Grey Matters

by Clea Simon

  So much for Lloyd’s own thesis. Well, they all needed to get paid.

  But Sarah was still talking. ‘I wonder if he’s trying to take over Cameron’s role, I mean, now that it’s open.’

  Dulcie spun around, but with the colored light sparkling off Sarah’s oversize frames it was hard to read her face. ‘What do you mean?’

  The medievalist shrugged. ‘Just saying.’

  ‘But Cameron wasn’t working with Bullock.’ Dulcie struggled to make sense of the claim. Between the beer and the lighting, she was feeling a bit muddled. ‘He’d only just come over from Comp Lit. He was in an entirely different period.’

  ‘He was doing something with Bullock!’ Sarah’s voice had started to grate, too. ‘I remember him asking about his hours and stuff.’

  ‘He was? They were?’ She shook her head to clear it, but that only started it throbbing. Tiny pinpricks started behind her eyes, like little claws just beginning to make themselves felt. Just then three of the bar’s execrable pizzas arrived, and Dulcie was jostled aside as the darts team and its cheerleaders fell on the greasy pies.

  Five minutes later, only three sad-looking slices remained, and Sarah had gone off. Dulcie found herself next to Trista, pepperoni and mushroom in hand. Those tiny claws were still digging in, and she chewed on the slice, hoping that food would ease the pressure in her head.

  ‘Did you hear anything about Cameron working with Professor Bullock?’ Dulcie took another bite. She hadn’t eaten since lunch, and mushrooms were a vegetable, weren’t they?

  Trista shrugged, her mouth full. ‘Wrong period.’ She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

  ‘That’s what I thought.’ Dulcie looked at her crust, thinking to discard it, and instead took a bite. ‘But Sarah was saying something about Cameron.’

  ‘Sarah.’ Trista rolled her eyes and reached over for one of the remaining slices. She looked up at Dulcie, who nodded. What the hell, it was Friday.

  ‘What does that mean?’ The cheese on the second slice had congealed and Dulcie had to grab it to keep it from sliding off.

  ‘Cameron?’ Trista was having her own problems, but managed to bite through the hardened topping. ‘She was jealous.’

  ‘But she’s a medievalist.’ It was the beer, it had to be. She closed her eyes and flashed back in time. When she’d sleep late – or too late for her hungry cat – Mr Grey would swat her, gently, to wake her. Had he ever used his claws?

  She opened her eyes to see Trista was shaking her head, slurping down the rest of the slice. ‘That hit the spot.’ She wiped the crumbs from her hands, then turned back to Dulcie’s question. ‘I wouldn’t sweat it, Dulce. I mean, I don’t think it was academic. Maybe she saw them talking, who knows? But for Sarah, it was personal.’

  Behind Dulcie’s eyes, the claws took hold. Trista continued talking. ‘Cameron was a bit of a masher, you know?’

  Dulcie shrugged. She’d felt the force of his charisma, and she knew the other women talked about him.

  ‘He’d hit on almost anyone. Act all fascinated about everything – your life, your work. And those eyes . . .’ Trista got a faraway look, and Dulcie was tempted to tell her to stop. The pain was getting too intense. But then her friend snapped back. ‘Hey, maybe he’d sweet talked the Old Bull. He could’ve. There was something off about him, though. You know? Like he was into the power trip of it all.’

  Dulcie nodded. ‘I think so. I think he manipulated his tutee. You know, the undergrad I’m now working with?’

  ‘Raleigh Hall? Senior hot shot?’ Trista seemed doubtful.

  ‘Yeah. I know she looks older, but I’m getting the sense that she’s sort of messed up.’ Dulcie explained about the delayed thesis and about Cameron grooming her for the university’s most prestigious prize. The pain came and went, right behind her eyes. ‘I know she’s smart, but I think he set her up for disappointment. Maybe, from what you’re saying, he had other reasons, too.’

  ‘There’s definitely something going on with that girl. She’s been showing up all over.’ Trista glanced past Dulcie. ‘And now you can ask her yourself.’

  Dulcie turned toward the entrance, just in time to see Raleigh push open the door, the auburn highlights in her perfect hair set off by the light from the street. ‘Just what I need,’ she groaned. ‘Work.’

  ‘Is she that bad?’ There was no way they could be overheard from this far away, but Trista leaned in anyway. ‘I’d heard she was quite bright.’

