Always Love a Villain on San Juan Island

by Sandy Frances Duncan

  Seven weeks since the accident. Why did she call it that? The guy had meant to take them out—he’d swiped them into the trees. She shuddered. Bathwater slopped over the rim. Crash! and she’d miscarried. Until then she hadn’t known she wanted a baby so much. And still did. Now she wanted Noel for its father, no sex just sperm, he wouldn’t have to be its parent if he didn’t want—

  She’d presented all this to him six weeks ago, quite reasonably, she still thought. Yet his “No way!” still reverberated. San Juan Island would be a good place to tackle the topic again. If they took this case.

  Plagiarism, Noel thought, as he checked Triple I’s email. When he’d been at university, some students had bought papers, the stupidest a kid who gave the professor a paper on water imagery in Wordsworth’s poetry, but the guy hadn’t even checked its author—the prof’s wife. Wonder what happened to the guy . . .

  Good to get to a case again. Dr. Peter Langley was the professor’s name. The email included his landline numbers, home and office, and his cell phone number. But it did seem overkill to pay a private investigator, even if plagiarism was intellectual theft. He texted Kyra that he would go over tomorrow. By now she’d probably read Langley’s email. And since San Juan was a US island, he’d have to leave the Beretta at home. What a shame.

  The Internet told Noel that Morsely University on San Juan Island was a small, expensive, specialized university with most of the teaching online—students came in for two weeks at the start of each term, a few days at the end of term. San Juan was an hour plus by ferry from Sidney, north of Victoria on the Saanich Peninsula. Nanaimo, where Noel lived, was two hours up Vancouver Island. Did he need a reservation for the ferry and what time did it leave? Okay, 12:05 PM, and a reservation was a good idea. He phoned Dr. Langley, no answer, then texted him to confirm his arrival the next afternoon. Texting was a new thing for him, Kyra dragging him into the present. Blackberry or iPhone? His nationalism chose the Blackberry. He didn’t much enjoy it—his fingers were too big.

  Later that evening Langley texted back: Call when you get in, I’ll give you directions. Noel packed a bag, had a drink and slept well. In the morning he grabbed his bag and computer case, locked the condo and put his luggage on the back seat of his brand-new deep-blue Honda Civic; his previous Honda, just a year old, had been totaled by Kyra on Quadra Island. He headed down-island, over the twisting Malahat, bypassed Victoria and arrived at the Sidney terminal with nearly an hour to spare. Before entering the ferry parking lot, he tried phoning Langley. This time a machine told him Langley was in class. Noel paid and lined up, one of three cars in the row going to San Juan. In another segment of the lot, seven more rows—cars to be ferried to Anacortes, connecting from there to the Washington mainland by a bridge. Not many cars on this late August Wednesday. Strangely, a good number of walk-ons. Commuting regularly between Canada and the US? Between the lineups and the dock stood a model of a little boat labeled FERRY BETWEEN FRIENDS. Cute.

  A yellow-jacketed ferry worker slid a yellow card under the Honda’s windshield wiper. Noel presumed that meant they knew he was going to Friday Harbor. Noel got out to explore. Around the parking lot was a high wire fence; toward Sidney, a public boat launch. A path ran along the beachfront and crossed the area where cars drove onto the ferry. Along the path were two gates, one on the ferry side, the other on the parking lot side. Clever, thought Noel. When no one was getting on or off, the gates remained locked and the public could easily walk along the path.

  He returned to the car and pulled out his book, first volume of Mark Twain’s autobiography. Fifteen minutes before departure, another yellow-coated ferry worker told him to drive aboard. He did, locked the Honda and went up to the lounge. It looked similar to the BC short-route ferries yet different—for one thing, the seats were more comfortable. He discovered a duty-free shop. Of course: he was traveling between nations. He bought a liter of vodka for twenty-one dollars. Kyra would like that.

  A seventy-five-minute trip. He walked the length of the ferry. The prow and stern were shaped alike. So it could go in either direction? But suddenly, maybe a quarter mile from shore, the ferry slowed, and turned. Aha. It had been backing out. He studied the shorelines and saw clearly why Sidney’s harbor was held in such repute—a perfect semicircle of land protected by windbreak islands.

