The Quotient of Murder (Professor Sophie Knowles)

by Madison, Ada

  I heard giggles from female students in the row behind me when one of the workers entered the screen from the left. He walked to a car parked off to the right side and removed his heavy jacket, his muscles apparent through a tight-fitting long-sleeved T-shirt.

  “Cute,” said one coed, as Virgil would have labeled her.

  “I don’t know, he looks pretty old,” another said.

  “Not that old,” said the first.

  “I’ll bet he’s forty,” said a new female voice.

  “You have to admit he’s cute.” Back to coed number one.

  When more than one student voiced the opinion that “Forty’s not cute,” I held my tongue. Except to ask under my breath “Who says?”

  I straightened my shoulders and stretched my neck to minimize any wrinkles that might have formed lately. I watched the unsuspecting worker stuff his jacket in the trunk and pull out a different one, with the orange protector stripes across the back. He put on the second jacket as another man approached him and the two seemed to be arguing. Three other men, also in jackets with protector stripes, passed them indifferently and walked to the bottom of the screen, out of camera range.

  “Wait a minute,” Lauren said from a row farther back. “Can you rewind that?”

  “It’s not tape,” Andrew said, ever the accurate engineer.

  “Whatever,” Lauren said, walking to the front for a better view. She hooked her wavy brown hair over her ears and steered her face to within a couple of inches of the screen. Virgil joined her and used the remote to go back in time. “There, see those guys?” she said to Virgil.

  He stopped the DVD. The two combative men were now frozen in position, arms raised, necks straining toward each other. One of them was the jacket changer; the other man had an ordinary jacket and no hard hat. The image wasn’t clear and it was difficult to distinguish all the similarly built and nearly identically dressed men from one another.

  The audience leaned forward, staring at the time-frozen men, and became silent, waiting for Lauren to tell us why she’d singled out the men.

  Virgil took a pen from his pocket and held it in front of the men, both firmly planted next to the cherry picker. “These two look familiar to you?” he asked Lauren.

  Lauren nodded. “This might be nothing, but I think I saw them in the campus coffee shop yesterday.” I swallowed. The day Jenn was attacked. “And they were fighting then, too.”

  “These were the guys?”

  “Uh-huh. I think so.”

  “And they were fighting with each other? No one else involved?”

  “Nuh-uh. I don’t think so.”

  I noticed that Virgil’s expectant look had collapsed into a polite smile. So had mine. I’d gotten excited when Lauren called out, hoping for something that could be directly connected to Jenn’s attack.

  “I think so” and “I don’t think so” are the kiss of death in a lineup, I mused, as if we were even at that point, and a couple of guys fighting on a construction site wasn’t exactly news.

  Virgil started the video again. The men sprang to action, and this time one of them turned, face front. He looked familiar. Where had I seen him? Graying hair, clean shaven, older than most of the other workmen. I took a mental step back. Well, how about on the campus, working, carrying tools, carrying a lunch pail. That’s where.

  The men continued the argument for another few seconds, until a third man approached and broke it up.

  “That’s the foreman,” Virgil said. “He couldn’t make it today, but he’s coming in to give us some names and addresses.”

  With nothing more to view, Virgil stepped to the center. He informed us that the footage from the Coffee Filter camera hadn’t been processed yet, but he hoped we’d be available when it was ready. He thanked us for our time and handed out his business cards. If something occurred to us, we were to call him, “day or night.”

  I made a note of the offer, in case I needed to take him up on it.

  Security Footage, the movie, now over, students and faculty filed out of what had become an A/V room. I waited on the side, hoping to have a few minutes with Virgil before he left. A memory of our last conversation clicked in—the “money” thing, where he’d also heard that Jenn had purportedly uttered the word money as she drifted into unconsciousness.

  I noticed for the first time the posters that lined the walls of the music room. Randy, or his staff, had mounted instructional photos of carillons, fully annotated, as if they were part of a music exhibit in a museum. I’d seen similar art on the walls of the hallway in this wing on my last visit, but at the time I hardly knew, or cared, how to spell carillon.

