by Leigh Perry
“You’re kidding.”
“I wish I were. Check out my spreadsheet.” Sid loves spreadsheets almost as much as he loves dossiers. “Along the side are the adjuncts, other than yourself. Along the top are the schools from which we have confirmed art theft.”
“Seems reasonable.”
“I’ve got another spreadsheet with the schools where each adjunct has taught for the past seven years.”
“Seven?”
“Just giving myself a margin for error. Then all I had to do was to check off the names. Easy, right?”
“I know a trick question when I hear it.”
“Well, it would have been easy if anybody had taught at all five schools.”
I ran down the list, more to humor him than anything else. “I see one person was at two of the schools.”
“Several were at two. Some were at three, and two were even at four. But no one was at five. I didn’t even get around to coordinating times to make sure they were at the right schools when the thefts took place. There was no need.”
I looked down the list again as I tried to think of something comforting to say and got as far as the D’s when I noticed something. “Hey, why isn’t Owen Deen on here?”
“He’s an English prof.”
“So?”
“Scarlet Letter is an artist.”
“Are you sure? Even I could take a design, scan it into a computer, and change the signature.”
“Some of the changes were more drastic than that, and nobody had any art training in their background.”
“Maybe they have natural ability that they’ve been hiding. Maybe they outsourced the dirty work. It won’t hurt to look at their resumes, too, will it?”
“No, it won’t! Give me a few more minutes!” He clattered off to his room and was gone for half an hour before he joined me in the living room. Now his joints were even looser than before.
“Nothing?”
He shook his skull so vigorously I was afraid it would roll right off his shoulders and handed me a new list. “Caroline and Renee were at two, and Owen and Dahna were at three.”
“And I was only at one.” He’d included me, and I had to respect his attention to detail. Except… “Wait, I’ve taught at Suffolk, too.”
“That was distance learning, right? You taught your classes via computer.”
“That doesn’t mean I was never on campus. I haven’t gone to Montserrat since you’ve been in town, but I do go every month to meet students whose issues I can’t handle via e-mail and deal with paperwork and such. Some schools require even more frequent in-person visits.”
“I didn’t realize that!” Sid said. “Off to the Internet!”
I would have apologized for sending him back to the salt mines if I hadn’t seen how tightly his bones snapped back together. He was delighted to have more work.
I admit that when I went to bed, I was worried about what I’d suggest if he didn’t find somebody with connections on all five campuses, but as it turned out, the question was moot.
When my alarm went off the next morning, Sid was sitting at the foot of my bed.
“I’ve got it,” he said and handed me a new and improved spreadsheet.
I rubbed sleep out of my eyes and took a look. He’d made it easy for me by circling one name in red.
“Dahna?” I asked.
“You were right about one of your colleagues having hitherto undiscovered abilities. It turns out Dahna Kaleka has a talent for art. Not to mention theft and murder.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
“I know I told you to add the English adjuncts to the list, but I never would have suspected Dahna. Are you sure?”
“Are you impugning my research abilities?” He drew himself up stiffly.
“No, of course not. You rule the Internet, Sid, but this is hard to take.”
“I understand. I even went back and double-checked a few of the adjuncts who’d been at four of the schools, just to be sure I hadn’t missed anything, but Dahna is the only one. And yes, I made sure her work history matched the timeline. In all the thefts we know about, she was at the schools when art was stolen.”
“Okay then. I’m convinced.”
“I wasn’t expecting you to take it so hard.”
“I wasn’t expecting the killer to be somebody I know as well as I do Dahna. I always liked her, until this whole tenure thing came up, and even then she hasn’t been as nasty as Owen or Renee. The other killers we’ve found weren’t so close to me.”
He patted my hand sympathetically. “Look, there’s still a chance we’re wrong. I mean, this is purely circumstantial. We still need definitive proof.”
“Any ideas for how we can get it?”
“I think I need another overnight at FAD.”
“Tonight?”
“There’s no reason to wait, is there? And I don’t want you working at the same school as a murderer any longer than absolutely necessary.”
I couldn’t help trying to poke holes in Sid’s theory as I showered, dressed, and ate breakfast. Had Dahna been able to hide artistic talent? Well, sure, anybody could have, and if she was Scarlet Letter, she would likely have taken pains to conceal it. Was she physically capable of lugging Kelly around? Certainly—she was a tall, strong woman. Would she have known a good place to push Kelly’s car off the road? Of course. She’d been in Falstone more than long enough to figure something like that out. The only question that gave me real pause was the timing. What had compelled her to kill Kelly when it seemed that Kelly had had no idea she was the thief? To do so purely as a preventive measure seemed like a colder decision than I could picture Dahna making.
Sid seemed to have no such doubts, but then again, he’d never sat around and eaten Danish with her while talking about Shirley Jackson and complaining about students. The fact was, I’d liked Dahna a lot more than I’d liked Kelly, and that made me more than a little uncomfortable.