  He went back and forth between his book, staring at the shoreline and exploring the ferry, the Chelan. It was named, he learned, for the Chelan tribe, from cotsill-ane, meaning the deep water of Lake Chelan, the area in which they had lived. Eventually the ferry passed an open grassy island with a few trees and a herd of sheep. Different ecology: the Strait of Georgia islands were heavy with coniferous forests, occasional houses dotting rocky shores. Probably there’d been trees here too, but they’d been felled likely long ago, the land turned to pasture. He spotted a map on the wall and checked it. Shaw Island. So he should be able to see San Juan from the other side of the ferry. Yes.

  Waiting in his car while the foot passengers walked off, Noel called Langley again. Same message. He drove off. Okay, eat, phone again, explore Friday Harbor, keep phoning till you reach the man. If he never answered, Noel would find a hotel room, treat himself to a good dinner, take the ferry back in the morning. Call it an excursion.

  One thing Noel knew, no different either side of the border, ferries dock at sea level and everything goes uphill from there. Getting off the ferry, he drove up a steep ramp, reached a ridge, then drove down another ramp to a curve, then up another ramp and finally onto land. Strange way to create an entrance, he thought.

  Friday Harbor felt like a very small town. Spring Street seemed to be the main drag. He found a restaurant with a special on mussels in white wine sauce. Delicious. In the washroom he checked his appearance: face still narrow, blond hair getting thinner, gray eyes looking relaxed, even a bit of a glow. Collar of his white and blue plaid shirt okay. His leather jacket over brown cords looked academic. Good.

  Back in his car, he phoned again. This time the professor answered. “Langley.”

  “Hello. This is Noel Franklin of Islands Investigations International.”

  “That was fast. I wasn’t expecting you until later.” A pleasant, engaged voice.

  “I’m in Friday Harbor. I’d like to meet, talk about your plagiarism problem.”

  “Okay, where are you?”

  “On Spring Street, not far from the ferry. If you give me directions—”

  “Sure. You have GPS or a map?”

  “Neither.” And why in fact didn’t he have a global positioning system in his six-week-old car?

  “You can pick a map up at the Chamber of Commerce—it’s right there on Spring, between First and Second. Got paper and a pencil?” Langley sounded as if he were teaching a class of wayward grade fours.

  “Yep.” From the glove compartment, Noel pulled out a notebook and pen, feeling like the most errant in the class. “Go ahead.” He didn’t say: Slowly.

  “Carry on up Spring until you see the medical complex on the right. Opposite is Mullis; it right angles into Cattle Point Road. Left on that, then jog right on Little. Turn left again, then the road quickly makes a right angle. You’re on Bailer Hill Road and we’re on the left, not far along, big elegant gateway and a sign above. Can’t miss it. I’ll be in my office on the second floor of the Mansion.”

  “Thanks.” Can’t miss it means he’d better find that map. He got out of his car and located the Chamber four doors away. He walked into the office, where a young woman with shiny short black hair and an attractive smile gave him a map and a pamphlet of San Juan Island’s highlights. Back in the car, he followed Langley’s directions. They were clear, but it helped to have the map.

  In fifteen minutes, he turned under an arch connecting two elegant orange marble pillars and drove along Morsely University’s broad roadway. It bisected rolling fenced pastures with grazing horses. A forest served as backdrop to a cluster of buildings. As he approached, neat flowerbeds with
bloomless chrysanthemums and something pink lined the road. Maples waved their goldening leaves. The Mansion, as Langley had called it, was unmistakable, large and old with peaked roofs, many chimneys, a covered veranda that seemed to run the length and width, colonnades on either side of the entrance stairs. The building was all white except for the deck floors, which seemed a kind of blue. It could’ve been plucked from the antebellum South but was probably early twentieth-century ostentation.

  GUEST PARKING, a sign said, and Noel complied.

