Sticks and Stones

by Janice Macdonald

“When should I pick you up?”

  We agreed to set off for the party about seven-thirty, and then Steve told me he had to dash. He offered me a ride back to my place, but I decided to check in at the department to see if any students had come groveling for exemptions to the exam. I waved as he headed back toward the Stadium Carpark, and then aimed my way eastward back to the libraries, HUB and the Humanities Building. HUB was a zoo. I grabbed a Java Jive and an almond cookie to take with me to the department, and beat my way through the mass of undergraduate humanity. I didn’t see a soul I knew, which brought back my feelings of paranoia I’d submerged during the morning. Somewhere out there was someone who hated me enough to voice it. Maybe I knew him; maybe I’d never laid eyes on him. Whoever it was had the edge on me, and that was not the way I liked it.

  The crowds thinned out the further north you went in HUB, and there were very few people camped on the chairs in the walkway to the Humanities Building. I spotted Denise in the grad lounge as I came through the stairwell door on the third floor. She had her back to me, reading something she’d pulled from on top of the mail slots.

  “Boo,” I said, unimaginatively.

  Denise jumped and turned in one movement. She looked wary—no, more than wary, guilty—before she recognized me and relaxed.

  “Randy! I didn’t expect to see you in this week.”

  “You looked as though you were expecting a lot worse than me, that’s for sure. What’s up?”

  Denise glanced around, as if the walls would suddenly glow neon where she suspected listening devices had been secreted. I decided that I was in no mood for deep conversation anyhow, so I tried a lighter gambit.

  “Leo tells me you have a boyfriend.”

  This obviously wasn’t the icebreaker I’d thought it might be. Denise’s defenses seemed to get even more rigid.

  “What’s he been spreading about?”

  “Not much, really.” I back-pedalled quickly. “You know Leo. He just saw you heading off for coffee with that reporter …”

  “Shhh.” Denise’s actions were a parody of spy thrillers. She craned her neck about madly and leaned toward me, ­conspiratorially.

  “Let’s go for coffee. We can talk there.”

  I looked down at the sweating styrofoam cup of Java Jive still in my hand, but innate nosiness won out.

  “Sure,” I said.

  35

  DENISE AND I FOUND A TABLE IN THE UKRAINIAN restaurant at the south end of HUB mall. Neither of us were what I would call perogy fanatics, but it was one of the only places you could actually sit down to eat within the restaurant itself, so we chose muffins and coffee (the woman looked askance at my Java Jive container and bullied me into buying a carton of skim milk) and found a table in the back corner.

  Only a couple of other tables were occupied, but Denise kept her tones low anyway.

  “I’m sorry to drag you into this, but I’ve got to talk to someone, and I don’t know who else to trust.”

  This was sounding like more secret than I wanted to know, but Denise looked ready to explode, so I just nodded my encouragement.

  “I don’t know what I’ll do if McNeely finds out, and knowing him, he probably will.”

  “Finds out what? That you’re dating a reporter?”

  “I know I’m sounding paranoid, but after what he said to you, I have a feeling he’ll see me as a traitor to the university.”

  “Well, how’s he going to find out, and what’s to find out? It’s not as if you’re feeding the guy information, after all.”

  Denise was silent.

  “You’re not feeding him information, are you?” I tried again, beginning to detect the chasm opening up in front of our collective feet.

  Denise blushed and reached down beside her chair into her briefcase. She pulled out today’s paper which she’d folded the way people on commuter trains do. I realized with a start that I hadn’t seen the morning’s paper. I’d been too caught up in last night’s phone message and this morning’s meeting with the psychologist. Denise handed me the paper and I could see it wasn’t the crossword she had folded upwards. It was Mark Paulson’s by-line, and the headline read “Sexist Pranks Aimed at U of A Feminists.”

  “Shit,” I breathed.