  I studied a close-up of a bell labeled “the bourdon,” described in the accompanying text as the largest bell in a carillon system, sounding the lowest note. Further documentation told me that a series of notes produced by a bell was called a “prime.”

  No way, I said to myself. Everyone knew “prime” referred to a number greater than one that had no positive divisors other than itself and one. I resolved to start a new project—making a prime number poster for the math floor of Franklin Hall. I was sure I could get help from someone in the department who was a better artist than I was.

  Several photos showed carillonists in action. A man wearing a headset pounding on an extended keyboard made of long dowels, also called “batons,” according to the caption. So many words for one item. I was glad math wasn’t so complicated. An older woman with thick glasses standing at a two-level set of keys/dowels/batons, a complex set of wires and weights upright in front of her, looking like she was trapped in one of Ted’s freshman physics labs. A duo—a man and a woman, side by side in a small glassed-in room, hitting the keys with four fists and four feet while visitors peered in from all sides.

  “Do you play, Dr. Knowles?” Andrew’s voice came as a surprise from behind me. I thought he’d left with the other students.

  “No, but I do enjoy hearing others play.”

  From Andrew’s somber expression, I sensed that he had more to say.

  “How are you doing with all that’s happened?” I asked him.

  He held back tears. “I hope they get this guy. I know you’re sort of connected to the police. Will you tell me if there’s anything I can do to help?”

  “Of course. I know what you’re feeling, Andrew. Right now, it seems the best we can do is wait.”

  “I’m not good at that.”

  “I’m worse,” I admitted, and got a smile from Andrew.

  Andrew moved on and I turned to my own thoughts. I pictured Jenn, my petite student, sitting on the bench, overwhelmed by the size of the instrument. I thought of how her instructor, Randy Stephens, had praised her talent and abilities to her parents. Had that been a true assessment, or a way to lift their spirits at a depressing time? I hoped someday I’d be able to attend a concert featuring Jenn Marshall and find out for myself.

  I fingered the hundred-dollar bill in my pocket. Surely not Jenn’s money, but—money that was part of the crime scene? Did Jenn simply see the hundred as she was crashing, and utter “money” in a battered fog? I thought it unlikely that she’d notice it, let alone feel it was important to mention to her rescuers.

  While I waited for Virgil, I leaned against the wall and thumbed through my texts and emails. I had two more messages with “Delivery Status Notification” as subject. More rejections of my email to Kenny. Not that I needed them or cared. No longer a worry, the nonexistent Kenny was now just a nuisance until my service provider stopped trying to find him.

  I switched to the list of notifications I was building, to stop automatic charges to my now-shredded credit card. It was taking more than one page of lines in my Notes app. I needed a secretary.

  A booming voice broke into my concentration.

  “Gaming?”

  I looked up at Virgil. “Since when do you even know what that is?”

  “I don’t. Sounds good, though, huh?”

  “Do you have a few m
inutes?” I asked Virgil.

  He pointed to chairs in the middle row and ushered me to a seat. Since we were going nonverbal for the moment, I pulled the hundred-dollar bill from my pocket and handed it to him.

  “Need a ticket fixed?” he asked.

  “Funny. You’re in a pretty good mood today. Hot date?”

  “Uh, let’s get to business,” Virgil said.

  Was that a flush on my friend’s face? After the (roughly) trillions of times Bruce and I teased Virgil about his weekends, could this be the one where he really did have a date?

  I studied his face. “Virgil? Is there something you want to tell me?”

  “I thought you wanted to tell me something,” he said, returning to his normal complexion.

  Later, I told myself, and took out my phone. I queued up the shots I’d taken of the money-laden bush outside Clara Barton dorm. I handed the phone to Virgil.

  “Sorry about the prints on the bill,” I said. “I didn’t have an evidence bag.”