  Inside the large doors, both carved with coats of arms, the foyer’s dark wood walls glowed as if they’d just been burnished. The floor, inlaid patterned blue and orange tiles, shone as if no one ever walked on it. Four doors leading off the foyer; from behind one, the mutter of voices.

  Up a stately curving wooden staircase with a carved banister and dark wooden floors to a landing where the hall stretched in two directions, many doors off it, each with a nameplate; he walked along and found LANGLEY at one end. Beyond an open door into a spacious room, a man sat at a steel table strewn with student papers, reading one of them. Noel rapped.

  The man looked up. “Mr. Franklin?”

  “You were right. This is a Mansion.”

  “It’s something, isn’t it?” He stood. Taller than Noel, six feet or so. Younger, thirty-five to thirty-eight, broad shoulders, reddish hair, disarming grin. Wearing an open dress shirt and jeans. Penetrating green eyes. Noel smiled too and offered his hand. They shook. “Thanks for coming, and so promptly. Can I offer you coffee?”

  “No thanks. Just had lunch. Perhaps we could talk about the case.”

  “Okay. But you’ve been on the ferry and I’ve been in a seminar all morning—would you like to walk the grounds? I could do with it.”

  “That’d be good.” Get the lay of the land? Why, for a case of plagiarism?

  Langley pushed the papers into a pile and locked his door. Downstairs and out.

  Behind the Mansion, along a continuation of the university’s now curving main drive, Langley pointed to some smaller houses on the open grassland, and a few beyond that disappeared into the forest. All in a style similar to the Mansion, as if trying to be miniatures of it. “Students live here when they’re on campus. Do you know how Morsely works?”

  “Distance education, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, we’re intimately connected by Internet. We’ve got term-long courses, and we meet for orientation and to get a sense of each other. The students send in assignments every other week, and we mark them and send them back before the next assignments come in. We’re not all here on campus. The instructors, I mean. Most work mainly from home, which can be anywhere. One lives in Mexico City, some are in Europe, lots across the country. In the English Department I’m one of the four exceptions; I’m here all the time. I do a lot of administration too. At the end of each term everyone comes back to get a face-to-face critique from their instructors.”

  Langley sounded as if he’d given that speech before. “Do the buildings stand empty all the rest of the year?”

  Langley laughed. “We couldn’t afford that. Morsely’s a major center for conferences—we take in a third of the operating budget by letting the place out for conventions and other meetings and housing the participants.”

  “Students are undergraduates?”

  “Most. But some graduates as well.” They walked along the drive, the trees becoming more frequent. “The young man I’m worried about, Jordan Beck, he’s just finished his master’s in creative writing. Or hopes he has, if I pass his thesis.”

  “Good. Tell me about that.”

  “I’m badly torn about it, even torn about having called your agency. I don’t want to charge him with plagiarism. If I can’t prove it, that’d be terrible.”

  “But you do suspect it’s not his work?”

  “I’m not saying he isn’t capable of it, just he’s never written anything like it before, neither in style nor content.”

  Noel was liking Langley, a man seemingly dedicated to both his university and his student. “I’m curious about one thing, Professor Langley. Aren’t there experts here on the campus who could help you with this problem? Why Triple I?”

  Langley nodded. “Morsely may look like a big campus, but it’s a small community for those of us here year-round.” They walked between two larger structures, colors similar to the Mansion but more rectangular, signs designating them Bigsby Hall and Ross Hall. “Classrooms or meeting rooms, as needed.” He seemed to collect his thoughts. “I’ve spoken about this problem—this possible problem—with my chair, and she agrees it’s better to go outside. If I’m wrong about Jordan, it’s my reputation that gets sullied. I’m up for tenure this coming spring, and I don’t want anybody to think I made an improper charge. And neither does our chair.”

  They walked a full curve of the road in silence. Noel could see Langley was mulling something. Their footsteps crunched on gravel. A breeze whiffled branches and a squirrel chittered. Birds must be napping, Noel thought.