  ‘Yeah, she is.’ Honesty compelled Dulcie to continue. ‘And, truth is, I haven’t even read what she’s written already. I’m getting as bad as Bullock.’ She turned again to look. Raleigh had been swallowed up by the crowd. The pain had settled into a dull ache, leaving Dulcie feeling drained. ‘I just want to work on my own stuff, you know?’

  ‘Tell me about it.’ Trista nodded slowly. ‘All the kids care about these days is hypertext and postmodern staging.’

  ‘Semiotics and signifiers!’ Dulcie warmed to the theme.

  ‘Does anyone give a damn about books anymore?’

  ‘I do!’ The two women looked up in surprise. Lloyd stood there, smiling. ‘Did I miss anything? I mean, besides an old-fashioned gripe session?’

  ‘I won at darts!’ Trista preened.

  ‘Score one for the bookish set!’ He seemed jolly.

  ‘I’m so glad to see you!’ Dulcie felt herself cheered by the sight of him, at least until her own questions came rushing back. ‘Hey, you weren’t at your office hours. Raleigh dropped by—’

  ‘I know, I know.’ Lloyd made a face. ‘Believe me, I heard about it. She had something for me. But I got the call from Bullock, and when Bullock calls . . .’ He shrugged. Trista, meanwhile, had poured him a glass from one of the fresher pitchers, and put it in his hand.

  ‘So, you got it, right?’ He took a hefty swig and nodded.

  Dulcie waited, but he seemed intent on his beer. Finally, she moved on. ‘So, were you helping him clean up?’ She’d get back to the book later.

  ‘Yeah, he’s sort of helpless these days.’ He looked around. ‘But I think I did some good.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ He smiled and lifted his glass to someone across the room.

  ‘I got him to drop that stupid claim.’ He refilled his glass and stood up. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me?’ And with that he disappeared into the crowd.

  The crowd had thinned out by the time Chris showed up, taking Lloyd with it and leaving Dulcie to wonder what he’d meant by that last statement. At least Raleigh had gone, too. Though when Dulcie mentioned this to Trista, her friend had given her an odd look.

  ‘You’ve got to get over that girl, Dulce. She’s not the threat you think she is.’

  ‘I don’t think she’s a threat, exactly.’ Dulcie stopped herself. What Trista had said had some weight to it. Here she was, doctoral candidate, afraid of an undergraduate. ‘Not exactly.’

  ‘She’s a fact of life, girl.’ Trista put her feet up on the table, just as Jerry and Chris returned with another pitcher – and another pizza.

  ‘I don’t think I can.’ Trista pushed herself away from the table.

  ‘Well, I haven’t eaten.’ Chris tore a slice off the pie and offered it to Dulcie. She shook her head. Chris seemed not to notice her weight, but bad bar pizza at 1 a.m. could have unintended consequences.

  ‘Your stomach is on a different timetable than mine.’ She smiled to soften the words.

  ‘I know, sweetie, and I’m sorry.’ With two more bites, he finished the slice and reached for another. ‘I know you’re feeling needy and I’ve not been there. But I promise, this is just for now.’

  Dulcie nodded. So much of their lives felt temporary. Until the end of the semester, or until the thesis was done. ‘I’m glad you’re working, Chris. Really, I am. It’s just that I feel so blocked.’

  ‘You’re still worried about The Ravages?’

  She nodded. ‘What if there’s a reason that nobody else solved the mystery?’<
br />
  ‘Sounds like fear of success to me.’

  It was the beer. The headache. Lloyd’s enigmatic parting shot. The entire miserable week, but just then Dulcie couldn’t take any more. ‘It’s not “fear of success,” Chris!’ She heard the edge creeping into her voice, but for once, she didn’t try to stop it. ‘And I’m not needy, I’m lonely. It’s not post-traumatic ideation or any of your high-concept therapy terms.’

  Chris had put his slice down and his mouth hung open, but Dulcie wasn’t stopping. ‘And maybe I really do have a problem. A real problem. You yourself said that whatever sticks out might be wrong. Might be, I don’t know, suspect. You’re allowed to have problems. But me? No, it’s all in my head.’

  She felt the tears starting and needed, quite suddenly, to leave. She grabbed up her coat and turned for one last parting shot. ‘I know you think I’m obsessing over nothing, Chris. You’ve made that clear. But this isn’t something I made up. It’s not a ghost story. It’s my life!’

