Cast a Blue Shadow

by Gaus, P. L.

  34

  Sunday, November 3 1:00 P.M.

  THE HOUR before the Sunday faculty meeting proved to be a busy one for Branden. Phillips Royce was the first person to knock on his office door at the college.

  Said Royce, “I hope you have reconsidered, Professor. About my motion, that is.”

  Branden got out of his chair slowly, closed the inner door to his office, and sat back down. “I’ll oppose your motion, Royce,” Branden said slowly, “because it is divisive and nefarious.”

  With forced calm, Royce responded, “You’re taking this much too seriously, Mike.”

  Branden tapped his fingers on the desk and thought carefully about his next statement. Eventually, he said, “I know about you and Martha Lehman.”

  “Just what is it that you think you know?”

  “I know that you two had an affair, Phillips.”

  Royce fumbled for his pipe, and Branden said, “Please do not smoke in my office.”

  Royce slipped the pipe back into the pocket of his sport coat. Then he fiddled with the long, pointed ends of his waxed mustache. Flustered, he said, “What are you going to do about it?”

  “I intend to speak against your motion this afternoon.”

  “Nothing more?”

  “Of course more, Phillips. Much more, eventually, if you force my hand. But nothing at this juncture.”

  “This is hardly the age, Mike, to go Puritan on the issue. She’s twenty-three years old.”

  “She is your student, Phillips.”

  “It only happened once.”

  “That hardly matters to me.”

  “I’ll deny it.”

  “I’m not pressing the issue,” Branden said. “I only had that information second-hand, to begin with.”

  “Martha didn’t tell you?”

  “Martha isn’t talking to me right now.”

  “She may be Mennonite, Mike, but she’s a wildcat.”

  “You’re disgracing yourself, now, Phillips,” Branden said. “There is no excuse for a professor, in a position of power and authority, to have intimate relations with a student.”

  “What’s she saying? That it wasn’t consensual?”

  “Martha hasn’t told me anything. By your own words, you’ve as much as admitted it.”

  “So, Professor, I ask again. What do you intend to do?”

  “If Martha comes through this episode safely, I’ll do nothing more than file a private complaint with the president. He’ll have to decide whether or not he wants to take it to the board of trustees for action.”

  “What do you mean ‘episode’?” Royce asked.

  “Martha Lehman is pregnant.”

  Royce’s face turned pale. Branden watched him carefully and decided that Royce had not known.

  Royce looked away and then back again. “It can’t be mine,” he said, with relief showing on his face. “That was last January.”

  “Don’t you think your affair with her will have had some negative emotional impact on her ability to finish your tutorial?”

  “Yes, well, I suppose.”

  “Then I suggest, Phillips, that you do whatever it takes to see that she succeeds in that tutorial. Help her any way you can, so long as it doesn’t besmirch her integrity.”

  “I don’t see that it is any of your business to tell me how to run a tutorial, Professor.”

  “And I don’t see that I’d have any choice but to ruin you, Professor, if your sorry conduct has caused Ms. Lehman lasting harm.”

  “I’ll work something out. Where is she?”

  “For the moment, I do not know.”

  “Then what do you expect me to do?”

  “Work it through, Phillips. I’m not your babysitter.”

  “Really, Mike, you’ve gone too far.”

  “If anything, I haven’t gone far enough. Now, get out of my office. I have a debate to prepare for.”

  “You can’t just leave it hanging like this.”

  “I can, and I will,” Branden said, heat flooding his cheeks and neck. He stood up behind his desk. “You’ll either make it right with Martha Lehman or I’ll have you up on charges in a grievance procedure.”

  Royce stood and took Branden’s measure with a long, fierce look into his eyes. Then he turned briskly and left.

  AS ROYCE left, Branden’s email delivered a message, which he scanned quickly:

  Mike. No fingerprints other than Henry DiSalvo’s on the trophy. Blood trace on the trophy matches Favor’s type. Take a week or so to have a full DNA match. Can you get a water sample from Dick Pomeroy’s lab? Missy.

