Are You Nuts?

by Mark Richard Zubro

  “I can never prove that.”

  “I’ve found out that there are a lot of secrets that all these people have been harboring.”

  “Dead is dead. Down is down.”

  “Belutha said she saw you in the hall. I hadn’t heard you left before the end of the meeting.”

  “Where was I going and for what?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Just trying to cool off and do some deep breathing. I know that doesn’t sound dramatic, but it’s true.”

  “How did your purse get next to the body?”

  “I was in such shock, I thought I must have put it there.”

  “But it was lost. How could you have?”

  “I guess I just must have.”

  “I’ve got another question. How did the book get next to him?”

  “What?”

  “When you hit him, where did you put the book?”

  “I’m not sure.” She thought a minute. “I was in such shock, I don’t remember. I must have just put it down on the counter.”

  “When you came back with the water, you didn’t pick up the book?”

  “No.”

  “Try this instead, Meg. You bash Jerome. You run off. You were gone, what, five minutes?”

  “At most.”

  “Meanwhile, the killer comes in. Moves the body.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know yet. The body is moved for whatever reason. The killer must have been watching and listening from behind the stacks or in the hall. Using gloves or only touching the edges of the book, he or she bashes him again. This time blood is drawn. The murderer takes your purse and puts it next to the body to add weight to the prints you have left on the book.”

  “Why put that book in your room?”

  “That book in my room is more proof you didn’t do it. The killer wanted to add me as a suspect. You wouldn’t implicate someone else in something you did. It had to be pure accident that the killer happened upon your quarrel.”

  “Serendipitous murder? I guess it’s possible. I didn’t think I’d kill somebody. Why do you think I wouldn’t try and implicate someone else?”

  “Did you?”

  “No.”

  “If you wanted to implicate me, you’d have put both books in my room or wiped one off completely and left only the one in my room. The killer wanted to implicate both of us. So, the killer takes another book and wipes off the prints and bashes him again. He or she had to be planning on the spur of the moment. Under those circumstances, it’s easy to screw up.”

  “Why wipe off the prints?”

  “So that I would be implicated as well. The killer couldn’t put my prints on it. Whoever it was had to simply eradicate all of them.”

  “That’s an awful lot to do in a short period of time.”

  “A person drags or carries the body to the back. The killer took the book with your prints on it to finish the job.”

  “And gets another book? And does it again? And risks capture?”

  “Maybe it was an afterthought.”

  “And why drag the body to the back?”

  “To avoid being discovered? If the killer heard someone come in while he or she was dragging the body, it would be easy enough to plausibly say they were trying to revive him. Jerome gets bonked a second time. Was the part where you told the cops you called 911 true?”

  “I called after I found him the second time.”

  “Did you examine the rest of the library?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe the killer was in there while you examined him.”

  She shuddered.

  “Or maybe he or she was there all along. Or maybe you simply left too soon. The killer didn’t have time. It is possible you really misplaced the purse and the killer found it or was bringing it back and finding Jerome out cold changed everything forever. Adding the purse would point to your guilt.”

  “That sure worked. How did the killer know I wouldn’t just stay there or even begin to search the library? I could have stayed put or found a custodian right outside the door. The killer would have been trapped.”

  “Maybe the killer was ready to bash you as well. Not a lot of time to plan and think, if it was a crime of passion.”

  “Mine was.”

  “While you were with the body, you were in danger. Whoever it was waited for you to leave both times. Maybe the second time was when the killer decided to try and implicate me as well. If the murderer was improvising, then he or she could have been making all kinds of mistakes. We don’t know yet that the cops aren’t going to try and pin part of this on me.”

  “Why would you murder Jerome?”

  “General principles? He was too stupid to live?”

  She actually smiled. “I hadn’t thought there was a possibility that I wasn’t the killer. Thank you for giving an old friend some hopes. It’s most kind, but it is useless.”

  “Why?”

  “Even if I didn’t kill him, I’m going to prosecuted for assault.”

  “By whom? Your victim is dead. He’s not going to care. All we have to do is find the real killer.”

  “I don’t have that kind of energy. The theories you’re expounding are just a little too unbelievable. If you try them on the police, they’ll laugh you out of the station. Maybe even try and include you in as an accomplice. I wouldn’t bother, Tom. I know what I did.

  “When Todd drove me home, he didn’t ask all kinds of silly questions, which I couldn’t have answered then anyway. I think I’m going to call him and tell him I’m prepared to plead guilty. It would be too humiliating to go through a trial. I’ll take my punishment. If I received the death penalty, I’d probably die of old age before they got around to executing me.”

  “I think it’s a little premature to pick out the correct execution attire. Even then, the murder wasn’t premeditated. You’ll be around for quite a while. There is more to this than either one of us knows so far. I’m going to get to the bottom of it. You should call Todd and tell him all this.”

  “I will.”

  “I’m going to keep investigating. What I’m trying to find out is what is this big secret or secrets that people are dancing around.”

