by Donn Taylor
What was the “one more issue” that President Cantwell wanted to take up with me?
CHAPTER 43
That night—two weeks ago now—we did visit the discount store and bought hat, gloves, and personal items. I spent the night in a motel, and Mara picked me up the next morning with news of a vacant apartment in the complex where she lived. I said that would start more rumors, but she waved the thought away.
“I’ve quit worrying about the Blatant Beast,” she said. So much for Spenser’s claim that the bite is incurable.
So I have a place to stay while I work through the aftermath of the fire. At the local Goodwill I found a replacement for the blue suit that was lost in the fire, and I bought another brown marker to keep my brown suit presentable. Emory Estes made me a reasonable deal on a replacement car that Manny Clampett says should last until Cindy is graduated and launched on a career.
Station KLYE trumpeted the news of Brill’s arrest for the two murders. Appearing again out of her mushroom cloud with a bell ring, Francie LaBouche reported the impending failure of Drisko’s company as a local tragedy while implying that Mara and I were responsible. Hidden in a subordinate clause came the news that we had been cleared of the false rumors against us. In a tone of regret, she reported the police department’s investigation of Clyde Staggart.
Staggart is still missing. I presume Guido Stefano either got him out of the country or out of existence. Brill’s recorded statement of intended flight got her held without bail.
In related matters, Dogface ... uh ... Detective Duggan Hahn ... is now acting Captain of Homicide. Sergeant Ron Spencer, having made amends to his long-suffering spouse, has been reassigned to Homicide.
In my appointment with Gordon Samstag, I expected a tongue-lashing for bankrupting the college. Mara insisted on going with me to share the reprimand. However, Samstag greeted us with regrets for loss of my house and congratulations on our winning out over impossible conditions.
“You found out about Dustin Industries without my help,” he said, “so now you won’t have to ask.”
“I suppose I still should ask about your connections to Dustin,” I said.
“None, past or present.” Samstag tented his fingers. “Except that Jerry Vaughan asked about Dustin just before he crashed. His curiosity piqued mine. I traced Dustin’s ownership to the Caymans. That warned me off.”
His gaze moved from me to Mara and back to me. “So I stopped investigating and began selling the college’s shares in Drisko’s company as quickly as I could without alarming anyone. Further investigation might have produced ‘inside information,’ which would not have been legitimate.”
“So that’s why you told me to stop investigating,” I said.
He smiled. “Exactly. I needed time to sell the last of the college shares.”
“But I kept asking questions,” I said. “How badly have I hurt the college?”
“Not at all.” Samstag’s smile spread into a grin. “I knew you weren’t going to stop. So I dumped the rest of the college’s stock the next day. That gave a cushion of several more days before the fur hit the fan. I don’t expect any repercussions.”
“Then the college isn’t going bankrupt?” Mara asked. “We aren’t all losing our jobs?”
“Hardly.” Samstag stood, signaling the end of our interview. “The sales have established an enviable position of liquidity.”
“How about your companies and that rocket failure?” I asked.
“The investigation blamed that on Drisko’s quality control. From now on, we’ll be more careful about our subcontracts.”
Outside, Mara and I exchanged glances of relief.
Cindy brought Mark Weston home for the Valentine’s Day holiday. He bunked in my apartment, and Cindy stayed with Mara. Mark is a solid young man, and Cindy could do a lot worse.
President Cantwell sent for me after his discharge from the hospital. He’d gone in on emergency, and a harried young ER doctor prescribed Augmentin for his pneumonia. But an older nurse noted that Cantwell had suffered a violent reaction to penicillin, and she knew that Augmentin contained a kindred drug, amoxicillin. She interceded, and the doctor gave him levaquin instead.
“Amoxicillin might have done me in,” Cantwell said, “but that nurse knew her chemistry. We’re going to tighten up the chemistry part of the nursing curriculum.”
“By the way,” he said as I departed, “I’ve told the architect to put a cross on the top of the fine arts building. We’re going to proclaim our Christian heritage to the entire valley.”