Our plan for the day was simple. I’d take Sid with me to class again—I’d used him for a writing prompt in a Tuesday-Thursday class, so now I could do the same in my Monday-Wednesday class. That would give me an excuse for bringing him back to campus and also for keeping him visible. The visibility made both of us happy. In my case, I needed a friendly face I was sure I could trust, and in his, he didn’t want me to be without backup while a possible murderer was so close by.
We made it to my office without seeing Dahna, which was a relief, and Sid and I the morning behind a locked door playing online and grading papers respectively. I really thought I might as well play games, too, for all I’d be able to get done, but apparently the years of practice paid off. When my alarm went off to let me know it was time to get to my classroom, I’d worked my way through a respectable number of papers.
Once Sid was posed comfortably in my desk chair, I wheeled him up to class. A skeleton on campus didn’t get nearly the attention this time around—students get jaded very quickly. The first class went well, and since I still didn’t want to risk running into Dahna, I skipped lunch and stayed in the classroom for the break before my next class. Giving the spiel with Sid the third time actually convinced me that FAD should add it to the curriculum permanently, if Professor Waldron didn’t object. Of course, not all instructors had a skeleton handy, but they could substitute some other prop.
Once that class was over, I had office hours, and since I only have two chairs in my office, that meant disassembling Sid. By his request, I put his head on the bookshelf so he could keep watch while I met with students.
By the time that was over, I badly needed a bathroom break.
With Sid there to keep watch, I didn’t bother to lock my door when I left. I really should have.
When I returned, Owen was sitting in my guest chair. Two cups of coffee and a plate of chocolate chip cookies were on the desk in front of him.
“Owen?” I said. “What can I do for you?”
“Can we talk?” he said, hanging his head. “I’d like to cle
ar the air between us.”
First Caroline, and now Owen. Of course, I liked Caroline and didn’t much care for Owen anymore, but I decided I really should be gracious about it. “Sure,” I said.
I sat down at my desk. Sid’s skull was on the shelf where I’d left it, and I could tell that if he’d had a tongue, he’d have been blowing a raspberry at Owen’s back.
As if he’d been practicing, Owen said, “I want to apologize. I’ve been borderline harassing you all semester, even though you’ve been very clear that you weren’t interested. I just haven’t been listening. If I’d realized you were seeing somebody else, I would have stopped.”
“Owen, at the risk of repeating myself, let me remind you that my love life is none of your business.”
“You’re right, you’re right.” He took a deep breath. “I’m just disappointed and—But it’s not about me. Other than me being the one apologizing, that is.” He gave me the grin I used to find attractive. “The coffee and the cookies are a peace offering. I hope we can go back to being friends.”
“Let’s start with friendly colleagues,” I said, but I did reach for the coffee cup. Before I could pick it up, I saw Sid’s skull moving. He was shaking an emphatic NO. I took a cookie instead, and when Sid didn’t react, bit into it.
Owen looked disappointed.
“This is good,” I said. “Would you like one?”
“No, no. They’re for you. The coffee, too. Black, just the way you like it.”
Sid was shaking his skull again.
I touched the cup, then drew my hand back. “It’s a little hot. Would you mind getting me some water from the bubbler to cool it down?”
“Sure, I’d be glad to,” he said far too enthusiastically and rushed off.
“Don’t drink that!” Sid whispered as soon as Owen was gone. “He was stirring it like crazy before you got here. Why would you stir black coffee?”
“I got the message, but I don’t understand. Owen can’t be Scarlet Letter. He was only at, what, three of the schools?”
“Maybe he’s got a confederate. The thing is, he must be the killer or why would he be drugging you?”
“Maybe he had some other reason to kill Kelly. Maybe he tried to date her or—”
“Georgia! I don’t care why he did it! We’ve got proof at last! Call campus security! Better yet, call the cops! They’ll be able to test that coffee.”
“Good idea.” Then I had a flash of inspiration. “Or we could try to catch him in the act.”
“What the patella are you talking about?”
“If he’s the killer and we call the cops now, he’ll know we’re onto him and clam up. I mean, even if we get him for trying to drug me, we don’t have any real evidence connecting him to the murder. Whereas if I play along, we might get him to say or do something that will really put him away.”
When Owen came in a few minutes later, I was eating the last cookie and the coffee cup was empty. “It wasn’t as hot as I thought,” I said.
“No problem.” He looked awfully happy for a man who’d been sent off on a meaningless errand, and looked even happier when I faked a yawn.
“Sorry. The day must be catching up with me.”
“I know the feeling. I was up late grading papers myself.” He regaled me with a couple of stories about his students’ writing skills, and I followed with one of mine. Only I purposely got it tangled up as if I was having problems following my own train of thought. Owen couldn’t stop smiling.
I was afraid he was going to sit there until I pretended to pass out, which I wasn’t sure I could do convincingly, so I finally said, “Owen, I don’t want to be rude, but suddenly I’m beat. I’ve got some work to do, but I think I’m going to lay my head down for a few minutes first.”
“Good idea. Forty winks is just what you need.”
“Thanks for the coffee and…” I faked a monster yawn. “And the cookies. Do you mind shutting the door behind you? I don’t want anybody finding me asleep.”
