Medieval Murders

by Aaron Stander

  Elkins waited, knowing Pearson would answer his own question.

  “It’s all these god damn intellectuals, especially those bastards in the humanities. They don’t like me because I was the president of a big steel company. I’m not one of them. And that’s exactly why the Board hired me. I care about this school, and I know how to get things done. None of those pointy-heads do. I like you guys in the applied areas, you know how to make things happen.” He paused and looked at Elkins.

  “Thank you, I think,” Ray responded.

  “Now, Elkins, the next thing I got to tell you, you’re not going to like. You’re expecting to be out from under this interim thing by Monday.”

  “That was our agreement.” said Ray, moving uncomfortably in his chair.

  “Well, I’m afraid we’re going to have to modify the agreement. This isn’t public yet, but your replacement, Don Thompson, called late Friday afternoon and turned down the job. We’ve got a contract with the SOB’s signature on it, but how the hell are we going to hold him to it?”

  “What happened?” asked Ray.

  “His wife. Says she refuses to come, refuses to bring the kids. I don’t know if that’s the truth or not. If it is true, we’re damn lucky we didn’t get him. Any man that can’t stand up to his wife sure can’t be trusted to manage a major department. Anyway, that’s why I was meeting with Bradford earlier today, needed to inform the Board. We’ll have to repost the position and form a new screening committee. It will probably take most of the fall semester. Bradford and I both think that it would be in the best interest of the university if you would stay on as interim. What do you say?”

  Elkins looked out the window, across to the carillon. “It creates a lot of problems. I’m teaching a seminar, and I’ve got graduate students that....”

  “We need you to do this. Why don’t you approach it this way: get someone to teach your seminar. If you want to, go ahead with your graduate students. I’ll get you a supplemental contract for that work. But continue on in this position. I promise I will have a replacement before the beginning of the winter term. What do you say?”

  “Do I have much of a choice?”

  “Fuck, yes, you got a choice, free country and all that,” said Pearson. “But I know you’re a team player. You’ll do the right thing for the university.” He pointed at Ray’s chest with his index finger to emphasize this point. “There’s one more thing I need to tell you. Bradford wants you to know that the board is going to endow a chair in the music school in memory of Ellen.”

  Ray felt the blood rush to his face as the anger throbbed through his body. “Were you planning to tell me this before or after you had my decision?”

  “Suspicious bastard,” Pearson retorted with a chuckle. “This has been in the works for awhile. You know how slowly things get done around this university. And I meant to tell you before. I just never had the opportunity. Ellen, how long has she been gone now?”

  “More than a year,” Ray answered.

  “Are you seeing anyone?” Pearson probed.

  “Seeing?”

  “A woman, Elkins. You need a woman. When my first wife died, I was lost for a while, but fortunately someone new came into my life. You’ve got to get on with living, Elkins.”

  Ray again moved uncomfortably in his chair. He needed to get out of there.Pearson didn’t notice. Changing the subject he continued, “Elkins, get me that report as quickly as possible. We’ll have university elations organize a news conference to put the proper spin on the facts. I want a nice, clean suicide. You know what I mean, no complications.” He stood again and firmly held Ray’s hand for a long moment as he repeated, “A nice, clean suicide with no complications.”

  On the way out, Ray stopped at the side of Sharon’s desk.

  “How did it go?” she asked.

  He moved his head from side to side, unable to find the right words.

  Sharon looked at him, a smile spread across her face, and she began to chuckle. “That bad, huh?”

  “Yes,” he answered, her warmth breaking through his tension.

  “This too, shall pass.” She paused briefly. “You should come to my yoga class. You need a little more Zen about you.”

  “Zen,” Ray repeated, looking back at her before he left the office.

  As he waited for the elevator, facing the wall of marble and stainless steel, in the empty hallway, he was angry with himself, sorry that he hadn’t told Pearson to stuff the job.

  5

  Char Pascoe was waiting at Elkins’s office when he returned from his meeting with the chancellor. She had carefully laid out neat piles of materials on the conference table.

  “What do you have?” he asked.

  “Here are the photos. The first set is with the body. The second with chalk outline. I’ll scan these into the computer and put the measurements in for you. I also have some prints. Didn’t find any usable prints on the door or knob on the first floor or around the window. We went over everything very carefully. We did get a good set off the chair by the window. I’ll check for a match with Bensen’s. We found something else that you’ll be interested in.”“What’s that?”

  “On the floor under one of the pedals of the carillon keyboard,” she paused and pulled a plastic bag from her portfolio, “we found this key. Don’t know how it got there, like maybe she tossed it. I’ve checked. It’s the key to the entrance door. There are partials on the key. I’ll see if these are Bensen’s prints.”Pascoe continued, “Here’s a copy of her complete HR file. I thought you might want to look at that.” She placed the file in front of Elkins.

  “Do you have anything else? How about her office?”

  “I’m scheduled to interview her office-mate, a Barbara Castlemain, in a few minutes. Do you want to come?”

  “Sure,” he answered. “You can drive.”