  CHEMISTRY professor Dick Pomeroy came next into the spacious office and stood by the corner windows. “You’ve always had the best view, Mike,” he said, and then took a seat in front of Branden’s desk.

  “You want some coffee, Dick? Something to drink?”

  “Naw. I’m just curious. Won’t take a minute. Heard you’ll be arguing against Royce’s motion.”

  “I will,” Branden said.

  “Just wanted to check,” Pomeroy said. “Can always use the help from your side of the street.”

  “I figure he’s attacking the fundamental assumptions on which this college was built,” Branden said. “And I never thought we were on opposite sides of the street—history and chemistry.”

  “Too true, Mike. Too true. Well, that’s all,” Pomeroy said, and rose.

  “Before you go,” Branden said, “I’d like you to consider giving Sonny Favor an extension on Monday’s exam.”

  “Very reasonable, under the circumstances.”

  “Thank you. Another thing,” Branden said, holding to his seat.

  “Name it.”

  “Melissa Taggert could use a sample of the water from your lab.”

  “No problem, Mike.”

  “Is it OK, then, if I stop by after faculty meeting?”

  “No problem at all,” Pomeroy said, and left.

  PRESIDENT Arne Laughton appeared in the professor’s office only fifteen minutes before the start of the faculty meeting.

  After pleasantries, Branden said, “I understand a little of Juliet Favor’s estate goes to the college, Arne.”

  The president said, “Where did you hear that, Mike?”

  “It’s going to cause squabbles over program funding, Arne. How are you going to handle that?”

  “We don’t have the money yet,” Laughton said, “but the board will make those decisions.”

  “That’s why I wanted to talk to you. You’ve got a chance to show some leadership here, Arne. The kind of leadership that will set your name in stone for a hundred years. Organize a joint faculty-board committee to plan how this money will be used.”

  “The board usually holds such decisions to itself, Mike. You know that.”

  “Yes, but if you sold that idea hard, the board would go along with it.”

  “Have you forgotten that I serve as president only at the pleasure of the board?”

  “Show some backbone on this one, Arne.”

  “This is hardly the time to haggle over money. Juliet Favor isn’t even in the ground yet, Mike.”

  “Let’s think toward the future, Arne. Let’s get past this idiotic debate Royce is precipitating, and organize some real faculty input, for a change, into how Favor’s money will be used.”

  “You know the board handles the big money issues.”

  “Right, Arne. I am suggesting you put your stamp on this institution by elevating academic concerns back into prominence.”

  WALT Camry, English professor, trudged with Branden through the snow to the faculty meeting in Bartlett Hall, adjacent to the new chemistry building. “Mike, I hope you’ll argue for the humanities,” he said.

  “I plan to argue in favor of the true liberal arts agenda. That includes sciences and the humanities.”

  “You’re not going to make many friends today, Mike.”

  “On the contrary. I hope to convert a lot of people. Remind them how things used
to be.”

  “Technology has advanced to the point where there is a divide between science and humanities, Mike. Anybody can see that.”

  “None of our students needs to be afraid of the sciences, Walt.”

  “Well, they are. You know that as well as anyone.”

  “Phillips Royce’s motion, if passed, will divide the college. Just debating the thing has already done too much of that.”

  “I’m sorry you feel that way, Mike.”

  “Are you afraid I might persuade you, Walt?”

  “Not likely, Professor.”

  “But you will listen.”

  “Of course. That’s what we’re all about, here. Keeping an open mind.”

  35

  Sunday, November 3 1:20 P.M.