  Langley said, “Also, it’s delicate. Jordan Beck’s mother was a Morsely, so he’s a descendant of the university’s founder. Family gets certain privileges, like attending the university for free.” He glanced at Noel. “A plagiarism investigation without real proof, if it gets out, could kill a career or two.”

  Noel raised his eyebrows. “Which is why you called us.”

  “Right. Both Madeleine—my chair—and I were taken by your slogan, Discretion is our calling card.”

  “And our promise.” Langley’s comment pleased Noel. He’d come up with the phrasing. “Well, let’s see what we can do, Professor. Tell me more about Mr. Beck.”

  Langley stopped walking and turned to face Noel. “First, you’d better call me Peter. Morsely may be a cautious small community, but it’s also informal.”

  Noel enjoyed the sparkle in Peter Langley’s eyes. “Okay, Peter. I’m Noel.”

  Peter reached out his hand. Noel took it. “Good to meet you, Noel.” They each smiled. “We should head back. I feel like I’ve washed the seminar out of my brain.”

  “Good. And you were just going to tell me about the student.”

  “Right. He was out of school after a degree in environmental studies. In his late twenties. Determined to be a writer, but he’s not sure if fiction is a good idea. He’s been writing creative non-fiction for the past year and a half, good enough stuff. But he tells me he doesn’t know if he wants to take a chance writing a novel. Doing journeyman work, he says, could earn him a living.”

  “Or he could do both,” said Noel. An idea had begun to form.

  “I need to determine whether the novella he handed me was his own work. I don’t want to grant a degree on the basis of nepotism.”

  Noel nodded. “Can you describe what’s different between the fiction and the non-fiction?”

  “I can’t cite passages. There are word choices and phrasing—” He nibbled his lip.

  “So you better let me read the novella. And some of his other writing.”

  Peter stopped. He thrust his hands in his pockets. “Noel, what do you know about writing? The way the words go on the page? How to distinguish style? You’re a detective. But this is hardly burglary.”

  Noel looked about. They were alone, surrounded by forest. He laughed lightly. “In a way it is. Plagiarism is copyright infringement, which is theft.” He spread his hands. “You know that, I’m sure. As for me, before my friend and I formed Islands Investigations International, I was an investigative journalist. I know a fair amount about writing and law.”

  “Holy shit!” Peter hit his head with the ham of his right hand. “I phone an ad and get an expert!”

  “Let’s not go that far. I better read his work first.” Noel clapped Peter’s shoulder. “Then you can call me an expert.”

  “It’s all at the office.” Peter smiled.

  On the way back, Peter gave Noel a bit of the history of Morsely University. In the last decade of the 18
00s, Thomas Morsely had kept a saloon in north Seattle. When gold was discovered in the Yukon, desperate and/or hopeful men and women had rushed north. To get to the goldfields they had to pass through Canadian waters and then overland to Skagway, and the Mounties didn’t allow anyone back into Canada who wasn’t carrying enough food to make it through the winter. So Morsely became an outfitter of would-be miners, and a supplier of gin and rum; no man should go to the Yukon without his stash of alcohol. Since there were many in north Seattle who could provide a man with booze, Morsely chose to buy out or scare away some of the opposition, and before the end of the century, he’d reduced his competitors by 80 percent. By 1905 he had become extremely wealthy. And fearful himself of being undermined. He realized he’d had enough, both of life in the trade and of cash in the bank, millions more than he needed to live out the rest of his days in princely style. So at the age of thirty-three, he sold his business to his largest rival at a price that guaranteed an amicable deal and bought four thousand acres of land on San Juan Island. There he built a grand home, Morsely Hall. He returned to Seattle only to find a wife so he could sire a large progeny. Sarah Morsely gave him a daughter and four sons. He had wealth in offspring, and he had massive wealth in the stocks and bonds of the most prestigious corporations in America. The Great War saw his financial wealth quadruple, and the growth of American industry in the twenties made him richer yet. His land provided him with all the produce he and his family needed, from garlic to beef cattle, from nuts on his trees to ducks, geese and hens in his barns. His income continued to grow.