’s a name for this type of architecture?” I said as we entered one of the massive metal doors at what we supposed was the front of the building. The doors appeared to have been painted sky blue with yellow dots of varying sizes placed indiscriminately about the two doors.

  “Andy Warhol original?” Walters suggested.

  “Hey, an attempt at humor,” I said.

  “Standup,” he said with a straight face, “I’m here through Thursday,”