A Knife in the Back

by Bill Crider

  “That’s one thing you don’t have to worry about,” Sally said. “I’m sure they’ll catch whoever killed Bostic. There must be plenty of people who have motives.”

  “All his customers, for example,” Jack said. “But to catch someone, the police would have to be looking. I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

  “Isn’t that their job?”

  “Sure it is. But Weems made it clear to me who his number-one suspect was. In fact, I don’t think he has any other suspects, and I’d be willing to bet he won’t be looking for any. I think he’s already made up his mind about the killer. He’s convinced I’m the guy.”

  “That’s bad.”

  “What’s worse is that I don’t think he was joking. I’m not sure he even knows how to joke.”

  “You have to admit that you’re in a pretty bad position. Whatever possessed you to take a knife-making class in the first place?”

  Jack thought about it for a couple of seconds.

  “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  Sally smiled. “At least you can joke about it, but I’m not so sure that’s a good idea. This isn’t a joking matter.”

  Jack tried a smile that didn’t quite come off.

  “What about our date?” he asked. “Are you afraid of being seen with a murder suspect?”

  “Not in the least,” Sally said, meaning it. That wasn’t what worried her about dating Jack.

  The telephone on Jack’s desk rang, and he answered it.

  “Please hold for Dr. Fieldstone,” said Eva Dillon, Fieldstone’s secretary.

  Jack looked at Sally and mouthed the words, “It’s the pres.”

  Sally nodded. Fieldstone would have been getting some of those phone calls, and he’d be summoning Jack to his office. She listened to Jack’s side of the conversation, and when he’d finished talking, she said, “So?”

  “So, Fieldstone wants me to pay him a little visit.”

  “I was afraid of that.”

  “So was I.”

  “I’ll go along,” Sally said. “After all, I’m your department chair.”

  “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Jack told her. “It might give him the idea that I’m afraid of him.”

  “Well, aren’t you?”

  “Not really. I’ve just been questioned by the cops. Why should I be afraid of a college president?”

  “Because the cops can just put you in prison. Dr. Fieldstone can take away your job.”

  “I guess I’ll just have to convince him that I’m innocent,” Jack said.

  “How are you going to do that?”

  “I don’t know,” Jack said.

  7

  Sally went back to her office and sat down at her desk. She resisted the urge to have another Hershey bar, but it wasn’t easy. She tried to busy herself with grading a set of multiple-choice quizzes that she’d given her American literature class on one of the reading assignments, but she couldn’t stop thinking about Jack and his situation.

  One thing she wondered about was the knife that had been used to kill Bostic. Jack’s knife. What did that mean? Did someone steal the knife for the purpose of framing Jack? Or did someone steal it and only later decide to use it for the murder? If someone was trying to frame Jack, why?

  She couldn’t come up with answers any better than those her students had circled on the reading quiz. Several of them thought that “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber” was set in New York City. A couple of them thought that Macomber had been shot by “a Mafia hitman.” Sally wondered if she was making the choices too difficult, but decided that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that some people just hadn’t studied the assignment.

  Maybe what she needed to do was study the murder more carefully. Maybe then she could discover some answers. For example, she might be able to find out who had clued A. B. D. Johnson in about Bostic’s dealings with the college. Sally was sure he couldn’t have discovered anything on his own.

  It wouldn’t do to go directly to A. B. D., of course. He would be sure that she was involved in some plot against him, mainly because he was constantly suspicious of everything and everyone. He believed that the administration was secretly (or not so secretly) conspiring against him and that his fellow faculty members were out to discover the secret topic of his unfinished doctoral dissertation so that they could claim it for their own. While his mild paranoia didn’t go a long way toward endearing him to anyone, it would have made him an ideal candidate to pass along information to the board. He would have seen the revelation of Bostic’s questionable dealings with the college as a way of striking back at everyone involved.

  Sally knew that if she questioned him, he might think that she was somehow trying to undermine his credibility—not that he had any to undermine—or even to get him fired. Sally would have to find out who his source was from someone else. Fortunately, there was someone else who would probably know.