  CAROLINE drove her small truck down off the icy road to Charm, Ohio, onto the vast, unplowed tourist parking lot of the Bavarian cheese factory, and slid to a stop in the deep snow at the very edge of the culvert at the front of the lot. Evelyn got out on the passenger’s side and examined the snow-covered ditch, the wheels of the truck on the driver’s side perched to slip over the edge. The psychiatrist motioned Caroline forward with a tentative wave, but as Caroline let out the clutch, the back left tire slipped off the pavement, and the rear of the truck dropped three feet into the ditch. After trying unsuccessfully to extricate the truck, Caroline climbed out on the passenger’s side and stood in two feet of unplowed snow to call AAA for a tow. If she hadn’t been so worried about Martha Lehman, she might almost have considered it funny. She finished her call, closed up the phone, and scanned the quiet country scene in white. Across a field at the far end of the parking lot came a one-horse sleigh.

  The sleigh glided smoothly forward in the deep snow, horse snorting giant puffs of white steam from its flaring nostrils. Ben Schlabaugh climbed down from the seat.

  Evelyn Carson asked, “Is Martha at your place, Ben?”

  “At the house,” he said, “in town. I live in town, now.”

  “We need to see her,” Caroline said.

  “I think you need to come,” Schlabaugh said. “She has nightmares, and they were bad last night. Early this morning she took some of Sonny Favor’s pills. Now I can’t wake her up.”

  36

  Sunday, November 3 2:30 P.M.

  CAROLINE would likely never forget the heartache of that frantic Sunday afternoon sleigh ride to John Schlabaugh’s house on the edge of the sleepy burg of Charm. Racing across the snow-covered stubble of a cornfield. Splashing through the ford on the little stream south of the cheese factory. Cresting the hill and then coming into town over snow-covered lawns. The runners of the sleigh clenching the bare pavement and throwing sparks as they crossed a road. The relentless lash of the whip.

  Then calling the rescue squad on her cell phone. Riding in the ambulance with Martha, and waiting alone in the emergency room at Joel Pomerene Hospital for doctors to attend to Martha and for Evelyn and Ben to arrive in Schlabaugh’s new car. Carson went in to help with Martha, leaving Caroline seated next to Schlabaugh in the busy hallway. Neither talked until Evelyn came out briefly to report that Martha had taken only a few pills. Desryl. A first-generation antidepressant, with a strong sedative effect. The pregnancy might have been compromised.

  As the news sank in, Caroline turned her attention slowly to Ben. To him she said, “This is too much like before, Mr. Schlabaugh. You in the waiting room and Martha in the emergency room. You’ll forgive me if I don’t sing your praises.”

  “This is not something I have chosen,” he said softly. “Neither was it then.”

  “You almost killed her,” Caroline charged.

  “I loved her. Still do, Mrs. Branden.”

  “You’ve got a funny way of showing it.”

  Schlabaugh sighed. He rubbed the shiny denim on his knees and tossed his black, broad-brimmed hat on the seat beside him. He struggled out of a worn denim jacket, turned to face Caroline, and asked, “Will you listen to my side of this?”

  Caroline stared at him, thought, softened, cast her eyes to the floor, sighed, and said, “OK, why not?”

  “I don’t know where to start,” Schlabaugh said and unhooked his denim vest. He combed his fingers back through long black hair, and shook his head. “Do you know any of the details of what happened to Martha when she was young?”

  Caroline said, “Her psychiatrist hasn’t told us much about that,” and waited.

  Schlabaugh seemed to gather his memories for a difficult task, and then began. “Martha stopped talking when she was six. It was spring, and one day she just stopped. Nothing persuaded her to talk again, at least for many years. After her son was born—she was fourteen then—it was Dr. Carson who finally pulled her through, I guess.

  “We eventually got used to it, us kids in the district. Martha didn’t talk. It was like saying she had brown hair. That was Martha. It didn’t seem like too much was wrong with her. She just wouldn’t talk, you see. But, there was a problem. A bad man in the congregation who never married. Name was John Wengert. I partly figured it out the year Martha was pregnant, by the way she acted around him. At the Sunday meetings and such. Other girls were involved, I think.

  “That man was a bad one, you’d better believe it. I confronted him. He moved to Wisconsin before Martha’s son was born. Then, a couple of years ago, we heard he had accidentally strangled himself with a rope attached to a beam in his barn. Had his pants down when they found him. Somebody called him a ‘gasper,’ whatever that is.