That was as close as he came to saying I’d been right several years ago about keeping chemistry in the curriculum and putting a cross on the fine arts building. Much to Dean-Dean’s regret, the president plans to travel less and take a hands-on approach to campus affairs.
Dean-Dean’s prestige has suffered since people learned about his students’ response to answering the roll with how they felt. On a particular day, every student in every class answered, “I feel fed up with being asked how I feel.” After the third day, Dean-Dean stopped calling the roll. I’m reasonably sure Arthur Medford’s organizing skills were involved.
In other campus events, Freda Broyles’ attitude has returned to normal—a cross between a horned toad and a porcupine. Malcolm Combes avoids me, apparently afraid I’ll tell his secret of finding Mitra’s body. I won’t, and I value his efforts to maintain academic standards.
Dathan Hormah is negotiating for a position with the inclusive seminary that gave Mara a full scholarship as a Wiccan. He’ll be compatible there, though his Meribah Valley church will need a new pastor.
Our faculty colleagues treat Mara and me like nuclear weapons about to initiate Armageddon. The Blatant Beast still lives, though lately he seems to be on a leash.
Cynthia Starlington has not spoken to me since the fire. She’s keeping company with a husky young math professor, who has begun wearing a colorful and expensive shirt. I hope it does not become a hair shirt.
In the campus grill, the female composition specialist told me that Hawthorne’s Hester Prynne could not have been a cheerleader for the University of Alabama because the novel was published in 1850, and Alabama only began intercollegiate athletics in 1893. For such researches we spend years in graduate study.
The Cloverdale newspaper continues a controversy as to whether a local waitress actually served a man from Mars. The waitress holds her ground, though various letters to the editor argue she was mistaken. Mara reads these, looks at me, and shakes her head.
She and I have talked seriously about fantasy and the Imagination. We agree that for practical purposes the Renaissance version of Imagination vs. Reason is workable. As individuals, we humans never get anything entirely right, and thus we all live to some degree in fantasy worlds. Mitra’s case was extreme, as was Steven Drisko’s belief in his invincibility. But Mara now classifies the idea that she can do everything on her own as a fantasy, and I’ve concluded that I must have a broader purpose in life than just teaching history. We don’t yet know where those conclusions will lead.
I have believed for some time that God uses events like the Synod of Whitby and the Peace of Wedmore to guide the great tides of history. But Mara’s and my recent trials make me believe He concerns Himself with waves as well as tides. Our own best efforts were not good enough to solve the complete complex of our problems. It took independent movings of conscience by Freda Broyles, Duggan Hahn, and Ron Spencer to develop the complete picture. It would be difficult to believe the Lord had no hand in those movings.
In our case, Truth did prove to be The Daughter of Time. But how generally does that principle apply? I keep remembering those documents of the McCarthy anticommunist hearings that are missing from the National Archives. How can Truth emerge if its basic documents are missing? But perhaps Time is not ready to give birth, or perhaps it is not yet God’s time ...
Limited by human understanding, we will never accurately perceive God’s work in
the world. But we see enough of it so that informed faith can assure us of the rest. “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away,” and sometimes He taketh a way that we’d rather not travel. Mara thinks He is leading us both into a broader function in life. I’m inclined to agree.
I grieve the loss of my home. Yet that loss has freed me for a wider experience of life. I don’t know what that will be, except that recently my internal orchestra shuts down for extended periods.
Mara and I continue to explore our growing friendship with increasing confidence. In church with her, influenced by the deep harmonies of hymns, I again feel a completeness I haven’t known for years. She seems to share that feeling, and the woman who abhorred being touched now rests her shoulder against mine as we share the hymn book.
I have not asked her, though, why she needed to record my first words of love to her. I’m glad she did, of course, because that recorded Brill’s confession. And I have not asked how Mara got through my buttoned-up overcoat to my suit-coat pocket to switch my recorder on without my knowing. That had best remain her secret.
Last fall I didn’t know what I was going to do about Mara Thorn, but that is no longer the case.
I know exactly what I want to do if she will accept my proposal.
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