  Elkins held the door open and followed Pascoe into the building. Old West Foundation Hall was almost deserted in the late afternoon. The hot air smelled of dust, old wood, and varnish. They climbed the stairs to the second floor and followed the numbers to 231. The door stood open. Elkins gazed into the large office. A fluorescent fixture, one of the four tubes flickering, hung from the twelve-foot ceiling. Sunlight from a large window cut obliquely across the room.

  Barbara Castlemain rose from her chair and came to the door to greet them. A sleeveless, blue cotton dress, carefully pressed, covered her tall, slender frame. Wisps of gray showed in a tight bun, and a pair of gold half-lens glasses rested on her aquiline nose.

  “Hello, Ms. Pascoe, and this is....”

  “Ray Elkins, the acting head of....”

  “Oh yes, Professor Elkins,” she brightened a bit, giving him a weak smile and extended a limp hand. “I’ve seen you at Faculty Senate meetings.” She motioned toward two empty chairs. “I’m sure I don’t have anything more to tell you,” she offered, looking at Elkins.

  “We have a few questions,” he began.

  “It was suicide, wasn’t it?” Castlemain asked.

  “All unnatural deaths have to be thoroughly investigated. It’s standard procedure. And we need to gather some additional information.” Ray could see her discomfort. Was it just an aversion to talking to the police or was there something she didn’t want to tell? He glanced around the office. The right half of the office, Bensen’s side, was in chaos—the desk piled with papers, shelves heaped with books and stacked with more papers, the floor covered with overflowing cardboard boxes, additional heaps of papers, and two plants, shriveled and long dead, on the window sill. The left side was a study in organization and order, a desktop with only a phone and calendar, books aligned at the edge of shelves, and a small refrigerator with a microwave on top.“Perhaps we should start with how long you knew Sheila Bensen,” said Ray.

  “Seven years. We shared an office since her first semester.” Castlemain stopped, focused first on Pascoe, then on Elkins. “What kind of information are you seeking?”

  “Anything that
you think might be helpful.” Pascoe paused. “Were you surprised by her death? Was there any indication that she might be suicidal?”

  “Before I answer the question, let me talk about the nature of our relationship. Sheila and I weren’t close. Yes, we shared an office, but I didn’t know her very well. We weren’t friends, we were barely colleagues, and we didn’t do anything socially. She was difficult and very unpleasant. I don’t know about the suicide. Sheila was rather bizarre, but I don’t think she was a depressive. That wasn’t part of her craziness.”

  “Would you tell us about her, to use your term, craziness?” asked Elkins.

  “I think much of it had to do with the tenure issue. Well, that’s not completely true, but let me start there because I think it all fits together. Sheila was an angry person, and after she didn’t get tenure, her anger intensified. She felt people in the department were out to get her.”

  “How do you know?” Elkins watched her eyes, watched the small wrinkles increase as she processed his question.

  “Well, it’s not that she said much to me, she probably thought I was in the enemy camp.” There was a long pause, and then she continued. “I guess most of it I overheard, phone conversations. And it’s not that I was trying to....”

  “Who was she talking to?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Her lawyer?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Remember, I was the enemy. She played to several audiences.” She glanced at Pascoe, then focused on Elkins.

  “Audiences?”

  “Yes. Different tones, different messages. When she was talking to one of her supporters, her followers, she could be quite inflammatory. She’d say lots of wild things, and her language was, well, rather crude. When she was talking to people who I think were her personal friends, she used a different tone, and the conversations seemed much more rational.”

  “Let me go back to an earlier comment. You said she felt people were out to get her, and you suggested that this was an inaccurate perception. Did she have enemies in the department?”

  “She didn’t have any friends in the department, but I don’t think she had real enemies, either. Her problems here were professional, and you know how tenure works,” she looked directly at Elkins. “Jobs are scarce, tenure’s hard to get. If you’re untenured, every time someone gets it, your chances diminish, or at least that’s how some people look at it. But Sheila’s reactions were a lot more paranoid. She hadn’t done any of the required things. She didn’t publish, and she refused to serve on department committees. The criterion for tenure is very specific. Sheila went out of her way not to meet it and then attacked us for not tenuring her. It’s like she wanted to fail. Does that make any sense?”

  “It’s illogically logical. I think we all know people who do that,” responded Elkins. “Can you speculate on why she....”

  “Well, I’m not one for amateur psychiatry, but I think her whole personality turned on being an outsider. She needed something to push against.”

  “You said she played to two audiences. Would you elaborate on that?” asked Pascoe.

  “Her first audience was young women, undergraduates for the most part, members of various feminist groups. You know the kind, long on rhetoric, short on action. The protest is more important than fixing the problem. It’s probably exciting and romantic to be out there pointing out what’s wrong with the world, especially when you never have to get your hands dirty working out the solutions. But that was Sheila, all theatre. A real Jean Brodie with her girls. That’s what makes the suicide rather surprising.”

  “I’m not following,” Elkins gave her a questioning look.

  “I’m surprised she didn’t get some of her followers to take the plunge. It would be more like Sheila to stand on the side and lecture on the meaning of their sacrifice.” She stopped, and Elkins noted that she looked embarrassed.

  “And the other audience?” he probed.