  I let Virgil study the gifts I’d bestowed. He looked back and forth between the phone and the bill. I was impressed that Virgil, a self-proclaimed Luddite, knew how to flick the photos across the screen. He wasn’t quite as adept at the motion as Fran’s seven-year-old grandson, but I was impressed nonetheless.

  “Hmmm,” he said. It was never useful to try to interpret Virgil’s partially verbal reactions. They were seldom very telling. I’d probably imagined the girlfriend lined up for the weekend.

  “I found the money wrapped around a twig in the bushes near where Jenn was attacked,” I explained.

  “When?”

  “This morning, on my way to class.”

  “You park over there now?”

  Virgil knew me too well. “I needed some exercise.”

  “And I know all about gaming,” he said, smiling.

  “Is the bill something that would have been picked up yesterday by the guys who searched the crime scene?”

  “If it was there at the time, I would assume so.”

  “So, it was probably dropped sometime last night,” I suggested. “Too late to be connected to the attack on Jenn. But it was windy yesterday. It could have been dropped during the attack”—I was getting better at using the word and not summoning the mental image—“and then blown away and then back again.”

  Virgil didn’t say “far-fetched,” but I figured it was on the tip of his tongue.

  “Kind of a big bill for a college kid, huh?”

  “Or a faculty member,” I said.

  Another smile. “Let me take it in anyway. No harm. I’ll return it to you if there’s nothing on it, and it will be yours to do what you want with it.”

  “Or you can keep it, in case I get a ticket someday.”

  Virgil happened to have a plastic baggie handy and inserted the bill. A little late to worry about contamination, I thought.

  A bell rang, weaker than the Franklin Hall bell in my opinion, and students staggered in under the weight of large, unwieldy cases in the shape of violins or something in that family. Virgil and I headed out of the room, our business concluded anyway.

  I’d left a message for Bruce about my credit card but hadn’t had time to whine about it in person with anyone. Since Virgil was handy, I ran on about Eric’s call and thieves these days. He understood it was just chatter, not a request for help. I knew what I had to do; I simply didn’t want to take the time.

  “Can you take my statement on the credit card theft?” I asked, for fun.

  Virgil frowned. “Not unless there’s a homicide involved. Is this bank guy, Eric, still alive?”

  I admitted there was no murder one to investigate, and gave him a heads-up on Judy Donohue. “She’s chair of the Biology Department. She wanted to be here today but couldn’t make it. Judy’s going to call you about looking at the footage some other time.”

  “Not a problem.”

  Just before the oddly situated portal was the half-open door to Randy’s office, where what sounded like a late New Year’s Eve party was in progress. We stopped and peeked in. I recognized members of the music faculty and a group of students, including Willa, who was having a busy day, apparently. Recorded carillon music was playing in the background; trays of champagne-filled glasses were making the rounds. One student carried a platter of hors d’oeuvres that produced a smelly cloud of butter and garlic.

  “We got some of those gourmet frozen puffs and microwaved them,” he said. “Would you like one?”

  I declined on the basis of the oxymoronic description, “gourmet frozen.” I was mildly surprised when Virgil, who wasn’t all that fussy food-wise, waved away the offer with a polite “No, thanks.”

  Randy spotted us. “Come in, come in,” he said, gesturing grandly.

  “Randy found out this morning that he’s been accepted into the World Carillon Guild,” said Lorna Beckman, a music theory professor.

  “It’s a big deal,” Willa explained. “He had to take a test and all.”

  “We surprised him when your movie was over,” another instructor said, lifting a glass to the level of a toast.

  “Congratulations,” Virgil and I said, both reaching in to shake Randy’s hand.

  Randy, standing slightly in front of his faculty, took a bow. “Thank you, thank you. I’m now the official Henley College carillonist.”

  “It means international travel, with recitals all over the world,” Lorna added.

  “Come in and have some champagne with us,” Randy said, flushed.

  Pleased as I was for Randy, I wasn’t in the mood for a party. Before I could respond, Virgil chimed in.