  Sally looked out her door toward the office suite of James Naylor, the academic dean, located inconveniently nearby. Sometimes Sally was sure that the dean had assigned her to an office near his own so that he could watch every move she made. In her heart of hearts, she realized that wasn’t the case, but anyone who worked in academia at any level had a little bit of A. B. D. Johnson lurking somewhere inside.

  Sally saw that Wynona Reed was sitting at her desk in Naylor’s outer office, working at the computer. Sally couldn’t actually see Wynona because of the computer terminal, but she could see the top of Wynona’s copper-colored hair, teased to a majestic height, of which several inches were visible over the top of the monitor.

  Sally got up and walked over to the dean’s office. She stood quietly in the doorway until Wynona finished whatever she’d been working on and looked up.

  Wynona had, besides her brassy, teased hair, a number of outstanding features, including her eyes. It was as if she had bought a book called Makeup Secrets of TV Evangelists’ Wives Revealed! and made each secret her own.

  “You need to see the dean?” Wynona asked. “Because if you do, he’s not in there. He’s in some kind of meeting with the president and one of your faculty members. I guess you know why.”

  “I know,” Sally said. “Do you?”

  Wynona looked smug. “Dr. Naylor tells me pretty much everything.”

  Sally wasn’t sure that was such a good idea, but she, along with everyone else on campus, knew that Naylor was one of Wynona’s many sources of information. In Sally’s opinion, Wynona knew far too much about the college’s business, but there wasn’t much Sally could do about it.

  “Actually,” Sally said, “I didn’t come to see the dean. I came to see you.”

  Wynona didn’t pretend to be flattered. Instead, she was suspicious and defensive, which Sally knew was generally the case. She seemed to assume that everyone wanted either to give her more work to do or complain about something she’d done. The truth was that Wynona was good at her job, and hardly anyone ever complained. And while people were always giving her work, it was nothing that wasn’t part of her regular duties. Sally thought that Wynona shouldn’t complain about doing anything that was just part of her job, but Wynona had a high opinion of her own importance. In fact, it sometimes appeared to Sally that Wynona thought she was actually the dean and Naylor was just some guy who had the big office in back of her.

  “I dismissed those classes for you,” Wynona said. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”

  “I know you did, and I really appreciate it,” Sally said. She wasn’t too proud to stoop to flattery if it would help.

  “Why else would you want to see me?” Wynona asked.

  “I thought you might be able to help me out with something,” Sally said.

  Wynona rolled her big eyes, looking like a raccoon in distress. Then she sighed, as if to indicate that she’d known all along Sally was there just to pile more work in her already overflowing in-box.

  “What is it, then?” she asked.
“You need some changes in the schedule for next semester? In the book orders? If it’s the book orders, you’re too late. I’ve already sent them on to the bookstore.”

  “It’s nothing like that. I was looking for some information.”

  Immediately Wynona’s attitude changed. She smiled and wiggled a bit to get more comfortable in her chair.

  “What kind of information?”

  “It’s something about Ralph Bostic.”

  “He’s dead,” Wynona said. “Everybody knows that.”

  “True,” Sally agreed. “But not everybody knows how A. B. D. Johnson got that information he gave the board about Bostic’s sweetheart deal with the college.”

  Wynona’s smile widened. “They sure don’t.”

  “But I’ll bet you do,” Sally said.

  “I might. But it’s just a rumor. You know I don’t like to repeat rumors.”

  On the contrary, Sally knew that Wynona loved to repeat rumors, but she never liked to do so unless she was getting something in return—something like another rumor.

  “I don’t like to repeat gossip, either,” Sally said. “But did Troy tell you why you were dismissing the classes?”

  Wynona looked peeved. “No. I asked him, but he said he was in a hurry.”

  “He was,” Sally said, glad that Wynona didn’t accumulate information as quickly as Troy. “We had to get Jack Neville out of jail.”