  “Given what I overheard, I think the people were either in other departments or from the community. Like her psychiatrist, she was always calling and changing or canceling appointments.”

  “Do you know the name of the doctor?”

  “The name is Margrave, that’s his last, don’t know his first name. And she did a lot of things with the Catholic Church on campus. She often called Father Bob. I assume he’s the priest there. I could never quite understand that whole thing.”

  “Why?” asked Elkins.

  “She was always going on about how the Catholic Church was the embodiment of paternalism and the greatest oppressor of women in the world, and yet, by all appearances, she was a fairly devout Catholic. But then there were lots of things I didn’t understand about Sheila. She described herself as a radical vegetarian and animal rights advocate, but every week or two I’d find her eating a Coney dog she had smuggled in. I once confronted her on it, and she told me she really liked Coney dogs, said it was her one inconsistency. I didn’t bother to mention a few others.”

  “Do you know anything about her family?”

  “Her mother died a few years ago. I think her father was long dead. She never said anything about siblings, so I always assumed that she didn’t have any, although I don’t know that for sure.”

  “Do you know of any romantic interests?” asked Pascoe.

  “Well, no. I didn’t see her in the company of any men, and they didn’t come around here looking for her. Other than Margrave and Father Bob, I didn’t hear her calling a specific man on a regular basis.” She paused. “I do know she took part in some gay rights activities, but I never knew if her participation was anything more than an act of solidarity.”

  “You did manage to get along?”

  “Yes, it’s interesting. We worked out a relationship of sorts, a live-let-live arrangement. Sheila had her own way of organizing,” she gestured to the other side of the office, “and I have mine.” She paused and looked thoughtful. “I have to tell you that even though I found her rather difficult, there were some good things. She was a poor teacher. She didn’t do enough preparation and was completely disorganized, but she cared about some of her students. I watched her counsel them, work with them. She could be very kind. Do you know what I’m saying? There were many inconsistencies in her character. It’s hard to say who she really was. There were times I liked and respected her. There were other times when I was ambivalent.”

  “Do you know if she ever received any threatening letters or phone calls?” Elkins asked.

  “I don’t know about phone calls or letters. I do know, boy do I know, that she had some pro-life people unhappy with her. Remember two years ago when that group came to town and tried to close the Family Planning Center?”

  Elkins nodded.

  “Sheila organized the opposition. She made sure that there were enough ‘choice’ people—students, faculty, and townspeople—that the crazies were outnumbered and out-shouted. During that time our office was ransacked, my things, too. It was a real mess. Her apartment was hit, also. I’m sure you can find a police report on it. The perpetrators were never apprehended. The police thought whoever did it was looking for a list of volunteers. The irony, of course, is that Sheila would never have been organized enough to have a list.”

  “How about students, conflicts over grades, anything like that?”

  “I know she’s had some in the past. But I didn’t witness anything in the last year or two.”

  “Monday’s meeting, what time did you get to the meeting?” asked Elkins.

  “About half past eight. I like to get there early so I can get a seat in the back.”

  “And you didn’t see Professor Bensen on your way in?”

  “No.”

  “When was the last time you saw her?”

  “Late last week. I’d stopped in to Xerox some syllabi. We chatted briefly.” She looked at Elkins, and anticipating his next question continued, “Just exchanged pleasantries, really. Neither one of us had taught this summer. Don’t think I had
seen her since June.”

  “And you didn’t miss her at the meeting?”

  “Quite frankly, I wasn’t looking for her. It’s a big department, over a hundred, counting adjuncts.”

  “Did you notice anyone leaving the lecture hall during the meeting?”

  “No, but I’m not a good person to ask.”

  “How so?”

  “I really hate meetings, and these are such a bore. Always take a book. Usually I don’t notice much of anything.”

  “So you were sitting in the back. Were you one of the first people out?”

  “No, I had stopped to talk to a friend. I was one of the last. When I got outside I could tell something dreadful had happened. Then David Jaymes said someone had jumped from the tower, and it looked like Sheila.”

  “And then?”

  “I stood around with Seneca Carducci and a couple of other friends until the police arrived. Ms. Widdowson confirmed that it was Sheila. Then Chesterton arrived. He went right to Sheila. Knelt down next to her. Might have even touched her, I couldn’t quite tell. Then I got out of there, went to the parking lot. I sat in my car for a long while, feeling faint. Eventually, I drove home and collapsed.”

  “We may have to reexamine Professor Bensen’s papers in the course of the investigation. I hope we won’t inconvenience you in the process.”

  “I’m sure it will be no problem.” She waited a long moment and then asked, “Do you have other questions?”

  “You have been very helpful. Anything else?” Char directed the question to Elkins.

  “No. Thank you, Professor Castlemain for your assistance. If anything else occurs to you that might be useful to our inquiry, please call.” He passed her a business card. “One more question, nothing to do with the investigation, just curiosity. What’s your area of specialization?”

  “My dissertation was a study of the foundations of Early English drama. But in recent years I’ve really focused on Restoration drama.” She brightened as she responded to the question. Then she asked, “Do you want to go through Sheila’s things now? Do you want me to leave?”