  “I’d love to but I’ve been summoned to the station. I got dropped off.” He pointed to me. “And I need a ride.”

  “Too bad” and “Come back later” and “We’ll save some bubbly” came from among the revelers.

  I put on my best disappointed look as the gang waved us off and the office door closed.

  “You got dropped off?” I asked Virgil as we walked away.

  “Uh-huh. Did you think I lied?”

  “Only for a nanosecond.”

  “I’ll bet you’re less impressed now that you know I didn’t lie.”

  “A little,” I admitted.

  We’d come to the weird door. Virgil opened it and we climbed the steps to the normal hallway.

  “Strange building,” he said.

  “I agree.”

  We walked through the building greeting people with “Heys,” mostly members of the administrative staff.

  “My car’s across campus,” I said as we approached the exit.

  Virgil shook his head. “I called in and a uniform is outside waiting for me.”

  “Then you did lie about my being your ride.”

  Virgil waved his hand. “I didn’t say you were my ride. I pointed to you and said, ‘I need a ride.’ Whatever they assumed, they assumed.”

  I laughed. “I feel like I’m talking to Socrates.”

  “Was I wrong? Did you want to go to the party?” he asked.

  “No way. This has been more fun,” I said.

  I considered telling Virgil about my recent discoveries about Kirsten Packard—locating, almost, Wendy Carlson, Kirsten’s roommate of old, now a researcher at the BPL; the rumor of a Patty Hearst–like robbery scenario; the other set of roommates I’d unearthed: our own Dr. Ted Morrell of the Henley College Physics Department and Vincent Packard, former US attorney representing Massachusetts, and father of the long-deceased Kirsten.

  Putting it all together, it seemed like a lot to talk about. A case worth reopening, perhaps. But Virgil had shown less than no interest—that would be negative interest—in a cold case.

  Sure enough, when we exited Admin a patrol car was idling in wait.

  “Anything else?” Virgil asked, as he prepared to enter the car.

  “Nothing else,” I said.

  • • •

  Bundled up again, I walked across campus, past the back of the t
ower, toward my car, parked as usual by the tennis courts. Another drawback of winter—it was already dark at just after five. There weren’t many students around and most of the workers had left. A few stragglers in work clothes, carrying lunch pails, some with toolboxes, climbed into pickups and cars. A group of three workmen, walking much faster than I was, overtook me on the path just east of the fountain. One, a young man, turned and tipped his Yankees cap. I pegged him for a major risk taker, wearing a Yankees cap this close to Boston.

  “Evening, ma’am,” he said.

  “Hey,” I said, to be cool.

  But no matter how I greeted him, we both knew I was old enough to be his mother. It was the same with most of my students, but they were, after all, students, not working adults. Different. Or so I told myself.

  It felt strange knowing the construction workers were unaware that they’d been stared at, ogled, and suspected of a crime by a room full of faculty and students. Did that make us voyeurs? Did it make it better or worse that there had also been a cop in the room?

  It took three more such greetings from young men to get me to my car, where a man, one of the workers, I assumed, but not so young, was standing by an old sedan. The car was parked three slots over from mine, with no vehicles in between. His hat was pulled low over his face, his arms were folded across his chest. I felt a wave of panic, though I couldn’t pinpoint what was threatening about him. I looked around and was relieved to see a group of students, backpacks and duffel bags bouncing, coming toward us from the gym.

  I hit the alarm button on my remote. A combination of loud sounds—a high-pitched chirp, chirp, chirp overlaid with a low pitched blare, blare, blare—filled the cold air around me. I looked up, feigning surprise and embarrassment, and waved as if to say “No problem, my mistake.”

  I ducked into my car.

  I had no reason to fear the worker, except that it was dark, he was large, and I was alone. Was I a snob, thinking that blue-collar workers weren’t to be trusted after dark? Would I have reacted the same way if the man had been in a suit and tie, or the male faculty “uniform” of decent pants and a sweater or sports coat?

  I’d deal with my prejudices later. For now, I locked the doors manually.