  I scanned the article as if I could vacuum up all the damage with my eyes. He had linked the disruption of the vigil with the department graffiti. He went on to question the ­university’s stance on harassment and to ponder the trail leading from the letters preceding Gwen’s murder through to the December 6th fiasco. It was with no great pleasure that I noted he’d spelled my name correctly.

  After I’d read it through a second time, I looked up to find Denise reading it upside down, shaking her head woefully.

  “You know McNeely’s going to have a bird,” I said.

  “It’s not as if we signed some official Secrets Act or anything.” Denise looked at me with three parts fear mixed with one dash of defiance.

  I looked at her.

  “It just came out.” Her face crumpled a bit. “We have been seeing each other, and I felt as though I was talking with a friend, not being interviewed by a reporter.”

  I understood the feeling. Sometimes I forgot that Steve might just as well be taking down a statement.

  “Didn’t he tell you he was going to use it?” I asked.

  “He told me he was going to look into it and question some other sources about it, so it wouldn’t be traced right back to me. And I think he tried. We really are more than just reporter and source, I think. But McNeely’s going to know, isn’t he?”

  “I know it really isn’t any of my business, but aren’t you forgetting that it was Paulson who printed Gwen’s letter in the first place?”

  “So?” Denise’s tone told me that it hadn’t escaped her.

  “So, it occurs to me that he might just share a little culpability here.”

  “Randy, Mark didn’t kill Gwen. In fact, he has been the only one actually doing his appointed job in this whole thing. He’s supposed to inform the public of what’s going on. The university is supposed to act on complaints, which they didn’t do. Students are supposed to spend their evenings studying, not harassing other people. The police are supposed to find the bad guys.”

  Denise looked as though she was about to crack, so I refrained from an argument on prurience versus the public’s right to information. If I kept this up, I would be the next ambassador to the UN.

  I spent the better part of an hour comforting Denise. By the time we were through, I had her halfway believing that McNeely wasn’t adept enough to trace the leak to her. We agreed to meet up at Grace’s party (which Paulson would not be going to), and I headed once again back to the department.

  I felt just as burdened as before, since I’d been unable to talk to her about any of my troubles. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see she was smitten with someone who was after a Michener award more than a lifemate; and there was no way I was going to jeopardize Steve’s case any more than I already had. I just couldn’t trust Denise to keep anything I might say to herself.

  I went past the Reading Room to Mail Room B, hoping that something nice had arrived for me in the afternoon mail. A couple of friends use my university address for personal mail, so I was perpetually hoping for more than departmental ­flyers.

  The only thing in my box was a pink message slip asking me to report as soon as possible to the chairman’s office.

  For once I’d been right. McNeely hadn’t traced the news story back to Denise. He had me fingered for the job.

  36

  NOW THERE ARE GOING TO BE SOME PEOPLE who will ­figure I should have kept completely silent as the chairman’s enraged rhetoric spewed over me. Others will probably call me on not ratting on Denise as soon as ­possible. In order to disappoint the maximum number of people, I opted for the middle ground.

  Once McNeely finished, I began haltingly to admit I’d seen the newspaper article, and that while I had talked to the rep
orter in question at the vigil (McNeely looked a bit purple at this admission), I quickly underlined the fact that I hadn’t been discussing the case at all, and that Paulson had gone off to talk to others.

  McNeely did his best to mop up his vitriol, but I could tell he wasn’t absolutely convinced I was being honest with him. I tried to assure him that I, of all people, wouldn’t talk to reporters since I was dating one of the police officers handling the case, and it wouldn’t be proper to speak of anything that might become part of a police inquiry.

  I wasn’t sure whether this piece of information calmed McNeely down the way I’d thought it might. Instead of Deep Throat, he’d found a police snitch. He tried to intimate that allowing the police to bumble through without overtly aiding them would be in everyone's best interests. I remarked that I wasn’t directly involved with the case and that my friend ­certainly didn’t discuss things with me after hours, and that seemed to mollify him somewhat.