  Her eyes blurred by tears, she pushed open the door and rushed out on to the street. She’d so looked forward to tonight. To seeing Chris. As she pulled her collar up and started along Mass Ave, his declaration of love seemed like it belonged to another world. She let the tears flow.

  Something grabbed her arm and she whirled around, ready for a fight.

  ‘Whoa!’ It was Chris. He backed off, hands up in surrender. ‘Dulcie, I’ve been calling after you. I’m sorry – I had to grab Jerry for a minute there. But, hey.’

  Dulcie stood her ground.

  ‘Look, Dulcie, I’m sorry.’ He ran his hand through his hair, pushing it back from a very white and tired-looking face. ‘I’ve just been working crazy hours.’

  She started to thaw, but the reference to Jerry struck a nerve. ‘Why, Chris? Jerry started to say something earlier, and Trista stopped him. Is there something going on?’ She didn’t want to believe he was seeing someone else. But Trista’s goofball boyfriend had been about to let something drop. ‘Are you in trouble?’

  ‘Only with you.’ He grinned, and she noticed how thin his face was. How worn. ‘Honestly, Dulcie, I’ve finally got the seniority to take all these hours, and I’ve just felt I should go for it. I mean, next semester, I’m going to have to start on my own thesis.’

  She couldn’t help it; she smiled back. ‘Well, that will teach you.’ She reached out to take his hand, and he pulled her toward him into a hug.

  ‘Dulcie, you silly thing. I’m sorry for what I said back there. I’ve been spending so long analyzing student projects, I think I’ve forgotten how to act like a human.’

  ‘No, you haven’t.’ She knew her response was muffled, pressed as she was against his wool Navy coat. So she hugged him closer before pulling back. ‘But did you get enough to eat?’

  ‘Me? You kidding?’ They stepped apart and she looked up. Maybe it was the cold, but Chris seemed to have tears in his eyes, too. ‘You wouldn’t happen to have any of that lasagna leftover still, would you?’

  ‘We just might, if you’re lucky.’ She took his hand and they started off toward her apartment. ‘And maybe some of those stuffed peppers, too.’ But as good as she felt, Dulcie couldn’t help wondering. That pain, the touch of sharp claws, had struck midway through the evening and then disappeared. Had Mr Grey been trying to warn her of something? What had he wanted to alert her about, and did it have anything to do with Chris?

  THIRTY-THREE

  ‘So let me get this straight.’ Chris was stirring the oatmeal next morning while Dulcie filled him in on her suspicions. ‘You think that Cameron might have been hitting on Polly and also Raleigh? And maybe also doing something with Bullock? And where does Lloyd fit into this?’

  ‘I knew there was something strange about Lloyd.’ Suze came down the stairs in her sweats and went straight for the coffee. Before long, the three of them were going over the possible permutations of Cameron’s romantic involvements – as well as the nagging idea that something had come between Polly and Roger Gosham.

  ‘He’s just too, I don’t know. Shut down.’ Suze sounded as bothered by her lack of precision as by the concept. ‘And you don’t see it. You’re a romantic.’

  Chris just smiled as he got up from the table. ‘She’s a Goth, actually, but that just means she trusts emotions over reason, Suze. Anyone mind if I take the first shower?’

  Once he had headed back up the stairs, Dulcie refilled her roommate’s coffee and her own. Suze sat there, stirring her mug absentmindedly.

  ‘What about that package?’ Suze finally broke the silence to gesture with her spoon. ‘The missing book?’

  Dulcie had told Suze about the neatly wrapped book Raleigh had left on Lloyd’s desk. Now she regretted it. ‘That could have been anything.’

  ‘But think about it.’ Suze put her spoon down and started counting off on her fingers for emphasis. ‘One, he tells you that the professor has him on some wild goose chase. Two, Bullock’s house is broken into and the cause of that chase goes missing. And, three, someone puts a book – a carefully wrapped book – on Lloyd’s desk.’

  ‘But Bullock has dropped the claim, or didn’t file it.’ Dulcie wasn’t clear on the details. ‘So the book wasn’t stolen.’

  ‘Maybe Lloyd hadn’t realized that there would be a fuss. He’s over there a lot, right? He could have slipped it back into the professor’s library without the old man being any wiser. Or, even better, convinced the old man that he’d simply misfiled it.’

  ‘Motive, Suze.’ Dulcie felt pretty confident about this. ‘Lloyd had no motive.’