  “There is another secret I have.”

  I wasn’t eager to hear more confessions. I could barely handle what I’d heard so far, but I prepared myself to listen.

  “I was part of the problem with the Quigleys.”

  “Beorn told me that his dad died of natural causes.”

  “I was young and foolish, perhaps half his age. He was prominent in the community, the head of the school board. He got me my first job here. We had an affair. I thought we were so discreet. We had our tryst in Chicago, when the Conrad Hilton was still the Conrad Hilton, not whatever it is today. It was bliss, but it ended after our first real date. What happened was an election. His opposition threatened to tell about us. They wanted him to withdraw. It would have meant divorce and disgrace. He was a pillar of the community when the scandal broke and he couldn’t take it. The first I knew about it was in the papers. I was married at the time.”

  Old Meg had a secret affair as a young adult. Hidden fires indeed. That Beorn remembered it differently, I didn’t doubt.

  “In fact that was what led to the divorce. Before it became public knowledge, somehow my husband found out. I’m sure I was much less clever than I thought I was. I would have left town, but I certainly wasn’t going to go crawling back home to southern Illinois. My husband left me, and I only had my paltry income from working in the library.”

  “But why does any of this have an effect now?”

  “Lydia and Belutha and Jerome somehow found out. The three of them wanted me to turn on you. They wanted me to tell secrets about you. I’m not sure I know any to reveal. Do you dress up in women’s clothes?”

  “Not even on Halloween.”

  “Well, that’s the kind of information they wanted. I was to help them against you. I refused. By trashing you
, they hoped to be able to trash Kurt and all that he’d done with the union.”

  “Why? He wasn’t running again.”

  “But Lydia, Belutha, and Jerome wanted to run against his record. You can’t imagine how desperate they were. Or maybe you can. You’ve met them and you know that type of person. Even a race for dogcatcher can bring out the worst in people. They were using it for revenge—to get even.”

  “I feel like I’m living in Morons R Us. Were there no lengths to which any of these people would not go?”

  “And if they wouldn’t, their friends would egg them on. One person after another would tell the latest rumor, each more fantastic than the other. It would make them more desperate to win. As their anger increased, their rhetoric heated up, and they did more and more outrageous things.”

  “Why didn’t Seth and Jerome ever just talk to each other?”

  “It’s either high stupidity or religious fanaticism, which is basically the same thing, I guess. I think they actually wanted to get together, but winning the presidency was also part of Lydia’s and Belutha’s faction attempting to control one more elective office. Jerome couldn’t back down. His buddies had made a commitment.”

  “What tangled webs we weave. Sorry, Jon Pike is getting to me.” I told her what he’d threatened to do.

  “It never ends, does it?” Meg said.

  “Nope.”

  “One last thing. I feel bad I couldn’t tell Agnes the whole story that night. I hope I didn’t get her into any trouble.”

  “She’s fine. Worried about you like we all are.” I stood up. I gave Meg a hug and said, “I’m going to try and get a good night’s sleep tonight so I can be fresh for harassing suspects. Call Todd and tell him everything. He’ll know exactly what to do. Meanwhile, don’t give up hope.”

  She smiled wanly and thanked me.

  I drove home as the north wind was rising to a gale. I had the window down and my arm draped over the edge. It was deliciously cool. I pressed the remote control switch on my key ring to open the outer gate. I pulled into the driveway and shut off the headlights. I stopped to listen to the silence and watch the twilight deepen to night. The early stars began to glow. The rim of an orange moon began to peak over the horizon. I let the car idle forward into the garage. I entered the house through the breezeway into the kitchen.

  All the electric lights were off. Two votive candles were burning on the table. The smell of garlic and rosemary filled the air. The windows in the living room were partly open admitting the refreshing air. A fire of applewood and sage burned in the fireplace.

  “Honey, I’m home” didn’t seem like the right thing to bellow out.

  I loosened my tie and draped my sport coat over a chair.

  I found Scott in the library. All the walls had built-in bookcases to the ceiling. The only gaps were for the windows and the door. A set of leather-covered furniture clustered in the center of a Persian rug.

  He was reclining in a brown leather chair. A reading light was on next to him, and a book was open on his lap. He was gazing out the window at the rising moon. The heels of his black leather boots rested on each end of an ottoman. He was wearing black leather pants. You have to have the right build to wear leather pants, and if you’re sitting down in them, the slightest bulge of a love handle will show. Scott looked perfect. He wore no shirt but had a metal chain around his neck and a leather band around his right biceps. A visor of a leather cap hung low over his forehead. Another fire was in the fireplace. I could smell the leather of his pants and the chairs.

  Definitely not a “Hi, honey, I’m home” outfit.

  I could see my reflection in the windows and I presumed he could too. He spoke to my reflection. “Hi, Tommy.”

  I sat down on the floor between his legs. I felt him move them as pillars on each side of me. He leaned down from behind and finished untying my tie and placed it with his book on the teak end table. He was rereading The Wind in the Willows.