  I left the office figuring it was just a matter of time before Denise was hauled into the inner sanctum. As a full-time ­sessional, she would be suspected before a tenured professor like Grace. I, of course, being the lowliest of the low, would have been the odds-on favorite, but even department chairs can’t have it all their own way.

  There was no way I was going to get anything productive done so I headed home. My plan was to phone Denise and warn her about McNeely, but the phone machine was blinking as I walked into my apartment, bringing back the horror of the night before.

  Gingerly, I pressed the blinking red button, expecting anything, or so I thought.

  Mark Paulson’s voice was the last thing I expected.

  “Randy? This is Mark Paulson. We spoke at the vigil on the sixth. Could you return my call as soon as possible, please?” He rattled off the number, and I automatically scribbled it onto a scrap of paper.

  The next call was from Leo, who sadly informed me that he wouldn’t be winging it southward and would see me at Grace’s party.

  Steve’s voice sounded strained in the following message. I suppose he was calling from work, judging by the ambient noise in the background.

  “Hi Randy. The manure has hit the proverbial cooling ­element here. Would it be possible for you to meet me here at the station around six? My boss would like to talk with you. Call me.”

  I dialed his beeper number and left my name and number, hoping he’d call back soon. He did, almost immediately.

  “Can you make it over, or would you like me to come get you?”

  “What’s this all about?”

  “I really can’t say at the moment. My supervisor, Staff Superintendent Keller, would like to discuss your apparent involvement with my case.”

  “As in my being threatened, locked up, and harassed, or as in my sleeping with the officer in charge?” I asked, wondering how much Steve could reply, and whether they tapped police lines. After my run in with McNeely, I didn’t really care. After all, Staff Superintendent Keller didn’t have the authority to fire me.

  “A bit of both, I’d say.”

  Well, it seemed like it was going to be my day for being raked over the coals. I told Steve I’d grab a bus and be there in about forty-five minutes. In reality, it took an hour, since the 69 heading down 51st Street didn’t show up until twenty minutes after the schedule had it pegged.

  Steve came to meet me at the front desk after the officer there had made a quick call announcing my presence. We walked through the half-gate and down the hall I’d been in just the night before to deliver my answering machine tape.

  We passed through the open area and knocked on a door in the corner. Steve gave my arm a quick squeeze, and I think I saw him wink as he opened the door for me.

  Staff Superintendent Keller was everything you’d expect him to be. He was about fifty-five and probably had joined when there were still height restrictions for the police force. He rose to greet me and stuck out an enormous hand for me to shake. His hair, sort of sandy-gray, had probably been a honey brown in his youth, and was cut regulation short.

  Keller waited until I was seated in one of the two chairs in front of his desk. Steve took the other. He looked us over, the way a liberal father would after catching his teenaged daughter out with her boyfriend.

  “It seems to me that we have to deal with things before we get carried away here,” he began, and I felt myself starting to blush. He noticed, which made me feel even hotter. McNeely should have taken lessons from this guy.

  “I realize, Ms Craig, that we approached you to help us in our investigation, so I am not about to chastise you for interference in a police effort. I realize as well that you have become involved through no fault of your own. I am referring to the telephone threat.”

  He looked down at some notes on his desk, and I took the moment to steal a glance at Steve. He was staring straight ahead, impassive. I looked down at my hands. Keller cleared his throat. I looked back up.

  “However, it has come to light that this investigation might be seen to be compromised by your involvement with Officer Browning. While I am not so antediluvian as to restrict the social lives of my staff, I cannot have their professional conduct questioned. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “There are a couple of solutions to this problem as I see it. The first would be to remove Officer Browning from the case. I hesitate to do this, in that he has an admirable handle on it. But he could remain in contact with the new officer in charge. The second solution would be to ask you to forego any further involvement with either the investigation or Officer Browning.”