  Wynona’s mouth got round. Her exaggerated eyes got even larger.

  “You’re kidding,” she said.

  “Nope,” Sally said, and gave her the short version of the story.

  “I can’t believe it,” Wynona said. “I mean, I knew Ralph Bostic was dead. I can believe that part. I heard it on the radio. What I can’t believe is that Jack Neville was arrested.”

  “Believe it. Now you can see why I’m interested in who gave A. B. D. that information.”

  “I certainly can. Of course I don’t know for sure, but I heard it was Roy Don Talon.”

  Roy Don Talon had given Sally trouble before. He was a well-known local car salesman whose slogan was DRIVE TO HUGHES FOR HUGE SAVINGS.” Apparently a great many people in Houston and other nearby towns took his advice because Talon had made tons of money. He collected cowboy art, and every year he was one of the high bidders for some prize-winning animal at the Houston stock show and rodeo. He cultivated a rhinestone cowboy image in his dress and always wore a big western hat and boots, along with an assortment of jackets that wouldn’t have looked out of place on one of the stars of the Grand Ole Opry. Sally suspected that Talon had never been on a horse in his life and had never come any closer to an actual cow than the ones he bid on at the stock show.

  She could easily see why Talon wouldn’t want Bostic to be ripping off the college by overcharging for vehicle repair. Talon probably thought that if anybody was going to rip off the school, he should be that person. But it wouldn’t have been politic for him to turn Bostic in. People would undoubtedly have suspected his motives. For some reason, nobody trusted a car salesman.

  “Thanks, Wynona,” Sally said. “I appreciate the help.”

  “Any time,” Wynona said, which Sally knew really meant anytime you have some gossip for me, I’ll be glad to trade. “You’re not going to get mixed up in this mess, are you?”

  “Who, me?” Sally shook her head. “I know better than to do that again.”

  Wynona blinked her striking eyes and said, “Sure you do.”

  8

  Jack walked slowly over to Fieldstone’s office, and though it was a nice day, he didn’t really notice the sunshine or the green grass or the students who passed by him. Some of them waved and said “hi,” and Jack always managed to respond. But his mind was on other things.

  Like job security. He’d never done anything except teach, not unless you counted the jobs he’d done during the summers of his high school and college years. Those jobs had been okay at the time, but he didn’t really think he could go back to washing dishes at a boardinghouse or bagging groceries. He wasn’t even sure there were such things as boardinghouses these days. There certainly weren’t any around the Hughes campus. Besides, he’d gotten a terrible case of dishpan hands, even though he’d used rubber gloves. His skin had turned red, dried out, and cracked. He wouldn’t want to have to deal with that again.

  He wondered what sort of work he’d have to do if he went to prison. Whatever it was, it was likely to be worse than washing dishes.

  He remembered some of the men he’d taught in classes at the prison units. He wondered if any of the ones who’d failed his classes were still there, and he thought about what kind of revenge they might wreak on him if he wound up imprisoned with them. Getting killed would be the least of his worries. There were worse things: dismemberment, gang rape, maiming. It really didn’t do to think about it. And after all, he told himself, no innocent man ever goes to prison.

  “What’s so funny, Mr. Neville?” a passing student asked.

  “Oh,” Jack said. He hadn’t even realized that he’d laughed aloud. “I was just thinking.”

  “Must’ve been a pretty funny thought.”

  “Not exactly,” Jack said.

  Eva Dillon rose from her chair when Jack entered the president’s office and smiled at him. It reminded Jack of one of those strained smiles you see on people who are about to deliver some particularly nasty piece of news and hope the smile will somehow help. It hardly ever did.

  “Dr. Fieldstone is waiting, Mr. Neville,” Eva said. “You can go right in.”

  Jack went through the heavy wooden door, and Eva pulled it silently shut behind him. Dean Naylor was sitting on the couch, and Fieldstone was behind his massive and entirely clean desk.