  ‘On the contrary!’ Suze was getting into this. ‘He had every reason. For starters, with that mysterious book gone, maybe he could go back to work. I mean, back to the eighteenth century. And besides, this was a valuable book, right?’

  ‘Lloyd isn’t a thief.’ Dulcie had to break in.

  ‘Wait! Just give me a listen. I’m not saying he’s a hardened criminal. But this book has got to be the cause of a lot of problems, right? And he is working for a pittance, so maybe he felt, I don’t know, like the professor owed it to him.’

  ‘You don’t know Lloyd.’ Dulcie wasn’t sure how to explain. ‘He’s got scruples.’

  ‘I listen to what you’re telling me, Dulcie. And you’ve been telling me that he’s stressed out, stretched to the limit – and recently he’s begun acting a little odd. Like he had a secret.’

  Dulcie shook her head. There was no point in arguing with Suze. If she ever went into trial law, she’d be deadly. ‘Well, tell me this, then, Suze. Suppose he did take that book – or was given it.’ What had Raleigh said about dropping it off? ‘What would he do with it, anyway?’

  ‘Sell it.’ Suze said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  Dulcie couldn’t help but laugh. ‘I don’t think an Elizabethan rarity fits the bookstore’s definition of “used texts.”’

  ‘What about your rare book guy? He does more than repair books, right? He sells them. So, it makes sense he must buy them, too.’

  ‘Suze, Professor Bullock probably bought that book from Roger Gosham. Gosham isn’t going to buy it back from one of his students, especially without a provenance.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘About Gosham? Yeah, he worships Professor Bullock.’ But something Lloyd had said sparked her memory. ‘Though, to be honest, I think Lloyd told me that Bullock doesn’t remember where he got it.’

  ‘There you go, then. It’s the only theory that fits all the facts.’

  ‘Not really.’ Chris came back down the stairs, toweling his hair. ‘You’re assuming a motive. The possible profit from a stolen book wouldn’t be worth the risk to Lloyd.’ Dulcie beamed up at him.

  ‘Got a better one?’ Suze was energized. Chris was always a better sparring partner than Dulcie.

  ‘Maybe he borrowed it.’ Chris poured more coffee into his cup and sipped it, leaning against the counter. ‘He was supposed to be working on it for Bullock. Or maybe th
at girl Raleigh did, and asked Lloyd to bring it back for her. She’s the entitled type, right? Or, get this, maybe she stole it – there was something in the paper about a wave of shoplifting in the Square. And then Lloyd found out and arranged to bring it back. Or, I don’t know, maybe he did want it to disappear, maybe just for a while. He had reason. But then the professor freaked, and when Lloyd heard that the book was reported stolen, he brought it back and explained. I mean, Dulcie, did you ever actually see what was in that package?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Maybe it wasn’t even a book!’ He drained his mug, triumphant, as Dulcie smiled up at him. ‘It was a book, Chris. I know that wrapping – but I do like your logic.’

  ‘That’s my specialty.’ He stood and put his mug in the sink. ‘But now, I’ve got to get to work.’

  Dulcie opened her mouth to protest, but stopped herself. Instead, she walked him to the top of the stairs and sent him off with a kiss.

  ‘What?’ Suze was watching her as she came back into the kitchen.

  ‘What what?’ Dulcie turned toward the coffee pot, even though she really didn’t need any more caffeine.

  ‘There was something you weren’t saying, when you were being all sweet to Chris. Is something wrong?’ Suze took the pot and refilled her own mug. ‘I mean, beyond him running off to work on a Saturday?’

  ‘I don’t know, Suze.’ She turned toward her roommate, unsure how to explain. ‘I just felt like I shouldn’t push it. I think I was getting a warning from Mr Grey last night. And it started just before Chris came into the club.’

  Maybe it was because she’d been out-argued by Chris, but Suze had a head of steam. ‘Dulcie, do you hear what you’re saying? I know you are having issues. But putting your anger off on Mr Grey?’ As she got up, she looked over at Dulcie, and immediately her tone softened. ‘I’m sorry. I really cannot imagine what this week has been like for you. And, yeah, I’ve noticed that Chris has been M.I.A., too. But I believe he’s got a reason, whatever it is. And, well, Dulcie? Isn’t it possible that you read the signs wrong? Maybe you just had a headache, a plain old vanilla headache?’