  Steve spoke up. “It’s going to be hard for Randy to extricate herself from some wacko’s threats, and with respect, sir, I think it would be safer if she felt she could contact us should anything more transpire.”

  “Point taken. So, are you willing to remove yourself from the case?”

  “I am. I can hand over the files and brief whomever you choose to replace me. I will, of course, be available to the ­officers in charge for background.”

  I couldn’t keep all the permutations and combinations straight in my mind.

  “Excuse me, could you spell it out a little more clearly for me?”

  “Certainly, Ms Craig.” Superintendent Keller smiled. “From this moment on, you are no longer an advisor on this case. You are a possible target and will be guarded ­accordingly. Officer Browning, who no longer will be assigned to the case, will likely be more circumspect when speaking into your answering machine.”

  “So I can talk to Steve about things?”

  “Yes, but should the need arise, you will report to Detectives Simon and Anderson. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir. And I’d just like to say I’m sorry to have caused any difficulties, but that Officer Browning was never unprofessional when dealing with the problems at the university.”

  “I’m sure you are right, and I will make note of that in my report. I hope you understand the need for this meeting, though. I would hate for something innocent to blacken the record of one of my officers.”

  Keller rose again from his desk, like a whale cresting. I stood, to avoid being bested by the shadow of his presence, and the next thing I knew Steve was ushering me out the door. He took me down the hall to an office where a man and a woman sat at neighboring desks.

  “Karen Simon, Kevin Anderson, this is Randy Craig. She received a threatening message on her phone last night, and we think it might tie in to the murder of Gwen Devlin. Ms Craig was Gwen’s English prof.”

  I nodded to the two detectives. Karen Simon asked for my address and phone number, which I gave her. We agreed on a time for them to come and interview me, then Steve led me out of the station.

  I was the first one to break the silence as he drove me home. Makes sense, I’m the wordy one.

  “So,” I said.

  Steve grinned a flat smile, keeping his eyes on the road.

  “So,” he replied.

  “What could I have done diff
erently back there?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I feel as though it’s my fault you’ve been thrown off the team, or whatever that was back there, but I can’t figure out what I did in the first place, or just now, that could have changed how it came down.”

  We were pulling up in front of my building. Steve parked, and turned to look at me.

  “Look Randy. I wasn’t thrown off of any team. The case has just been reassigned. Tomorrow I'll go to work on other cases, and Karen and Kevin will take up the slack on this case, and things will go on. You didn’t cause that to happen. The we/us thing sort of complicated matters, but that’s not something I want to give up on for the sake of a case. Do you?”

  I hadn’t realized until he said it that that was exactly what I’d been worried about. I felt one of those Monty Python ­sixteen-ton weights come off my shoulders.

  He agreed to pick me up for Grace’s party at seven-thirty Friday, and kissed me quick before I hopped out of the car. I waved as he drove off, then hummed my way into the building, stopping briefly to peer into my mailbox and see if it was worth unlocking. I grabbed the three flyers and a please letter from the David Suzuki Foundation, and headed down the once-again serene hallway.

  All was okay in my world. I could put the case behind me just as easily as Steve could. That is, unless I became the next victim.

  37

  GRACE’S PARTY WAS PROBABLY NOT THE EVENT of the season by everybody’s standards, but I’d come to mark my Christmas revelry by it. I would pull out my red and green chenille sweater, braid the annual stalk of mistletoe into my hair, and fiddle with layers of refried beans, cheese, salsa, and sour cream. This year I’d begged a few holly leaves from the florist down the street, and placed them in each corner of the pan. I just hoped no one would think they were a new type of nacho chip.

  Tomorrow afternoon I was planning to head down to the tree lot, which was set up annually in the Garneau tennis court, and drag home a Charlie Brownish tree for the ­apartment. Maybe I could persuade Steve to string some popcorn with me while watching Miracle on 34th Street, which I’d noted in the TV listings.