  He placed his hands on my shoulders and gently kneaded the muscles. He murmured, “I was reading the part where Mole stops Rat so they can go to the hole Mole abandoned. His old home.”

  I leaned my head back into his crotch and listened to the gentle flow of his words as he described the scene almost verbatim. I lost myself in the rhythm of his thrumming baritone. I began caressing him. After we finished, we had a dried-out but not burned dinner.

  Scott had made a trip to the city. He had had a conference with his banker, broker, and accountant and then stopped at his penthouse. I filled him in on the latest developments in the case.

  “I like thinking she didn’t do it,” he said, “and I sort of respect her for being willing to bash him a good one.”

  After the dishes were done, we both put on gym shorts and white socks. He wore a Bullwinkle T-shirt. I chose one with a University of Oz logo—tiny ruby slippers, and a small witch flying against the background of poppies and the Emerald City. We sat in front of the fireplace in the living room.

  We were discussing the murder. “I think the body being moved convinced me,” I said. “Somebody doesn’t just stagger around then plop over dead.”

  “I don’t know,” Scott said. “That seems kind of possible to me. The first blow might have made the subsequent ones more effective.”

  “The book being moved tells me she’s innocent.”

  “If Meg was telling the truth.”

  Reluctantly, I agreed.

  Scott said, “Meg’s at least partly guilty.”

  “We’re all capable of violence and we all have those feelings. What about when you aim at a batter’s head?”

  “I’ve never beaned anybody intentionally.”

  “But you’ve hit a few guys?”

  “Yes.”

  “Meg just went a little farther. Since it wasn’t in the context of a game, she couldn’t possibly get away with it.”

  As we lay in bed later reading, he the article “Sport Contracts” his lawyer had given him, I, Entries from a Hot Pink Notebook, I said, “You know, I’m a little worried about the kids’ reaction tomorrow. The ‘high school mind’ is not usually set to be receptive to openly gay teachers.”

  “I bet the reactions will startle you or rather the lack of them. The vast majority simply won’t care.”

  “The insecure idiots will feel compelled to make a statement. They always do.”

  “Yeah, you can’t predict which way they’ll jump. High school kids are emotionally volatile.”

  “Got that right.”

  14

  First thing the next morning, I checked my room for further sabotage and to do any last-minute preparations for the imminent teenage onslaught. The humidity was back and the wind had died. The breeze made feeble attempts to puff through the opened windows. Everything seemed fine until I tried to turn the computer on. Nothing worked. I began punching keys and softly swearing. The door to my room opened. It was forty-five minutes before school was to start, and I didn’t expect anyone. A slender kid about five feet eight inches in dark horn-rim glasses stood in the doorway. He carried a computer disk in his shirt pocket—the pocket protector of the nineties.

  “Can I help you?” I asked.

  He looked behind him in the corridor, then eased several steps into the room and shut the door. He looked solemn. “Mr. Mason, if it’s okay, I wanted to say thanks for all you’ve done.”

  “For what?”

  “Being on television and everything. I feel better about myself because of you. I think you and your lover are really brave. The gay kids I know are really proud of you.”

  “Thanks,” I mumbled.

  He glanced nervously around. “I can’t stay long. I also came to give you some information.” He edged a little farther into the room.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Jason Brewer. I don’t have a lot of time. I heard that a few of the kids are going to be out to get you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Like, when you wal
k down the hall, to more than accidentally bump into you, or slash the tires on your truck, wreck things, stuff like that.”

  “Who told you this?”

  “Lots of kids know. I heard it from three different sources. Friends of mine. They wouldn’t hurt you, but everybody knows what’s being said. The only thing I could tell for sure was that it was some of the troublemakers here at school.”

  I banged my hand on the top of the computer. “I don’t need the hassle.”

  “You could hurt the computer if you do that.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Banging on it.”

  “The stupid thing isn’t working anyway.”

  “It’s not plugged in.”

  I glanced at the floor and the wall. I felt silly. The cord and outlet were near him. He took several steps forward and reached down.

  “Jason, wait.”

  But it was too late. He plugged the machine in. Several things happened simultaneously. The computer screen lit up for a second, then the insides fizzled, and puffs of smoke rose from the back. Jason was hurled against the wall. He slumped to the floor.

  As I rushed to his side, smoke alarms started to sound. He was no longer in contact with the electricity. He was breathing. Moments later several custodians with fire extinguishers rushed in. The computer fizzled a bit and let out a last puff of smoke as they thoroughly doused it and the surrounding area.

  It took the paramedics seven minutes to arrive. Jason hadn’t regained consciousness by the time they took him away.

  Edwina arrived to assess the situation. “You are kind of a menace,” she said.

  “Wrong again, O wise leader. The people who did this are the menace. The victim of the crime is not the guilty one.”

  “Yeah, well, we can’t have this going on all the time.”