  Naylor stood up and walked over to Jack, throwing an arm around his shoulders. There was nothing unusual in that. Naylor was a touchy-feely guy, a hugger, in a world when hugging could be dangerous. Sometimes Jack wondered how he had lasted as long as he had without having some kind of sexual harassment complaint lodged against him. He’d probably never hugged Vera Vaughn, the campus’s militant feminist. She would have flattened him.

  “How are you, Jack?” Naylor asked. “I hope you didn’t have any problems with the police.”

  “Not really,” Jack said. “I’m an innocent man.”

  “Thank God for that,” Fieldstone said as Naylor guided Jack toward a seat on the couch.

  Fieldstone was immaculate, as always, dressed in an expensive navy blue suit and sparkling white shirt. His tie had probably cost more than Jack’s entire outfit, which was composed of khakis and a shirt he’d bought at Wal-Mart. Fieldstone always looked exactly the way a college president should look; confident that he was in control. He walked around his desk to shake hands with Jack before Jack was seated. Then he put the desk between them once again.

  Good fences make good neighbors, Jack thought. Or maybe he’s just afraid of me. Mad-dog Neville, the psycho killer.

  “I’m not at all sure your situation is as amusing as you seem to think it is,” Fieldstone said.

  “Sorry,” Jack said. “I seem to find myself laughing out loud for no reason at all.”

  Fieldstone looked alarmed.

  “Oh, don’t worry,” Jack said. “I’m not going crazy. At least I don’t think I am.”

  “You could have fooled me,” Fieldstone said, trying for a light touch, something that he could seldom manage. “If I were you, I’d be feeling pretty somber right about now.”

  “I am,” Jack said, repressing a smile. “That’s probably why I’m laughing. Defense mechanism.”

  Fieldstone appeared to think the idea over and decide that it was as good an excuse as any. He gave Jack a straight look and said, “The question is, are you guilty?”

  “As I said, I’m an innocent man. The police didn’t hold me, so I must not be guilty.”

  “You see?” Fieldstone said. “That’s what I mean. You’re taking this much too lightly.”

  “I don’t mea
n to. I just can’t see how anyone could believe I’m a killer. Do I look like a murderer to you?”

  “No,” Fieldstone admitted. “But then most of the people I see on the television news shows don’t, either. And some of them have done some terrible things.”

  He had a point there, Jack conceded, thinking again about the men he’d taught in prison. For the most part, they looked just like everyone else. Nobody passing one of them on the street would ever give him a second glance.

  “It doesn’t matter how I look,” Jack said. “I didn’t do it. I’m not capable of something like that.”

  “I didn’t really think you were. But we have to consider the school’s position in this.”

  Here it comes, Jack thought.

  “What is the school’s position?” he asked, maybe a little more sharply than he’d intended.

  “Now, Jack,” Naylor said from his place beside him on the couch, “there’s no need to be upset.”

  That was just what Jack would have expected him to say. Unlike the town of Hughes, the college could afford both a good cop and a bad cop.

  “I think there is,” Jack said. “I think I’m about to get some bad news here, and I don’t deserve it.”

  “It’s not bad news,” Fieldstone said. “We just want you to take a little vacation. With pay, of course. Why would anyone object to a paid vacation?”

  “Have you talked to Dr. Good about that?”

  “That’s not necessary,” Fieldstone said. “Dr. Naylor is her supervisor, and he’s already agreed to the decision.”

  “Nothing like due process,” Jack said.

  “What was that?”

  “Nothing,” Jack said.

  “You can appeal the decision, Jack,” Naylor said. “You certainly have that right. But it could make things very difficult for the college.”

  “What about me?” Jack asked. “If you take me out of the classroom, people are going to believe you think I’m guilty of something, whether I am or not.”

  “I’m sure everyone will understand,” Naylor said.

  “Then you have a lot more faith in people than I do. Besides, I don’t understand. And I don’t like being thrown out of my own classroom. The students won’t like it, either. They like consistency when it comes to little things like tests and grading.”