  “Anyways, Martha seemed OK after he moved away. Well, at least she started talking again. She seemed better. But her family had trouble with other folks in the district because of her, and they converted to conservative Mennonite. The Bishop told us we weren’t allowed to talk to them anymore, after that. She finished high school with a G.E.D., but I guess you’ll know more about that than I do.

  “But the thing is, lately, I’ve had my doubts about Amish ways, too. Cal Troyer helped them convert, so I’ve been studying with him, like her parents did. Now my own family won’t talk to me because I’ve bought a car, so I guess I might as well go ahead and finish the thing. Join Martha’s church. That was my idea, anyways, but it seems, now, that Martha has fallen away. Backslidden. She’s not interested in church like she used to be.

  “Cal Troyer says I should give her time. Says if she was molested as a child that she might need to work through a lot of mental problems before she gets well. So, I have waited, and it’s been hard, you see, to watch her take up with the likes of Sonny Favor. It’s like she’s looking for trouble. But I just hold on and wait. Hope she notices I’m not backward Amish anymore.

  “But it’s been hard. I wanted to take care of her when her son was born. Didn’t matter to me whose kid it was. I told her I’d marry her. I think by then she knew she couldn’t stay Amish. Maybe I stand a better chance, now.

  “Mostly, now, I’m waiting. Yep—biding my time. I don’t have a farm, you see. I got a job as an electrician for a contractor out near Apple Creek. My old man used to wire up camper trailers for a living, so I learned the trade. I’ve sure gone English, you’d better believe it. House in the city. Car. Job off the farm. Maybe she’ll see I can take care of her, now. I’d want her to finish college, too. Use her photography. That’s an art, you know. Amish don’t have much time for art, and they don’t tolerate photography at all.

  “But Martha is going to have to get rid of her nightmares. They’re bad. I mean really bad. Last night, she just about cried all night long. And that Favor boy has been giving her pills. Silly weed, too. You know, marijuana. Drugs for a pregnant woman, for crying out loud. She says her nightmares seem so real—she’s back as a young girl, and that man on top of her. I don’t think she realizes, yet, what that means. Or maybe she does, and that’s what’s driving her into the nut house. I don’t think she’s slept in months.

  “But I wish she knew I am not going to be Amish anymore. Maybe Dr. Carson can explain that to her. I tried last
night, but I think she was too loony to hear. Amish don’t have a sure hope of salvation, you know. No sure hope of heaven. That’s the problem. Cal Troyer can explain it good enough. All their salvation is based on living right—following all the rules. Endless rules, and then you can’t even be sure of heaven.

  “But the Mennonites understand Faith and Grace. It’s all in Ephesians and Galatians. I don’t think Amish read these epistles too carefully. They think the only way to heaven is to live a good life. Not a bad idea, I suppose, but it doesn’t leave any room for faith. We are saved by grace through faith—‘not by works, so that no man can boast.’ I’m hoping Martha still remembers that. I have a feeling she’s going to need it.

  “Last night scared me, you’d better believe it. She acted like she was a little girl all over again. All of a sudden, she wouldn’t talk again. I remembered how she was, when we were kids. Back then, she just didn’t talk, and that was all. Now, she is also very frightened. She doesn’t believe she can ever be safe again.

  “Now, it’s like the old hurting from childhood can hurt her again, only this time it’s worse. This time, it’s out in the open for her to see. I want to help her. Make her safe. Marry her, Mrs. Branden. I hope you can accept that. Hope you understand. If Martha is in trouble again, it won’t be the likes of Sonny Favor who will help her. He won’t even try. No, Mrs. Branden. I’m the one for her. I’ve changed my life for her. Sonny Favor is damaged goods. It’s too late for him. He’ll be brought low by a love of money, just like his mother.

  “You blame me because I took Martha to a midwife. You blame me because she almost died. But I got her here in time, didn’t I? I’ve been the one for Martha all along, Mrs. Branden. You’d better believe it.”