“You bet,” he said, but I noticed he didn’t push it far enough for the lock to engage.
As soon as I was sure he was gone, I closed the door more securely, then told Sid what we were going to do. At first he was unhappy, but the further I went with the plan, the more he liked it. It only took a few minutes to get everything set up. Then I put the door back the way Owen had left it and went to my desk to put my head down.
It seemed like I stayed that way for an hour, but Sid later assured me it was no more than fifteen minutes later when the door cracked up and Owen peered in. He stepped inside, this time locking the door behind him, and Sid saw he was carrying a tote bag. “Georgia?” Owen said.
It was all I could do to keep pretending to be asleep.
“Georgia!” he said a little louder.
I murmured something and shifted position.
“That’s my girl.”
It was harder to sit still for being patronized than it was for the worry he was going to hurt me. With Sid watching from above and the rest of his skeleton under the desk, ready to spring forth if needed, I knew that wasn’t going to happen.
I felt Owen putting something on the desktop next to me, though I couldn’t tell what it was. Then I heard him pouring something. “Should have bought something cheaper,” he said regretfully, “but it’ll be worth it.” Finally, I heard him putting at least one item into my trash can.
He stepped away, and Sid told me later that he actually made a frame with his hands, the way movie directors supposedly do, to look over the scene he’d set. All I knew at the time is that he said, “Now is that any way for a tenured professor to act?” He chuckled to himself, then went back out the door.
I waited a few minutes before lifting my head. “What did he do?”
“He’s not trying to kill you,” Sid said indignantly. “He’s trying to frame you!”
“For murder?” I looked at what Owen had left on my desk and realized what game he was actually playing. “That ossifying piece of sacrum!”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Twenty minutes later, there was a loud knocking at my door, but I pretended I hadn’t heard it, even though I was no longer playing possum on my desk. Instead I had my laptop out and was working on a file. At least, I was pretending to work.
There was a second barrage of knocks, which I also ignored. A minute later, I heard a key being used.
I looked up to see Mr. Perkins staring at me, with Owen behind him with a look of glee that quickly turned to horror.
“Mr. Perkins?” I said, pulling my ear buds out. “Is something wrong?”
“You didn’t answer the door,” he said.
“Sorry, I didn’t hear you,” I said. “I like to listen to music when I work. What can I do for you?”
“Dr. Deen said there was a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
Mr. Perkins turned to Owen. “You told me there was something I needed to see. Would you care to explain further?”
“Um… I was afraid something was wrong. Georgia didn’t answer my knock, either.”
“Owen, you were just in here a few minutes ago,” I said. “What did you think could have happened in that length of time?”
“I thought…I thought I smelled…” He swallowed visibly. “I must have been mistaken.”
I continued to look as innocent as I could.
“Dr. Deen, if this is your idea of a joke,” Mr. Perkins said, “I find it in questionable taste at best. Dr. Thackery, is there anything wrong?”
“Not a thing,” I said.
“Then please excuse my interruption.”
“Of course.”
He gave Owen a stern look and stomped off. Owen was about to leave, too, though it was more of a slink than a stomp, but I said, “Owen, would you stay a minute?”
“Um, sure. What’s up?”
“This.” I turned my laptop around so he could see the screen, then pressed the play button for the video I had queued up and rea
dy. It showed exactly what Owen had done while he thought I was asleep. He’d put an empty beer can on my desk, and a half-filled one close to my hand. Then he’d put three more empties into my trash can. Sid, who’d been using my phone to take the video, had gotten a lovely close-up of Owen’s smug expression as he made sure everything was just the way he wanted it.
The expression on the real Owen’s face was far more satisfying to me. His eyes had gone big, and his skin was as pale as Sid’s skull.
“Georgia, I didn’t mean to—”
“I know what you meant to do, Owen. First you drugged my coffee. Which obviously I did not drink, though I did pour it into my water bottle so it can be tested for roofies or whatever you tried to dose me with. Then you came back and tried to make it look as if I’d been drinking on the job and had passed out at my desk. Finally, you dragged Mr. Perkins over as a witness. So you don’t need to say anything about that. However, you are going to explain why you did it.”
“You know why.”
I leaned forward, ready to hear his confession. It wasn’t what I was expecting.
He said, “I deserve tenure, Georgia, a lot more than you do. I don’t have parents in the field who can get me plum positions.”
“If my parents’ connections could get me plum positions, don’t you think I’d have one by now?”
He looked sullen. “I need this job.”
“Enough to ruin my professional reputation by making me look like a drunk? You can’t expect me to believe that’s all you were trying to do.”
For a second he looked as if he was going to hold it in, but I could see him reach the point where he wanted to talk more than he wanted to get away. I thought for sure that the real confession was coming. And again, it was, but not in the way I expected.
“Okay, fine,” he snapped. “It’s because you’ve been playing me.”
“What?”
“All semester long you’ve been leading me on, and then I find out you’re seeing some other guy.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play coy. I heard that other guy’s voice at your house the night you said you were working. You’ve been making a fool out of me.”